That actually happened in a RW 737 and the flight attendant even held a commercial pilot's license and was on track to be a pilot himself with his airline, but hypoxia and other issues such as both engines flamming out worked agasint him and he wasn't successful.

I was about to say that Wikipedia claims that the flight attendant could not have saved the aircraft with his level of experience (he had not received any training on the B737), but after reading the official report, it seems as if the primary factors that prevented him from doing so were indeed extreme stress and the lack of oxygen.

You could handle the systems, but hand flight might get very tricky.

See the thread, "Can you teach a dog to drive?"

 

Hook

I say this with no direct response to any single post here, but every time this comes up and people bag on it, I start to wonder...

 

Can we all stop kidding ourselves here? Flying in and of itself isn't exactly the most difficult thing in the world, and admitting that isn't cheapening all of your experience. After all, your experience will probably pull you through tough spots a lot better. I'm not saying it's the easiest thing around, either, but the idea that it takes some people as much effort as it took you is an outright lie to yourself. Just look at your peers. How long did it take them to hit the various milestones? What did they score on their exams? The fact that most of you have different numbers lends a hand to the idea that you all put in different amounts of effort. In other words, some of you picked it up a lot faster than others.

 

Certain people are prodigies at what they do. Just have a look at sports. There's always someone who will show up later and do it better than the last guy, and sometimes, it's the youngest and least experienced person out there. Some people have a natural aptitude that, in a situation like this, they could pick up the stick and after a few minutes of feeling how it responds, would be able to fly it just fine knowing what you'd pick up from the NGX (or other study-level sim in FS).

 

 

The pilot personality, being predominantly Type A, doesn't lend well to the acceptance that someone else could do it better with less experience, but that's a fact of life. Admitting to yourself that there are people out there who are better, or will be better will only make you a better person, because you'll be more comfortable in your own skin.

 

Give it a rest. It could happen. You know it could happen.

 

Remember, intimate knowledge of the intricacies doesn't keep you from crashing, it makes you a better pilot.

Lots of people can fly planes. Your knowledge and experience allow you to fly better and safer.

 

It's okay if, in a freak turn of events, a 16 year old manages to put a 737 on the ground because of the stuff he learned from the NGX. You will still be able to fly your own planes a lot better, and your experience will still have the same meaning.

 

Some of Wayne Gretzky's impressive records have been broken by younger, newer guys, but his performance remains impressive, and he remains an icon.

Having the knowledge isn't the same as having the skill. A desktop PC might give you most of the knowledge you need; it will give you none of the skill. Combined with real world experience, where you learn the actual skills, the desktop PC can allow you to practice them.

 

Imagine what people outside the flight simulation community would say. "He thinks because he can do it in a video game he can do it in real life."

 

What happens when the real world autopilot doesn't do the same thing it does in FSX, and gets into a state you've never seen before? You can't pause Real Life and look it up in the manual. There's a very good reason why PMDG doesn't allow their aircraft to be used in Prepar3d.

 

I've got a LOT of hours flying GA planes in FSX. I've even got a few hours in real aircraft. That doesn't mean i think I could go down to the local airport and solo later today. Even with an autopilot.

 

Hook

I got to fly a level D full motion 737NG sim last summer having no real world flying experience outside of just a few minutes at the controls of a couple GA aircraft (just making small turns etc) spread out over many years of my life. The first thing I did in the NG sim was this scenario that gets talked about by simmers where you have to land a plane from cruise with no help.

 

I actually did succeed with it but made a pretty critical mistake that could have been disastrous in real life - I left the speedbrake handle extended all the way through to touchdown.This is very easy to do in the real thing where you don't have the huge field of view where you can see the entire cockpit at once like you can in FSX. Handflying the airplane is a lot easier than it is in FSX actually - the real yoke is much more deliberate and harder to overcontrol with than a flimsy joystick is in FSX. Judging the flare is pretty difficult though (as someone above mentioned) and I definitely hit harder than I would have liked. All the systems stuff I did with relative ease - FMC, MCP, AP & AT etc. Approach was a handflown visual to the runway that I had programmed into the FMC (as an ILS) and displayed on the ND.

 

I also did a handflown Cat I ILS, a CAT IIIb autoland (this would be really scary actually in the real thing, you don't see anything until you're already in the flare) and I handled a V1 cut and a microburst just after takeoff successfully without knowing what was coming from the sim operator. I failed at doing a single engine crosswind landing though just because my rudder skills aren't that great (I don't have pedals on my FSX setup).

 

In short - no, a level D sim is not the real airplane, but it's as close as most can ever get and it's good enough that they train real pilots on it. I'm pretty confident I could in fact get the real thing down, especially with someone talking me through things on the radio to make sure I didn't make silly mistakes like leaving the speedbrakes out. The things you'll screw up going from FSX on a home PC to an actual cockpit are mostly going to be ergonomics and instrument scan related I think - stuff like figuring out how to adjust the seat height even is not obvious from FSX. Throwing in weather, failures etc multiplies the chance that you won't succeed too.

Yessssssss!

 

Ask Mr. M. Atta.

 

He did it.

Yessssssss!

 

Ask Mr. M. Atta.

 

He did it.

 

He didn't try to land and I don't think it would be that hard to steer a 767 if you don't intend on following air traffic protocols or even aircraft limits. Also did have some formal flight training, they didn't spend a couple of hours with a simulator and then decide to go with their plan.

No, because flying an $80 simulation on an archaic platform aka FSX doesn't compare to the thousands of dollars in training and flight hours real pilots get before even sitting in the right seat.

 

It's wishful thinking but great stuff to daydream about when you're bored at work or trying to fall asleep at night.

 

I strongly disagree.

 

First off, FS9/FSX, NGX et. al.. is NOT an $80 simulation. That's the retail price point. It's actually a multi-million dollar simulation that's priced to sell many units at $80 each, thereby making up investment in sales quantity, not price.

 

Secondly, it would be better to break the question down a bit further.

 

Maybe a better set of questions would be:

 

a) If I know how to operate the PMDG 737 properly, could I operate a real 737NG properly? The answer is an astounding YES! I know, because I've done it. I can tell you the name of the aircraft and where it was- The US Navy P8 named City of Orange Park, based at NAS JAX in Jacksonville, Florida (where I worked as contractor one time). I can tell you that the technician was blown away by the fact that I knew where every single item in the cockpit related to pre-start and start of the APU and all the electrical systems were and the flows to get them up and running.

 

b) If I can "fly" the 737 in FSX, then can I fly it in the real world? Maybe, maybe not. I would say that I definitely can both fly and operate real-world aircraft better than the average person with no sim experience because I've done it time and time again. Do I have bad habits? Yes (not looking outside enough when clearly flying VFR in the real world). Do you feel all the same sensations? Clearly the answer is no. But, flying an ILS is not much different in a real C172 and a 737 outside of speed and power management along with all the safety flows required to operate procedurally correct. Always remember- very few planes are intentionally designed to fly poorly.

 

PS- I guess I should throw in that I fly my full scale LJ45 sim weekly and that probably would help quite a bit as far as having more of a feel to all the hardware in place vs. mouse/keyboard. But the experience I shared regarding being able to operate the aircraft after spending considerable time with the PMDG 737NG (original version for FS9) on desktop and then getting a session in the real aircraft- that was before I had my full size sim and naturally, the LJ45 and 737 are not comparable in any way other than both being faster than a C172 :-)

 

Handflying the airplane is a lot easier than it is in FSX actually

 

+++1

SIMULATION SIMULATION that's what it is. YES you could fire up the aircraft if the simulated aircraft model contains detailed pit and procedures and even maybe take it to the RWY and even probably rotate it if all the documents or POH provided are perfect I SAY MAYBE , but I feel once up in the air there are forces on the aircraft which no armchair pilot could experience on a sim of course if you had a wind tunnel that would be different. Landing and circuit patterns would be the most difficult.

To those making the comments about the price point, the vast difference in price isn't to pay the engineers working on the dynamics of the sim, it's to get the sim certified. If you look at a lot of the FAA Certified, commercially available sims (even non-motion), you're going to see a price tag up in the thousands, often with fewer features than FSX.

 

Contrary to popular belief, these aren't flown by FAA gurus who sit down and nitpick every flight dynamic issue. Basically, the company selects a pilot who "is qualified in" the real aircraft being simulated (note, "is qualified in" is in quotes, meaning I pulled that directly from the CFR/FARs - it does not specify what "is qualified in" means - did that pilot get checked out in the plane yesterday, or do that have 1000 hours - isn't specified*). That pilot then subjectively says "yes or no." The FAA will then validate this though the objective method of comparing the data spit out by the sim versus official sources such as the real world aircraft flight manual.

 

So, you're essentially using the exact same thing on your personal computer. You just haven't paid to go through the process of getting it certified. That is really the only difference.

 

Here's a pic of one of RedBird's offerings.

Those runway textures look oddly familiar, don't they?

 

 

 

* Don't believe me? Here it is:

(d) The pilot(s) who contributes to the confirmation statement required by paragraph (b) of this section must—

(1) Be designated by the sponsor; and

(2) Be qualified in—

(i) The aircraft or set of aircraft being simulated; or

(ii) For aircraft not yet issued a type certificate, or aircraft not previously operated by the sponsor or not having previous FAA-approved training programs conducted by the sponsor, an aircraft similar in size and configuration.

Trust me......If my life was on the line, I would land it! :blink: :unsure:

 

Life's a simulator........It just takes longer to re-set! :ph34r:

Doubtful, I flew the DA-20 and C172 in the sim and once I started to train on the real planes the handling and experience is much different than in the sim.

 

In what way was the handling and experience much more different ?

 

 

In what way was the handling and experience much more different ?

 

RW flying is so much more dynamic. Hard to put onto words. There are just so many forces large and small acting on an aircraft. The only sim I think comes close is the DCS series, especially the p51.

I've flown in a full motion 737-800 simulator a couple of months ago. The instructor told me every time he had a NGX-er in the seat, he was surprised of the amount of knowledge and skills of us simmers. Personally I landed the plane the first time, but not perfectly.

You have to remember that in such an occasion that you have to take over the controls because the pilots are in some way incapable, your heart rate will be probably around 200 BPM and your bloodpressure likewise. Furthermore, you are likely to suffer from some kind of tunnelvision and forgot most of your experience you had on the NGX. Most of that because your life is on the line, as well as a couple of hundred others's lifes. However, if you have some help from "below", you have a better chance than someone with no experience at all, I think.

 

Greetz,

Sjoerd Nieuwland (EHTE)

By the way, asked myself that question a few times..