Reply #34: Hmmmm

[bdab1973]

First, it was the Navy, not the Army. And most people that attend pilot training are typically head-and-shoulders among the smarter people out there. I seriously doubt this had anything to do with the pilot's "ego". I think too many people base their assumptions of military pilots on watching Hollywood movies. Military pilots are typically very professional. The pilot in this case was a student in the F/A-18, meaning he wasn't yet even fully qualified and hadn't graduated the course yet. He was likely qualified to fly solo, obviously, but even with that, he wasn't highly experienced.

The situation listed above showed multiple systems failures on the F/A-18 that made it a difficult situation at best. He was inexperienced, and after the first engine failed, and the carrier told him to go to NZY, his home squadron probably told him to bring it on back to Miramar (where they could immediately start looking at the failed engine). It's a common situation in any aviation setting...if you lose an engine, and several fields are easily within reach, pilots will often consider going to home field because that's where their maintenance support is. I've done that myself. The problem is, you have to make a judgement call whether or not you can make it there safely on the remaining engine. 99% of the time, that answer would be yes, but sometimes that answer is no.

This young guy was probably heading to NZY when his home squadron said "bring it to Miramar". Now, if he was an experienced Hornet pilot, he could have made a better decision based on the compounded emergency with a pending fuel problem (that he probably wasn't aware exactly would result), and tell the guys at Miramar "no, I'm going to NZY, I have a hand-full of airplane". Instead, he did what many young, inexperienced pilots do...they trust what they assume is better judgement of the more experienced guys on the ground at Miramar (the squadron flying supervisor or equivalent). They just don't realize that although those pilots on the ground are likely very experienced, they aren't in the airplane, and they don't know 100% of what's going on with the jet.