Left-handed fighter pilots
- Thread starter greybeard
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I presume you get used to it. I regularly used to drive a British (RHD) car to the airport and pick up a European (LHD) car at my destination. In my youth I rode motorbikes with left and right sided gear change and rear set footrests which reversed the sequence of changes. Before things were standardised on cars and motorcycles the controls were where the manufacturer wanted them
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buffnut453
Captain
I'm a lefty and first learned to fly in a Slingsby Venture T.2 motor glider with the throttle on the left (instructor was left seat). I then switched to the Cessna 150/172 with the throttle on the right. Didn't have any problems changing and soon learned how to fly with either hand.
If you must you can, some people who lost both arms can write and paint beautifully with their feet, I worked with a Japanese guy who could write with both hands at the same time, in English or Japanese, its a helluva thing to see. The most difficult thing I found to adapt to was switching from riding two strokes to four stroke motorbikes, it took a few days to adapt yet some guys ride both at the same race meeting eve at the Isle of Man, hats off to them.
It would be just like the good folk of Slingsby to do things differently, my mother came from the next village to it in Yorkshire, strange folk around there
.Joe Broady
Airman 1st Class
- 105
- May 30, 2019
In a plane with side by side pilots and shared throttle(s) in the center — anything from a light plane to a B-52 — an instructor must be able to fly expertly from either seat. So clearly there's no fundamental problem operating the flight controls with the weak hand.
In the old B-47 bomber the pilots were in tandem so the throttles could have been on either side. The choice of Boeing (or the Air Force) was to put them on the right. On the other hand, the present day B-2 has side by side seating and a separate set of throttles at the left hand of each pilot.
In the old B-47 bomber the pilots were in tandem so the throttles could have been on either side. The choice of Boeing (or the Air Force) was to put them on the right. On the other hand, the present day B-2 has side by side seating and a separate set of throttles at the left hand of each pilot.
Especially the Italian pilots!
fastmongrel
1st Sergeant
There's no such thing as left handed in the military. If you were unlucky to have been spawned by the devil and were left handed you either adapted or got another career.
Most of it is in your head. If you try playing snooker or pool with the "wrong hand" it is your rest hand that is the problem, the hand that holds the cue does nothing but hold the cue. Suddenly you find that your right hand (if you are right handed) has a mind of its own and wont do what your left does without thinking. Ask any group of adults to play with the wrong hand and unless they have done it before they look like 7 year old having their first game, it is always the hand they rest the cue on that is the problem. I did it once for a laugh with friends in Germany.
Mike Flanagan
Recruit
- 6
- May 23, 2017
It took a little time to be comfortable after 500 hrs in the left seat, but it was not the switching of hands on the throttle & wheel (stick) but the sight picture from the right seat. Cross wind landings even though the inputs were the same, just being in a left or right slip felt funny in the right seat for a while. Took a number of hours to be comfortable right seat.
P-39 Expert
Non-Expert
I'm left handed and it's a right handed world, so we leftys are very ambidextrous to begin with. We can and do learn anything put in front of us.
American and European cars were made for left handers, until automatic transmission was invented you steered with the left and changed gear with the right, only the UK and Japan are right handed nations, internet fact number 5,000,234.
fastmongrel
1st Sergeant
Then there's India where you drive on the left, the right, the middle and only the cows have right of way.
Tracker
Senior Airman
Having been trained to fly in the Royal Canadian Air Force, you had to be right handed to fly jets in the 1960's
You had to be right handed, or you had to be able to adapt?
As soon as I got my commercial license, the flying club put me on their membership committee as a "new member recruitment/assessment pilot". This meant taking new member applicants up for an introductory flight and giving them a little unofficial stick time before they paid their non-refundable membership fee. Sad experiences in the past and a shortage of CFIs had made this necessary. By the time I had passed my CFI written and was ready to start the flight course, right seat flying was old hat.
Later, as chief instructor of an FAR141 flight school, I used some of the excess "time building" hours in the commercial syllabus to get students ambidextrous in anticipation of the much tighter scheduled CFI course.
I think it might have been easier for a left hander to learn to fly a helicopter than a right hander.
To me it was always harder to get down what you had to control with your left hand, main blade pitch and engine rpm, than the task assigned to your right hand, main blade tilt. Then you feet were pretty busy too.
The main blade tilt was instinctive to me, the rest had to be learned.
To me it was always harder to get down what you had to control with your left hand, main blade pitch and engine rpm, than the task assigned to your right hand, main blade tilt. Then you feet were pretty busy too.
The main blade tilt was instinctive to me, the rest had to be learned.
