by Susan Parson, FAA Safety Briefing

The mission of this publication is to be the FAA safety policy voice for non-commercial GA. We also aim to improve GA safety by making airmen aware of FAA resources, helping readers understand safety and regulatory issues, and encouraging continued training.

All those aims come together especially well in this issue of FAA Safety Briefing, which takes an admittedly whimsical and, we hope, engaging Casablanca-themed approach to addressing a deadly serious issue: the persistently consistent causes of GA safety mishaps.

Meet the Prime Suspects

The collection of common causes for GA accidents and incidents is remarkably (maybe depressingly) consistent. The AOPA Air Safety Institute’s most recent Joseph T. Nall Report notes that a whopping 75 percent of causes of non-commercial fixed-wing accidents can be attributed to the action — or inaction — of the pilot.

The mix of specific pilot problems shifts; just for example, the Nall Report notes that reductions in the number of takeoff/climb and adverse weather encounters were offset by increases in numbers attributed to low-altitude maneuvering, descent/approach, and (sigh) fuel mismanagement.

It is also troubling to note that instructional flights are again the second largest category for accidents involving personal flying. While the classic VFR-into-IMC scenario accounted for fewer than five percent of all accidents, these mishaps are deadly. Almost 70 percent of accidents in IMC were fatal, compared to 17 percent of those occurring in VMC.

Though not usually fatal, runway incursions are another elusive member of the not-so-exclusive usual suspects club for GA mishaps. FAA statistics (go.usa.gov/xQ8eN) show an uptick in national runway incursions as compared with 2017.

The numbers were better for non-commercial helicopter accidents (fatal accidents dropped by 30 percent), but low-altitude maneuvering persists as a leading cause.

Sleuthing for Solutions

We’ll take a look at each of these topics in this issue, all presented through the lens of famous phrases from Casablanca. But while we borrow the immortal “round ‘em up” words of Captain Louis Renault, Casablanca’s Prefect of Police, to talk about the causes, it’s important to emphasize that we don’t subscribe to his post-hoc, enforcement-centered methods of keeping order when it comes to airmen who make honest mistakes. Rather, as Flight Standards Executive Director John Duncan reminds us in this issue’s Jumpseat department, the FAA’s compliance philosophy aims at getting a steady flow of safety information we wouldn’t otherwise have. We then work collaboratively with airmen to prevent accidents from occurring in the first place or, if prevention isn’t possible, to keep them from re-occurring.

It’s Time

We know you’ve probably heard of all the usual suspects before, and you may even have more than a passing acquaintance with one or more of these pesky perpetrators. Safety-minded readers are similarly likely to be familiar with some — maybe all — of the suggested preventions and mitigations, so there may be more than a touch of the “can’t happen to me because I would never do that” mentality. However, somebody does keep falling prey to the pesky perps. So since nobody is immune from making honest mistakes and errors, everybody will benefit if anybody who encounters this issue will take the time to get a “safety booster shot” through reading and heeding the proffered preventions.

To encourage that investment of your time, we challenge you to keep a tally of all the Casablanca-inspired words and phrases in this issue — extra credit if you can identify both the source and the scene. Send us your best guess via the links in Forum or through our social media accounts, and we’ll recognize the winner in a future issue.

Are you ready?

Click the links under the images below to read the features!