Upcoming Webinar
"Landing with Confidence" is a dynamic, one-hour recurrent training session designed for pilots who already know how to land well—but want to land even better. Attendance at the event including, including completion of a brief online quiz, is valid for 1 Credit, Advanced Knowledge Topic 2 in the Wings program. The webinar will be on Thursday, March 19 at 8:00 PM EDT. This presentation is at a time favorable for the eastern half of the U.S. We will soon announce another live running of the event at a time more favorable for the western half of the country. Registration is limited and required. Click here to register on Zoom.
NASA "Callback"
In a subject dear to my heart, the latest issue of NASA "Callback" deals with risk management and mitigation. Check it out here.
Recommended Viewing: "Crosswind Essentials"
March is famous for it's wind which may or may not be down our runway. This 6-minute video reviews the concept of the demonstrated crosswind component and some rules-of-thumb for determining it the crosswind component for each landing. We discuss the mechanics involved in the crosswind landing and how ground loops and dynamic rollovers occur. Finally, we provide some practical tips on handling wind gusts. Sponsored by Avemco. Click here to see the video on YouTube.
Free Virtual Safety Presentations Available
As you plan your late fall and winter meetings for your pilot group, consider including a virtual guest speaker. We can provide a safety presentation, valid for Wings credits if you choose, free of charge, courtesy of Avemco. For more information or to schedule, contact gene@genebenson.com. Click here to download a copy of our current presentation catalog.
The brain's conflict monitoring system helps us to make the best decision when it matters most.
Arm Wrestling Within Our Brain
Sometimes your brain is hosting a wrestling match? Not the kind with ropes and referees, but a mental arm-wrestling contest between different parts of your brain, each vying to make the next move. Turns out, this isn’t just a quirky metaphor—it’s how your brain actually works!
Imagine your brain has its own “quality control” department. This team is always on the lookout for moments when your goals are challenged by conflicting information. The star player here is the Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC). Think of it as the referee, watching for any friction between what you want to do and what you should do. When the ACC spots a clash, it sounds the alarm and calls in the Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex (DLPFC), the captain of cognitive control. The DLPFC steps in, sharpens your focus, and helps you pick the right response, keeping you from making a mistake. This feedback loop keeps repeating as new challenges pop up, making sure your brain stays on top of its game.
Let’s take this airborne. Pilots are pros at using this system. Picture yourself on a short field takeoff, a tree line looming ahead. Instinct screams, “Pull back!”—but your training says, “Wait, that could stall the airplane!” Your conflict monitoring system jumps into action, weighing options: trust your calculations, make a slight turn, or stick with your gut. It’s a mental tug-of-war, and the winner decides your next move. Sometimes, the best choice isn’t the obvious one, and your brain’s wrestling match helps you figure that out.
Not every conflict is dramatic. Maybe you’re switching fuel tanks. You know what happens if select the “OFF” position or a tank with little fuel. Your conflict monitoring system pauses you for a split second, bumps the decision up to your conscious mind, and makes sure you double-check before acting. It’s these tiny moments of hesitation that keep you safe and smart.
Here’s a cool bonus: once your conflict monitoring system is activated, it stays on high alert for a few seconds. This is called the Grafton effect. If another challenge pops up, your brain is ready to resolve it even faster. In emergencies, this supercharged alertness can be a lifesaver, helping you make rapid, accurate decisions when it matters most.
Want to make your brain’s wrestling team even stronger? Scenario-based training is one answer. By practicing different situations, you teach your conflict monitoring system to spot the best action quickly and confidently. This kind of mental rehearsal can help you make smarter, faster choices when the pressure is on.
There are also brain games online that can sharpen the conflict monitoring system in general. "Dual M-Back" exercises are a great place to start. Here are links to some websites that offer free online exercises:
Hesitation
Picture someone standing at a roulette table, rent money in hand, heart thumping. Just as the chips start to leave their fingers, something inside yanks the brakes. That jolt—that internal “are you *sure* about this?”—is the brain’s conflict‑monitoring system firing off. The anterior cingulate cortex rapidly weighs risk, emotion, and consequence, and for a split second it pushes the person toward inaction until they either commit…or walk away.
In aviation, that same moment of hesitation can be a guardian angel or a silent threat. Pausing before you twist a fuel selector or lift a landing‑gear handle is smart—it gives your higher‑order thinking a chance to double‑check the plan. But hesitation at the wrong moment—like during a go‑around or an aborted takeoff—can be deadly.
A sudden startle can scramble the conflict‑monitoring system. Something unexpected on short final can freeze a pilot just long enough for continuation bias to take the controls. After all, you’ve invested time, effort, and pride into making the landing work. A go‑around can *feel* like a failure, even when it’s the safest choice.
And those last few seconds of an approach are a cognitive knife‑edge. Workload spikes. Working memory is stretched thin. The brain starts filtering aggressively to protect the current plan. Conflicting cues—wind shear, unstable airspeed, a ballooning flare—may get filtered out entirely, leaving the pilot stuck in a moment of dangerous indecision.
The takeoff roll is no different. Evidence that screams “abort now” can be mentally muffled, and that hesitation can lead to a late reject, a runway overrun, or a liftoff with a serious, unrecognized problem.
Even in aircraft equipped with a ballistic recovery system, hesitation has cost lives. In those cases, the delay is usually tied to poor decision‑making rather than the split‑second cognitive conflict we’re focusing on here.
Flight instructors face their own version of this challenge. Accident reports often criticize delayed intervention, but the cognitive load and social dynamics involved are far more complex than a simple “why didn’t they act sooner.”
Pilots can fight back against dangerous hesitation by building clear, non‑negotiable gates into their flying. A stabilization altitude, for example, becomes a hard line: if the approach isn’t stable by that point, the go‑around happens immediately—no debate, no bargaining. But gates alone aren’t enough. Scenario‑based training is what burns these decisions into muscle memory, cutting through startle, bias, and the brain’s instinct to cling to the original plan.
We can dive deeper into improving our cognitive response by doing some mental exercises. See how in our “Squawking Human” feature.
Accidents discussed in this section are presented in the hope that pilots can learn from the misfortune of others and perhaps avoid an accident. It is easy to read an accident report and dismiss the cause as carelessness or as a dumb mistake. But let's remember that the accident pilot did not get up in the morning and say, "Gee, I think I'll go have an accident today." Nearly all pilots believe that they are safe. Honest introspection frequently reveals that on some occasion, we might have traveled down that same accident path.
The 73-yer-old, 541-hour private pilot involved in this Cessna 150 crash was extremely fortunate to survive with only minor injuries. The crash occurred in Maine in June of 2024. The NTSB supplied video below shows the dramatic result of the pilot's decisions.
NTSB supplied video
The NTSB report includes the following: The pilot stated that the tailwind for the selected turf runway was “5 to 10 [knots] with some gusting.” He said the winds “did not seem unruly…” so he continued the approach and once he was close to the ground the winds were “very flukey.” He said with full reduction of throttle, 30° of flaps, and speed slowed to “landing” the airplane would not “settle down.” At touchdown, the pilot said he was “too long.” He then increased throttle, and “released the flaps and carb heat to go around.”
NTSB Photo showing view of the runway facing the direction of takeoff
The NTSB report continues: "The pilot said that there were no mechanical deficiencies with the airplane preventing normal operation, it simply did not have the performance capability to outclimb the trees. The pilot said the airplane’s left wing brushed a tree reducing its airspeed, and the stall warning sounded intermittently before the airplane “careened” into treetops before it settled nose down onto the ground. During the accident sequence, the airplane sustained substantial damage to the wings and empennage."
NTSB Photo
When asked how the accident could have been prevented, the pilot said a go-around performed “sooner” than the touch-and-go landing.
The NTSB probable cause states: "The pilot’s delayed decision to abort the landing. Contributing was his decision to land downwind."
As I have written many times before, bad things happen on downwind takeoffs and landings. It is best to avoid them except when absolutely necessary and then double the expected landing or takeoff distance.
Regarding the delayed decision, see this month's blog on the subject of hesitation.
Click here to download the accident report from the NTSB website.
Accidents discussed in this section are presented in the hope that pilots can learn from the misfortune of others and perhaps avoid an accident. It is easy to read an accident report and dismiss the cause as carelessness or as a dumb mistake. But let's remember that the accident pilot did not get up in the morning and say, "Gee, I think I'll go have an accident today." Nearly all pilots believe that they are safe. Honest introspection frequently reveals that on some occasion, we might have traveled down that same accident path.
This crash involved a Mooney M20K. It occurred in West Virginia in august of 2024. The 63-year-old, 1497-hour private pilot escaped with minor injuries but a passenger was seriously injured.
NTSB Photo
The NTSB report includes: "TThe pilot stated that while en route to his destination he diverted to an alternate airport due to low cloud cover. After reviewing the runway length at the diversion airport, he overflew it then entered the airport traffic pattern for landing. He turned onto the base and final legs of the airport traffic pattern, and while on final approach, he recognized the airplane was fast but continued the approach. He reported that the airplane touched down too far down the runway, with a witness indicating that the airplane touched down past the last crossing taxiway, which resulted in about 836 ft of runway remaining."
NTSB Photo
The NTSB report continues: "After touchdown the pilot stated that he applied the airplane’s brakes momentarily, but in that instant, he knew he was fast and added power to abort the landing. The engine responded and he fully retracted the flaps. During the subsequent climb out, the airplane impacted trees and then the ground. The airplane’s fuselage and left wing were substantially damaged."
NTSB Photo
The NTSB probable cause states: "The pilot’s failure to attain the proper touchdown point, and his delay in aborting the landing."
NTSB Photo
Again, we have a hesitation in making the decision to go around as discussed in this month's blog article.
The NTSB docket includes a summary of a conversation between the pilot and an NTSB investigator. Click here to download that record of conversation directly from the NTSB accident docket.
Click here to download the accident report from the NTSB website.
Accidents discussed in this section are presented in the hope that pilots can learn from the misfortune of others and perhaps avoid an accident. It is easy to read an accident report and dismiss the cause as carelessness or as a dumb mistake. But let's remember that the accident pilot did not get up in the morning and say, "Gee, I think I'll go have an accident today." Nearly all pilots believe that they are safe. Honest introspection frequently reveals that on some occasion, we might have traveled down that same accident path.
This crash involved a Cessna 150L and occurred in Georgia in July of 2023. The 60-year-old, 5632-hour private pilot escaped with minor injuries. The NTSB report includes the following: "The pilot reported that during the engine start the engine “skipped” a few times. He then taxied to runway 11 at EBA and performed a run-up, which he described as “normal.” The pilot applied full power for takeoff, and when the airplane became airborne the engine exhibited “a couple of quick power surges” and then a steady partial loss of power. He recalled seeing an engine speed of 2,100 rpm and that he became “fixated” on the throttle, mixture, and keeping the wings level. During the initial climb, he realized he had traveled too far down the runway to abort the takeoff. Subsequently, he reduced pitch, navigated towards an open grassy area between trees, and lowered flaps to 40°. During the touchdown, the left wing abruptly dropped and impacted the ground, and the airplane nosed over during the roll out. The fuselage, wings, and empennage sustained substantial damage."
NTSB Photo
The NTSB accident report continues: "Three witnesses at the airport heard and observed portions of the pilot’s taxi, run-up, and takeoff. The witnesses reported that during the pilot’s taxi the engine was skipping and running rough and continued to run rough during the takeoff. They described that during the initial climb, while the airplane was over the runway, the airplane could not gain altitude and eventually descended out of view towards trees and terrain."
And the NTSB report also includes this note regarding airport surveillance video: "Airport surveillance video captured most of the takeoff and initial climb (the video did not capture sound). The airplane’s first rotation attempt occurred about 2,300 ft from the beginning of runway 31 (total length 5,004 ft). About 300 ft further down the runway, the airplane becomame airborne, but remained near ground effect and did not climb while flying over most of the remaining runway surface. After the airplane flew over the remaining runway surface, it again attempted to climb, and the airplane gained altitude for a few seconds, but descended in a left turn towards terrain and trees before it exited the camera’s view." The video can be seen below.
NTSB supplied video
The NTSB report also includes: "Postaccident examination of the engine revealed that the No. 1 cylinder exhaust valve was stuck. There were no other anomalies observed with the airplane or engine." Supporting that conclusion is the following: "The pilot reported that in the few days preceding the accident, he had experienced multiple partial losses of engine power. He changed the spark plugs the day before the accident and the accident flight was the first flight after that maintenance. It is likely that the repeated engine skipping and partial losses of power the pilot experienced were evidence of a sticking valve, which ultimately became stuck during the accident flight. Had the pilot decided to allow a mechanic to examine the repeated engine issues more thoroughly, the stuck/sticking valve may have been properly diagnosed. Further contributing to the outcome was the pilot’s continuation of the takeoff roll and initial climb despite the opportunity to abort the takeoff and land on the remaining runway surface."
The NTSB probable cause states: "The pilot’s decision to take off with a known engine issue, which resulted in a partial loss of power on the initial climb due to the No. 1 cylinder’s exhaust valve becoming stuck. Contributing to the outcome, was the pilot’s delay in aborting the takeoff."
So we once again see where hesitation, both in contacting a mechanic and in the decision to abort the takeoff, ended badly. This crash illustrates a rule that should be burned into the brains of all pilots, "Never take a problem airborne."
Click here to download the accident report from the NTSB website.
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