Flight instructors at an aviation school in northeast Iowa are using Saturday’s plane crash in San Francisco as a teaching tool. University of Dubuque Aviation School Chief Flight Instructor Brett Hoben says it’s critical for a student to spend several hundred hours flying an aircraft before they’re granted a pilot’s license.
“It’s that repetition — doing things over and over again and just imprinting that into our mindset and into our actions,” Hoben says. “Developing that muscle memory takes time.” The National Transportation Safety Board is still investigating the crash of the Boeing 777 that killed two people and injured more than 180 others.
The pilot of Asiana Flight 214 was reportedly inexperienced with the 777. Hoben notes the San Francisco crash is an example of why training is so important across various plane models. He says every pilot needs repetitive training on each and every single plane they fly.
Hoben says while flying a plane is routine, it’s nothing like the proverbial “riding a bike”. Hoben said, “There are a lot of complex systems that need to be learned and memorized on a jet. There are different speeds even between jets of that size and several differences in systems.”
A spokesperson for Asiana Airlines reported the pilot in Saturday’s crash had logged nearly 10,000 hours operating other planes but had only 43 hours in the 777.
By Katie Wiedemann, KCRG-TV, Cedar Rapids