Drunken Flying Problem

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32221, 13 February 1970, Page 13

Drunken Flying Problem

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright) SYDNEY, February 12. A positive blood-alcohol level had been found in 35 to 40 per cent of dead pilots in two American studies of general aviation fatalities, a German specialist in aviation medicine, Dr 11. Bruner, said in Sydney yesterday.

While there were specific! prohibitions against aircrew I drinking alcohol and taking drugs in airline and military; flying, none applied to gen-! eral aviation, he said, yet the social habits of people involved in this type of flying; favoured the abuse of alcohol; and tranquillising and stimulant drugs. Dr Bruner, of the Institute of Aviation Medicine Research at Bad Godesberg. West Germany, was speaking ■at the twenty-ninth International Congress on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence. i As little as one or two (glasses of beer could make a pilot drunk at an altitude of about 10,000 feet, because of the effects of reduced oxy--gen pressure, he said. A pilot received his most important information by vis-; ual perception: alcohol re-1 duced the power and acuity of vision, narrowed the visual field and might even cause double vision. It also reduced! touch and hearing sensitivity,; ' which might lead to pilot ■ error. > Although the critical limit ' of driving fitness was reached • at a blood alcohol level of .08. > as little as .015 of blood- • alcohol caused a measurable decrease in a pilot’s perform-; ance. I Dr Bruner suggested thatj 1 aircrews employed in general | • aviation should be prohibited; ’ from flying with a blood-' ’ alcohol level of between .0151 ' and .02. , Australia’s civil aviation; medical director (Dr J. C. Lane) told the conference: | i “Australia does have a drun-; . ken flying problem in general' aviation, but not airline fly-j ing, and I cannot comment on; military flying. “The point about restric-

itions in general aviation is [that they must be self-enforc-I ing. I can just imagine people running round aircraft with breath-analysers.”