Question about tablet PCs and students in the cockpit

[WBBulldogs]

I have been hearing the rave about iPads and the Samsung Galaxy Tab and how pilots love to use them to replace some paper charts and sometimes even use GPS capability.

I am a future student. Probably won't start lessons until about a year from now when I'm out of the middle east. I was curious though. Is it a good investment for a student pilot to have or should I not even worry about gadgets at this point in time? I do have an android phone that I could use to look up charts if I ever really needed to. I guess I am just trying to see if an iPad or equiv would really help me as a student or if i decided to even go instrument rated?

 

[Jim Logajan]

I have been hearing the rave about iPads and the Samsung Galaxy Tab and how pilots love to use them to replace some paper charts and sometimes even use GPS capability.

I am a future student. Probably won't start lessons until about a year from now when I'm out of the middle east. I was curious though. Is it a good investment for a student pilot to have or should I not even worry about gadgets at this point in time? I do have an android phone that I could use to look up charts if I ever really needed to. I guess I am just trying to see if an iPad or equiv would really help me as a student or if i decided to even go instrument rated?

Personal opinion: don't buy a tablet at this point if the only reason to get it is to reduce the need for paper charts. I can't see how it would help you much as a student. Wait till you earn your private certificate, then and only then consider what is useful.

 

[Jim Logajan]

Learn how to do it with the E6B and paper.. they dont have batteries that fail. And you learn HOW to do it...

Technology is a wonderful thing.. and when it fails you, its a sickening feeling if you dont have a fallback position.

Getting lost in VFR conditions doesn't kill enough pilots for it to even rate its own category in any of the accident statistics analysis reports (e.g Nall) that I'm aware of.

What does seem to kill is accidents where knowing your precise position and ground track is essential, but you don't have the tools. Such as flying in MVFR, IMC, or at night in hilly and mountainous terrain. Relying on dead reckoning or pilotage by reference to a sectional in these circumstances would seem unwise at best.

The finite resources of training time and money should be directed at those aspects that provide the greatest safety yields. While some time should be spent on pilotage and dead reckoning, the accident statistics seem to suggest that much more time should be used in effective use of those new-fangled navigation gadgets.