AircraftOwner Online

I was at AOPA's summit last week. to tell the truth, the attendance was a little dissapointing. Technology in the cockpit is still the big focus. One of the On Line Fourms that they held- right in the middle of the show floor- was on the subject of technolgically advanced cockpits, vs. accidents associated with having the advanced technology in the cockpit. Sound familiar? The discussion was right on the mark. AOPA's safety foundation has identified the same trends that those of us who are out flying as instructors are seeing every day. You have to LOVE the technology. When I started flying, ( in 1980) the hottest movie of the summer was Alien. In that flick, Segourney Weeaver lands a spaceship on a far away planet using a landing system that has her flying through a series of rectangles on a CRT that is displaying the surface of the planet. Does that sound remarkably like the Hiway int he Sky on the new Garmin G1000 systems? It's taken 29 years for sience fiction to become reality, but now we have it on our GA airplanes. Some of the new systems have FMS like keyboards that reduce knob twisting for route inputing and radio frequecy selction is automatic. But all of this comes at a cost. Not just in dollars but in complexity. I flew today with a gentlmen who owns a brand new Mooney Acclaim Type S. He told me he always flys an approach with the autopiolt coupled, never ever by hand. When I asked him what he would do if the technology failed he said it hadn't yet. When I asked if he did any training with the aircraft in a "Black Tube" configuration, that is a PFD and an MFD failure, he said he hadn't but was planning to learn to use the "stand by" instruments.
So I want to know. How many pilots are flying glass panels and are you triaining regularly for the posssiblility of a technology failure?  If you are an instructor, tell me what you are doing to teach your students what to do when the lights go out.

Michael Leighton