[NomadSK]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

It is true that we have seen more and more automation in the cockpit. But pilots are still trained and certified to fly planes manually.

This reminds me of an interaction with a cousin of mine who is a fighter pilot. I asked him, in peace situation, what's the most diffcult part of flying the figther jet. To which he replied, a drill to stall the jet midair and do the recovery. That made me like

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by NomadSK

This reminds me of an interaction with a cousin of mine who is a fighter pilot. I asked him, in peace situation, what's the most diffcult part of flying the figther jet. To which he replied, a drill to stall the jet midair and do the recovery. That made me like

Yes, all pilots need to train for stall recovery throughout their career. Every pilot will remember the first time doing a stall sitting next to your instructor. Very few students keep their underwear dry!

These days civil pilots don’t do full stalls as part of their training. The FAA discovered more student pilots got killed practicing full stalls, than during normal flying. These days emphasis is on stall prevention and early stall recognition and early recovery.

Another factor is that in civil flying if stalls appear it tend to be very close to the ground, during descent and being on final for landing. No matter how good a pilot you are, there is simply not enough vertical space to recover.

I assume it is very different for military or at least fighter pilots. They might find themselves in a stall at all kinds of different attitudes.

Irrespective, modern fly by wire planes, have also decreased the risk of pilots stalling unintentionally.

Jeroen

[fhdowntheline]

@Jeroen this may be a bit OT, but I am not sure how much " hand flying" is done by civil pilots in course of their transiton into modern jetliners. I would love to be in a plane which more handflown than being set to auto pilot in LNAV/ VNAV right after take off if you get what mean. I would imagine military pilots to be much more hands on by definition of the flying requirement.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by fhdowntheline

@Jeroen this may be a bit OT, but I am not sure how much " hand flying" is done by civil pilots in course of their transiton into modern jetliners. I would love to be in a plane which more handflown than being set to auto pilot in LNAV/ VNAV right after take off if you get what mean. I would imagine military pilots to be much more hands on by definition of the flying requirement.

We have some real civil pilots on the forum, hopefully they chip in.

The actual hand flying on commercial jets is somewhat limited. A large factor is company policy. There are mandatory requirements too, to fly manually, or automated. A big consideration is fuel efficiency. Going on autopilot and auto throttle is always going to be more efficient than hand flying!

If I go by the discussion on the pilot forums, many feel there is not sufficient manual flying. Of course, this tends to be the older generation pilots talking about the younger generation. Or so it seems to me.

Jeroen