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A comment on Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that kept flying. Parent comment

Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by YZF on Monday November 11, 2024 @11:21PM (#42112780)
A pilot is expected to follow procedure when that's called for but ultimately has full responsibility and can make any call they want. Procedure is never going to cover the range of scenarios you can run against and there's no time to reach out to the chain of command when something goes wrong.

Ejecting could save you but send the plane crashing into a city, and that's just one of many scenarios.

If he was flying with instruments in bad weather and felt that he could not trust those instruments that seems like a good reason to eject since you can easily end up in the ground or a mountain. I don't know if switching modes like he did was standard procedure and if the resulting failure was unusual or not. Maybe he wasn't familiar enough with the airplane's systems. That said, there was a real failure that seems to have happened at the worst possible times.

At the end of the day, the bar is set really high for someone in this position.

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Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by swiftcoder on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @03:07AM (#42113667)
> Maybe he wasn't familiar enough with the airplane's systems

It seems that a highly qualified marine test pilot is unlikely to be unfamiliar with the airplane's systems

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Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by dotancohen on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @04:23AM (#42114020)
He has less than 50 hours in that type.
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Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by ExoticPearTree on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @04:53AM (#42114175)
Until you get to actually fly it for real, you read the manuals a few times over, do countless hours in the simulator and so on.

Those 50 hours can be misleading as to his experience with the aircraft.

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Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by dotancohen on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @05:08AM (#42114241)
A stimulator comfortably positioned at FL000 is much more amenable to troubleshooting multiple electrical failures than a tin can balancing on computer-controlled thrust differentiating, 1900 feet in the air well below stall speed.
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Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by ExoticPearTree on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @05:16AM (#42114279)
You are missing the point. Incidents do happen, but you just don't get to fly a fighter jet until you proved in a simulator that you are capable of flying it and troubleshooting it. What the simulator does is to see if you can be entrusted with the aircraft.
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Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by dotancohen on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @05:24AM (#42114322)
Yes, but decades of experience have shown that pilots are far braver and willing to risk their skin in a simulator than they are in the air. And for good reason.
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Re:Marine pilot loses command after ejecting from F-35B that... by concerned_user on Tuesday November 12, 2024 @05:09AM (#42114246)
> I don't know if switching modes like he did was standard procedure and if the resulting failure was unusual or not.

Pilot switched mode back to normal flight because it was the switch to landing mode is what caused his HUD and PFD to turn off in the first place.

[ Parent | on HN ]