Jimbo 0 #1 October 4, 2003 I was searching for this particular quote: QuoteAviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect and during my search came across all of these quotes: Quote"[Airplanes are] near perfect, all they lack is the ability to forgive" — Richard Collins "The R-101 is as safe as a house, except for the millionth chance" — Lord Thomson, Secretary of State for Air, shortly before boarding the doomed airship headed to India on its first real proving flight on October 4, 1930. The day before he had made his will. "Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect" — Captain AG Lamplugh, British Aviation Insurance, London. Early 1930's. "In flying I have learned that carelessness and overconfidence are usually far more dangerous than deliberately accepted risks" — Wilbur Wright in a letter to his father, September 1900 "If you are looking for perfect safety, you will do well to sit on a fence and watch the birds; but if you really wish to learn, you must mount a machine and become acquainted with its tricks by actual trial" — Wilbur Wright to Western Society of Engineers in Chicago, Sep 18, 1901 "There are two critical points in every aerial flight -- its beginning and its end" — Alexander Graham Bell, 1906 "The fundamental problem is government people -- pointy-headed bureaucrats -- telling people what to do. There is an environment in this city of people unwilling to admit their mistakes and move ahead. The attitude toward rule-making has been so curtailed that common sense recommendations now take years and years" — James Hall, NTSB, 1996 "There are no new types of aircrashes -- only people with short memories. Every accident has its own forerunners, and every one happens either because somebody did not know where to draw the vital dividing line between the unforeseen and the unforeseeable or because well-meaning people deemed the risk acceptable" "If politics is the art of the possible, and flying is the art of the seemingly impossible, then air safety must be the art of the economically viable. At a time of crowded skies and sharpening competition, it is a daunting task not to let the art of the acceptable deteriorate into the dodgers' art of what you can get away with" — Stephen Barlay writes in 'The Final Call: Why Airline Disasters Continue to Happen' March 1990 "What is the cause of most aviation accidents: Usually it is because someone does too much too soon, followed very quickly by too little too late" — Steve Wilson, NTSB investigator, Oshkosh, WI , August, 1996 "Trouble in the air is very rare. It is hitting the ground that causes it" —Amelia Earhart, '20 Hrs 40 Mins,' 1928 "There is no problem so complex that it cannot simply be blamed on the pilot" — Dr Earl Weiner "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live in the real world" — Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden "If the pilot survives the accident, you'll never find out what really happened" — Doug Jeanes "Flying is inherently dangerous. We like to gloss that over with clever rhetoric and comforting statistics, but these facts remain: gravity is constant and powerful, and speed kills. In combination, they are particularly destructive" — Dan Manningham, 'Business and Commercial Aviation' magazine "Mix ignorance with arrogance at low altitude and the results are almost guaranteed to be spectacular" — Bruce Landsberg, Executive Director of the AOPA Air Safety Foundation "Learning should be fun. If you don't have fun in aviation then you don't learn, and when learning stops, you die" — Pete Campbell, FAA "Flying is so many parts skill, so many parts planning, so many parts maintenance, and so many parts luck. The trick is to reduce the luck by increasing the others" — David L Baker "It's better to miss the lead story at 6 . . . than to become the lead story at 11" — Bruce Erion, President of the National Broadcast Pilots Assn, 1999 "No matter how interested individual employees might be, or what assistance a manufacturer offers, or how insistent a certificating authority might be -- none of these factors will have a significant effect on safety without support from top management" — John O'Brian, ALPA's Engineering and Air Safety Department "I'd hate to see an epitaph on a fighter pilot's tombstone that says, "I told you I needed training." . . . How do you train for the most dangerous game in the world by being as safe as possible? When you don't let a guy train because it's dangerous, you're saying, "Go fight those lions with your bare hands in that arena, because we can't teach you to learn how to use a spear." — Colonel 'Boots' Boothby, USAF "When you have two engines, you have two engines that can fall to bits. When you have four, you have four that can fall to bits. The less engines you have, the safer you are" — Frank Fickeisen, chief engineer for Boeing, replying to a complaint made by American Airlines Allied Pilots' Association about dangers of flying two-engine airplanes across the Pacific "The alleviation of human error, whether design or intrinsically human, continues to be the most important problem facing aerospace safety" — Jerome Lederer "Of the major incentives to improve safety, by far the most compelling is that of economics. The moral incentive, which is most evident following an accident, is more intense but is relatively short lived" — Jerome Lederer "The high level of safety achieved in scheduled airline operations lately should not obscure the fact that most of the accidents that occurred could have been prevented. This suggest that in many instances, the safety measures already in place may have been inadequate, circumvented or ignored" — International Civil Aviation Organization, 'Accident Prevention Manual, 1984 "Complacency or a false sense of security should not be allowed to develop as a result of long periods without an accident or serious incident. An organisation with a good safety record is not necessarily a safe organisation" — International Civil Aviation Organisation, 'Accident Prevention Manual, 1984 "The hard, inescapable reality is that anyone who flies may die in an airplane" — Stephen Coonts "ATTENTION! Aircraft Designers, Operators, Airmen, Managers. Anxiety never disappears in a human being in an airplane -- it merely remains dormant when there is no cause to arouse it. Our challenge is to keep it forever dormant" — Harold Harris, Vice President, Pan American World Airways, circa 1950 "For they had learned that true safety was to be found in long previous training, and not in eloquent exhortations uttered when they were going into action" — Thucydides, 'The History of the Peloponnesian War,' circa 404 BC All quotes from here: What the air gurus say. I thought that a few fit well with what we do. - Jim"Like" - The modern day comma Good bye, my friends. You are missed. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
skydyvr 0 #2 October 4, 2003 I love those! But this one sounds like flawed reasoning: Quote "When you have two engines, you have two engines that can fall to bits. When you have four, you have four that can fall to bits. The less engines you have, the safer you are" — Frank Fickeisen, chief engineer for Boeing, replying to a complaint made by American Airlines Allied Pilots' Association about dangers of flying two-engine airplanes across the Pacific . . =(_8^(1) Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pds 0 #3 October 4, 2003 Quote"In flying I have learned that carelessness and overconfidence are usually far more dangerous than deliberately accepted risks" — Wilbur Wright in a letter to his father, September 1900 dedicated to those who continue to call me a dead man walking. recognizing and pushing your own envelope is an entirely subjective learning experience and does not necessarily imply ignorance or carelessness.namaste, motherfucker. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
happythoughts 0 #4 October 4, 2003 William D. Becker was the mayor of St. Louis, in 1943. During WWII, a local company was making gliders to sell to the Army. During peacetime, the company made coffins. He was absolutely convinced that the gliders were excellently built. On August 5th, he and 5 other city leaders went up in a glider to offer a demonstration. The glider was being towed up when the wings fell off. Perhaps his faith was misplaced. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Atlas 0 #5 October 4, 2003 QuoteI love those! But this one sounds like flawed reasoning: Quote "When you have two engines, you have two engines that can fall to bits. When you have four, you have four that can fall to bits. The less engines you have, the safer you are" — Frank Fickeisen, chief engineer for Boeing, replying to a complaint made by American Airlines Allied Pilots' Association about dangers of flying two-engine airplanes across the Pacific It might look that way at first glance, but engine blowouts can be quite spectacular :) They can rip the wing up something fierce if something goes wrong "just right" hehe. It makes sense in my book :/ Just like the engines GE made for the 777. There are only two of them on there, and one of them alone can fly the plane from new york to england. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
darkvapor 0 #6 October 4, 2003 Some more very good reading material: http://www.skygod.com/quotes/misc.html http://www.skygod.com/quotes/lastwords.html That last words page is very powerful. It's sort of eerie reading about incidents which inevitably resulted in a loss of life, but at the same time, they are so powerful and sometimes even inspiring. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tailwheel 0 #7 October 4, 2003 How about the universal pilots utterance of "Oh Shit!" Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Aviatrr 0 #8 October 4, 2003 QuoteHow about the universal pilots utterance of "Oh Shit!" I always wonder what people would think if I crashed and they listened to the CVR....some of the conversations we get into are....umm....best NOT made public. Sometimes I tell the FO to erase the CVR(we have those nice little test and erase buttons on our panels on the FO's side!) after we've landed and blocked in. Mike Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
wildblue 7 #9 October 4, 2003 I like: "Mix ignorance with arrogance at low altitude and the results are almost guaranteed to be spectacular"it's like incest - you're substituting convenience for quality Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
