Los-Angeles-Shooter Loc: Los Angeles

I have a friend. This guy has endless hours of flying time, and is rated for multi-engine, jets, commercial, instrument (of course) and in a variety of training environments and flying gigs has vast experience with pilots of all levels of sk**l and experience AND G****R. He has also done instructing though does not hold a CFI rating.

My friend thinks women have no place flying an airplane. Especially with passengers on board.

He made several observations while flying me through the sky and having $100 hamburgers later.

HYPERSENSITIVE TO CRITICISM OR IMPLIED CRITICISM: One male pilot always ran his own checklist of the essentials on a jetliner just before takeoff, just to be sure and extra careful. Never had an issue with a male pilot, whose attitude was always "The more safety checks the better." One day he was assigned to fly with a woman and when he did his usual routine, the woman threw a tantrum and accused him of insulting her by implying she didn't know the checklist or how to do it right.

FREEZING AND GIVING UP IN TOUGH SITUATIONS: Most jetliner training is done in hyper-realistic simulators, where the trainers deliberately simulate engine failures, fire warnings, landing gear malfunctions and other unusual situations. The pilots often leave the simulator mentally exhausted and bathed in sweat. My pilot friend said he has REPEATEDLY seen women pilots give up or freeze in difficult situations. He has seen male pilots make mistakes and screw up. But he NEVER saw a male pilot give up, throw his hands in the air, or burst into tears when things got tough. (Note: for affirmative action and political correctness reasons, female pilots are supposedly given more leeway than men as to passing/flunking simulator training and tests.)

Nor is the giving up and crying confined to the safety of a simulator. A male pilot friend of my friend was flying with a "fully-qualified" woman pilot in a light twin. On final, with gear and flaps fully down, one engine quit. (Now, for you non-pilots, I'll share the fact that this is an EXTREMELY dangerous situation for a variety of reasons. But to oversimplify, one major reason is that the working engine tends to skew the airplane around and there may not be enough rudder authority at that slow airspeed to keep the plane flying right. If you want a fuller explanation of the dangers of this situation, take a multi-engine pilot out for lunch and get him talking.)

So, the woman pilot was flying and when one engine quit ... so did she. She let go of the controls, threw up her hands, and screamed into the headset microphone, "I can't deal with this." The astonished male pilot took over. (He said later that he would have smashed her arms off the controls if the woman hadn't let go already.) With sterling airmanship and cool nerves and keeping his head and following procedures, he managed to avert what would have almost certainly been a fatal crash
.
The day after, he was still so shaken up by the near fatal-crash and the woman pilot's incompetence that he didn't want to do ANY flying for a few days. And this was a man who had seen air combat.

The woman, aided by the affirmative action push for pilots with vaginas, went on to a career with a regional airline. I believe but don't recall that she wound up flying CR-J jets.

My own friend's conclusion after extensive experience is that women are fine as pilots IF EVERYTHING GOES SMOOTHLY. But he feels that when things get tough and the s..t hits the fan, you're much better off with a male pilot next to you.

I realize this modest and impartial post may cause energetic discussion. But energetic discussion is what free speech is all about. So everyone feel free to speak up, and I'm especially interested in hearing what actual pilots have to say.

dljen Loc: Central PA

I would take everything your friend says with a grain of salt. He probably thinks women shouldn't be in the cockpit but rather at home, barefoot and pregnant.

skylane5sp Loc: Puyallup, WA

There are C-17 all female flight crews. But they don't call where they work the cockpit. They call it the box office...
No kidding. Really.

nakkh Loc: San Mateo, Ca

Your virgin friend should stop hating women.


....

mwalsh Loc: Houston

AaaaHaHa!

I don't eat cherries anymore,

just the box they came in!

Los-Angeles-Shooter Loc: Los Angeles

My friend likes women and they like him. His opinions about women PILOTS were formed from experience. He had no opinions pro or con when he started flying.

There is a noticeable push going on among the airlines to get more women pilots. They also try hard to find minority race pilots but there are deucedly few of those to go around.

Los-Angeles-Shooter Loc: Los Angeles

I'd love to hear from some PILOTS.

My friend's comments are consistent with those of some other pilots I know. One of them is a check ride pilot with a major airline. He decries the abandonment of strict standards in favor of affirmative action.

nakkh Loc: San Mateo, Ca

Well, as everyone knows one persons opinion / life experience is makes for an absolute t***h..

davidheald1942 Loc: Mars (the planet)

I once heard of this woman stunt pilot who had a nasty crack up.
ronny :lol: :lol: :thumbup: :thumbup:

Nikonista Loc: England

Me too. I always like it when I find we have female crew as I really believe tthay have to work ten times as hard and be ten times better than a male to get to the same level.

Frank T Loc: New York, NY

Wow, Neanderthals actually do exist.

Jackinthebox Loc: travel the world

I am not an actual pilot but I am an actual passenger. No one ever asked me for my preference, male or female pilot. I prefer women for almost everything except piloting.

It should be a choice when making online bookings.

Yes, I want my RIGHTS, I want male pilots.

Jackel Loc: California

This poor fellow's head-in-the-sand prejudice against women flying aircraft is just that, prejudice, with no basis in fact.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_Airforce_Service_Pilots

Los-Angeles-Shooter Loc: Los Angeles

Not in these days of affirmative action and other discriminatory policies. Today, just the opposite is the fact of the matter. Women can be less competent than males and reach the same or higher levels of advancement.

dljen Loc: Central PA

Do you really believe that, Shooter? Wouldn't you as a pilot, man or woman, want the welfare of your passengers and the plane entrusted to you to mean more than anything. I still think this guy doesn't feel a woman deserves the job...because she is a woman.