The AOPA Air Safety Foundation has just introduced Single-Pilot IFR – www.aopa.org/asf/single_pilot_ifr/ – a free online course designed to help pilots come to grips with the often rapid-fire decisions involved in flying in the soup.

“Single-Pilot IFR focuses on decision-making, organisation and cockpit resource management,” said ASF executive director Bruce Landsberg. “Staying ‘ahead of the plane’ is even more critical when you can’t see.”

One of the exercises is based on an actual accident. The exercise asks pilots to make a series of decisions about a flight that is slowly deteriorating and presents the outcome of each in a ‘decision tree’ format leading eventually to the successful or unsuccessful conclusion of the flight.

At the end of the exercise, pilots can compare their decisions with the conclusions of the National Transportation Safety Board investigators from the actual accident.

The new interactive programme uses true-or-false, multiple choice, and other question formats in what the designers call an entertaining atmosphere to effectively teach a serious topic.

“By the time a pilot finishes the course, he or she will understand many of the risks and challenges

of single-pilot IFR operations,” said Landsberg.