Quote:
Originally Posted by npwalters
Actually the Newsweek article said exactly what I said. The third person was a non-rated crewmember (crew chief). That same article said the female pilot was the Pilot in Command. That COULD be true but is very unlikely. It is definitely NOT true if the instructor pilot (IP) was functioning as an IP. A person functioning as an instructor (IP) is always the pilot in command for that flight. Unlike most commercial flights - Army pilots can be qualified as a pilot in command but function as the co-pilot (PI) on a specific flight. Each flight has a PC designated by the approving authority.
If the pilots had on NVGs the crew chief also was wearing NVGs. All crewmembers wear NVGs on a flight so designated. We (the pilots) want the crew chief to see all that we do. NVGs allow the crew to see MUCH more than the unaided eye. That is critical and allows us to fly low in tactical environments. Unfortunately, NVGs can get light saturated where there are many light sources. It takes some experience to learn how to cope with this.
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The article didn't say the 3rd crew-member wasn't Rated. The Chief of Staff for Army Aviation said he had "100's of hours of flight time".
The Chief of Staff of Army Aviation apparently disagrees with your contention that the Instructor was the PIC. He specifically said that the "Evaluated Pilot" was PIC (according to the press reports).
Also, there was no directive to wear NVG's. According to Retired CWO Jonathan Koziol who's been attached to the Unified Command Post to coordinate the investigation, the Army doesn't know if they were in use for the flight, but they were available in the aircraft.
https://6abc.com/post/army-black-haw...ence/15849913/
Accuracy matters and we all know the press accurately reports the facts.