It is called anticipation Dave. It is used to be ready for unexpected events, the timing of which could be 1 second away, 1 minute, 1 year or a lifetime. The way I deal with a complex system, is to follow guidlines set down and improved over many cycles. In the case of driving, I use Roadcraft. If I decide to relax the Roadcraft rules a bit, then I am increasing the "chaos" factor back in to the drive.
It is the same with flying. Many years and many crashes has led to the level of training our airline pilots go through. Occasionally, a flight crew will "relax" the rules a bit, maybe because they sneer at one of the recomendations. All too often, these decisions lead to accidents.
During flying training I would often meet qualified pilots who did the most stupid of things, probably in the same sort of "it is such a slight risk, it will never happen to me" way. One example was when I was on finals to land. I called at 4 mile final, runway 26 at Elstree. I continued approach while listening to the radio chatter (for situational awareness) - I was aware of an aircraft taxiing to the runway. I called again at two miles and the controller replied, "continue approach". I got to a mile and could see the aircraft holding short of the runway. I called finals but the controller didn't answer (maybe in the bog). The aircraft holding short of the runway transmitted, "entering runway 26". I immediately came back with, "Elstree traffic, November Romeo is short finals 26". At that moment, the aircraft stopped its forward movement, but stopped with the front half on the runway. I initiated a go-around from 100ft.
That pilot had "relaxed" one of the check items to look at the final approach before moving onto the radio and-or "relaxed" his concentration on the radio. Either way, missing out one part of that "system" could have proved dangerous.
The IAM and TripleS a reconciliation 393I think that in that brief paragraph you've hit the nail sqaurely on the head. I've read this thread (and those like it) and it's concentrated largely on the minutiae of the "mechanics...
This is why I can't understand your continuous statements about things being too rigid, or over the top or something that could be relaxed - Roadcraft has been developed over many years to provide an excellent system of car control. If you feel it is a poor system and yours is better, go and write a book about it, take it to police forces and other driving organisations or go and learn a totally different system. At least finish the training THEN report and discuss your findings.
MrBitsy
