Co-pilot wives, Co-pilot husbands, Co-pilot friends talking to you during landings

[freddy]

I thought I'd post this for a bit of a laugh ... I am interested to hear if anyone has similar experiences to the following ...

My computer is in a room with two other computers. I use my computer for Flight Simulator. Often, I will be flight simming at the same time as one of the other computers in the room is being used by another member of the household. It always seems to happen that the other member of the household needs to ask a question or start a conversation just as I am in the middle of setting up for landing and performing all the various necessary tasks and checklists and radio frequency changes and turns and airspeed adjustments and all that other stuff that requires a fair amount of concentration to perform correctly and with no margin for error. And, worse, usually on finals, they always seem to want you to turn around and look at their computer screen "just for a second".

Do these people not understand the workload and concentration that is required to get an aircraft on to the ground safely? Why is it that they generally don't need to have a converstaion with you whilst you are in cruise? It always seems to be during the complexities of the landing phase of the flight. It's worse if you are flying the big jets with things happeing a lot faster for you than in the smaller GA aircraft. Hmmm.

Does anyone else "suffer" from this or something similar?

[GeorgeM]

My dog has an uncanny sense for when I'm on short final and will come harass me for attention. There must be something I do that he picks up on because it happens way too often to be coincidence.

[SteveB]

That's why MS put the Pause function in the game ;-D

[tigisfat]

There must be something I do that he picks up on...

Like neglect the dog?

[dcoats]

Lucky me - I live alone so I don't have that problem, but:
I was on final at KFCM the other evening for the last landing of a 2-month+ round-the-world in the Cessna 441 when the phone rang (my land line on which almost nobody I want to talk to ever calls).
While deciding whether to answer it or not (I didn't)- this is my rationale at least - I lost concentration, flared too hard and floated down the runway farther than I wanted to while simultaneously drifting off to the right. Wound up landing in the grass. In the real world, given that those runway signs are somewhat less ephemeral than in FSX, I might not have survived.
The upshot was that what had up to that point been a pretty successful trip, especially landing-wise, ended on a slightly disappointing note. Drat.

dc

[Kimber]

Brad and I fly together most of the time and both being pilots,
this is not a problem!! The not in charge pilot, always watches
what the pilot is doing and only makes comments if there is a
problem or potential problem!!

When I have no-pilots, I tell them to not talk when I say, "Let's
be quiet for a minute"!!

I have taken a lot of kids flying, most first timers in lite aircraft,
and it is more of a problem to get them to talk, mostly, big eyes
and big grins!!

Want to here silence, give the controls to a 14 year old girl for the
first time!!

[ComputerGuy]

My Granddaughter will climb onto my lap and watch me land and go "SEEEE?"

[GeorgeM]

Like neglect the dog?

LOL! Guilty as charged.

[freddy]

That's why MS put the Pause function in the game ;-D

Ah yes, of course, true. Hehe, perhaps I should have also mentioned in my initial post that I personally like to fly in real time and therefore the pause option is one I prefer not to take. Still, at the same time, it can be comforting to know that one can still land an airplane with other distractions around them.

Lucky me - I live alone so I don't have that problem, but:
I was on final at KFCM the other evening for the last landing of a 2-month+ round-the-world in the Cessna 441 when the phone rang (my land line on which almost nobody I want to talk to ever calls).
While deciding whether to answer it or not (I didn't)- this is my rationale at least - I lost concentration, flared too hard and floated down the runway farther than I wanted to while simultaneously drifting off to the right. Wound up landing in the grass. In the real world, given that those runway signs are somewhat less ephemeral than in FSX, I might not have survived.
The upshot was that what had up to that point been a pretty successful trip, especially landing-wise, ended on a slightly disappointing note. Drat.

You know what they say, "... any landing you can walk away from ...".

Still, it can be quite annoying after long trips and everything going so smoothly to have it all come to a disappointing ending like that. Whenever my "co-pilots" talk to me I too can end up drifting left or right of centre etc. Thankfully, the option to go around exists. I have done that on more than one occassion. But, sometimes when one needs to do that, one's dinner gets cold. Ah, the price you have to pay if you want to "do it right".

[NikeHerk67]

freddy and group,

That's funny because I somethines think that too many people have my cell phone number, or so it seems, when I'm landing. It's so uncanny, I've invisioned sneaking in my house when I'm nat home and planting a webcam. When I'm flying, everyone is tuned in and for laughs they say, "OK, he's on final, let's all give him a call.

Or that perhaps I'm the star of "The Truman Show".

Try hand flying a Vor to VOR plan with the 737 in FSFlyingSchool. The total time to accomplish the fight is over an hour. I'm on approach, so far I've done everything by the numbers and haven't gotten a single snide remark for the CFI yet. I'm on a perfect ILS approach, the vector indicator is buried perfectly in the needle and the GS is perfectly centered on the rose. Ring...Pause....Hello, Hey Dad what are doing? Oh nothering son. 45 minutes later, try to hit the pause once again and continue the perfect landing. Impossible.