Governor General's Cup Air Rally 2009

“…a lone renegade patch of thick fog suddenly rolled in off the water and made a beeline for the runway. Elder expertly ducked the Cherokee Six under the ever-lowering cloud deck to make a safe landing at the last minute (I was positioned for the go-around). We went IMC on the rollout. A while later, after attempting several approaches, a brave rally Aussie Cessna 172 pilot finally managed a landing after the fog moved a hair. A harrowing experience to hear, yet not see, was the airplane barely above the runway in the fog. Prayers were whispered. Later the ceiling dropped to zero.”

This is an excerpt of a recently published article written by MayBay Beeler, a pilot under paid contract with Aviation Connection. In the article, she describes the arrival of non instrument-rated rally pilots at Havre St. Pierre Airport during the Eastern section of the rally to which I did not participate.

Since the runway at Havre-st-Pierre is less than 1 mile long (4,500 feet) and Cherokee Six airplanes have a typical ground roll distance between 600 and 1,000 feet, IMC on the roll-out seems to indicate visibilities well below the minimum 1 SM visibility required for any VFR operations anywhere in the world. Furthermore, Havre St. Pierre Airport offers METAR and TAF reports for planning purpose and AWOS for updated information at the airport (difficult to not be aware of the current weather conditions, if desired).

Prayers replacing airmanship — like may be checking weather data and/or having a backup plan (there is another airport just 34 NM away). According to NTSB statistics, VFR flight into instrument conditions ends in fatalities in 85% of all occurrences.

Something like that was predictable considering the behaviors I observed during the first section of the rally. As Bruce Landsberg, Executive Director of the AOPA Air Safety Foundation, said: “Mix ignorance with attitude and the results are almost guaranteed to be spectacular.” Apparently, prayers worked this time…

According to the same article, only 12 airplanes including 4 carrying paid members of the organization finished the rally out of the 30. That suggests that two third of pilots registered in the rally realized that this rally’s activities were not meeting their expectations.

Flying in Canada

The raw beauty as well as the vastness of Canada’s wilderness has an appeal that few adventurous pilots can resist. The kindness and helpfulness of Canadian people make each stop warm and restful.

Canada offers a great diversity of flying environments: from busy metropolis with abundant resources to sparsely populated areas with inhospitable land. Although many pilots believe that the most challenging piloting occurs in congested areas, I have always found that, in fact, remote areas require more knowledge and skills. In these areas, there is no one to guide you or watch out for you. Less help means more work to stay safe.

In Canada, pilots must file a flight plan or flight itinerary for any VFR flight beyond 25 miles from the departure airport and must file an alternate for any IFR flight. This rule makes a great deal of sense when considering the Canadian flying environment and the challenges associated with search and rescue operations. In addition, the archiving of flight plans permits monitoring of flights so logbook entries and flying conditions can be verified if necessary. It keeps everyone honest.

Transport Canada recently made using a 406 MHz ELT mandatory in Canada. Those who have flown in the Canadian North or over the Canadian Rockies certainly understand the need for such a requirement.

Our airplane, the Diamond DA 40

Diamond DA40s are built in Canada, at the London Ontario manufacturing plant. The initial concept for Diamond aircraft came from Austria in Europe. Safety and fuel efficiency were the driving factors behind the project.

Today, Diamond aircraft holds the best safety record among light GA aircraft. Fuel efficiency is a plus. For example, our DA40 travels 60% more miles per gallon that the equivalent-in-performance Cessna 182. With the wheel fairings on (we did not have them, grrrr), the DA40 cruises at between 130 and 135 knots on as little as 8.2 gallons an hour. One other airplane in the Diamond Aircraft line, the DA20C, known as the Eclipse, delivers 29 miles per gallon. That is much better than most cars on the road today.

What really makes the Diamond a great airplane is how much fun the airplane is to fly. Not only is it responsive, maneuverable and has plenty of excess power, it also provides great visibility and comfortable seating. The stylish and elegant look is an added perk.

The 2009 Governor General’s Cup International Air Rally

The concept was outstanding – to celebrate the 100-year anniversary of aviation in Canada, we would fly and land in each of Canada’s provinces and territories and meet the local people at each stop. In addition, the organizers, Camil Dumont, Aviation Connection, and Catherine Tobenas, his wife, International Air Rally, had decided to offer training as an added incentive to participants and were looking for volunteer instructors.

Although it was obviously a group-based adventure, we had been assured by the organizers before the rally and at the first rally briefing that each airplane would have the ultimate authority over whether to fly or not.

Reality strikes

Most flight segments on the western section were 350 to 500 NM long. On the schedule, activities at each destination were planned starting at 1:00 or 1:30 PM. Given the basic logistics of a rally that included 15 airplanes, the schedule was on the tight side.  Let’s consider that every airplane had no pre-takeoff ground time and that all the airplanes took off at 3-minute intervals. That would yield a total departure time of 45 minutes. At the destination, if all airplanes landed at 3-minute intervals, then the total arrival time would be another 45 minutes. Adding a refueling stop and giving only 5 minutes to each airplane to refuel and pay would yield a total refueling time of nearly one and half hour. Therefore, taking off, refueling, and landing 15 airplanes would add nearly 3 hours to the travel time making even the shortest segment, a 6.5-hour trip for a Cessna 172. Based on this data, the planned schedule would have required a 7:00 AM takeoff time but 7:00 was the standard time for daily briefings. It was nearly impossible to make the schedule as a group even in perfect conditions. The western section of the rally was constantly challenged with less than favorable weather conditions delaying our departure and progress. We missed most of activities that cities had worked so hard to organize for us.

Organizing such an event is a massive undertaking which requires a lot of work and perfect handling of details. There were signs of details falling sideways before departure when some of participants did not get last minute changes to the route. No one is perfect. However, there were also such oversights during the rally as well. For example, somehow and without our knowledge, the organizers opened a flight plan for an airplane that we were not flying in the rally and then failed to close it. That resulted in George being deluged with phone calls from everyone searching for him and the presence of an RCMP officer at the destination waiting to verify that George was alive. May be, that was why there were so many questions about intercepting procedures in our rally quizzes. Another example of such inattention to details was when we were asked to use an ATS frequency as a pilot-to-pilot rally frequency. That worked well until we got within range of the ATS facility using it.

“Flexible is much too rigid, in aviation you have to be fluid.” — Verne Jobst

Realizing that the schedule was not working giving the logistics and the weather conditions should have been obvious. Most organizers would have called the upcoming destinations and ask them to adjust their planned activities to match our actual schedule. That did not happen. Instead, the drive to “get there” on time at all cost became stronger.

To add to the “get there” mantra, there was no plan B in the planning. For example, when we were weathered in at Watson Lake, getting rooms for the additional night was a bit of a challenge. Each participant was also left to fend alone to avoid hotel room cancellation charges at the next destination. What’s more, we were instructed to get a taxi ride in town. More than 45 people were looking for a taxi ride in a town with a population of about 1,500! We hitchhiked. If there is no plan B, you have no other choice than to push on, right?

Financial considerations may have also been a factor for the “get there” mantra (see these newspaper articles: article 1, article 2).

Whatever the reason or reasons, as a result of the “get there” attitude, basic airmanship like checking weather information thoroughly and establishing options became overlooked. Any attempt on the part of the rally participants to do so on their own was perceived as a direct affront to the organizers.

In the end, despite the “get-there” attitude, the rally failed to achieve its goal since no airplane landed in each province and territory of Canada.

Risk taking: one size does not fit all in aviation

I had the opportunity to fly over the U.S. Rockies and the Midwest from Los Angeles, CA to Oshkosh, WI many times over the years and in very different airplanes. The first flight was solo in a Cessna 172. Subsequent flights were in a Beech Bonanza, a Beech Baron, and a Piper Cheyenne. Each airplane yields a different set of options to deal with a similar situation. As an example, let’s discuss thunderstorms avoidance which is always a part of that flight during the summertime. Going around a thunderstorm in a Cessna 172 can quickly add one hour of flight time (a mini cross-country flight). However, it often represents just a delay for a Bonanza or a Baron. For the Cheyenne, options abound: around or above?

Aviation risk assessment should always take into account the pilot, the equipment and the environment. Failure to assess each element individually and as a whole during the process disqualifies the outcome. Furthermore, a person without personal knowledge of each of the three elements is never in a position to make an adequate risk assessment. Yet somehow during this rally, Camil Dumont acted as if he felt qualified to assess risks for every team and insisted on pressuring pilots to fly based on his private assessment.

General Chuck Yeager wrote: “I was always afraid of dying. Always. It was my fear that made me learn everything I could about my airplane and my emergency equipment, and kept me flying respectful of my machine and always alert in the cockpit.” Pilots are trained to identify and counteract hazardous attitudes. One of most hazardous attitude is invulnerability which leads pilots into taking inappropriate risks. Pilots, a naturally confident bunch, are particularly prone to suffer from this attitude. However, few of us consider this attitude an asset as Camil Dumont, our organizer, seems to in this article (see here).

This rally was no place for flight training

After declining to act as an instructor for pre-solo students, I gladly accepted to participate as a volunteer instrument instructor. I had lots of experience training instrument students within a cross-country format. Doing so allows them to acquire the required cross-country time (FAA requirements for Part 61 training) and greatly expands their experience at the same time. The rally seemed a perfect format that would provide a great variety of operating environments and instrument procedures. In addition, the organizers had assured me on multiple occasions that instructors would have operating freedom to meet the special needs associated with training.

Flight instruction is an interesting discipline. Flight instructors provide mentoring (never show a student something that you do not want them to duplicate), create a safe teaching environment (worrying about one’s safety does not yield a ready-to-learn mind), and of course, teach proper skills and behaviors. It is not very different from parenting. To achieve that, instructors must control the flight conditions as much as possible to expose the student to the elements to be taught incrementally. Overwhelming the student is always counterproductive because fatigue prevents learning and the student does not get a chance to feel successful. Incremental success is the key to continuous learning.

However, the reality of the international air rally was very different than that promised. The organizers forced us to fly in loose formation flight with the group. Formation instrument flight??? The weather conditions made training challenging since we had to practice low level flying around thunderstorms during most of the flights of the western section. Furthermore, the displayed disrespect by some in the group for proper procedures, regulations, and planning practices created a negative mentoring environment. As a flight instructor, I was particularly troubled by the presence of two pre-solo students in such environment as they had no previous aviation references. These young people are likely to think that what they saw is the way pilots normally operate. What a shame.

Four airplanes were involved with training at the beginning of the rally. After the Montreal stop, training continued on only one airplane.

They will pressure you into doing things that may be unsafe, use your good judgment, and remember, ‘I would rather be laughed at, than cried for.’

— George MacDonald

Albert Einstein said: “Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence.”

As I walked to join the morning briefing, I overheard Camil Dumont, the rally organizer, telling my student, George, and I quote:”I know it is not your fault but I want you to know that we will not tolerate any delay on your part today”. That meant that the organizers of the rally were yet again denying George the opportunity to receive instrument training today. He had just been ordered to fly to Montreal VFR and with the group. In addition, he had also been told that no mechanical, piloting, or weather issues could be dealt with if they would cause a delay.

Camil had grown increasingly upset with us. He did not like the fact that George and I looked at the weather carefully on our own before deciding to go or not to go. He felt that if he was going then every pilot should go as well, never mind that his briefings never included winds aloft forecast or NOTAMs. Furthermore, he had decided that I was making unilateral decisions for our team thus the remark to George, “I know it is not your fault”.

What Camil had obviously failed to assess was that George is a knowledgeable dispatcher for the airlines who is not only very capable of assessing weather reports on his own but also understands the value of doing so. Moreover, since the beginning of the rally, George always had the ultimate say as whether we would fly or not based on the information we had and the applicable regulations. My responsibility as an instructor was simply to keep the flights safe, legal and enriching. In considering the ongoing attitude of the organizers towards our team, the failure of the rally to provide George the freedom to obtain the training he had been promised and was seeking, and the disregard for basic aviation safety, George decided to stop participating to the rally after reaching Montreal. That decision was made knowing that it meant separating from new friends which was painful to him.

The briefing for the arrival in Montreal Trudeau included one reporting point and two frequencies. No expected route. The departure order of the airplanes was reversed from the usual for the occasion: the fastest airplanes would go first and the slowest ones, last. I never knew that C172s were faster than Diamond DA40s. Once airborne, on the rally frequency, we heard that we should use a frequency different from the ones we were told to use during the briefing. We experienced the result of inadequate planning on the part of the organizers one more and last time.

We approached Montreal from the northwest and flew just west of the Mont Tremblant ski resort. Upon contact with ATC, we were vectored to fly directly over the Mirabel Airport. Now that we were in French Canada, many pilots chose to address controllers in French. It is a feast to hear the controllers go back and forth to instruct pilots in their preferred language. However, it also took away some traffic awareness for pilots who were not bilingual. From Mirabel Airport, we flew toward the bridge of the 13 freeway, followed the 13 freeway to cross Montreal Trudeau at mid-field, and entered a left downwind for runway 24 L. George, who will become a commercial pilot soon, concentrated on delivering one of his smoothest landings. And so he did. Job well done, George.

After a short bus ride to downtown Montreal, we checked in at “le Reine Elizabeth” hotel. We have decided to discover the eastern side of Canada on our own. You can follow the rest of our voyage by checking my post-rally blog entries, here. When George called Camil to advise him of his decision to not continue, Camil did not query why or asked if you could change George’s mind. Instead, he simply told George to have a good trip home. George and Ashley were not invited to participate to the rally dinner that evening. I guess that since the entry fees had been paid, it made no difference to him whether George was continuing to participate or not. Ashley has friends here in Montreal and George wanted to stay in Montreal an extra day to visit them before flying to the La Chute Airport for the airplane’s 50-hour inspection.

Montreal is an amazing and fun town especially for me who speaks French. All the signs are in French, of course. However, what was more striking to me was observing the French-like behavior. For example, it doesn’t just seem OK to jay walk if no cars are coming, it seems to be expected. That’s a behavior I almost got a ticket for when I lived in Los Angeles. Back then, the cops settled for lecturing me instead of giving me a ticket. All ended well.

After a late lunch, George and Ashley went on to meet their friends while Glen, Diane and I opted for a dip in the jacuzzi and pool at the hotel, followed by shopping on Saint Catherine Street, and finally attending the Francopholies, an annual music festival that aims at promoting French music. It includes simultaneous live music concerts on stages built on streets and parks. Jean-Louis Foulquier created the Francofolies in La Rochelle, a French city near my birth town, and exported the concept to Montreal, Canada and Spa, Belgium. We had fun singing and dancing along and ended the evening with a delicious French crêpe.