> It seems like both the pilot and instructor misidentified the plane they were supposed to be separated from, otherwise the instructor would have taken the controls and performed the maneuver himself if he knew a collision was imminent.
I think eventually they figured out and instructed the pilot to avoid but the pilot didn't listen. But that was the second mishap of the flight. The pilot was failing to maintain a proper altitude before that.
> Maybe visual flight separation is a bad idea when there are a bunch of lights from the ground and a busy airspace. A plane on a collision course with you will just look like a static light, like many many other lights in the area.
To me, at least in this case, it seems the pilot was not adequately prepared. They were either distracted or rusty. The instructor should have taken controls and flown back at the first sign of not being able to maintain a proper altitude. However, the pilot outranked the instructor; taking controls away and failing the qualification / training flight could have resulted in some retribution or more hassles. Also, I think they should instead let pilots do this kind of qualification in similar but more remote or less busy area, longer, until they get more hours under their belt and not allow rank reversals to train like that. They should have found someone outranking her who wouldn't have though twice about grabbing the control.
I think eventually they figured out and instructed the pilot to avoid but the pilot didn't listen. But that was the second mishap of the flight. The pilot was failing to maintain a proper altitude before that.
> Maybe visual flight separation is a bad idea when there are a bunch of lights from the ground and a busy airspace. A plane on a collision course with you will just look like a static light, like many many other lights in the area.
To me, at least in this case, it seems the pilot was not adequately prepared. They were either distracted or rusty. The instructor should have taken controls and flown back at the first sign of not being able to maintain a proper altitude. However, the pilot outranked the instructor; taking controls away and failing the qualification / training flight could have resulted in some retribution or more hassles. Also, I think they should instead let pilots do this kind of qualification in similar but more remote or less busy area, longer, until they get more hours under their belt and not allow rank reversals to train like that. They should have found someone outranking her who wouldn't have though twice about grabbing the control.