The Washington Post — where ‘Democracy Dies in Darkness’ is not just a motto; it’s a mission statement — breathlessly announces that FIVE THOUSAND PILOTS SUSPECTED OF HIDING MAHOR HEALTH ISSUES; MOST ARE STILL FLYING. Dear God, the planes must be falling out of the sky like the summer rain! Scott points out that, as usual, when it comes to a WaPo headline there is less to it than meets the eye.
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17 replies on “Crazy About Flying”
Re; Kidney stones
Bill, I really hope that you didn’t tick “None” or “No” on the kidney stone question. The correct response to this is “Previously reported”. Whenever you respond in the affirmative on a question regarding your medical history and the application gets deferred to the bowels of the Mike Monroney center at OKC – it stays with you forever, like herpes! The deficiency can be resolved and a Medical issued – but the”ding” must always be acknowledged on future applications.
What exactly is a mental health issue in the FAA regs?
We are Diversity, Inclusion, Equity Airlines. When you come with us to fly, you come to DIE!
I’m back! So… anything interesting happen in the news this past month?
The elites and celebrities are trying to take Lahaina, Maui from the locals.
There should be an investigation into how the supposed “wildfires’’ started and why was the water turned off in the affected areas and the police blocked residents from leaving in their vehicles.
Jimmy Buffett became a literal Cheeseburger in Paradise over Labor Day weekend. RIP, 1946-2023
In reference to the guilt felt by drone operators; the first season of Jack Ryan on Amazon had a nice tertiary storyline about a drone operator and his guilt at killing people from a distance and what happens when he kills someone who was mistakenly targeted as a bad guy.
Won’t give it away but I thought it was a well told story.
This may be my new all-time favorite Steve line:
“… keep those stupid proles locked in their dark homes, eating the bugs.”
As a favor to those of us who hold pilot certificates, please refrain from using “drone” and “pilot” in combination.
Drones are operated, not piloted. Therefore, the proper phrases are “drone operator” and “aircraft pilot”
You guys missed the main point. Scott finally got to the crux of the problem in the end but his perspective and the perspective of this whole video is off. It’s off because news items rarely give the real, complete story. So it’s not their fault, the guys are going with the information available to them.
There is a HUGE problem with people retiring or otherwise exiting the military and doing everything they can to inflate as much as possible their service related “disabilities”. They are essentially finding ways to get benefits they would not otherwise be entitled to except for going to extraordinary efforts to attain them.
I’m not talking about a guy with his leg blown off, an eye shot out, his back broken from the wreck that ensued after an IED exploded under his HUMVEE or anything like that. Those guys are entitled to their disability benefits with no argument.
What I’m talking about, for instance, is that they get a 50% disability rating for sleep apnea. Sleep apnea that they would have had anyway, has nothing to do with their military service and that they’ve been living with for years without ever saying a peep about it to either a civilian or military doctor.
Come retirement or separation time there are a whole bunch of things that can be fudged by someone willing to do the fudging. Sleep apnea is just one example and I’m not going to go into that list further because I don’t want to give anyone any ideas …
While we’re talking about the U.S. Federal Government here, which seems to have unlimited deep pockets and clearly does not because infinite money does not exist — Those cheating on disability claims are taking money from people with real, genuine service related disabilities.
What the FAA has done with this crackdown is to say that if you’re getting money for a disability that would ground you, you can’t fly. This seems reasonable to me. If you have the disability you’re being paid for and that prohibits you from holding a pilot’s license, then you can’t hold a pilot’s license. You’re either disabled and so grounded, or you’re not disabled and you can fly.
If you’re not disabled then stop taking disability money from the U.S. taxpayer and I really think you ought to pay back what you got for that too.
I know all of this because for the last 7 months my son has been grounded pending FAA clearance of his flight status. Because he told the truth and chose not to lie and not to fudge on his service retirement disability claims. We’ve discussed this at length over this period of time so I probably know a lot more about the situation than the WaPo does, or at least I know enough about it to avoid any unwarranted bias.
I do not feel even a tiny bit sorry for any pilot who was grounded because he fudged on his military disability ratings. There is a waiver process for those who have genuine disabilities and are still fit to pilot an aircraft. That’s what took my son 7 months to process through. Don’t lie on your pilot license application.
That said, the idea that kidney stones could adversely affect your ability to operate an aircraft is ludicrous. Stones hurt, a lot, but I never heard of anyone blacking out from kidney stone pain. That kind of thing is just bureaucrats looking for every means possible to deny perfectly capable people. I’d probably lie on that one too and I don’t blame Bill if he’s done so.
Additionally a perspective Bill left out is that it’s not just the people in an airplane with an ought-to-be grounded pilot who are at risk. An operating, flying aircraft is a missile full of highly flammable payload. That’s a danger to people on the ground who never fly at all as much as to anyone on the aircraft.
While I don’t think this was the point of the article, I also thought of this. I recall many years ago after being involved in a bad accident when the Psychiatrist who was working with Mrs Ron suggested to her that he could write up that she was no longer capable of working so she could collect disability benefits for Soc Sec. She stared at him like he had three eyes until she processed what he was saying; then she stared a hole through him that I have fortunately only seen a few times.
Absolutely appalling but way too many people are very comfortable cheating the system because they are “entitled” to do so. To have someone on the inside be the one to suggest it was so many levels of disappointing that I have no real word to use for it.
BTW – she was back to work less than 4 months after said accident and worked another 15+ years to collect her 30+ year pension. So he was basically telling a soon to be healthy person to let the government support you without understanding that means let your neighbors support you.
It’s a well known phenomena that those separating from service fudge their service related disability(s) all to hell. If you can get a 50% disability for sleep apnea you get over $12,000 more annually on top of your retirement. If you can bump that up to 100% with other things you can get an extra $3,621.95 each month. That’s a significant amount of extra money and the temptation is to go for it.
I think I’ve mentioned before that I have a buddy who’s a retired USMC Lt. Colonel, he spews about this all the time. He works in a “shop” with active duty personnel and they’re always scheming about how they can fudge the service related disability system. It pisses us both off a lot. It’s a shitty, dishonest thing to do.
Being one myself, I think veterans are due what they have coming to them. That was the agreement between us and the American taxpayer and no veteran should ever be shorted. But no veteran should ever cheat either and those that do are going to end up ruining things for the rest of us.
As far as the point of the article goes, I’m assuming you’re talking about the WaPo article and the author of that article can make any point he likes. Accurate or not. I happen to know this is the point of the FAA reviewing pilot’s service disability records because I have inside information that the person who wrote the article either doesn’t have or ignored if he did have it.
My son took the position that it’s better to tell the truth and face the music than to cheat, get caught in a lie and lose both disability and pilot’s license. I think he made the right call.
He’s flying again right now. He just called me from the company’s HQ in Denver a couple nights ago. He worked at a national hardware store chain in his down time just to have something to do. He still had his retirement from the military so the main loss was income he could have been making but didn’t. But now when he gets in a cockpit he doesn’t have to worry about getting caught doing something he should not have either.
BTW, good for Mrs. Ron and I’m glad she recovered and went on to live a productive life. I’m sure she’s a happier, better person for it. Integrity is becoming more rare as time goes on it seems.
I knew a guy years ago who got shot with a .357 in the leg. The fleshy part of his leg, it was a through-and-through wound and he physically recovered fully from it in a few months. He drew disability for the rest of his life because of the “psychological trauma” he supposedly incurred. I’d be embarrassed to tell anyone if that was me but he was proud of it.
That’s not the worst I’ve ever heard. I don’t know them personally but I know of several instances where people stripped their gears on dope and psychotropics like inhalants (paint, glue, etc.) who drew permanent disability for that too.
The biggest difference between ‘live’ pilots and drone pilots is the live pilots, when they blow somebody up, see only a flash if that much of bodies and blood as they zoom by to get out of the area before they draw ground fire.
Drone pilots, with the cameras and magnification they use to see, isolate, and ensure their target is in fact the guy they want, witness up close and personal to the blood spray and body parts flying around. THAT has an effect.
I flew over 700 combat missions as a Huey crew-chief/door gunner in Nam. Wasn’t all that bothered by anything until the first time I actually saw MY 7.62 rounds impacting human bodies.
As for PDST, I lived a “normal” working life for more than 30 years after Nam, until a friend suggested I see a VA counselor because I didn’t sleep well, drank to much, etc. I was diagnosed with PTSD at 30% base line, two years later I was reevaluated at 70%. The VA made these decisions, not me. I’m “not smart enough” to make that call.
My experience taught me that ANYBODY who leaves the Earth voluntarily DOES have a mental condition. It has also taught me it is survival for 99.999999% of people who actually do it. The ones who don’t survive mentally are those who become p-shrinks.
“Drone operators”. (they are not pilots)
I stand corrected. Thanks.
Sorry, it’s just a “thing”. Stolen valor, or something! 😄
Stolen Valor? Hey, I know him. Yeah. Two tours in Nam as Huey gunner/crewchief, 760 combat missions. Never ‘shot down, but made a dozen or more “cautionary landings” in the bush/off base.
Well, ya know what I always say – Sempre Fly.