Retired International Pilot here with over 26,000 hrs. I always remembered the phrase, " a superior pilot is one that uses his knowledge and experience to avoid a situation requiring their superior skills". No truer words.
It's like how someone trained in combat sports gets even more combat avoidant after training. Once you know how bad things can get, you learn to stay the hell away.
I've worked professionally on sailboats for about a decade. The best and most experienced captains were the ones who would stay in port and drink margaritas when more inexperienced captains would risk the weather.
Interestingly, a similar one exists in medicine: "The Superior surgeon uses his superior knowledge and superior experience to avoid any situation which may test his superior skill"
That is one of my concerns with low time pilots getting on with the airlines. Most of us that have been around a while learned these lessons long before we were getting paid to fly people.
@ most of them were during flight instruction, some single pilot in a turboprop between 1k-4k hours of flight time. Flying as a CFI provides invaluable experience recognizing warning signs before things go wrong. Had a student Vmc roll an airplane doing multi-engine instruction. We were working on simulating engine failures on takeoff at altitude, ended up inverted, luckily we were at 5,000 AGL and had room to recover. Weather dropping at destination below minimums, diverting to alternate where winds were worse than forecast and having to find a second alternate while airborne leading to a min fuel situation. Feeder bus failure single pilot over the mountains in icing conditions. Evaporator blower melting the windings and filling the cabin with smoke, at night in the mountains 30 minutes from nearest airport. Having an engine failure in a light twin, diverting and landing with an engine shut down. These are just a few that come to mind. Training similar situations in a simulator does help, but it is impossible to replicate the feeling you get when your life is actually on the line.
looked like a deviate left as soon as practical was in order and A/P engaged would also allow one guy to monitor V/S and power in case of windshear. I had a microburst on short final at MCO once that required firewalling it and hanging on. The only close one so far... FSB training came in handy that day. I did survive the kobayashi maru in the FSB Alteon sim at LGB, at which time no one else had yet. Maybe we cheated, not by knowing it was coming but the way the sim allowed a wing drop to be mitigated back and forth - not sure that's real world behavior.
"Waiting 20-30 minutes...Will it cause some delays? Sure, it will cause some delays. But if you get microbursted into the ground that's gunna make you really late for your connecting flight" - this sarcasm had me in stitches 😂
I was having dinner with a UAL 747 captain, just after the Final Report on the Dallas crash came out. He said: "I do not understand why anyone would choose to land in that weather! I've never flown anywhere in the world were you couldn't wait 30-45 min for the bad stuff to pass and then land. I've had a very boring career and I intend to keep it that way." I've never forgotten that lesson...
You sound like my dad. His best friend post-retirement said the most impressive thing about my dad's flight logs was the consistent "no incident, no report" despite having flown 5.5 years of missions in Vietnam during that war plus many other years flying all over and in many types of craft (he began in a ferry wing, then moved to LTA, then back to fixed wing craft and was fully carrier qualified). He once waited for DAYS to leave Lemoore NAS because the tule fog was so thick.
The Dallas thunderstorm was very unusual. It grew from tiny to massive in just a matter of minutes. When the Delta crew questioned the tower they stated to the effect 'well everyone else is landing' so they continued. It was crazy how fast the storm grew and then just as fast dissipated.
"Your plane's going to do better going through a storm than it is going through a mountain." Kelsey has the driest humor delivery I've seen in a long time.
Kelsey does have a very dry and excellent sense of humour. I wonder sometimes how many jokes of his I have missed. The folk that fly with him must adore him.
I got into an argument with that exact pilot on instagram. He posts videos of his landings where he clearly overcontrols the aircraft giving very strange imputs during landing. After I pointed him out that he became very aggressive and started talking back shit to me as if I was wrong. Not here to judge anyone but after I saw your video about him I’m happy to say he is quite a strange human being.
Crazy that someone with that kind of attitude is a commercial pilot. We weed out people like that in my company, and we're not flying planes. Don't want someone working for us that thinks they know everything. Over confidence will eventually burn you and, unfortunately some innocent bystander
That stuck out to me as well. It's rough weather, I get it, but giving opposite deflection 4 times in 1 second doesn't achieve much in a passenger jet.
"Balls" have their uses in certain kinds of military flying. It's gonna take more than a little balls to learn to land on an aircraft carrier for example, and even more balls to go barrelling into enemy territory and blasting some terrorists! In airline flying, "Professionalism" is the word. Leave the "balls" end of things for the combat pilots and the extreme dudes with their aerobatic planes :)
Omg!!! I saw this video hours after got release, comment on it saying that was completely unnecessary and he told me that I probably am a shitty pilot don’t know nothing and blocked me! This is the 101 of what not to do when conditions are not good. This man should definitely go back to BASIC TRAINING
Nicely done video Kelsey. My most memorable conversation on the subject of weather and terrain was with a Royal Nepal Airlines Twin Otter pilot who told me, "Royal Nepal Airlines does not fly through clouds, because in Nepal, there are rocks in the clouds."
30 odd years ago, I was on a shuttle service from Heathrow to Manchester (UK). We were taxiing out when the pilot told us that we were going to hold for a while. His reason.....there was a thunderstorm passing through our projected flight path, and it was better to be down here wishing we were up there, rather than being up there and wishing we were down here. Never a truer word said.... and 20 minutes later we were away without and further hitches - and very grateful to that pilot!
I’m an ex engineer and made a similar point to a frustrated passenger on a tech delay. I reminded her it’s better to find out there is a problem on the ground than at 30,000ft.
I first heard that quote 25ish years ago. I was a stupid 20-something kid who was impatient with everything. While sitting on the ATL tarmac the pilot announced a weather delay. I acted visibly annoyed and the elderly gentleman next to me gave me that bit of wisdom. It provided me the perspective I needed at that moment and have thought about that moment many times since.
I too am a retired commercial pilot, spending the last 15 years on 757s around Europe and Far East where they grow massive thunderstorms. I can proudly say I never had a lightning strike nor did I fly into a thunderstorm, and that is because I was well trained in how to use the weather radar and to always treat thunderstorms with respect they deserve and steer well clear. If they appeared on the extended centre line or anywhere along my departure path I would negotiate a rerouting or early turn after take-off with ATC before commencing a take-off roll. If it wasn't available then I would either sit it out while monitoring the wx radar or vacate if there was someone braver behind me who wanted to chance it. But what really surprises me in this case is that what we see in the video is the First Officer/Co-pilot flying, but the decision to go lies with the Captain. What was he thinking? When I've been in this situation, and I have, and my FO decides to showboat his hand flying skills by following the FDs and magenta line I have just lent over and engaged the autopilot. Kelsey is absolutely correct in what he says about this.
As a private jet pilot, this reminds me of the time we were flying down to southern Florida and there was a massive red, even magenta, line of thunderstorms blocking off the state coast to coast. It was a thin line maybe 15-20 miles or so but no gaps and tops too high to get around. Passengers were pissed off that I refused to fly through the storm despite me telling them the guy in front of us who tried to punch through reported EXTREME turbulence and declared an emergency including injuries. Dropped them off in Georgia close to the border and said good luck driving through that. Week later when I went down to pick them up they said it was the worst storm they had ever seen and nearly crashed multiple times trying to drive through it. They also ended up having to pay for hail damage to the rental car they took through that storm. Oh well, I don't get paid enough to risk my life like that and at the end of the day if having no balls gets me home in one piece, then that's what I'm gonna do.
I would have just asked "And you wanted me to take a rather small aircraft trough that storm you went trough with a car? Now consider hard and long how well it would have gone...."
Million times better to be stuck on the ground, wishing you were up in the air than to be up in the air, desperately praying to be back safely on the ground. Here’s to hoping that EVERY commercial pilot flying today feels the exact same way.
I'm pretty sure they do! I'm not an airline pilot in the slightest but I'm certain that what you've just described is a mindset that's universal among them.
Kelsey, I remember years ago driving through Colorado and western Nebraska with tornados all around. I was listening to a CB radio as I was driving to a rest area for shelter. A trucker got on the radio and said, 'this is what separates the men from the boys, the men stop and wait while the boys keep going.' Not happy that commercial pilots have the "boy" attitude. Great video as always.
And it's truck drivers like that one that give everyone a bad name (31+years driver here)... Only a ga pilot but I still know better than to go flying with such "ballsy" pilots. Agree 110%.
As someone that has been in that truckers situation (as an owner op that was actually driving through Joplin, MO in 2011 LITERALLY minutes before THE tornado) there are other factors to consider. Myself and a couple other trucks didn’t have an option to just pull off and get to a safe place and I44 DEF wasn’t safe either so we just wanted to get out trucks out and hope we don’t end up in the path at touchdown. I DEF don’t agree with that comment made over the radio though about ‘men from boys’ because actions taken deliberately with purpose for a better potential outcome while considering risk factors should be what people strive for. The people that make decisions based on ego however deserve to be completely shamed out of their mentality. As far Joplin, myself and a couple friends that were making the LA to Mass run doing LTL seafood every week made it out of there significantly faster than normal (IYKYK). Touchdown happened a couple mins later. My body still gets amped up and I can physically feel exactly how I felt during that and I can remember everything about that portion of the drive from the temp to the sky. It truly is an amazing feeling for my body to go through even after all this time but I honestly would rather not to have known it.
I've driven like that guy, barely see through a river going down the windscreen but could use the reflective line on the road to keep pushing through at reduced speed.
"trust, but verify" This is the first I've seen a vid of yours, but I ALWAYS have respect for anyone that's had to learn the phrase on their own.😊 Instant sub ❤
I love the attitude to safety in the aviation world. I worked for years as a professional Scuba instructor. One of the hardest things was to instill the same attitude into students and other instructors and divemasters. A spectacular rescue was always looked on with great approval, with the “heroes” congratulated, while the instructor who had looked at the dive site conditions and gone quietly to another site or not dived at all was not given any respect for a good decision. I didn’t know much about aviation when I was diving, but after watching Kelsey’s videos, I think the recreational diving industry could learn a huge amount from the procedures seen on the channel. Great stuff.
Alot of the same wisdom should be applied to boating. Recently a young boy and, I think his dad, were lost off the coastal area of S.C. They weren't wearing life jackets.
And driving! Unironically, CRM with a partner or friend if you’re driving with someone is actually applicable especially if a failure, accident, or incident happens. If someone hits you or road rages you should be ready to get the plate number and work together for the best results. Same with accidents and pulling over. Having a habit of safety and always checking your mirrors, blindspots, and knowing the limitations of your vehicle is important.
There are many industries that could benefit from aviations attitude to safety. I'm working as a truck driver, hauling hazmat tanks. We have a very strict safety policy in our company, always investigating "near misses" etc. Drivers coming in trying to show off or "having balls" won't stay very long. Refusing to do a job or driving in really bad conditions is always encouraged and as drivers we have very strong mandates to stop something if it feels unsafe. One of my most important habits is to checking and double checking myself before every important step in the procedures (Such as starting a pump, disconnecting a hose or opening safety critical valves), making sure all valves are in their correct positions etc. I know that some drivers might look and laugh, but I refuse being the reason for a urgent safety meeting...
I remember when learning to SCUBA dive we were on our 2nd open water (ocean) dive up in Rhode Island. We went to the first dive site, the instructor said he always stopped and surveyed before diving. To me, the uninformed, everything “looked” great on the surface, but he made us pack everything up and we went to the alternate site. He said just because everything looked good on the surface, doesn’t mean everything is good below. Turns out another diver ran into some nasty currents below about an hour later. Caution is always better
Great video Kelsey. I am an anesthesiologist, and I tell my residents "if you find anesthesia exciting....you're not doing it properly". Boring is best !
Oh my God, my dad says the same thing! He is also a Cardiac Anaesthetist and he told me one of his teachers used to say "there's nothing heroic in Anaesthesia". As a pilot, I feel us pilots and Anaesthetists are a lot similar in professional ethics, dad also said putting someone through Anaesthesia and taking them off of it has been compared to an airplane taking off and landing in their textbooks. Quite similar characteristics and sequence of events.
i'm a 737 pilot, just for your info the wx radar on the max has auto tilt, you're able to scan wx based on the Flight level, of course it takes time to sweep around before departure.
"If you get micro-bursted into the ground that's going to make you really late for your connecting flight!" - Yep. I hate it when I miss a connection because of this.
Hi, my lovely partner Greg lost his battle with depression 3 weeks ago. He didn't fly, but was obsessed with planes and he loved watching all your videos (and so I watched all your videos too lol). They brang him joy, so I just wanted to say thank you. Your videos are not just informative but enjoyable. Keep up the good work there may be others like my Greg benefiting from watching in ways you may not have realised ❤
Ahh, that's absolutely devastating. I'm extremely sorry to hear that, Vanessa. My sincerest condolences. I wish you nothing but the best while getting through these tough times. Keep your head up and stay strong, as I'm sure that's what Greg would have wanted. I know it isn't much consolation, but at least we know Greg won't be suffering anymore. Rest in peace, buddy.
I’m so very sorry for your loss. I lost my husband when I was 35. I thought that I would follow behind him. There was nothing in my life worth my time. He had been my whole world. Not in the way a man controls a woman but in the way that he was everything to me. Of course, I still loved my friends and family but I lost him. If you want/need to talk, please reach out. Don’t let depression ruin the rest of your life. You are loved by so many and you are probably unaware of how important you are to many people. You want to talk, cry or both, please respond to me. Please. Edit: I meant to say please reach out to someone even if it’s me. You are too precious to the world. There will be help when you ask for it.
It requires "huevos" to exercise prudent, professional judgement in the face of peer pressure to accept needless risks from colleagues with less maturity.
I've dealt with the same issue as an A&P. When it comes to flight safety, I always stand my ground. This is why, given the state of the industry, I'm making a career change. I don't cut corners and I don't shirk my duty to follow the rules. They're written in blood. Lives depend on it.
I knew an airline pilot who was asked if he was more careful when the plane was full or empty. His response, " My goal is to get me there safely. If I do that, the passengers will too." The man had thousands of commercial hours and survived the Ploesti raid in WWWII.
All the airline pilots I know have an attitude like that, including my boyfriend. The thought that they want a boring flight so they can go home to their families just as much as us. They have the human survival instincts. It’s why I’m not afraid when I fly.
Kelsey!!! Thank you for still providing the older type content that is technical! Glad your still producing this stuff too. I’m glad you’re producing a mixture of content now, and still providing classic content. Thanks you, Captain! You’ve done what I’d hoped - you do your personal stuff, and still give us the technical stuff. Giving us the technical stuff keeps me interested in the personal stuff. Keep it up!
The fact that he never asks for someone to subscribe or like, just shows the great personality that he has. Thank you, Kelsey for always making our Sundays the best!
You speak my mind! 🙂👍I'm so fed up with hearing like+sub. He's the perfect example that it's possible to grow a channel without bombarding viewers all the time.
When posed as a polite request at the end, that's fair, but when posed as a command at the begnning, yeah, those ones can piss off about me subscribing. LOL
During my PPL (A) training many years ago I was taught that it was always better being on the ground wishing you were in the air rather than in the air wishing you were on the ground. 2000 hours private flying so far and its one lesson I never forgot.
Thank you for this important message: Short after getting my PPL 25 years ago we were a group of 5 pilots flying a lot through Europe and supporting each other. The other 4 told me on a regular base that I don‘t have enough balls to be a real pilot, I was the chicken of the group. Today I‘m the only one holding a Frozen ATPL and still flying. The 4 real pilots with balls will unfortunately never ever fly again - always blue skies my friends! You‘ll be never forgotten! Sometimes it‘s better to be the chicken than a hero.
My driving instructor would get annoyed with me during my early lessons because I would wait "too long" at a junction. I told him "Better to be late than 'the late'," and he gave up. Despite his prediction that I'd annoy the examiner, I passed my test first time and have had a clean licence for 42 years.
@@CamMci Two died in flying into a mountain in IMC (VFR flight) following a self created GPS profile on a portable GPS device, one killed himself by doing aerobatics in a PA28 and the last one crashed his SEP on a take off (hot, high altitude) massive overloaded and with the CG out of the Limits (aft), resulting in an insufficient climb rate stalling the aircraft. Unfortunately these four crashes killed not only the pilots but 9 people in total. They were absolutely great and helpful people but their mindset when it came to airmanship was at the end not the best.
As a paramedic/flight medic/critical care medic instructor I would talk about medical situations similar to this as "Don't just do something, stand there." You have to be on that other side of the Dunning-Kruger curve to realize that sometimes doing nothing is the best thing to do.
Funny you say that. When flying, doing nothing is generally better than doing the wrong thing. The Jeju Air crash - if the pilots had just done nothing but continue their approach as normal after the bird ingestion, it is probable they would have landed normally and everyone would still be alive. Instead, they mistakenly shut down the wrong engine, panicked, failed to run the emergency checklist to restore power to critical systems and attempted a downwind landing in a clean configuration, going way too fast and flew right into a reinforced concrete wall. I had 9/11 flashbacks when I saw the video.
Thanks for another great story. I was in my backyard in Carrollton, TX on August 2, 1985 when that Delta L-1011 flew over my house at a very low altitude. I pointed it out to my wife, as we were not under any arrival to DFW. She came back out a little later to tell me that plane crashed short of the runway in a storm. It’s something you never forget, and I always kept a big distance from a thunderstorm.
I was in hospital the day of that crash. I remember telling the nurses to get ready. In the end most of the injured were taken to larger Dallas hospitals but I was glued to the tv coverage. One casualty was a pickup truck on the freeway that got crushed by the stricken aircraft.
I remember that one. I was a FAA License Dispatcher for Jet America Airlines. I had a MD80 that was scheduled to land before that Delta L-1011. The captain called me and said he was holding to wait out the storm passing through. We discussed fuel and he had 45 minutes extra. Good call as he later described the crash scene. The L-1011 encountered wind shear microburst on approach.
@@keithfreitas2983 I remember Jet America. I was in college and worked for a transport company at DTW that delivered flight crews to their hotels. We loved your airline. Nicest crews of them all. More interesting conversation than listening to a bunch of elderly AA pilots talk about their investments....
I lived a mile from DFW, was outside at the pool, (storms were isolated, but arriving fast), came in for ice tea, happen to turn on the tv, when the news of this crash was on. I went back out to see a big plumb of smoke, (as I think the plane collided with some large fuel tanks not far from runway. I believe this was just before the new kind of radar, (forgot what it's called), was common, able to detect micro bursts / wind shear.
Back in 1985, I was a FAA License Dispatcher for Jet America Airlines. I had a MD80 that was scheduled to land before that Delta L-1011 at DFW. The captain called me and said he was holding to wait out the storm passing through DFW. We discussed fuel and he had 45 minutes extra. Good call as he later described the crash scene. The L-1011 encountered wind shear microburst on approach.
We've all flown with pilots like that. Two years ago I flew with a prick who told me EVERYTHING to do and constantly corrected me for things that weren't even in the manual. And the final straw was when he accepted a flight plan that put us in Oakland with only 8900 pounds fuel over destination. I asked him to add 2000 pounds, since I like landing places with around 11,000 pounds/1 hour 10 minutes of fuel, but he refused. We landed with 8700 and told him that this was unacceptable in the ride to the hotel, which he just blew off. I had one more trip to fly with him that month and I should have contacted our union Professional Standards guy for a mediated debrief, but I just called sick. Looking back, that was a situation where I should have had more "balls" and not called sick and asked for the debrief. Great video!
👍💯 A situation where a pilot requires "balls" yes. Mentour Pilot has debriefed several crash reports that exposed a flight deck energy that could best be described as bullying - be it intentional or not - where FOs have evidently been too timid to speak up when the captain made poor decisions, resulting in tragedy or perhaps only poor but nonetheless undesirable outcomes.
Having been a pilot for almost 60 years, I still remember my training to stay at least 5 miles from thunderstorms to avoid micro-bursts, wind shears and hail....none of which would be pleasant to encounter. Remember, there are old pilots and bold pilots, but few old bold pilots. Be safe and fly another day!
Ditto accounting. Boring is good. Not good finding a forged document costing millions or the phone call..."This is...from the Securities and Exchange Commission..." Those were not boring days that carved years out of my career. Boring is good! 21:29
@@_purge9488 Most of my flying is over the high plains. Convective conditions are very common in the summer. The sky can go from completely clear to having a thunderstorm with tops > 70k' in 20 minutes. These storms draw in air from 30 or 40 miles away, or more, reducing low-altitude visibility to near zero from blowing dirt, along with erratic > 50mph winds. Then, as the storm develops, those updrafts turn into a hell of rain, hail, and microbursts. Watching them from the safety of the FBO, they're awe inspiring, but that's as close as I want to get. Not to mention that, even without a thunderstorm, flying a small plane in convective conditions feels like being run through the washing machine with an angry wolverine. Anyway, agreed - in a light plane, 20nm feels like the absolute minimum.
At first I was thinking about exactly what is worthy of being called out and then you delivered on the pilot's social media attitude. Gotta stay humble.
I'm a social worker, not a pilot, but we have a similar outlook on boring. I worked direct care in an in-patient facility for many years. Boring is good. You want boring. Action is not the opposite of boring. Terror is the opposite of boring.
Uneventful doesn’t have to be boring if you are a good teacher. “We got on the runway and this is what we saw in front of us. This is why we chose to decline to takeoff…”
"Get there-itis" has killed many pilots, and sometimes passengers have that attitude. True story: 20 or so years ago, I was a passenger scheduled to leave on an early morning (still dark) flight, and we had uncharacteristically VERY thick fog. Flights were delayed and some passengers were upset. One idiot asked (for what must have been the 5th time) the gate agent why they couldn't just get on the plane and go. The gate agent said "Sir, can you see the runway?". "No". Gate agent: "Neither can the pilot".
I have been in a microburst (on the ground). It is terrifying. A microburst has many of the characteristics of a tornado. Don't evert let the term "microburst" fool you into thinking it's minor.
Same, at a music festival. One guy near me lost his t-shirt, like it got sucked straight off him! One tree ended up being sorta impromptu lost & found, there was so many hats hung on it, like some weird xmas tree! Luckily no one got seriously hurt, but there was nothing “micro” about it.
That's exactly what I saw when one hit our flight line at Campbell. Perfectly clear calm day that suddenly looked like a tornado that wasn't visible. Much unscheduled maintenance on several helos afterwords. Then as fast as it hit it was gone.
@74 Gear Kelsey, I'm new here. I know nothing about planes or how to fly them & I do not like flying. But I love to listen to you talking about the videos you share with us & I love the fact that if you have done something that failed or was just wrong you will admit it. Not many people in general will own up to their wrong doings or failures. Take care & safe travels, Kelsey.
Almost 25 years ago, I boarded a British Airways flight from EWR to LHR. It was a warm and humid night in late May. Before we pushed off the stand, I could see distant lightning, which quickly got closer, but we pushed off and began taxiing, by the this storm was close to being overhead. After a few minutes, the plane stopped, the captain came on and as he said we were not taking off in this storm and the engines were shut down. Other aircraft continued to take off into this storm. I was aware of the dangers of microbursts and I felt for the poor folk on those flights. I heaved a sigh of relief. The captain said it had become a very large and slow-moving supercell. The crew turned on the entertainment system and served drinks and snacks while we waited for what turned out to be an hour and three quarters. During that wait, lightning was coming down left, right and centre. By the time we did take off, the storm had moved well out to sea. When I returned to New York a week later, I learned that a tornado had touched down just a few miles from the airport. I don’t know whether that is or was a BA policy, or whether the pilot flying just made the right call on safety grounds, but I was, and remain, extremely grateful.
74 Gear is the best mix of entertainment, tough stories and personal epics. I just set with crazy grin and anticipation throughout his videos. Blancilario and Pilot Debrief are my other two channels. Different niches and hope they are all around a longtime. Haven’t watched a TV show or movie in ages.
Check out Mentour Pilot (the u is correct). Petter is a line trainer and captain, though he's taking a break for now, and he's incredibly interesting. Kelsey's done a video with him - haven't seen it yet but I can imagine that they're having sensible fun. 😅 Petter explains news (on his Mentour Now channel) and crash reports better than any TV shows. I'm not exaggerating.
CFIIMunden is much newer, but in the same vein as well. He's only about 3k subs right now, so we'll see how it goes over time, but he's focusing on discussing safety and learning from other videos right now.
@@y_fam_goeglyd, sorry, I've enjoyed Petter's channel for some time, filling a niche for non-pilots who enjoy aviation. Unfortunately, his channel has taken a hard turn on its target demo since he left the line and focused on the channel. Click bait coefficient on video titles and over production on graphics has hit an ungodly climb rate. I really can't recommend it anymore in the face of the other three excellent channels that keep on providing excellent, insightful coverage of recent mishaps and haven't jumped on the sensational band wagon to increase followers/revenue. It's starting to trend towards the Mojo of aviation channels, despite Petter's excellent delivery and explanation technique. Just too much fluff and show, now, diluting the actual technical content. If I watch one anymore, I simply look at the peak watch point and back up a minute.
When I was a child, my parents owned a small 10 acre plot on a subdivided large cattle ranch in the central mountains of Idaho. The main entrance to the ranch had a nice locked timber gate right off the highway, and there were about 50 mature pine trees on either side of the gate. One summer a microburst came right over the ranch entrance and sheared off all of the surrounding trees at about 7 feet off the ground. Luckily, no one was injured, but to this day, the beautiful entrance still isn’t the same. (I know, nothing to do with aviation, but I was just reminded of the story.)
Same happened to a 5 acre cedar grove near my family farm. A blow down took down all but the strongest in minutes. I told the same story to my CFI during ground school
It is actually a very pertinent story. In late 2010, I lived on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, in a suburb called Ashmore. The home sat on a edge of a small tributary of the Nerang river, with the creek bank covered in 4-5m tall silky oak trees (similar to a pine tree.) Most people don't associate Australia with Tornados or Super cell thunderstorms, but in South East Queensland we get absolutely MASSIVE storms and this was a couple of months before the massive January 2011 floods which pretty much wiped out most of the Eastern Coast of Australia (aka, the time of the inland Tsunami). This massive storm came in, I checked the BOM radar and it was just Black, then the winds hit. I was at home with my youngest 10 year old daughter and it was so scary. The garage roller door bowed in and ripped off, all the windows were also bowing and creaking. I've wrapped up the budgies in a cage, my daughter and two Siamese cats in rugs in the hallway. I looked out the back to the creek bank. The trees were bent at 180 degrees and the wind was twirling at enormous acceleration in a corkscrew fashion. The first tree broke and smashed over our backyard fence, then the second, then the third and fourth and so on. I'm on the phone to my Mum in tears because I thought we were going to die. It was fast and furious and only lasted for less than 10 minutes but the storm/tornado did a lot of damage. And it was a harbinger of the terrible summer of flooding to come. And last summer the Gold Coast had a whole series of tornados that totally destroyed multiple homes on Boxing Day (26-12-2023). So, if the radar goes red, or God forbid, black, that is a situation where everyone and everything should be inside shelter, not in a plane taking off or landing into the very worst possible conditions. We humans, because we think we are soooooo very clever, forget that the combination of global warming and mother nature are creating impossible weather situations. And these are the weather scenarios, where no matter the size of the pilot's "huevos", they simply won't win that fight.
Reminds me of the quote in the movie "2012" where Charlie Frost (played by Woody Harrelson), the eccentric conspiracy theorist, says- "The government says planes don't crash because of turbulence. What they don't tell you is turbulence causes structural failure, and structural failure causes planes to crash."
I was told in my training that autopilot is bad when in a thunderstorm because of the fact that control surfaces can become overstrained. Was told to hand fly and keep a level flight attitude, flying straight on and making small turns, if any so as to not stress the airframe while experiencing the crazy updrafts/downdrafts. Definitely helpful to hear this take - thanks!
That’s very interesting. I’m not a pilot -just interested. I hear pilots saying that these planes can take tremendous pressure and I’m always relieved to hear that -always hope those parts are attached securely and redundantly!! I did not know auto-pilot was the way to go, but it makes sense if it’s more responsive.
for those who haven't quite grasped how the microburst works. if your plane's climb rate is 1000 feet per minute, and you hit a microburst, that downdraft could easily be 8000 feet per minute or more. it's kind of like those AFV clips of a person jumping onto a moving treadmill and being launched off the back.
Its not why they are Sooo dangerous They are dangerous bcs in the first stage as you enter them the wind is blow towards you thus increase wing energy so you instinctively REDUCE engine power to stay in you assigned envelop (remember you not alone in the skies) the downdraft itself is relatively short so does not posses that much affect consider regular plane speed the PROBLEM is the TAIL wind remember you already reduced engine power tail wind will KILL you
perfect analogy. I was one of the original BN 727-100's and hit a burst. The change was so dramatic, the overheads came open and the oxygen masks deployed. Everybody was fine; but I just about needed some kind of "barrier" for my seat cushion *lol*
Flying out of Tallahassee, FL one time, as a passenger, we hit what was then called an "Air Pocket" where the jet suddenly, DROPPED like straight down like if was just falling from the sky and then THUMP it hit something (at least it felt like it did) and then no problem. Pilot explained it was just an Air Pocket. I have never had fear of flying, bird strike, even landing in 2 feet of un-plowed Snow on the runway, but the above shook me, because I did not understand what had happened. Thank you Kelsey for helping people "understand".
Thank you, Kelsey, for a non-pilot it is really reassuring to hear your perspective on safe flying decisions, something I hope is shared by the vast majority of pilots out there. I am always impressed with the way you present both fact and opinion, very clear and understandable. Glad you made it through your weather situation safely!
Great video Kelsey, really appreciate you calling the guy out. Also, on your comments about never trust ACT for weather, iirc, a USAir flight crashed at CLT several years ago because ATC didn’t correctly update them.
Great video Kelsey, that pilot and his cavalier attitude mad me so cross! When I did my PPL thirty years ago my flying instructor drummed into me that if there was the slightest doubt, don't go. He taught me a couple of phrases (I dare say you already know them): "there are old pilots and there are bold pilots but there are no old and bold pilots" and the other one was "it's better to be down here wishing you were up there than up there and wishing you were down here!" His name was Stewart and I think he would have got on with PJ.
My instructor once said to me as I sat waiting for the weather to clear, "It's much better to be down here wishing you were up there than being up there wishing you were down here."
I'm no aviator, but it's very similar thing if you live in an extreme weather location during the winter when it comes to driving. There is almost never a scenario in which you should be rushing onto highways in the middle of a blizzard, but people do it all the time because they get impatient. I can only imagine the situation with flying is a million times more serious.
I'm not a pilot and usually only get passenger time in the air once every couple years. Aviation has always been interesting to me and I have been binge watching 74 Gear. One of your videos has a van driver waiting for you with a sign showing your last name which I believe we share. Great content Kelsey! ✈😎
Oh no !!!! 😮 I happen to know this guy from my airline and I think he is going to have a long talk with the chief pilot. Our SOP’s are clear about not taking off with WX ahead, or delay it. Everything he did was a no-go, but the worst one was hand flying near a storm. Actually, Kelsey, I like your points of view and I’m sorry for my colleague but most of us don’t fly like that. I have been too into very serious WX but I usually avoid it!!!
Does your airline have any policy about recording on the flight deck? Tends to encourage more "showy" or risky behavior, and has no business on commercial passenger flights. If someone wants to chase likes, go do it on their own time, in a private aircraft.
I think both pilots will get tea and biscuits with the chief pilot. Sure the FO is flying but the Captain has overall responsibility, and he’s allowing and facilitating this madness. Absolutely reckless behaviour from both pilots.
Yeah, I'm particularly interested in the policy on attaching uncertified camera equipment (ie FOD/loose articles/secondary frag) to the flight deck, let alone showboating for likes! What is the captain playing at? Wouldn't be happening on my flight deck. Turn it off and put it in your nav bag.
Funnily enough that was literally the first thing I noticed about his flying. Like, I almost missed the second bright flash of lightning because I was mesmerised by the way he was moving and yoke around. I’ve only watched a handful GoPro videos of takeoff and landings but none of the pilots in those were moving the yoke around like that. I was almost convinced that they couldn’t and the slow, smooth motions were basically all it was capable of. 😅
Hey Kelsey. Great vid as always. Haven’t commented in a while. Congrats on your upgrade. Having been flying commercially for nearly 6 years, every single video of yours I watch, there’s literally nearly nothing I ever disagree with you on, and I learn something new every time. I wish every Captain I flew with was like you 😂 We’re unlikely to cross paths in the flight deck, but who knows, at some point we might cross at 0200L at a hotel reception somewhere, or in a crew security line. At my company at Night, the SOP is PF on Wx PM on Terrain. Let’s PF control what he’s looking at, keeps the double sweep, splits the tasks well between weather avoidance and terrain avoidance, and makes comparing weather with ground returns much easier!
Amazing how much I have learnt from you as a small time pilot. Thank you. Everything you say makes sense and it does contribute to safety. Keep it up please. Maybe some stories from where you were a rookie? People learn a lot from early mistakes.
Flying up here in the Canadian Rockies (turboprop) we have a lot of short runways, mountains, big storms, snow and ice, and everything else. LOTS of risks. Managing them is something you have to also communicate to your passengers. In almost 2 decades of flying, ive been lucky to get to cut my teeth in many unique scenarios that can only be found flying up here in Canada, some of which have indeed scared me... and I am fortunate to have that experience in my back pocket. Being on social media... I always try to communicate in an educational way to people online and my passengers so that they understand my decisions as a pilot without letting your ego get carried away. I think that is the main issue, that pilot needs check the ego a bit, especially when responding to comments from people who are genuinely interested on why a pilot may make certain decisions.
Alaska is the same as you described. Being a frequent (island to island) passenger on the little float planes (45 years), all I can say is, we watch the pilots. We have lost too many to the "I can do this" kind of guys, even the most experienced. When you guys go white knuckled, I worry. Like being flown from one island to another (where the hospital is) while in labor. Weather was such that No one would fly, the new "doctor" was such a chickensht, he threatened to medivac me out (WHO? THERE WAS NO ONE FLYING!). I threatened to go home & have the baby in bed. One guy volunteered - wheels - airport to airport - no floatplanes going that day. Our airport was on another island, take a 15 minute ferry to the main / hospital island. We didn't think we'd make it; the experience was unreal. 10 lbs 2 oz boy : )
No, I'd rather a rough ride to get there on time, rather than a mine site wimp doing a sit rep and swms, then saying oh it's not safe so you've got to re book your connection flights and put up with a 2 hr delay
@@jamesaustralian9829 lol so you want the pilot to take a chance, take off in a thunderstorm knowing that a downdraft could hit the plane. Guess that way you wouldn't have to worry about rebooking flights cause you were just on your last one, which went down the way.
I want to add another problem for "balls"-culture in the cockpit. What if you're a newbie FO flying with someone identifying as "I've got balls"? That kind of environment can very easily create a steep power gradient with can make CRM much more difficult in a dangerous or in an emergency situation.
I hated flying with "Big Daddy". Spot on regarding the lopsided power gradient. The arrogance and dismissive attitude on the part of the Captain - regardless of whether they're the PF or PM - was not conducive to creating an atmosphere where safety of flight was the primary focus. Glad those days are over.
That’s exactly the situation that caused national airlines to crash into the river in DC in the 90s. Mentour posted a nice overview video. The guy with the big nuts is dead now. And everybody else.
Which begs the question as to what exactly the left seat occupant is there for... Either he failed to speak up and question the decision to roll, or he didn't want to appear scared. Neither has a place on an aircraft, let alone at the pointy end.
I was the Captain on a 737-900 taxiing for takeoff out of Tucson. A fast moving thunderstorm came over the field. Heavy rain, high winds, and limited visibility. I decided to park on a ramp in front of the control tower. I told the passengers that I wasn’t interested in flying into that mess. 20 minutes later, the storm blew over and we had a nice smooth departure to get out of town. We did not have a on time arrival, but we got there safely.
After watching a considerable amount of his, and Mentour Pilot, videos you can handle VASAVIATION. Without pre-education listening their detailed explanations I would not be able to handle that channel.
The difference is you're saying you made a mistake. He's saying he has the balls to fly into a storm. It looks like he flew into the storm so he'd have an exciting video. People like this guy are why some airlines ban video cameras in cockpits-they don't want their pilots showing off for internet clout.
Our #7 is an FO on the 787. On his way “up to the majors” he risked his upward mobility when he reported unsafe Captains. It didn’t hurt him. He is absolutely a safety first guy.
Kelsey, you are really talking like a captain! Your growth over the years from FO to Cap’n has been immense and we all got to see it! Eggs are for breakfast and baby mamas!
Thank you! Not sure there's much I can do about a risk-attracted pilot once I'm on a plane. But I do know now that I will contact his/her head office about any flight on which I have questions. I'm flying a lot these days so TH-cam popped your videos into my feed. This particular video gained you my subscription. I want to live a long time so I can enjoy and be helpful to my grandchildren.
Thank you for posting more viral debriefs, Kelsey. I really enjoy watching these. I am always looking forward to learning something new. Much love from 🇦🇹
I'm suspicious when Kelsey with his almost British understatement says "moderate turbulence". I suspect that Kelsey's "moderate turbulence" means "If you're wearing false teeth, take them out now rather than have them rattled out of your head". 🤣
Kelsey has talked before about different levels of turbulence, and yep you're right. By the time you get to "moderate turbulence" from the pilot's point of view, the passengers are having a very bad time.
I got my PPSEL at Embry-Riddle in ‘89. A few years later, I was flying aerobatics in an RV4. On my way home from a practice session at Sebring, I hit weather, and kept going into it. Didn’t have any of the nav or weather aids available now. Had to keep losing altitude to stay below the clouds. Wound up flying over OkE at 200 ft, but it cleared a bit shortly thereafter. A couple of years later, I experienced first hand the violent power of a microburst, fortunately while on the ground, in my hangar. Never intentionally flew into weather again.
In 1994, Flight 1016 was slammed into the ground during a go-around by a microburst/windshear at Charlotte-Douglas. We had just flown back from a vacation and I was 14 years old. We heard about the crash on the drive home from the airport. I have loved aviation since I was a child, and I was devastated it happened at “my” airport. I spent weeks reading everything about the accident and wanting to know how it happened and how it could be prevented. This year, a permanent memorial was finally set up for Flight 1016, and I go often. Major changes in radar and policies about flying in weather changed because of Flight 1016. As someone who wants to get my pilot license, I think it’s important to learn from every accident. Every law is truly “written in blood,” and rather than having “heuvos,” we should honor those who have died by using what we’ve learned to stay as safe as possible. Being a hero doesn’t mean you go looking for danger. It’s about how you handle things when danger presents itself. In the case in this video, the hero is the pilot who says, “Let’s wait 15 minutes.”
Kelsey, you are awesome. Flying scares the hell out of me. Every time I watch your videos I walk away with a feeling of confidence in air One pilots. That being said I only want to fly with you in the cockpit. I used to have to walk on a plane sit down and strap in. Then the plane would taxi out and take off. I was always scared to death. Then there would be a voice that said stand up, hook up, shuffle to the door.thats when my anxiety would leave me, because I was jumping out of that death trap into the wide blue yonder….what a relief😅
Outstanding video. Safety is priority ONE. Never take off into a known thunderstorm. I’m an Airbus captain at AA. We’ve hired a huge number of far less experienced pilots in recent years due to a shortage of qualified pilots. As captains, one of our jobs is to teach the less experienced pilots as they quickly move up towards their own captain seat. The captain in this video failed in this example by allowing this yahoo in the right seat to take off, under those conditions. Great video!
Retired International Pilot here with over 26,000 hrs.
I always remembered the phrase, " a superior pilot is one that uses his knowledge and experience to avoid a situation requiring their superior skills".
No truer words.
very well said, sir!
It's like how someone trained in combat sports gets even more combat avoidant after training. Once you know how bad things can get, you learn to stay the hell away.
I've worked professionally on sailboats for about a decade. The best and most experienced captains were the ones who would stay in port and drink margaritas when more inexperienced captains would risk the weather.
Interestingly, a similar one exists in medicine: "The Superior surgeon uses his superior knowledge and superior experience to avoid any situation which may test his superior skill"
Where?
Retired professional pilot here. 47 years of experience including USAF. That pilot hasn't had the sh-t scared out of him yet.
don't want to be there when he does.
That is one of my concerns with low time pilots getting on with the airlines. Most of us that have been around a while learned these lessons long before we were getting paid to fly people.
Genuinely interested to know what happened and how far into your aviation career you were?
@ most of them were during flight instruction, some single pilot in a turboprop between 1k-4k hours of flight time. Flying as a CFI provides invaluable experience recognizing warning signs before things go wrong. Had a student Vmc roll an airplane doing multi-engine instruction. We were working on simulating engine failures on takeoff at altitude, ended up inverted, luckily we were at 5,000 AGL and had room to recover.
Weather dropping at destination below minimums, diverting to alternate where winds were worse than forecast and having to find a second alternate while airborne leading to a min fuel situation.
Feeder bus failure single pilot over the mountains in icing conditions.
Evaporator blower melting the windings and filling the cabin with smoke, at night in the mountains 30 minutes from nearest airport.
Having an engine failure in a light twin, diverting and landing with an engine shut down.
These are just a few that come to mind. Training similar situations in a simulator does help, but it is impossible to replicate the feeling you get when your life is actually on the line.
looked like a deviate left as soon as practical was in order and A/P engaged would also allow one guy to monitor V/S and power in case of windshear. I had a microburst on short final at MCO once that required firewalling it and hanging on. The only close one so far... FSB training came in handy that day. I did survive the kobayashi maru in the FSB Alteon sim at LGB, at which time no one else had yet. Maybe we cheated, not by knowing it was coming but the way the sim allowed a wing drop to be mitigated back and forth - not sure that's real world behavior.
"Waiting 20-30 minutes...Will it cause some delays? Sure, it will cause some delays. But if you get microbursted into the ground that's gunna make you really late for your connecting flight" - this sarcasm had me in stitches 😂
Did it? I doubt it even made you laugh out loud. A little snort perhaps because you seem like that type. Well you got 111 likes congratulations.
Someone is having a bad day 🤣🤣@@jedfra9172
Better 'late" than " DEAD - Ontime !"
@@jedfra9172 why you so mad that someone else is having fun bro
@@jmjohnn he's likely that pilot who Kelsey roasted
I was having dinner with a UAL 747 captain, just after the Final Report on the Dallas crash came out. He said: "I do not understand why anyone would choose to land in that weather! I've never flown anywhere in the world were you couldn't wait 30-45 min for the bad stuff to pass and then land. I've had a very boring career and I intend to keep it that way." I've never forgotten that lesson...
That’s some wise words.
What a "chicken" in the eyes of foolish men.... He's only risking hundreds of lives by gambling:(
I agree with him totally
You sound like my dad. His best friend post-retirement said the most impressive thing about my dad's flight logs was the consistent "no incident, no report" despite having flown 5.5 years of missions in Vietnam during that war plus many other years flying all over and in many types of craft (he began in a ferry wing, then moved to LTA, then back to fixed wing craft and was fully carrier qualified). He once waited for DAYS to leave Lemoore NAS because the tule fog was so thick.
Real men land in all weather.
The Dallas thunderstorm was very unusual. It grew from tiny to massive in just a matter of minutes. When the Delta crew questioned the tower they stated to the effect 'well everyone else is landing' so they continued. It was crazy how fast the storm grew and then just as fast dissipated.
"Your plane's going to do better going through a storm than it is going through a mountain." Kelsey has the driest humor delivery I've seen in a long time.
Kelsey does have a very dry and excellent sense of humour. I wonder sometimes how many jokes of his I have missed. The folk that fly with him must adore him.
Came here to find this comment
“Cumulogranite” clouds are the worst.
When that flight simulator went into that storm I thought "What were they thinking..."
A hard thunderstorm is softer than a soft rock.
I got into an argument with that exact pilot on instagram. He posts videos of his landings where he clearly overcontrols the aircraft giving very strange imputs during landing. After I pointed him out that he became very aggressive and started talking back shit to me as if I was wrong. Not here to judge anyone but after I saw your video about him I’m happy to say he is quite a strange human being.
In that case, he really shouldn't be flying. I hope his airline sees his IG posts.
Big corrections, big mistakes.
Crazy that someone with that kind of attitude is a commercial pilot. We weed out people like that in my company, and we're not flying planes. Don't want someone working for us that thinks they know everything. Over confidence will eventually burn you and, unfortunately some innocent bystander
That stuck out to me as well. It's rough weather, I get it, but giving opposite deflection 4 times in 1 second doesn't achieve much in a passenger jet.
He sounds like an egomaniac- he really shouldn't be allowed to fly people around with that kind of attitude!
“Zero balls needed!” Great quote and excellent clip Kelsey!
Kelsey, let me check you and make sure 😮
And we know he doesn’t have a big ego going through the airport into the airline lounges. Lol.
@@tomwilliam5118 Unless there are no snacks -- then you start to see a little attitude. 🤣
@ yeah and if there’s no free breakfast, he’s really grumpy to put it mildly. But we love them just as he is.
"Balls" have their uses in certain kinds of military flying. It's gonna take more than a little balls to learn to land on an aircraft carrier for example, and even more balls to go barrelling into enemy territory and blasting some terrorists!
In airline flying, "Professionalism" is the word. Leave the "balls" end of things for the combat pilots and the extreme dudes with their aerobatic planes :)
I've never seen you this angry. Good teaching video Kelsey. Your statement that "Boring is safe." is itsomething every pilot should learn.
Angry? Your definition must be more loosely defined than mine. Frustrated maybe, angry no IMHO.
clearly you have never seen him in a no-snack crisis
@@PunishedBeerCanBennyIVor that time he missed free breakfast. Steer clear of him.
then later in the video he tells how he flew through red.. i see hypocrisy...
@@PunishedBeerCanBennyIV XD
Omg!!! I saw this video hours after got release, comment on it saying that was completely unnecessary and he told me that I probably am a shitty pilot don’t know nothing and blocked me!
This is the 101 of what not to do when conditions are not good. This man should definitely go back to BASIC TRAINING
What platform is he on and what's his @?
Definitely someone who doesn't belong in any cockpit. Friggin timebuilders.
Nicely done video Kelsey. My most memorable conversation on the subject of weather and terrain was with a Royal Nepal Airlines Twin Otter pilot who told me, "Royal Nepal Airlines does not fly through clouds, because in Nepal, there are rocks in the clouds."
I love that. Thanks.
🥚🥚 in clouds ❌
🪨🪨 in clouds ✅
I think it was Terry Prattchet who said something to the effect that withches shouldn’t fly through clouds because mountains like to lurk there.
I find it quite funny that he said he has eggs, like, the opposite of balls
@@Wumbo-z4z in my country we also call them 🥚🥚
30 odd years ago, I was on a shuttle service from Heathrow to Manchester (UK). We were taxiing out when the pilot told us that we were going to hold for a while. His reason.....there was a thunderstorm passing through our projected flight path, and it was better to be down here wishing we were up there, rather than being up there and wishing we were down here. Never a truer word said.... and 20 minutes later we were away without and further hitches - and very grateful to that pilot!
Amazing PA 😄
I’m an ex engineer and made a similar point to a frustrated passenger on a tech delay. I reminded her it’s better to find out there is a problem on the ground than at 30,000ft.
Your quote was perfect. "Better to be down here wishing we were up there, rather than being up there and wishing we were down here." Thanks😊
I first heard that quote 25ish years ago. I was a stupid 20-something kid who was impatient with everything. While sitting on the ATL tarmac the pilot announced a weather delay. I acted visibly annoyed and the elderly gentleman next to me gave me that bit of wisdom. It provided me the perspective I needed at that moment and have thought about that moment many times since.
Just fly above the storm.
I too am a retired commercial pilot, spending the last 15 years on 757s around Europe and Far East where they grow massive thunderstorms. I can proudly say I never had a lightning strike nor did I fly into a thunderstorm, and that is because I was well trained in how to use the weather radar and to always treat thunderstorms with respect they deserve and steer well clear. If they appeared on the extended centre line or anywhere along my departure path I would negotiate a rerouting or early turn after take-off with ATC before commencing a take-off roll. If it wasn't available then I would either sit it out while monitoring the wx radar or vacate if there was someone braver behind me who wanted to chance it. But what really surprises me in this case is that what we see in the video is the First Officer/Co-pilot flying, but the decision to go lies with the Captain. What was he thinking? When I've been in this situation, and I have, and my FO decides to showboat his hand flying skills by following the FDs and magenta line I have just lent over and engaged the autopilot. Kelsey is absolutely correct in what he says about this.
As a private jet pilot, this reminds me of the time we were flying down to southern Florida and there was a massive red, even magenta, line of thunderstorms blocking off the state coast to coast. It was a thin line maybe 15-20 miles or so but no gaps and tops too high to get around. Passengers were pissed off that I refused to fly through the storm despite me telling them the guy in front of us who tried to punch through reported EXTREME turbulence and declared an emergency including injuries. Dropped them off in Georgia close to the border and said good luck driving through that. Week later when I went down to pick them up they said it was the worst storm they had ever seen and nearly crashed multiple times trying to drive through it. They also ended up having to pay for hail damage to the rental car they took through that storm. Oh well, I don't get paid enough to risk my life like that and at the end of the day if having no balls gets me home in one piece, then that's what I'm gonna do.
Cudos to you. You did the right thing. 👍
I see it the other way. You DID have the balls to tell them NO and save their lives. Your judgement was good, theirs was in self destruct mode.
I would have just asked "And you wanted me to take a rather small aircraft trough that storm you went trough with a car? Now consider hard and long how well it would have gone...."
Well done, saved their lives and yours.
@@JohnnyToboggan lol there's always one of you guys, though i didn't see this coming from President Mountain Dew Camacho 😂
Million times better to be stuck on the ground, wishing you were up in the air than to be up in the air, desperately praying to be back safely on the ground. Here’s to hoping that EVERY commercial pilot flying today feels the exact same way.
I'm pretty sure they do! I'm not an airline pilot in the slightest but I'm certain that what you've just described is a mindset that's universal among them.
THAT, is a well known aviation saying. Nothing new you said here, but I agree.
“WW2 fighters, need balls. Airline pilots, zero balls needed, just good judgment”. Agreed 100% but the way you said it cracked me up. 😂
"There should be no balls. Zero balls needed."
Use your superior judgement to avoid having to use your superior flying skills
Except when talking breakfast.
Whenever climb into the cockpit, I stow my balls in the luggage compartment for the duration of the flight.
Kelsey, I remember years ago driving through Colorado and western Nebraska with tornados all around. I was listening to a CB radio as I was driving to a rest area for shelter. A trucker got on the radio and said, 'this is what separates the men from the boys, the men stop and wait while the boys keep going.' Not happy that commercial pilots have the "boy" attitude. Great video as always.
In a lot of corporate cultures these days they reverse that, saying 'look how much work the real men do' as they ignore safety.
And it's truck drivers like that one that give everyone a bad name (31+years driver here)... Only a ga pilot but I still know better than to go flying with such "ballsy" pilots. Agree 110%.
That trucker was later extracted from his rig after being tossed into rocks! Ha! Macho man!
As someone that has been in that truckers situation (as an owner op that was actually driving through Joplin, MO in 2011 LITERALLY minutes before THE tornado) there are other factors to consider. Myself and a couple other trucks didn’t have an option to just pull off and get to a safe place and I44 DEF wasn’t safe either so we just wanted to get out trucks out and hope we don’t end up in the path at touchdown. I DEF don’t agree with that comment made over the radio though about ‘men from boys’ because actions taken deliberately with purpose for a better potential outcome while considering risk factors should be what people strive for. The people that make decisions based on ego however deserve to be completely shamed out of their mentality. As far Joplin, myself and a couple friends that were making the LA to Mass run doing LTL seafood every week made it out of there significantly faster than normal (IYKYK). Touchdown happened a couple mins later. My body still gets amped up and I can physically feel exactly how I felt during that and I can remember everything about that portion of the drive from the temp to the sky. It truly is an amazing feeling for my body to go through even after all this time but I honestly would rather not to have known it.
I've driven like that guy, barely see through a river going down the windscreen but could use the reflective line on the road to keep pushing through at reduced speed.
"trust, but verify"
This is the first I've seen a vid of yours, but I ALWAYS have respect for anyone that's had to learn the phrase on their own.😊
Instant sub ❤
I love the attitude to safety in the aviation world. I worked for years as a professional Scuba instructor. One of the hardest things was to instill the same attitude into students and other instructors and divemasters. A spectacular rescue was always looked on with great approval, with the “heroes” congratulated, while the instructor who had looked at the dive site conditions and gone quietly to another site or not dived at all was not given any respect for a good decision. I didn’t know much about aviation when I was diving, but after watching Kelsey’s videos, I think the recreational diving industry could learn a huge amount from the procedures seen on the channel. Great stuff.
Alot of the same wisdom should be applied to boating. Recently a young boy and, I think his dad, were lost off the coastal area of S.C.
They weren't wearing life jackets.
And driving! Unironically, CRM with a partner or friend if you’re driving with someone is actually applicable especially if a failure, accident, or incident happens. If someone hits you or road rages you should be ready to get the plate number and work together for the best results. Same with accidents and pulling over. Having a habit of safety and always checking your mirrors, blindspots, and knowing the limitations of your vehicle is important.
And put down your lipstick and your damn phone.
There are many industries that could benefit from aviations attitude to safety. I'm working as a truck driver, hauling hazmat tanks. We have a very strict safety policy in our company, always investigating "near misses" etc. Drivers coming in trying to show off or "having balls" won't stay very long. Refusing to do a job or driving in really bad conditions is always encouraged and as drivers we have very strong mandates to stop something if it feels unsafe.
One of my most important habits is to checking and double checking myself before every important step in the procedures (Such as starting a pump, disconnecting a hose or opening safety critical valves), making sure all valves are in their correct positions etc. I know that some drivers might look and laugh, but I refuse being the reason for a urgent safety meeting...
I remember when learning to SCUBA dive we were on our 2nd open water (ocean) dive up in Rhode Island. We went to the first dive site, the instructor said he always stopped and surveyed before diving. To me, the uninformed, everything “looked” great on the surface, but he made us pack everything up and we went to the alternate site. He said just because everything looked good on the surface, doesn’t mean everything is good below. Turns out another diver ran into some nasty currents below about an hour later. Caution is always better
Great video Kelsey. I am an anesthesiologist, and I tell my residents "if you find anesthesia exciting....you're not doing it properly". Boring is best !
My uncle was an anesthesiologist, 😅
Oh my God, my dad says the same thing! He is also a Cardiac Anaesthetist and he told me one of his teachers used to say "there's nothing heroic in Anaesthesia". As a pilot, I feel us pilots and Anaesthetists are a lot similar in professional ethics, dad also said putting someone through Anaesthesia and taking them off of it has been compared to an airplane taking off and landing in their textbooks. Quite similar characteristics and sequence of events.
@@casilasgoaler that’s such a great analogy and puts into great perspective both professions!
Random: one of our anesthesiologist neighbors had a huge sport fishing boat-wait for it, "Gas Passer". Doctor humor, I guess
What's your poison? Sudoku or crosswords?
i'm a 737 pilot, just for your info the wx radar on the max has auto tilt, you're able to scan wx based on the Flight level, of course it takes time to sweep around before departure.
"If you get micro-bursted into the ground that's going to make you really late for your connecting flight!" - Yep. I hate it when I miss a connection because of this.
You get connected, just not to the flight you expected.
Yeah, but to be fair: you reach your final destination faster!
@@Fs3i And there's a good chance your checked bags end up in your lap. So yeah...point taken.
On the up side of things, you do get a straight connection into afterlife with no delays - literally front seat VIP.
@@mrN3w7 Everyone is re-seated in the first row. Whether that's first or business class makes no difference.
As a frequent flying passenger I wholeheartedly support this pilot's efforts to make my flights as boring as possible. 😄👍
I prefer an amusement park ride when I fly. If I wanted boring I’d take a bus.
@@user-tb7rn1il3q - There can be a lot of drama on busses. Just sayin'.
I know it was a good flight if i slept through the beverage service and only woke up because I felt the landing gear and flaps deploy.
@@justaskin8523 With some flights cheaper than taking the bus that crowd is now in the air.
More free sleep time
Hi, my lovely partner Greg lost his battle with depression 3 weeks ago. He didn't fly, but was obsessed with planes and he loved watching all your videos (and so I watched all your videos too lol). They brang him joy, so I just wanted to say thank you. Your videos are not just informative but enjoyable. Keep up the good work there may be others like my Greg benefiting from watching in ways you may not have realised ❤
I'm sorry to hear that Vanessa.
Love from New Zealand ❤️ 😊
Ahh, that's absolutely devastating. I'm extremely sorry to hear that, Vanessa. My sincerest condolences. I wish you nothing but the best while getting through these tough times. Keep your head up and stay strong, as I'm sure that's what Greg would have wanted. I know it isn't much consolation, but at least we know Greg won't be suffering anymore. Rest in peace, buddy.
@Strype13 thank you ❤
I’m so very sorry for your loss. I lost my husband when I was 35. I thought that I would follow behind him. There was nothing in my life worth my time. He had been my whole world. Not in the way a man controls a woman but in the way that he was everything to me. Of course, I still loved my friends and family but I lost him.
If you want/need to talk, please reach out. Don’t let depression ruin the rest of your life. You are loved by so many and you are probably unaware of how important you are to many people.
You want to talk, cry or both, please respond to me. Please.
Edit: I meant to say please reach out to someone even if it’s me. You are too precious to the world. There will be help when you ask for it.
My sincere condolences, that is really tough and I have no words, can't imagine the pain you are going through.
It requires "huevos" to exercise prudent, professional judgement in the face of peer pressure to accept needless risks from colleagues with less maturity.
Huevos Grandes !
Spanish lesson: if heuvos means eggs, I suddenly just learned what Huevos Rancheros are! 😆
I've dealt with the same issue as an A&P. When it comes to flight safety, I always stand my ground. This is why, given the state of the industry, I'm making a career change. I don't cut corners and I don't shirk my duty to follow the rules. They're written in blood. Lives depend on it.
I knew an airline pilot who was asked if he was more careful when the plane was full or empty. His response, " My goal is to get me there safely. If I do that, the passengers will too." The man had thousands of commercial hours and survived the Ploesti raid in WWWII.
He survived World Wide Web 😅
He knew better than to push his luck!
All the airline pilots I know have an attitude like that, including my boyfriend. The thought that they want a boring flight so they can go home to their families just as much as us. They have the human survival instincts.
It’s why I’m not afraid when I fly.
Over Macho Grande?
@westerlywinds5684 the second world wide web!
Kelsey!!! Thank you for still providing the older type content that is technical! Glad your still producing this stuff too. I’m glad you’re producing a mixture of content now, and still providing classic content. Thanks you, Captain! You’ve done what I’d hoped - you do your personal stuff, and still give us the technical stuff. Giving us the technical stuff keeps me interested in the personal stuff. Keep it up!
There are old pilots and bold pilots. There are no old, bold pilots.
I love this quote and often use it with guys who ride bikes.
Sure there are old bold pilots! But they're better off spending their careers in a fighter jet instead of an airliner :)
And bald pilots
@@yeeebayeeba4268to much stress bro 😂
@@yeeebayeeba4268 There are old pilots and there are bald pilots, and there are old bald pilots
The fact that he never asks for someone to subscribe or like, just shows the great personality that he has. Thank you, Kelsey for always making our Sundays the best!
You speak my mind! 🙂👍I'm so fed up with hearing like+sub. He's the perfect example that it's possible to grow a channel without bombarding viewers all the time.
It is refreshing. Result - I will like and subscribe
agreed...and if we click on his other vids after watching this one it will help this channel a lot
He has said he forgets a lot. Lol
When posed as a polite request at the end, that's fair, but when posed as a command at the begnning, yeah, those ones can piss off about me subscribing. LOL
During my PPL (A) training many years ago I was taught that it was always better being on the ground wishing you were in the air rather than in the air wishing you were on the ground. 2000 hours private flying so far and its one lesson I never forgot.
“But if you get microbursted into the ground, that’s going to make you really late for your connecting flight” 😂😂 lmao Kelsey what a line
Thank you for this important message: Short after getting my PPL 25 years ago we were a group of 5 pilots flying a lot through Europe and supporting each other. The other 4 told me on a regular base that I don‘t have enough balls to be a real pilot, I was the chicken of the group. Today I‘m the only one holding a Frozen ATPL and still flying. The 4 real pilots with balls will unfortunately never ever fly again - always blue skies my friends! You‘ll be never forgotten! Sometimes it‘s better to be the chicken than a hero.
When in doubt, chicken out!
My driving instructor would get annoyed with me during my early lessons because I would wait "too long" at a junction. I told him "Better to be late than 'the late'," and he gave up. Despite his prediction that I'd annoy the examiner, I passed my test first time and have had a clean licence for 42 years.
There are old pilots - and there are bold pilots....
What happened to them?
@@CamMci Two died in flying into a mountain in IMC (VFR flight) following a self created GPS profile on a portable GPS device, one killed himself by doing aerobatics in a PA28 and the last one crashed his SEP on a take off (hot, high altitude) massive overloaded and with the CG out of the Limits (aft), resulting in an insufficient climb rate stalling the aircraft. Unfortunately these four crashes killed not only the pilots but 9 people in total. They were absolutely great and helpful people but their mindset when it came to airmanship was at the end not the best.
As a paramedic/flight medic/critical care medic instructor I would talk about medical situations similar to this as "Don't just do something, stand there." You have to be on that other side of the Dunning-Kruger curve to realize that sometimes doing nothing is the best thing to do.
Nothing is often a good thing to do and almost always a good thing to say.
Funny you say that. When flying, doing nothing is generally better than doing the wrong thing. The Jeju Air crash - if the pilots had just done nothing but continue their approach as normal after the bird ingestion, it is probable they would have landed normally and everyone would still be alive. Instead, they mistakenly shut down the wrong engine, panicked, failed to run the emergency checklist to restore power to critical systems and attempted a downwind landing in a clean configuration, going way too fast and flew right into a reinforced concrete wall. I had 9/11 flashbacks when I saw the video.
Thanks for another great story. I was in my backyard in Carrollton, TX on August 2, 1985 when that Delta L-1011 flew over my house at a very low altitude. I pointed it out to my wife, as we were not under any arrival to DFW. She came back out a little later to tell me that plane crashed short of the runway in a storm. It’s something you never forget, and I always kept a big distance from a thunderstorm.
I was in hospital the day of that crash. I remember telling the nurses to get ready.
In the end most of the injured were taken to larger Dallas hospitals but I was glued to the tv coverage. One casualty was a pickup truck on the freeway that got crushed by the stricken aircraft.
I remember that one. I was a FAA License Dispatcher for Jet America Airlines. I had a MD80 that was scheduled to land before that Delta L-1011. The captain called me and said he was holding to wait out the storm passing through. We discussed fuel and he had 45 minutes extra. Good call as he later described the crash scene. The L-1011 encountered wind shear microburst on approach.
@@keithfreitas2983 I remember Jet America. I was in college and worked for a transport company at DTW that delivered flight crews to their hotels. We loved your airline. Nicest crews of them all. More interesting conversation than listening to a bunch of elderly AA pilots talk about their investments....
I lived a mile from DFW, was outside at the pool, (storms were isolated, but arriving fast), came in for ice tea, happen to turn on the tv, when the news of this crash was on. I went back out to see a big plumb of smoke, (as I think the plane collided with some large fuel tanks not far from runway. I believe this was just before the new kind of radar, (forgot what it's called), was common, able to detect micro bursts / wind shear.
Back in 1985, I was a FAA License Dispatcher for Jet America Airlines. I had a MD80 that was scheduled to land before that Delta L-1011 at DFW. The captain called me and said he was holding to wait out the storm passing through DFW. We discussed fuel and he had 45 minutes extra. Good call as he later described the crash scene. The L-1011 encountered wind shear microburst on approach.
We talk about that crash at Delta all the time. We were just coming into an awareness of micro bursts.
I knew a lot of former Jet America crew at Alaska Airlines- The BEST!
This Aeromexico, Aeromexico already had an Embraer E190 crash after taking off during a storm a few years ago.
We've all flown with pilots like that. Two years ago I flew with a prick who told me EVERYTHING to do and constantly corrected me for things that weren't even in the manual. And the final straw was when he accepted a flight plan that put us in Oakland with only 8900 pounds fuel over destination. I asked him to add 2000 pounds, since I like landing places with around 11,000 pounds/1 hour 10 minutes of fuel, but he refused. We landed with 8700 and told him that this was unacceptable in the ride to the hotel, which he just blew off. I had one more trip to fly with him that month and I should have contacted our union Professional Standards guy for a mediated debrief, but I just called sick.
Looking back, that was a situation where I should have had more "balls" and not called sick and asked for the debrief.
Great video!
👍💯 A situation where a pilot requires "balls" yes. Mentour Pilot has debriefed several crash reports that exposed a flight deck energy that could best be described as bullying - be it intentional or not - where FOs have evidently been too timid to speak up when the captain made poor decisions, resulting in tragedy or perhaps only poor but nonetheless undesirable outcomes.
I get where you’re coming from bro. People on the outside can’t see the political side of aviation.
@@mowtivatedmechanic1172 ?
Having been a pilot for almost 60 years, I still remember my training to stay at least 5 miles from thunderstorms to avoid micro-bursts, wind shears and hail....none of which would be pleasant to encounter. Remember, there are old pilots and bold pilots, but few old bold pilots. Be safe and fly another day!
Ditto accounting. Boring is good. Not good finding a forged document costing millions or the phone call..."This is...from the Securities and Exchange Commission..." Those were not boring days that carved years out of my career. Boring is good! 21:29
There are old bald pilots 🙂
Nowadays they recommend staying 20nm away, due to hail. At least at my 141
@@_purge9488 Most of my flying is over the high plains. Convective conditions are very common in the summer. The sky can go from completely clear to having a thunderstorm with tops > 70k' in 20 minutes. These storms draw in air from 30 or 40 miles away, or more, reducing low-altitude visibility to near zero from blowing dirt, along with erratic > 50mph winds. Then, as the storm develops, those updrafts turn into a hell of rain, hail, and microbursts. Watching them from the safety of the FBO, they're awe inspiring, but that's as close as I want to get.
Not to mention that, even without a thunderstorm, flying a small plane in convective conditions feels like being run through the washing machine with an angry wolverine.
Anyway, agreed - in a light plane, 20nm feels like the absolute minimum.
@@trespirethere are young bald pilots, too
Never thought I'd watch a Kelsey video and hear the word balls so many times. The delivery was just too funny! 😅😅
At first I was thinking about exactly what is worthy of being called out and then you delivered on the pilot's social media attitude. Gotta stay humble.
I'm a social worker, not a pilot, but we have a similar outlook on boring. I worked direct care in an in-patient facility for many years. Boring is good. You want boring. Action is not the opposite of boring. Terror is the opposite of boring.
Guess that’s why people choose ems or the emergency room if they don’t want boring
Uneventful doesn’t have to be boring if you are a good teacher. “We got on the runway and this is what we saw in front of us. This is why we chose to decline to takeoff…”
you're one of the best pilots i've seen . I've learned a lot about pilots and thier behaviours with this channel
"Get there-itis" has killed many pilots, and sometimes passengers have that attitude.
True story: 20 or so years ago, I was a passenger scheduled to leave on an early morning (still dark) flight, and we had uncharacteristically VERY thick fog. Flights were delayed and some passengers were upset. One idiot asked (for what must have been the 5th time) the gate agent why they couldn't just get on the plane and go. The gate agent said "Sir, can you see the runway?". "No". Gate agent: "Neither can the pilot".
That gate agent has a great wit lol.
I have been in a microburst (on the ground). It is terrifying. A microburst has many of the characteristics of a tornado. Don't evert let the term "microburst" fool you into thinking it's minor.
Yes the tailwinds on the other side are really bad
Yeah 6000 fpm ain’t no joke
Same, at a music festival. One guy near me lost his t-shirt, like it got sucked straight off him! One tree ended up being sorta impromptu lost & found, there was so many hats hung on it, like some weird xmas tree! Luckily no one got seriously hurt, but there was nothing “micro” about it.
That's exactly what I saw when one hit our flight line at Campbell. Perfectly clear calm day that suddenly looked like a tornado that wasn't visible. Much unscheduled maintenance on several helos afterwords. Then as fast as it hit it was gone.
We should rename it to “Megadeathburst” to better illustrate what it is.
Casey, that is the best vid you ever made. Thank you. No old bold...
Who is Casey?
@74 Gear Kelsey, I'm new here. I know nothing about planes or how to fly them & I do not like flying. But I love to listen to you talking about the videos you share with us & I love the fact that if you have done something that failed or was just wrong you will admit it. Not many people in general will own up to their wrong doings or failures. Take care & safe travels, Kelsey.
The NTSB has hundreds of boxes full of pilots exchanging common sense for balls.
Well said.
Almost 25 years ago, I boarded a British Airways flight from EWR to LHR. It was a warm and humid night in late May. Before we pushed off the stand, I could see distant lightning, which quickly got closer, but we pushed off and began taxiing, by the this storm was close to being overhead. After a few minutes, the plane stopped, the captain came on and as he said we were not taking off in this storm and the engines were shut down. Other aircraft continued to take off into this storm. I was aware of the dangers of microbursts and I felt for the poor folk on those flights. I heaved a sigh of relief. The captain said it had become a very large and slow-moving supercell. The crew turned on the entertainment system and served drinks and snacks while we waited for what turned out to be an hour and three quarters. During that wait, lightning was coming down left, right and centre. By the time we did take off, the storm had moved well out to sea. When I returned to New York a week later, I learned that a tornado had touched down just a few miles from the airport. I don’t know whether that is or was a BA policy, or whether the pilot flying just made the right call on safety grounds, but I was, and remain, extremely grateful.
74 Gear is the best mix of entertainment, tough stories and personal epics. I just set with crazy grin and anticipation throughout his videos. Blancilario and Pilot Debrief are my other two channels. Different niches and hope they are all around a longtime. Haven’t watched a TV show or movie in ages.
Damn right I follow the same channels
Check out Mentour Pilot (the u is correct). Petter is a line trainer and captain, though he's taking a break for now, and he's incredibly interesting. Kelsey's done a video with him - haven't seen it yet but I can imagine that they're having sensible fun. 😅
Petter explains news (on his Mentour Now channel) and crash reports better than any TV shows. I'm not exaggerating.
CFIIMunden is much newer, but in the same vein as well. He's only about 3k subs right now, so we'll see how it goes over time, but he's focusing on discussing safety and learning from other videos right now.
@ quit Mentour the night he begged for patreons or members so he could quit work.
@@y_fam_goeglyd, sorry, I've enjoyed Petter's channel for some time, filling a niche for non-pilots who enjoy aviation.
Unfortunately, his channel has taken a hard turn on its target demo since he left the line and focused on the channel. Click bait coefficient on video titles and over production on graphics has hit an ungodly climb rate.
I really can't recommend it anymore in the face of the other three excellent channels that keep on providing excellent, insightful coverage of recent mishaps and haven't jumped on the sensational band wagon to increase followers/revenue. It's starting to trend towards the Mojo of aviation channels, despite Petter's excellent delivery and explanation technique. Just too much fluff and show, now, diluting the actual technical content.
If I watch one anymore, I simply look at the peak watch point and back up a minute.
When I was a child, my parents owned a small 10 acre plot on a subdivided large cattle ranch in the central mountains of Idaho. The main entrance to the ranch had a nice locked timber gate right off the highway, and there were about 50 mature pine trees on either side of the gate. One summer a microburst came right over the ranch entrance and sheared off all of the surrounding trees at about 7 feet off the ground. Luckily, no one was injured, but to this day, the beautiful entrance still isn’t the same. (I know, nothing to do with aviation, but I was just reminded of the story.)
Those were very irresponsible trees
Actually, your story does have to do with aviation.... It shows the power of a microburst and how dangerous they can be. Thanx for posting.
Same happened to a 5 acre cedar grove near my family farm. A blow down took down all but the strongest in minutes. I told the same story to my CFI during ground school
It is actually a very pertinent story.
In late 2010, I lived on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, in a suburb called Ashmore. The home sat on a edge of a small tributary of the Nerang river, with the creek bank covered in 4-5m tall silky oak trees (similar to a pine tree.)
Most people don't associate Australia with Tornados or Super cell thunderstorms, but in South East Queensland we get absolutely MASSIVE storms and this was a couple of months before the massive January 2011 floods which pretty much wiped out most of the Eastern Coast of Australia (aka, the time of the inland Tsunami).
This massive storm came in, I checked the BOM radar and it was just Black, then the winds hit. I was at home with my youngest 10 year old daughter and it was so scary.
The garage roller door bowed in and ripped off, all the windows were also bowing and creaking. I've wrapped up the budgies in a cage, my daughter and two Siamese cats in rugs in the hallway.
I looked out the back to the creek bank. The trees were bent at 180 degrees and the wind was twirling at enormous acceleration in a corkscrew fashion.
The first tree broke and smashed over our backyard fence, then the second, then the third and fourth and so on.
I'm on the phone to my Mum in tears because I thought we were going to die.
It was fast and furious and only lasted for less than 10 minutes but the storm/tornado did a lot of damage. And it was a harbinger of the terrible summer of flooding to come.
And last summer the Gold Coast had a whole series of tornados that totally destroyed multiple homes on Boxing Day (26-12-2023).
So, if the radar goes red, or God forbid, black, that is a situation where everyone and everything should be inside shelter, not in a plane taking off or landing into the very worst possible conditions.
We humans, because we think we are soooooo very clever, forget that the combination of global warming and mother nature are creating impossible weather situations.
And these are the weather scenarios, where no matter the size of the pilot's "huevos", they simply won't win that fight.
Reminds me of the quote in the movie "2012" where Charlie Frost (played by Woody Harrelson), the eccentric conspiracy theorist, says- "The government says planes don't crash because of turbulence. What they don't tell you is turbulence causes structural failure, and structural failure causes planes to crash."
USAF: "There is no reason, in peacetime, to deliberately fly into a thunderstorm..."
53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron has entered the chat.
@@ancrm1147 They don't fly into thunderstorms. Hurricanes are fundamentally different.
@@scottycatman And the only lives they are risking are their own. Also fundamentally different.
Admiral Halsey entered the chat
@@benterbenter9281the Pacific war was the exception lmao
3:15 - LMAO. "Your plane is going to do better going through a storm than it is going through a mountain."
i concur 😂😂😂
It's funny because it's true 🤣
I laughed and replayed several times with the Kelsey "delivery"
I was told in my training that autopilot is bad when in a thunderstorm because of the fact that control surfaces can become overstrained. Was told to hand fly and keep a level flight attitude, flying straight on and making small turns, if any so as to not stress the airframe while experiencing the crazy updrafts/downdrafts. Definitely helpful to hear this take - thanks!
That’s very interesting. I’m not a pilot -just interested. I hear pilots saying that these planes can take tremendous pressure and I’m always relieved to hear that -always hope those parts are attached securely and redundantly!! I did not know auto-pilot was the way to go, but it makes sense if it’s more responsive.
for those who haven't quite grasped how the microburst works. if your plane's climb rate is 1000 feet per minute, and you hit a microburst, that downdraft could easily be 8000 feet per minute or more. it's kind of like those AFV clips of a person jumping onto a moving treadmill and being launched off the back.
Its not why they are Sooo dangerous
They are dangerous bcs in the first stage as you enter them the wind is blow towards you thus increase wing energy so you instinctively REDUCE engine power to stay in you assigned envelop (remember you not alone in the skies) the downdraft itself is relatively short so does not posses that much affect consider regular plane speed the PROBLEM is the TAIL wind remember you already reduced engine power tail wind will KILL you
perfect analogy. I was one of the original BN 727-100's and hit a burst. The change was so dramatic, the overheads came open and the oxygen masks deployed. Everybody was fine; but I just about needed some kind of "barrier" for my seat cushion *lol*
"Face Planting"
Thats a lot of power!
@@samholdsworth420 not so much power as floor-falling-out-from-under-you.
Flying out of Tallahassee, FL one time, as a passenger, we hit what was then called an "Air Pocket" where the jet suddenly, DROPPED like straight down like if was just falling from the sky and then THUMP it hit something (at least it felt like it did) and then no problem. Pilot explained it was just an Air Pocket. I have never had fear of flying, bird strike, even landing in 2 feet of un-plowed Snow on the runway, but the above shook me, because I did not understand what had happened. Thank you Kelsey for helping people "understand".
This sounds more like wake turblance.
Thank you, Kelsey, for a non-pilot it is really reassuring to hear your perspective on safe flying decisions, something I hope is shared by the vast majority of pilots out there. I am always impressed with the way you present both fact and opinion, very clear and understandable. Glad you made it through your weather situation safely!
Thanks Kelsey. This one was really interesting. Merry Christmas to you and fellow 74 gear groupies. Keep the blue side up.
❤❤⛄️🎄🎄
And a very merry Christmas to you and yours, too. Hope you have a lovely holiday season wherever you may be on this planet of ours.
Great video Kelsey, really appreciate you calling the guy out. Also, on your comments about never trust ACT for weather, iirc, a USAir flight crashed at CLT several years ago because ATC didn’t correctly update them.
Great video Kelsey, that pilot and his cavalier attitude mad me so cross! When I did my PPL thirty years ago my flying instructor drummed into me that if there was the slightest doubt, don't go. He taught me a couple of phrases (I dare say you already know them): "there are old pilots and there are bold pilots but there are no old and bold pilots" and the other one was "it's better to be down here wishing you were up there than up there and wishing you were down here!" His name was Stewart and I think he would have got on with PJ.
My instructor once said to me as I sat waiting for the weather to clear, "It's much better to be down here wishing you were up there than being up there wishing you were down here."
Exactly! And sometimes if you're up there and wishing you were on the ground, your wish can be granted, but you get slammed to the ground.
I'm no aviator, but it's very similar thing if you live in an extreme weather location during the winter when it comes to driving. There is almost never a scenario in which you should be rushing onto highways in the middle of a blizzard, but people do it all the time because they get impatient. I can only imagine the situation with flying is a million times more serious.
@@falxonPSN The graveyards are full of people that caught that "Get-There-Itis" bug...
@russbell6418 - Commercial planes can kill a lot more than you very quickly.
“If you get microburst it into the ground, that’s going to make you really late for your connecting flight.” Hahaha! Love it!!
I'm not a pilot and usually only get passenger time in the air once every couple years. Aviation has always been interesting to me and I have been binge watching 74 Gear. One of your videos has a van driver waiting for you with a sign showing your last name which I believe we share. Great content Kelsey! ✈😎
Oh no !!!! 😮 I happen to know this guy from my airline and I think he is going to have a long talk with the chief pilot. Our SOP’s are clear about not taking off with WX ahead, or delay it. Everything he did was a no-go, but the worst one was hand flying near a storm.
Actually, Kelsey, I like your points of view and I’m sorry for my colleague but most of us don’t fly like that.
I have been too into very serious WX but I usually avoid it!!!
Does your airline have any policy about recording on the flight deck? Tends to encourage more "showy" or risky behavior, and has no business on commercial passenger flights. If someone wants to chase likes, go do it on their own time, in a private aircraft.
@@CarbonKevin I couldn’t agree more. Can’t stand pilots that record themselves at work.
I think both pilots will get tea and biscuits with the chief pilot. Sure the FO is flying but the Captain has overall responsibility, and he’s allowing and facilitating this madness. Absolutely reckless behaviour from both pilots.
@@EdOeuna Tea and biscuits? The sort of meeting I am forecasting was called, in the organisation I worked in, an "interview without coffee". 😠
Yeah, I'm particularly interested in the policy on attaching uncertified camera equipment (ie FOD/loose articles/secondary frag) to the flight deck, let alone showboating for likes!
What is the captain playing at? Wouldn't be happening on my flight deck. Turn it off and put it in your nav bag.
The way the pilot was yanking on the control yoke, looked like he was playing Call of Duty.
Yeah, that was seemingly his mindset as well.
Funnily enough that was literally the first thing I noticed about his flying. Like, I almost missed the second bright flash of lightning because I was mesmerised by the way he was moving and yoke around.
I’ve only watched a handful GoPro videos of takeoff and landings but none of the pilots in those were moving the yoke around like that. I was almost convinced that they couldn’t and the slow, smooth motions were basically all it was capable of. 😅
Yes, my very first thought when Kelsey played the clip was "are we looking at a simulator?"
Hey Kelsey. Great vid as always. Haven’t commented in a while. Congrats on your upgrade. Having been flying commercially for nearly 6 years, every single video of yours I watch, there’s literally nearly nothing I ever disagree with you on, and I learn something new every time. I wish every Captain I flew with was like you 😂
We’re unlikely to cross paths in the flight deck, but who knows, at some point we might cross at 0200L at a hotel reception somewhere, or in a crew security line.
At my company at Night, the SOP is PF on Wx PM on Terrain. Let’s PF control what he’s looking at, keeps the double sweep, splits the tasks well between weather avoidance and terrain avoidance, and makes comparing weather with ground returns much easier!
Amazing how much I have learnt from you as a small time pilot. Thank you. Everything you say makes sense and it does contribute to safety. Keep it up please. Maybe some stories from where you were a rookie? People learn a lot from early mistakes.
Flying up here in the Canadian Rockies (turboprop) we have a lot of short runways, mountains, big storms, snow and ice, and everything else. LOTS of risks. Managing them is something you have to also communicate to your passengers. In almost 2 decades of flying, ive been lucky to get to cut my teeth in many unique scenarios that can only be found flying up here in Canada, some of which have indeed scared me... and I am fortunate to have that experience in my back pocket. Being on social media... I always try to communicate in an educational way to people online and my passengers so that they understand my decisions as a pilot without letting your ego get carried away. I think that is the main issue, that pilot needs check the ego a bit, especially when responding to comments from people who are genuinely interested on why a pilot may make certain decisions.
Alaska is the same as you described.
Being a frequent (island to island) passenger on the little float planes (45 years), all I can say is, we watch the pilots. We have lost too many to the "I can do this" kind of guys, even the most experienced. When you guys go white knuckled, I worry. Like being flown from one island to another (where the hospital is) while in labor.
Weather was such that No one would fly, the new "doctor" was such a chickensht, he threatened to medivac me out (WHO? THERE WAS NO ONE FLYING!). I threatened to go home & have the baby in bed. One guy volunteered - wheels - airport to airport - no floatplanes going that day. Our airport was on another island, take a 15 minute ferry to the main / hospital island. We didn't think we'd make it; the experience was unreal. 10 lbs 2 oz boy : )
Thank you so much for your informative contribution!! This is so important!!
The PILOT may feel he needs balls to take off, but I'll wager the passengers don't want a seat-of-the-pants RISK-TAKER in the cockpit.
No, I'd rather a rough ride to get there on time, rather than a mine site wimp doing a sit rep and swms, then saying oh it's not safe so you've got to re book your connection flights and put up with a 2 hr delay
@@jamesaustralian9829 lol so you want the pilot to take a chance, take off in a thunderstorm knowing that a downdraft could hit the plane. Guess that way you wouldn't have to worry about rebooking flights cause you were just on your last one, which went down the way.
I want to add another problem for "balls"-culture in the cockpit. What if you're a newbie FO flying with someone identifying as "I've got balls"? That kind of environment can very easily create a steep power gradient with can make CRM much more difficult in a dangerous or in an emergency situation.
I hated flying with "Big Daddy". Spot on regarding the lopsided power gradient. The arrogance and dismissive attitude on the part of the Captain - regardless of whether they're the PF or PM - was not conducive to creating an atmosphere where safety of flight was the primary focus. Glad those days are over.
Been there and yes, it sucks having an Ego maniac as your flying partner.
That’s exactly the situation that caused national airlines to crash into the river in DC in the 90s. Mentour posted a nice overview video. The guy with the big nuts is dead now. And everybody else.
Which begs the question as to what exactly the left seat occupant is there for... Either he failed to speak up and question the decision to roll, or he didn't want to appear scared. Neither has a place on an aircraft, let alone at the pointy end.
@@wotchyadoingalan brings the question
Probably your best video yet. Thank you for posting!
I was the Captain on a 737-900 taxiing for takeoff out of Tucson. A fast moving thunderstorm came over the field. Heavy rain, high winds, and limited visibility. I decided to park on a ramp in front of the control tower. I told the passengers that I wasn’t interested in flying into that mess. 20 minutes later, the storm blew over and we had a nice smooth departure to get out of town. We did not have a on time arrival, but we got there safely.
Yep, that was probably the one T-storm TUS gets each year.
Instagram Pilots like this are a major red flag for crew
Great tuition Kelsey. Great learning video.
74 Gear..Taking aviation channels to another level .#1
After watching a considerable amount of his, and Mentour Pilot, videos you can handle VASAVIATION. Without pre-education listening their detailed explanations I would not be able to handle that channel.
The difference is you're saying you made a mistake. He's saying he has the balls to fly into a storm. It looks like he flew into the storm so he'd have an exciting video. People like this guy are why some airlines ban video cameras in cockpits-they don't want their pilots showing off for internet clout.
Look up the Fairchild AFB B-52 crash piloted by Bud Holland. He thought he had balls as well......
But does he have the 🥚🥚🥚to fly into North Korean airspace?
@silntstl Bud definitely had balls...titanium man marbles. His actions were, indeed, heart-stopping for all involved.
@@billcook4768
@@KarynHill I feel the pilot had or should have been disciplined.
Great video and great channel and I loved you in watchmen!
This is a good one. And lots of salient one-liners. "No missile shoot down for me!"
Awesome video Kelsey, your explanations have greatly reduced my anxiety with flying.
Once again another good video by a true Professional….thanks Kelsey👍👍
I am not a pilot but I totally agree Kelsey. That's why YOU have four bars on your shoulders.
One of your best episodes ever.
Our #7 is an FO on the 787. On his way “up to the majors” he risked his upward mobility when he reported unsafe Captains. It didn’t hurt him. He is absolutely a safety first guy.
Baseballmomof8? Hmmm.
Happy Holidays, Kelsey and the rest of the 74 crew 🎄!!!
Gotta love Kelseys face when hes watching videos. He looks disgusted
I know! I always forget to watch the actual video itself😅
I think it is the look of absolute focus
But why 2/3 of the screen with Kelsey’s face, and the actual footage pushed in the right corner? Almost useless to watch on a mobile phone this way
@@christiaanmeyns5979 If you're making reaction content one should make sure that the content is focused on their commentary and reaction.
Kelsey, you are really talking like a captain! Your growth over the years from FO to Cap’n has been immense and we all got to see it! Eggs are for breakfast and baby mamas!
He's earned snacks for life.😊
Best snacks for Kelsey.
Baby mamas?
@ I know it’s hard to believe but all of us were placed on the good earth by way of our momma’s eggs that she was gifted by her momma upon her birth.
Thank you Kelsey!! Merry Christmas 🎄
You need some “zero balls needed” merch!😂😂. Great post and quote.
Totally agree! SAFETY FIRST!!!
Dropping bombs while getting shot at: balls. Airline pilot: zero balls. God I love Kelsey
Thank you! Not sure there's much I can do about a risk-attracted pilot once I'm on a plane. But I do know now that I will contact his/her head office about any flight on which I have questions.
I'm flying a lot these days so TH-cam popped your videos into my feed. This particular video gained you my subscription.
I want to live a long time so I can enjoy and be helpful to my grandchildren.
"Usually your plane's going to do better going through a storm than through a mountain." Let us all reflect on that.
This should be written on the walls of aviation schools! 😂
Also from watching the video further:
"Your plane's going to do better going through a storm than it is going through North Korea"
Thank you for posting more viral debriefs, Kelsey. I really enjoy watching these. I am always looking forward to learning something new. Much love from 🇦🇹
Loved the video. Thank you kelsey you are amazing. I really loved your take on this❤!
Lol. Love the subtle humor. Nearest mountains to Miami are at 500 miles away.
You are forgetting about Space Mountain, about half that distance 😊
I'm suspicious when Kelsey with his almost British understatement says "moderate turbulence". I suspect that Kelsey's "moderate turbulence" means "If you're wearing false teeth, take them out now rather than have them rattled out of your head". 🤣
was thinking the same. moderate turbulence for kelsey = super severe bowel releasing turbulence for the rest of us mortal civilians in the back 😄
Kelsey has talked before about different levels of turbulence, and yep you're right. By the time you get to "moderate turbulence" from the pilot's point of view, the passengers are having a very bad time.
hey man! It's been a long time since I last watched your videos and noticed the 4 stripes on your shoulder... congrats Captain!
I got my PPSEL at Embry-Riddle in ‘89. A few years later, I was flying aerobatics in an RV4. On my way home from a practice session at Sebring, I hit weather, and kept going into it.
Didn’t have any of the nav or weather aids available now.
Had to keep losing altitude to stay below the clouds.
Wound up flying over OkE at 200 ft, but it cleared a bit shortly thereafter.
A couple of years later, I experienced first hand the violent power of a microburst, fortunately while on the ground, in my hangar. Never intentionally flew into weather again.
In 1994, Flight 1016 was slammed into the ground during a go-around by a microburst/windshear at Charlotte-Douglas. We had just flown back from a vacation and I was 14 years old. We heard about the crash on the drive home from the airport. I have loved aviation since I was a child, and I was devastated it happened at “my” airport. I spent weeks reading everything about the accident and wanting to know how it happened and how it could be prevented. This year, a permanent memorial was finally set up for Flight 1016, and I go often. Major changes in radar and policies about flying in weather changed because of Flight 1016. As someone who wants to get my pilot license, I think it’s important to learn from every accident. Every law is truly “written in blood,” and rather than having “heuvos,” we should honor those who have died by using what we’ve learned to stay as safe as possible. Being a hero doesn’t mean you go looking for danger. It’s about how you handle things when danger presents itself. In the case in this video, the hero is the pilot who says, “Let’s wait 15 minutes.”
Powerful statement there, about how “…we should honor those who have died [to teach us how to fly safer and make better decisions].” Well said.
I totally agree. It is better to be 30 minutes late, than never arrive.
Kelsey, you are awesome. Flying scares the hell out of me. Every time I watch your videos I walk away with a feeling of confidence in air
One pilots. That being said I only want to fly with you in the cockpit. I used to have to walk on a plane sit down and strap in. Then the plane would taxi out and take off. I was always scared to death. Then there would be a voice that said stand up, hook up, shuffle to the door.thats when my anxiety would leave me, because I was jumping out of that death trap into the wide blue yonder….what a relief😅
Outstanding video. Safety is priority ONE. Never take off into a known thunderstorm. I’m an Airbus captain at AA. We’ve hired a huge number of far less experienced pilots in recent years due to a shortage of qualified pilots. As captains, one of our jobs is to teach the less experienced pilots as they quickly move up towards their own captain seat. The captain in this video failed in this example by allowing this yahoo in the right seat to take off, under those conditions. Great video!