Student on Drugs
Here’s a question asked by a fellow pilot a while back that, I don’t believe, made it into my Since You Asked column in AOPA Flight Training magazine. Some questions and answers are a bit more fun than educational and aren’t quite ready for prime time.
A fellow pilot named Rick asked the following question: As a CFI I’m curious about the most difficult/strange/wild student you’ve ever had. Care to share?
My response follows.
Dear Rick:
I’ll gladly answer your question because I think it’s instructional and something of which all CFIs should be aware.
I experienced one of my most unusual students more than 30 years ago, as a young CFI. He was a middle aged private pilot who hadn’t flown in 20 years and needed a flight review. He was also a doctor who always showed up fatigued, with his eyeballs glazed over, and he mumbled a lot to himself. This didn’t bother me, because he acted just like I did after a full day of flight instructing. It was only later I found out that he was on drugs, which explains why he offered to medicate me during our first lesson (I thought he was kidding. He wasn’t). I respectfully declined the offer, then mentioned that if he flew properly I might not need medication.
On the first lesson, he nearly taxied into a parked gas truck. The worst part is that he had to go out of his way to get close to the truck. He claimed he didn’t see it. On the second day, he landed with brakes on. I had to stab at his thick barrel-like legs with my pointy little arms just to get his feet off the pedals. A few days later, a senior CFI at the airport pulled me aside and told me the truth about this fellow. He apparently had worn out four flight instructors in his recurrency attempt, totaling over 35 hours of dual in the process. When each CFI caught on to his game, they’d furlough him. The doc would simply get a new logbook and try for a fresh start. Yes, this type of thing happens. I, too, was really upset and promptly furloughed the doc. He suggested I might not be so upset if I were medicated. No thanks, doc.
The moral here is to trust your gut. If it quacks like a doc, it probably is one. I knew something was wrong with this fellow but chose to ignore my instincts. I try never to make that mistake again.
Wow. I have a similar story, but it never got to that point. Suffice to say, a very wise AME put me wise after a phone call where he taught me what little I now know about psychotropic drugs…
Rod,
It’s always a joy reading your work.
& BTW, thanks for your advice, it was definately a step in the right direction.
We had a few people bounce around from CFI to CFI at my old flight school, but nothing like this.
Although it may seem ridiculous in retrospect, it really is easy to look past the fact that a student is simply untrainable. No, I don’t mean that the candidate is not capable of learning to fly (I rather optimistically think anyone can be tought). It comes right down to being “ready” to learn. Attitudes, anxiety, personal problems, and apparently drugs all get in the way and must be dealt with before proper learning can be accomplished. Good story Rod.
Wow! That is just darn scary. Is there a way to permanently revoke his ability to fly (an aircraft) or obtain training?
I can’t believe that I missed your point, I will have to do some research on this.
Dear Rod,
This isn’t a comment about the above, its about Flight Sim, 2004 which I’ve had for about 18mths now.I passed the first stage of going sole and since then have done heeps of simulated flying and circuits, even in a ww2 Mosquito and in most of the other modern aircraft thats available.
I have tried and tried to get my Simulated PPL but your testing Officer will just not let me through, I take off, and do everything right as he says and two to three minutes into the “check Ride” I am fobed off, its really frustrating when one gets up a lots of experience, and go over and over again, and all he says “IS Im sorry, and it flicks off.
So Rod what can I do, can you help????
Graeme Wilce
Christchurch
New Zealand.
Greetings Graeme:
There are so many reasons that you may not be able to finish that I can’t possibly list them all. But I might suggest that you do everything possible to reduce the load on your computer’s CPU in hopes of preventing problems with the checkride. Sometimes idling your virus program can help. Sometimes idling other background programs running in Windows can also help. The thing to keep in mind here is that many people don’t have similar problems with the checkride, so I can only assume that it’s a computer problem. I wish you the best success.
Best,
Rod
Hi there ROD
It is great to hear from you,Yes it could well be a computer problem, and I will try ease the load off the CPU, as you say, I can only but try.Thanks very much for your reply.
GRAEME WILCE of NEW ZEALAND
CHRISTCHURCH.24/08/2010
Good post! jfgoiprjg