NAME WITHHELD BY REQUEST
After 15 years flying the UH-60M, I was back in the cockpit as a UH-60L instructor. Most of my state’s 60M aircraft were deployed forward, and more instructors were needed in the 60L to handle a sizable number of new aviators returning from flight school. I received some refresher training in the 60L, consisting of day, instrument and night vision goggles (NVG) flights, and was signed off to conduct instruction.
The UH-60L, unlike the M-model, is mostly analog and lacks a coupled autopilot, voice-activated transmissions (VOX), moving maps or a modern GPS. As a result, the workload is increased, as even basic actions require more button pushes than in more advanced, ergonomically designed airframes. Despite this, the systems and procedures of flying the 60L came back quickly, and I felt confident to begin training some of the newer pilots.
Several days later, I was flying a training mission with a new pilot. We had already flown a few times before and he was proving to be a quick study. His basic instrument (BI) skills were spot-on and we conducted a few precision, non-precision and GPS approaches to nearby airports. The weather, according to the forecast, had begun to lower, but I was not overly concerned. We had planned to do some instrument training, and part of the instruction was going to be a lesson on picking up an instrument clearance at a nearby airport for recovery.
At the airport, we ended up spending extra time working on some traffic pattern maneuvers the pilot was still having difficulty with. We decided it was time to get home and updated weather while sitting on the ground. Unfortunately, the field had gone instrument flight rules (IFR) earlier than planned, dropping to 900 feet. While we were already briefed for this weather, it was lower than I wanted to fly with such a new pilot. However, the weather forecast was for the ceiling to stay at 900 feet the remainder of the day, and the pilot’s solid BI convinced me to proceed. We didn’t need an alternate, and besides, worst-case, I would take the controls and fly the approach. The instrument landing system (ILS) allowed us to get down all the way to 200 feet above ground level (AGL) if needed. Having a significant amount of actual weather time and experience in the area, I had a lot of confidence in my ability to provide safe training while still recovering back to our home airfield.
We picked up our filed flight plan and took off, climbing into the clouds. As he had performed in BI and the simulator, the student was in full control of the aircraft and maintaining airspeed and altitude. After about 10 minutes of flying, we switched controls so the student could load the GPS for the RNAV approach, which would get us down to 500 feet — below the reported cloud ceiling. While the ILS was available, the student did not have much experience with the 128D GPS system, and I wanted to get him some practice “button-pushing” while I flew the approach.
I remained on the controls so he would be able to activate and sequence the approach. I had him brief the approach, which consisted of the type of approach, runway, decision height and missed-approach procedures. Shortly after, we were cleared for the approach and intercepted the initial approach fix at the correct altitude before descending to the next step down, which my pilot read off the chart as 900 feet. Arriving at 900 feet, we were in and out of the clouds and the terrain was partially visible through the chin bubble.
A few seconds later, air traffic control (ATC) contacted us and provided a low-altitude alert and asked if we had the runway in sight. We did not, and before I could inquire, ATC told us the altitude for that leg was 1,400 feet. I immediately climbed and intercepted the correct altitude. Rattled, I glanced down at my iPad while flying the aircraft and identified the approach segment we were on. My student had inadvertently thought we were further along on the approach and read the wrong step-down altitude, putting us dangerously low too far away from the runway. We flew the rest of the approach and landed uneventfully. On the shutdown, my head was still going through the low altitude and the potential consequences. I was not fully mentally present during this last phase of the mission.
Lessons learned
After landing and before debriefing, I had to clear my head and sat in flight planning, trying to sort out what led to the low altitude, how we could have avoided it and still trying to grapple with the fact that the flight may have ended very abruptly with a tragic ending. First, I was overconfident in my skills as an instrument instructor. While I had many hundreds of IMC hours in the Black Hawk, most of it was in the more advanced M-model. The autopilot of the M-model allows for more “head space” to cross monitor the other pilot. I was busy flying the aircraft while simultaneously instructing on a complex, yet archaic, GPS.
Second, while the student did brief the approach, I did not ensure he briefed the step-down altitudes or verify at which point we would descend to the next altitude. Instead, I assumed he read the correct altitude to descend to past the initial approach fix. I also failed to transfer the controls to give myself a brief and familiarize myself with the approach. I was overconfident in my ability to fly and glance down at the chart at the same time, which, in the M-model under autopilot, is not very challenging.
Finally, even after recovering the aircraft, I let the error distract me for the last five minutes of the flight. Instead of compartmentalizing it, I dwelled on it, an action which could have led to a secondary failure. Essentially, I abandoned my inexperienced pilot by brooding on my error and its potential ramifications.
In the brief with the pilot, I covered some of the hazards I identified and some potential controls. I wanted him to share the same concern about descending early. The number one thing I felt was my hazardous attitude — overconfidence. I truly thought I could do more cross-monitoring than I could in an aircraft without an autopilot and with less-than-stellar currency as an IP in the aircraft.
The number one control for overconfidence is saying to yourself, “It could happen to me.” I should have done a proactive brief on the ground before taking off from the airport or even considered not flying solid IFR with a new pilot, despite his prior performance. I also should have had him give me a detailed read back of each altitude and checked it myself. The pilot flying should be the one to conduct the approach brief. We got lucky that we didn’t hit any obstacles, but that’s not a chance I want to take again. Next time, I’ll remember it could happen to me (again)!