Hachette Fate is the Hunter

I read this book many years ago when I was young. I was always passionate about aviation and built models and read countless books about pilots and airplanes. I found that reading it again was much more interesting as the years of experience as a pilot gave me a better understanding of the emotions, fears and learning that the author presented. The language is careful and descriptive.What a great book to finally own!

This is required reading for any Pilot, just beginning or just finishing....Tells it like it was when Pilots had to be Pilots.....No automation to bale you out of trouble or hold your hand.Extremely well written, with some heart-stopping moments....Records a really extraordinary time in aviation. history...An absolute must-read, Pilot or not, a great adventure with some tragic moments...These were the pioneers, who made aviation what it is today..Being a pilot I still have the occasional nightmare thinking about some of the events described within.!

Earnest K. Gann is a well known aviation writer and before that, a succesful pilot of airliners and military transports in the time period during, before, and after World War II. "Fate is the Hunter" is probably his best known book, and it deserves to be. Reading it, we are in the presence of a classic that can be read on at least two levels: as a drawn-out adventure story taking place over a period of years, studded with gems of aviation art from a period that now seems very long ago, or as a thoughtful reflection on danger and man's reaction to it, guided by a deep familiarity with the psychology of superstition.From the first point of view, we get to see the near-collision with the Taj Mahal on takeoff, and the wild ride in ice-laden clouds over the Applachians that nearly brought down Capt. Gann's airliner in a time period when anti-ice equipment was primitive and instrument navigation in its infancy. Straddling the two points of view we have the Arctic adventure when a military transport with wounded coming back from Europe has to land on a frozen lake in Canada, in a region with so much natural magnetism that navigation systems of the day are useless, a region so vast that radio contact can only be made when the target has already been localized and the search aircraft is getting rather close to it. I'm remembering a movie of this that I saw in childhood, although I lack the online skills to find the name and date; but Mr. Gann's description of it is ever so much scarier.As we read through the book, which is a fast, exciting read, we begin to see the second point of view. Like everything that humans perceive as very dangerous, early aviation had superstitions. Looking back on his career at a mature age, Capt. Gann names all his colleagues, pilots just as good as himself in all humility, and wonders why, after so many near misses, he is practically the only one still alive to tell the tale. He concludes, I believe, that there is a mysterious fate choosing its next victim like a Valkyrie flying in formation with each airplane. You can soar effortlessly above the clouds in godlike majesty for many hours, but someday this force will rear back and bite you. If you live you'll have a tale like Mr. Gann's to tell your grandchildren, and if you don't, it could be months before the search parties find what's left of your body.Those of us who have learned to fly in "modern times" (say, after 1970?), and the general public as well, have little notion of how dangerous flying really is. We are taught that 80% (or something) of accidents are caused by pilot error, and if you follow procedures meticulously, "flying is safer than driving to the airport." (This is a familiar cliche now.)Mr. Gann's book shows us this isn't true. Like everything, flying depends on humans to carry it out. Humans forget they have already loaded an airplane to capacity and fill the fuel tanks to capacity as well. Humans fail to tie down the cargo. Humans make navigational errors, or start an approach when the airport is below minimums because the wind was different than predicted and they don't have enough fuel to fly someplace else to land. Humans get a report from the stewardess that there is an unusual vibration coming from the rear and ignore it because they are scheduled to go on leave after this flight and want badly to get home.Pilots will devour this book. But everyone, even those who don't give a d@#n about aviation and have never flown in their lives, should read it. When they have finished, they should re-think our present day delusion that we can make any technology safe that involves energy management (high speeds, high altitudes, high pressures or temperatures, explosive or flammable fuels). However, they also need to reflect that before aviation and automobiles, before railroads, one of the most common causes of death for healthy males in England was falls from horseback. (This is attested in Dr. Paul Johnson's book, "The Birth of the Modern: World Society 1815-1830.")Danger is omnipresent in this world. When humans are aware enough of it to trigger our natural reaction, fear, we develop superstitions to help us cope. The reality might well be that it's mostly random, even after you've done everything right. But humans can't coldly face that unless they are very special. Earnest K. Gann was that kind of person, and his thoughts on danger are therefore relevant for the rest of us.

創世記の飛行機とパイロットの短編オムニバスです。それぞれのストーリーが実話に基づいており、それ故、ガン自身の経験に少しずつ連携しており、一息に読み切りました。

1st - This guy can write... 2nd - Mr Gann's long and varied career as a commercial pilot and a wartime pilot is never less than exciting.... (and hair raising)... Something I never knew: As the airlines (and the US government) were promoting flying as convenient and safe, the life insurance industry would not insure any pilots until about 1959. Mr Gann and his fellow pilots knew the risks all too well.Excellent Book.