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The pilot who argued with the static port for 10 minutes
Last spring at a small field outside Tucson, this older pilot kept insisting his altimeter was lying. Said the plane felt wrong. I checked the static port, clean, no bugs. He watched me the whole time, arms crossed. Then he points at the port and says "talk to it, it listens better than my wife." I just stared at him. He laughed, signed the logbook, and flew off. Still never figured out if that was a joke or a ritual. Anyone else have a pilot say something weird while you worked?
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the_lucas18d ago
Tiny cracks usually show up in a bench test, not a visual check.
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nathan49219d ago
Why do people always assume a pilot is being crazy when they trust their gut? You checked the static port and it looked clean, but bugs and dirt are not the only things that block those lines. A tiny crack or a loose fitting can do the same thing, and you can't see that from the outside. Maybe the guy was just messing with you, but maybe his altimeter really was lying and he knew it. I have seen gauges fail in weird ways that took a whole tear down to find. Sometimes the guy talking nonsense is the only one paying attention.
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