The first few hundred hours of any pilot's flying career are the ones involving the greatest accumulation of experience and judgment. In some ways, it's a miracle any of us survive this period; in other ways, these first few hours of flying time are both necessary and something of a rite of passage. In any event, a new Private Pilot's objective should be to get through them without bending sheet metal or bones. He or she should take few risks and concentrate on learning about making decisions, conducting proper pre-flight planning, developing various in-flight routines and constantly monitoring a flight's progress. A healthy respect for weather doesn't hurt anything, either.Once we "graduate" from these first few hundred hours, we can go on to earn our Instrument Rating, a Commercial Certificate or much more. But first we have to get through the challenges inherent in being on our own.Perhaps the greatest challenge to our health and safety during this period is complacency. After all, we've got a piece of paper that says we can fly, take passengers, travel from point A to point B at will and be the master of our destiny. No less authority than the federal government has decreed we are qualified to get into an airplane and fly it pretty much where and when we want. So, what is there to worry about?The problem with this scenario is that we don't know everything so early in our flying career -- veterans with thousands of hours of jet time confess they don't know everything, either -- and we may not recognize certain warning signs for what they are.No matter how well things are going, taking various things for granted -- the engine will always run, there will always be fuel in the tanks, the radios will always work, the weather at our destination will always be the same as it was when we left -- can be our undoing.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/flight-safety/probable-cause-34-complacency-kills