A flight instructor recounts a chaotic lesson where anxiety, fatigue, and overconfidence collided in the cockpit, triggering freezing, irrational mistakes, and a near-loss of control. The conversation digs into FAA psychology, acute fatigue symptoms, and why impatience and perceived unfairness can sabotage pilot training.

Show Notes

• AIH Chapter 2: Human Behavior: https://www.faa.gov/sites/faa.gov/files/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/aviation/aviation_instructors_handbook/04_aih_chapter_2.pdf

This episode breaks down the FAA’s POTBIT warning signs for bad instructor questions—like puzzles, oversize prompts, false choices, and trick wording—and shows how they can overwhelm a student’s working memory. It ends with a clear model for asking focused, safety-minded questions that actually test what a pilot knows.

Show Notes

• AIH Chapter 6: Assessment: https://www.faa.gov/sites/faa.gov/files/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/aviation/aviation_instructors_handbook/08_aih_chapter_6.pdf

Using a near-miss in the cockpit and a hilarious old biplane story, this episode breaks down the FAA’s distinction between slips and mistakes. It also introduces practical error-reduction strategies pilots can use to slow down, verify actions, and avoid dangerous planning and execution failures.

A frazzled flight lesson turns a near-stall and crosswind landing into a crash course on the RUAC learning model: rote, understanding, application, and correlation. Along the way, the episode shows why memorizing facts isn’t enough when you need to actually fly the airplane.