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Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

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Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#191

Post by smackfu »

nathanstitt wrote: post #177
jcoby wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True. Or they bought the plane 20+ years ago and still own it. When I go to EAA meetings I'm the youngest by 15-20 years and I'm in my 30s. I don't think I've ever seen a privately owned certified plane that was newer than 25 years old. It's all around a bad situation for general aviation.

Same here. I'm in my late 30s and am by far the youngest at any pilot gathering I attend. I really don't know where the airlines are going to get the next generation of pilots from. Of course with the horrible pay and hours, I can't blame anyone from not choosing that career path.

>I really don't know where the airlines are going to get the next generation of pilots from.

The military. As usual.

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#192

Post by nathanstitt »

smackfu wrote: post #191
nathanstitt wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here. I'm in my late 30s and am by far the youngest at any pilot gathering I attend. I really don't know where the airlines are going to get the next generation of pilots from. Of course with the horrible pay and hours, I can't blame anyone from not choosing that career path.

>I really don't know where the airlines are going to get the next generation of pilots from. The military. As usual.

Eh, I'm not so sure that'll happen. Military pilots aren't getting as many hours as they used to, plus it's actually a pay drop for them to leave and work for an airliner the way it is right now.

Right now the airlines have managed to talk high school grads into taking out huge student loans and drop 100K+ on a for-profit school, then take a job making ~ 20. There's no way that's sustainable though.

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#193

Post by pingswept »

S201 wrote: post #122
pingswept wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but it takes around 45 minutes to prepare a plane for flight and about 20 minutes to put it away. Also, you have to drive to and from the airport. Planes are incredible, but you have to fly pretty far before they're a timesaver.

Where did those numbers come from? Preflight and run-up can be done in 20 minutes once you've done it many times and securing after a flight is as simple as turning everything off and pushing the plane in the hanger or parking on the pad. That's maybe 10 minutes at most. The only really time consuming part would be making and filing a flight plan. If you've done the route multiple times, you already have the flight p…

My parents are both pilots. The numbers are just my estimates from having flown with them a bunch. Maybe my numbers are a little high, but I think I'd stand by them.

There's always a bunch of dealing with cranking open the hanger door with the winch, dragging the plane out, checking that there is no water in the fuel (both tanks), transferring the stuff you're bringing with you from the car to the plane, getting into the seatbelt, plugging in the headsets and checking that they're all working, talking to the tower, taxiing out to the runway, waiting for a plane or two to take off, and then actually taking off.

Anyway, have fun flying.

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#194

Post by Tossrock »

vilhelm_s wrote: post #168
jedmeyers wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those are not the same "motorcycles" each year, so you cannot multiply by 30.

How do you mean? The suggested calculation is: In any given year, a motorcycle owner has a 72/100000 chance of dying. So if you own a motorcycle for 30 years, the chance of dying is approximately 30*72/100000.

That is not how a binomial probability is calculated. Consider the case where you flip a coin twice - do you have a 2 * 1/2, or 100% chance of getting a 'head'? Obviously not – you have a 75% chance.

The actual way you calculate the probability of an event with a binomial distribution is by taking the inverse probability and raising it to the power of the attempts, then subtracting from 1. So in the case of two coin flips, that is 1 - (1/2 ^ 2), or a 75% of getting a 'head'. That would mean, with a huge host of assumptions, that a motorcyclist's chance of dying over 30 years would be 1 - (99928/100000)^30, or (funnily enough), 2.13%.

edit: I said bimodal when I meant binomial.

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#195

Post by baddox »

lutorm wrote: post #178
baddox wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> have you ever had your car engine die on the road? Yes, several times in the ten years I've been driving automobiles. Is that not common?

As far as I can recall, it hasn't ever happened to me in the 24 years I've been driving. Are you doing the required maintenance?

I suspect it is strongly correlated to how much you spend on cars (particularly, how old your cars are). I've had a car that liked to overheat, which took a couple of trips to the mechanic before they sorted it out. I also had a truck that had some sort of electrical problem (I don't remember what exactly, and I know nothing about automobiles).

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#196

Post by mistercow »

jcoby wrote: post #135
mistercow wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, that makes sense, although I guess I'm a bit surprised that FBW isn't common with ultralights, given its advantages.

In the US an ultralight has to be under 254 pounds and does not require any training or licensing to fly. In most other countries an ultralight is more like the sport class in the US. At 254 pounds you want light and simple. FBW requires actuators. And controllers. And sensors. And power. And then you have to double up everything for redundancy. You would easily eat up 50 lbs or more making a reliable FBW system and…

This is completely destroying my sense of living in the future. I have no choice but to delete this discussion from my memory.

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#197

Post by rogerhoward »

Retric wrote: post #183
rogerhoward wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you own a motorcycle for 30 years, your chances are not the same every year - your chances of dying on a bike are higher when you're younger and when you have less years on a bike. So every year I ride, my chance of dying that year on a bike gets smaller. In other words, the bulk of deaths on bikes are young, inexperienced, and/or unlicensed riders. Also, bike deaths are far more likely to involve alcohol than car…

Not really, your odds do change as a non drinker but age is far less important than you might think. Your hypotetical driver that owns a motorcycle for 30 years is more likely to die over 25 than under it. http://www.cdc.gov/features/dsMotorcycleSafety/ A significant reason for this is your far less likely to survive an accident as an older rider than a young one. Note: The death rate statistics they quote include no…

"Your hypotetical driver that owns a motorcycle for 30 years is more likely to die over 25 than under it."

That's a very weird statistic. Sure, since those riders spend most of their 30 years riding time over 25yo.

From your link: "The highest death and injury rates were among 20-24 year-olds, followed by 25-29 year-olds."

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#198

Post by rogerhoward »

Retric wrote: post #183
rogerhoward wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you own a motorcycle for 30 years, your chances are not the same every year - your chances of dying on a bike are higher when you're younger and when you have less years on a bike. So every year I ride, my chance of dying that year on a bike gets smaller. In other words, the bulk of deaths on bikes are young, inexperienced, and/or unlicensed riders. Also, bike deaths are far more likely to involve alcohol than car…

Not really, your odds do change as a non drinker but age is far less important than you might think. Your hypotetical driver that owns a motorcycle for 30 years is more likely to die over 25 than under it. http://www.cdc.gov/features/dsMotorcycleSafety/ A significant reason for this is your far less likely to survive an accident as an older rider than a young one. Note: The death rate statistics they quote include no…

Also, one other note - I was talking about riding experience, not absolute age - something the CDC doesn't track, but other large studies I've seen do. There's a strong correlation between experience - whether gauged by years of riding or, even better, raw mileage.

There's also a huge correlation between unlicensed riders and serious injuries. Motorcycle riders are far more likely to be unlicensed than car drivers - last I heard was something like 3-4 times as likely.

Unlicensed motorcycle riders are over twice as likely to be in fatal accidents than licensed motorcycle riders.

I ride 15,000-20,000 miles a year - I'm well trained, equipped, and experienced. A lot of bike owners ride weekends, occasional trips, etc. I actually don't ride much on the weekends - and when I do, I'm pretty shocked how bad (dangerous, rude, etc) the riders are compared to the commuters I mostly see.

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#199

Post by lutusp »

Tossrock wrote: post #194
vilhelm_s wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you mean? The suggested calculation is: In any given year, a motorcycle owner has a 72/100000 chance of dying. So if you own a motorcycle for 30 years, the chance of dying is approximately 30*72/100000.

That is not how a binomial probability is calculated. Consider the case where you flip a coin twice - do you have a 2 * 1/2, or 100% chance of getting a 'head'? Obviously not – you have a 75% chance. The actual way you calculate the probability of an event with a binomial distribution is by taking the inverse probability and raising it to the power of the attempts, then subtracting from 1. So in the case of two coin…

You certainly deserve my upvote. :)

You set out to correct a naive statistical assumption, computed it properly, and the result was about the same (not at all common for such problems). But you posted it anyway, in the spirit of sharing useful information.

As the Australians say, "Good on you, mate."

Re: Questions People Ask When I Tell Them I Own an Airplane

#200

Post by existencebox »

nathanstitt wrote: post #177
jcoby wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True. Or they bought the plane 20+ years ago and still own it. When I go to EAA meetings I'm the youngest by 15-20 years and I'm in my 30s. I don't think I've ever seen a privately owned certified plane that was newer than 25 years old. It's all around a bad situation for general aviation.

Same here. I'm in my late 30s and am by far the youngest at any pilot gathering I attend. I really don't know where the airlines are going to get the next generation of pilots from. Of course with the horrible pay and hours, I can't blame anyone from not choosing that career path.

Maybe I'm being a bit far fetched here, but what if someone up in management is banking on "phasing out the pilots." Autopilot has for a long time been "good at some things", and there's often debate here as to what purpose a human pilot increasingly does or doesn't have in the cockpit as the computerized solutions become more reliable. As there are fewer pilots, relegate the physical role to a babysitter; potentially cutting down on the initial educational costs and reopening the low wage employment doors without that first costly hurdle.
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