Be Prepared For The Bad Thing

My friend and I sat at the kitchen table. Laid out before us was an aeronautical chart. The two of us pored over it with great care.

“I don’t want to climb out this way,” my friend said, indicating a route he found concerning. “I’ll be too low to be over that much water.”

“Agreed,” I said.

His wife busied herself nearby — close enough to hear but not so close that she was part of the conversation. Until she interjected: “You guys are so negative.”

She is a wonderful woman. But she is not a pilot. The truth is we weren’t being negative at all. We were just planning out the safest, most effective route for him to fly while giving biplane rides at a regional event. This was in a place where he had never flown before.

We were simply considering options and ruling out the ones that left my friend in too tight a spot should “the bad thing” happen.

The bad thing is entirely generic. In this context it might be an engine failure. Losing full or even partial power while climbing out only 100 feet or so over a large body of water. That is not a desirable situation. The same can be said for an electrical fire. Or a bird strike. The list of possibilities is long and mysterious. Yet, if we plan for a best outcome regardless of what the bad thing might be, our chances of finding success rises sharply.

As I learned in Boy Scout Troop 69 in East Hartford, Connecticut, many years ago — be prepared.

Being prepared to handle the bad thing requires forethought. The only way I know how to do it is to sit down in a quiet place, let the imagination wander, and consider every negative possibility that comes to mind.

This isn’t dark work. It’s liberating. The scenarios unfold to provide confidence. The fewer unknowns I might encounter, the better prepared I make myself. Of course, you can and should do the same.

Anyone can prepare themselves for the bad thing. Because the bad thing is coming in a thousand different ways, even if we don’t know exactly what it might be just yet.

This is true of all phases of life. Work, relationships, going to the movies, stopping into a late-night place for a drink and a bite to eat. Everyplace we go, everything we do involves risk.

Certainly, guiding an aircraft into the sky to travel at a relatively high-speed thousands of feet above the earth entails a modicum of risk. Or an astounding amount. It all depends on how you prepare for the experience.

The amount of risk we assume has an awful lot to do with how well we prepare ourselves.

One of the best examples of the importance of this theory occurred to me when I was transitioning from single-engine airplanes to multi-engine airplanes. My instructor wisely encouraged me to make a verbal briefing part of my pre-takeoff checklist.

1. If we lose an engine before rotation we’ll throttle back, bring the aircraft under control, and taxi off the runway.
2. If we lose an engine after rotation with runway remaining, we’ll throttle back, land, get the aircraft under control, and taxi off the runway.
3. If we lose an engine after rotation with no runway remaining, we’ll fly straight ahead, pitch for blue line, clean up the aircraft, and evaluate the situation.

To the uninitiated this may seem like an unnecessary and even unhealthy fixation on the negative. Honestly, it is nothing more than an acceptance that something unpleasant may happen at a time and place where anything unpleasant is entirely unwelcome. So we prepare ourselves mentally for that scenario. We plan. We move the procedures to be followed from the back of our mind to the very front. We say these things out loud. We confirm the other pilot or passenger with us understands and agrees with our planned course of action. Then we go with confidence.

We’re prepared not just for the bad thing, but for the worst thing imaginable. And being prepared can make all the difference.

This is why Dave Ramsey drones on about saving and investing. Because there will be a financial challenge in our future and we’d be best off if we prepared for it well in advance.

This is why our doctors tell us to stop smoking, drink moderately, and exercise more frequently. Our bodies will wear out through age or disuse. That’s undeniable. Yet a behavioral commitment to prolonging our physical and mental viability can give us years of additional productivity.

From the moment we roll out of bed in the morning until we slide back under the covers at night, we are at risk. That’s simply true. Whether we ride a skateboard to class or drive a Mercedes to work, there are unknown challenges before us that we would do well to consider before we depart. It is equally important that we stay on the ball and manage our travels and surroundings to the best of our ability on a full-time basis.

Technology can help us as we confront these issues. But while technology as a tool brings us great benefit, technology as a crutch can do us in. There are a number of cases of pilots flying on autopilot who fell prey to this oversight. Unfortunately, many of them took passengers with them on that final flight.

The autopilot may be able to hold an altitude consistently. But they are not necessarily able to predict whether the altitude the pilot selects is high enough to clear obstacles rising up from the ground.

Spending time considering options, studying the route we intend to take, theorizing the inherent risks, and preparing a plan of action can make all the difference in the long run. Because the bad thing is going to happen to all of us in every phase of life. We would do well to prepare for it in advance.