Kerry Lynch stepped into the role of editor of the&nbsp;Aviation International News&nbsp;monthly magazine in May 2022 after serving with&nbsp;AIN&nbsp;for eight years. She joined&nbsp;AIN&nbsp;in December 2014 as a senior editor covering Washington and business aviation news. She has also served on Convention News teams, including as editor of&nbsp;HAI Convention News. Lynch previously spent 25 years with Aviation Week. During her time there, she reported for and later steered&nbsp;The Weekly of Business Aviation, oversaw business aviation content on the&nbsp;Aviation Week Intelligence Network, served on the&nbsp;Show News&nbsp;staff, and held roles as the Washington columnist for&nbsp;Business &amp; Commercial Aviation&nbsp;and&nbsp;Overhaul &amp; Maintenance&nbsp;monthly magazines. In 2021 she was honored with the National Business Aviation Association Platinum Wing Award for lifetime achievement in journalism and was the 2004 recipient of the National Air Transportation Association’s Aviation Journalism Excellence Award. She also has been a recipient of an Aerospace Media Award for business aviation (2022) and NBAA Gold Wing Award (2003, 2024). Lynch graduated from The Ohio State University with a bachelor of arts in journalism.

Editor, AIN monthly magazine

Kerry Lynch

As attendees of Bombardier’s 2017 Safety Standdown focused on "intentionally safe" last month, they heard tales underscoring the importance of knowledge acquisition and airmanship and the fact that they can be a matter of life and death.

 


Most people gain knowledge, pass FAA check rides and then increase their knowledge with experience.&nbsp;This knowledge should grow over time, speakers told attendees. But if a pilot doesn’t study his discipline, he or she might be meeting the minimums, but not be practicing good airmanship. “The FAA-regulated minimums are only 25 percent of capabilities [of flying],” one speaker pointed out.

 


A story of two pilots underscored this point.

 


One part of the story involved a check ride a check airman had given to a friend. During the oral part of the review, he quizzed his friend on several items, including new checklist procedures in the event of a dual-engine flameout. The friend did not know the procedures. When asked what he would do in the case of such an event, the friend responded that it was a one-in-a-billion event.&nbsp;

 


The check airman then quizzed his friend on a number of other items. The friend could not answer several of those questions.&nbsp;The check airman was in a quandary. He had flown with his friend and knew he was a skilled pilot. But he was “severely disappointed” by the responses.

 


The check airman decided to go on the check ride with his friend to see how that went before he made a decision on how to handle the situation.&nbsp;The check ride went beautifully. "Good stick-and-rudder skills,” the check airman thought.&nbsp;

 


After the flight, the airman pondered his next course of action.&nbsp;He decided against sending his friend back to remedial training. Instead, he decided to give him a thumbs up, but tell him that he didn’t come close to meeting FAA standards and to never come back for a check ride like that again.

 


That was his friend’s last check ride.

 


The National Transportation Safety Board report said that as the friend flew over a lake, the fisherman in a boat below could see him wave to them.&nbsp;“How low do you have to be to be seen waving?” the speaker asked. The fisherman told NTSB investigators they saw the aircraft disappear over trees and then heard an explosion. Left behind were a wife and two children.

 


The check airman believes the NTSB should add a faulty check ride to the report, and wonders, “Do you think it would have made a difference if I had done my job that day?”

 


Not knowing a checklist is a symptom of a larger problem, the speaker said.

 


<h2>Skills in Practice</h2>

 


This is in contrast to a pilot who had encountered a dual-engine flameout.&nbsp;During this pilot’s check ride, not only had he learned the checklist, but he also quizzed the same check airman for an hour about different scenarios and what he should do.&nbsp;The check airman was not the only one he quizzed. He also quizzed many others.&nbsp;He wanted to make sure he learned about every scenario possible. The pilot felt like something was missing in his knowledge and persisted until he had learned as much as possible.

 


About 18 months later, that pilot, acting as an instructor pilot, was flying over Northern Georgia with a pilot who had just five hours in jet aircraft.&nbsp;

 


They were discussing flying into IMC weather as they flew over lower convective activity. At 38,000 feet, they had received instructions for initial descent. After the thrust levers were pulled slightly back, the aircraft experienced a dual-engine flameout.&nbsp;The instructor pilot told his new jet pilot companion to take care of altitude and airspeed and “I’ll take care of the rest.”&nbsp;He went through the checklist, including three failed attempts to restart the right engine.&nbsp;As they descended, they lost the airspeed indicator.&nbsp;The instructor pilot found himself flying into rain, IMC for 250 miles around, no engines or airspeed indication—and with one pilot relatively unfamiliar with jet aircraft. The instructor pilot decided to synch the second hand of his watch with the “sweeps of the altimeter” to determine descent rate.&nbsp;

 


Using airmanship and knowledge, he was able to land “dead stick” in Jacksonville, Florida.

 


“Who succeeds against all odds?” the speaker asked. “Sometimes we have to be perfect to survive.” But to be perfect, pilots need the knowledge of how to address the situation and the confidence to perform it, he concluded..

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