Fresh ideas for flight instructors interested in preventing inflight loss of control will be presented by two experts from the Society of Aviation and Flight Educators (SAFE) on Wednesday, October 14 at the NTSB Conference Center in Washington, D.C. Inflight loss of control is involved in 40 percent of all fatal general aviation (GA) accidents, making it one of the NTSB’s top priorities for improving GA safety.
The presentations will be part of the full-day NTSB “Humans and Hardware: Preventing Inflight Loss of Control in GA” forum. SAFE members Rich Stowell, nationally known as The Spin Doctor, and Tom Turner, Executive Director of the American Bonanza Society’s Air Safety Foundation, will speak as part of Panel 3: Pilot Training Solutions, from 1:30 PM to 2:40 PM ET. Other panelists will be David Oord, VP Regulatory Affairs at AOPA and Stasi Poulos, President of MindStar Aviation.
The forum will be webcast live from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM ET at www.capitolconnection.net/capcon/ntsb/ntsb.htm. Pilots may submit inflight loss of control questions for the panelists at LOCForum@ntsb.gov no later than 3:00 pm ET on October 13.
“Every GA pilot gets training in loss-of-control events, such as aerodynamic stalls,” said NTSB Member Earl F. Weener, who will preside over the event. “Yet about 40 percent of GA fatal accidents involve loss of control. We want to know what can be done to better address this stubbornly recurrent safety challenge.”
Other topics slated for the full-day forum include an overview of the various types of loss of control accidents, human performance and medical issues and technological enhancements that can reduce loss of control accidents.
In published proceedings from this NTSB Forum will also be research papers from the SAFE Resource Center and the SAFE Symposium web site, including:
- Examining Instructor Pay
- What Is Your CFI Worth?
- Symposium Preliminary Report
- SAFE Training Reform Progress Report
SAFE is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to supporting and promoting aviation education at all levels of learning. With almost 1,000 of the nation’s top CFIs, SAFE is a recognized leader in pilot training reform, safety education, and mentoring for aviation educators. For information on free resource materials and membership, go to www.safepilots.org.
