They Called It Pilot Error: True Stories Behind General Aviation Accidents

Rating:
Summary: Some people don't like what they read
Review: (...) Most of this book is about hypoxia contributing to accidents. The sequence runs something like this: Pilot flies high for a long time, without adequate oxygen, doesn't notice the onset of hypoxia, then makes a series of judgement errors that, coupled with some terribly bad luck, results in a serious accident. (...)

On the night oxygen issue -- I was confused at first too, because the book doesn't really explain this point. Why would we want to use oxygen at a lower altitude at night? My most recent Jeppesen private pilot textbook indicates that oxygen should be used over 5,000 MSL at night and 12,500 during the day, but doesn't say why. A little research reveals the probable answer:

The very first organ to be affected by hypoxia is the eye. It can be affected as low as 5,000 MSL. Your night vision deteriorates under hypoxia. During the day, the effect is not so noticable because there is so much light entering your eye. At night your eye is dark-adapted and must be much more efficient with the light that enters it. Hypoxia inhibits the light-gathering efficiency of your eyes, particularly in low-light conditions.

So there are multiple effects of Hypoxia. There are judgement-altering effects, vision effects, and others. They combine to produce a pretty bad situation.

The fictional accounts certain put the fear of god into you, as they should. Flying is as safe as you make it.

In future books of this type I'd like to see considerably more statistical detail. It's a bit too anecdotal for my taste. Because of the book's focus on hypoxia, extended medical information on the condition should absolutely be present, and is missing. Editing errors abound (including simple grammatical errors - ouch), but I'd say that, overall, it's a page-turner and a make-you-thinker.

Rating:
Summary: Some people don't like what they read
Review: (...) Most of this book is about hypoxia contributing to accidents. The sequence runs something like this: Pilot flies high for a long time, without adequate oxygen, doesn't notice the onset of hypoxia, then makes a series of judgement errors that, coupled with some terribly bad luck, results in a serious accident. (...)

On the night oxygen issue -- I was confused at first too, because the book doesn't really explain this point. Why would we want to use oxygen at a lower altitude at night? My most recent Jeppesen private pilot textbook indicates that oxygen should be used over 5,000 MSL at night and 12,500 during the day, but doesn't say why. A little research reveals the probable answer:

The very first organ to be affected by hypoxia is the eye. It can be affected as low as 5,000 MSL. Your night vision deteriorates under hypoxia. During the day, the effect is not so noticable because there is so much light entering your eye. At night your eye is dark-adapted and must be much more efficient with the light that enters it. Hypoxia inhibits the light-gathering efficiency of your eyes, particularly in low-light conditions.

So there are multiple effects of Hypoxia. There are judgement-altering effects, vision effects, and others. They combine to produce a pretty bad situation.

The fictional accounts certain put the fear of god into you, as they should. Flying is as safe as you make it.

In future books of this type I'd like to see considerably more statistical detail. It's a bit too anecdotal for my taste. Because of the book's focus on hypoxia, extended medical information on the condition should absolutely be present, and is missing. Editing errors abound (including simple grammatical errors - ouch), but I'd say that, overall, it's a page-turner and a make-you-thinker.

Rating:
Summary: UNTRUE Stories Behind General Aviation Accidents
Review: I have two problems with this book. First, the subtitle - "True Stories Behind General Aviation Accidents" - might lead you to believe that these are, well, TRUE stories. They are not. Read the Forward carefully and you find that "This book is a work of fiction."

My second problem is with the fictionalized stories themselves. As a Flight Service Station Specialist I certainly agree that many aspects of the FAA are bureaucratic nightmares and need updating and revision, but the conclusions here are absurd. For example, a drunk guy with no license and only a couple of lessons under his belt rents an aircraft with forged documents, loads up 3 drunk friends, and flies around shooting birds with a shotgun out the windows until one of the drunks blows a hole in the wing and they crash. The author's conclusion? "Perhaps this will...change the way alcohol, substances, and drugs are dealt with in general aviation." Give me a break!

Pilots fly into lines of thunderstorms despite FSS briefers begging them not to in both preflight and inflight briefings. The author blames the result on the system. A pilot constantly plays games by seeing how close he can calculate his fuel burn so as to arrive with virtually no fuel in the tanks. Of course the inevitable fuel exhaustion accident is the fault of the system. A VFR-only pilot not only files IFR flight plans and flies in IMC, but breaks every rule and weather minimum in the book, with the inevitable result. Gosh darn the system, we've just got to educate pilots better!

As a comic look at idiots using aircraft to improve the gene pool by taking themselves out of it it's not a bad read, aside from the fifth-grade level it's written in, but as an indictment of the system it's a joke.

Rating:
Summary: I loved it at first, and then felt cheated.
Review: I loved this book to start with, especially getting a kick out of the way in which the NASA representative managed to find an excuse to blame everything on hypoxia. Some things worried me, though, like the already-mentioned error of calling the artificial horizon an HSI. Then, I found the line in the introduction about the book being a work of fiction, and I started to get worried that perhaps I'd been cheated all along, and that these accounts were in fact figments of the author's imagination. I almost feel like writing to him and asking him straight out how much he made up, especially since I've retold some of these stories to my flying buddies, and now feel like I've told them a bunch of bull! Oh, and on the subject of the author's flying experience, there is a Robert L Cohn listed in the FAA database with a commercial certificate with an instrument rating, but how could someone like that make that error re the HSI?

Rating:
Summary: Robert Cohn is a 'con' - and a lousy writer to boot!
Review: I was lounging in the FBO killing time when I started thumbing through this book. I was patiently waiting for several level 3-4 cells to pass over the airport so I could be on my way. I'm an instrument-rated, multi-engine pilot. Like most safety-conscious pilots, I regularly read NTSB accident synopses, not out of morbid curiosity but in the hopes of learning something new from the mistakes of others. Cohn's book had an interesting title and it didn't take long to get drawn into one rather vivid account of a Cardinal picking up ice on an approach into Charleston. I bought the book and tucked it away in my bag with the intention of reading more later.

Wish I hadn't wasted the $20! This book has several key problems. First, it is a work of fiction. The author claims that the accounts of pilot error are 'based on fact' and are 'carefully' researched, but since no real names, locations, (or facts?) are given, it is impossible to determine how much of the book is really fiction. The author also claims to have 6,400 hours under his belt, but his aviation terminology and basic aeronautical knowledge are so deficient that I have serious doubts as to the veracity of that claim. Furthermore, to the best of my knowlege, the author never really provides his credentials; is he a commercial pilot? CFI? Pilots are skeptical people by nature; our lives depend on it. I have my doubts about the legitimacy of Robert S. Cohn, master pilot.

Cohn thinks that "oxygen concentration levels" (?) are lower at night, and that this contributes to hypoxia. Clearly, Cohn is not familiar with the Aeronautical Information Manual, which is a basic bible for every pilot -- ranging from student to a commercial, instrument-rated pilot. Ironically, Cohn attacks the FAA for not requiring pilot applicants to more thoroughly demonstrate a knowledge of day/night oxygen requirements/recommendations and how to combat hypoxia on their checkrides. Cohn consistently refers to the attitude indicator (artificial horizon) as the "HSI" in one amusing passage. No aviation editor could have missed these glaringly erroneous references, which leads me to believe that Cohn wrote and edited his own book. That is suspicious in and of itself. Cohn also likens stall entries to 'intentionally slamming the brakes on in your car,' as though it were a dangerous and useless exercise; yet, later in the book, in a fictionalized tale wherein a private pilot stalls his ice-laden aircraft, his 'automatic response to release back pressure on the yoke' probably saved his (imaginary) life. Is this guy really a pilot? I have a hard time believing it.

This book is a platform for some of the author's ill-conceived notions that the FAA should allow ATC to supercede the Pilot-In-Command's authority in the aircraft. Both ATC and pilots are well aware of their responsibilities, and the system produces millions of safe flights per year. Perfect? No, but the real problems are not where the author is pointing his fingers - the problems are technology and congestion, not bumbling pilots running amok in the skies.

A student pilot could poke this book full of so many holes that it would never be airworthy. As a work of pure fiction it is mildly entertaining; as a soapbox for anti-general aviation propaganda, it is a) poorly researched, b) embarassingly inaccurate on basic facts, and c) unconvincing at best.

Rating:
Summary: Good idea, bad read.
Review: Mr. Cohn presents a few good ideas about needed changes to the general aviation system, but I quickly tired of his exaggerations.

Cohn also seems to confuse some of the basics of flying (confusing a Horizontal Situation Indicator HSI with an Attitude Indicator AI). Also, he seems to forget that all pilots are required to know information in the Federal Aviation Regulations and the Airman's Information Manual. I find it hard to blame anyone but the pilot (myself included) when that pilot does not study the information given

I do agree, however, that some of the basic ideas presented in this book would help make General Aviation safer.

Rating:
Summary: Caveat emptor
Review: The book's content is interesting and, I suppose, somewhat educational. However, there is a hidden, perhaps fatal, flaw. Notwithstanding the misleading subtitle (True Stories Behind General Aviation Accidents), at page xii of the introduction the author concedes [quote]: this book is a work of fiction that is based upon carefully researched and thoroughly documented facts (sic) and enhanced (sic) with contributions from aviation experts.

There is no way to tell which portions of the purported accident reports have been slightly modified to preserve confidentiality, and which have been entirely invented by the author. Accordingly, the authenticity of the whole book is highly suspect.

If you want to read detailed accounts of imaginary events, by all means buy the book. Anyone searching for accurate reports of real life accidents is better advised to look elsewhere.

Rating:
Summary: A perfect book to make us pay attention
Review: Well-researched accident histories but a lousy selection of accident causes; terrible information (example: "at night. . .oxygen concentration levels might be much lower than daytime"); and recommendations to turn the FAA into a police agency. Dwells on alcohol-related accidents, even though 1995 and 1996 accident statistics show only one (1) fatality and two accidents related to alcohol during the two years. The book places blame on the FAA, FBOs, ATC for not running a police state and blames everyone by the pilot. (Of course the pilots involved in accidents all liberally assigned blame elsewhere too.) It looks like an aviation smear -- even though written by a high time pilot. Too bad - it could have been good. Good research on hypoxia. Good conclusions on vertigo, flying partial panel, night vision.