Foreign pilots from the Philippines have been involved in two plane crashes in just over a month, according to media reports.
The latest, a military transport plane, crashed Tuesday outside the capital of Manila during a military mission, killing both pilots on board.
Another incident occurred last week, when an Air Force transport aircraft suffered a “major mishap” in Mindanao in eastern Philippines, killing two people, and injuring another five. In January, a Philippine Airlines plane crashed off Manila Bay, killing five people.
Investigations are still underway, according to CNN Philippines.
Read the full story at i09.
And read about other big accidents involving foreign pilots.
Why do Air Force pilots get twice as much combat experience as civilian ones?
In a military, every pilot gets experience flying combat missions. But it’s of an extreme nature. For military pilots, combat missions can last months. According to the MIT Aviation Lab, some military pilots have combat missions from 13 to 17 hours a day.
Read the full story at MIT Aviation Lab.
All of the planes involved were foreign. What do international aviation safety standards look like?
According to International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) safety standards, a minimum of an hour of flight experience from the local carrier, plus at least 900 hours of flying time is mandatory for commercial airline pilots, which includes time flying with “crew” and time flying unaccompanied. But as The Telegraph notes, there are “hard and fast rules,” particularly for places like the Philippines, where the average distance from civilian operators to foreign airline operators is 1,300 miles. The same rule doesn’t apply, though, to the larger forces of the military in the Philippines, which is composed of a number of less-regulated branches like the army, navy, air force, and coast guard.
Read the full story at The Telegraph.