What would you have done?
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From NASA’s Aviation Reporting System, CALLBACK
Flying…on an IFR flight plan last night, it was overcast at 12,000 feet and very dark.… I had descended from 8,000 feet and was level at 3,000 feet. I was heading 290 degrees getting vectors for the ILS approach.… Approach told me to turn left to 250 degrees. During the turn, I noticed bright lights ahead and at first, thought it was an airplane very close above me at 12 o’clock flying in the opposite direction.… I ducked my neck down and tilted my head back to look up 45 degrees out the windscreen to look directly at the lights. Immediately, I thought I was flying with a very nose high, pitch up attitude and immediately realized [the lights] were not an airplane!
I must have pushed on the yoke to get the nose down. I turned my head left to look out the side window hoping to make sense of what I was seeing, but the pitch blackness with only a couple lights was of no help. I immediately looked at my G5 [attitude indicator], and what I saw made my head spin! For a split second I questioned whether my G5 had malfunctioned.
I focused on using the attitude indicator to get wings level and control the airspeed.
What would you have done?
Thank God all my training kicked in, and I immediately disregarded the thought that my G5 was broken. At that moment, I realized I was experiencing overwhelming spacial disorientation. So, I focused on using the attitude indicator to get wings level and control the airspeed. I was in a bank of approximately standard rate. I leveled the wings first. I did not notice the horizon, so I did not immediately perceive my pitch attitude. After getting wings level, I…focused on the airspeed. The airspeed indicator was moving fast…and the numbers were increasing! I do not remember whether or not I reduced power. Before this happened, power was set at about 1,700 rpm, and I had been flying at 135 mph. Now airspeed was passing through 190 mph fast!
I immediately pulled back on the yoke to reduce the airspeed and recover the airplane.… The horizon came back into view, I stopped the descent, added power, and began to climb. As I started to climb, the Controller came on the radio and stated, “Aircraft X, I got an altitude alert. Check your altitude.” I could hear the Controller’s alarm going off. I didn’t try to communicate. I only focused on completing the recovery and controlling the airplane. I had gotten 400 feet or more off my assigned altitude. Although it felt like slow motion, this all occurred in a time span of less than 10 seconds. I got back to 3,000 feet and a heading of 250 degrees.… After a minute of silence, the Controller gave me a vector to intercept and cleared me for the approach.
I’ve thought a lot about what happened last night and realize that a slight disorientation accelerated rapidly into extreme disorientation.… My head movements in the cockpit trying to figure things out were counterproductive and actually were a significant contributing factor to the magnitude of my disorientation.
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