Famous pilot health

[stephen]

In the military, I think the supply and demand ratio applies. Even though less physically fit pilots could perform the same duties, military leaders must have some way to weed out the oversupply of potential pilots. That is one of them. They might as well select the best physical specimen possible. They didn't have that luxury in WWI.

In the case of civilian aviation, it is a matter of bureaucratic survival. If it became known that people could fly, drive, live, eat and breathe without government approval and inspection, the alphabet soup bureaucracies would lose their claim to legitimacy.

[CincinnatiRedlegs]

A pilot may have suffered inummerable wounds (i.e. Nungesser), or had physical ailments, but it must be remembered that people can will themselves to do things that would be seemingly unlikely due to physical limitations. This applies to any human endeavor, it is not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog.

[Barrett]

Originally Posted by stephen

In the case of civilian aviation, it is a matter of bureaucratic survival. If it became known that people could fly, drive, live, eat and breathe without government approval and inspection, the alphabet soup bureaucracies would lose their claim to legitimacy.

Yup. Gotta wonder how the Wrights and their contemporaries ever managed to design, build, and fly aeroplanes without gummint supervision. (At a time when the US Govt was pouring tons of money into Prof. Langley's various schemes.)

But there's no going back. I have actually talked to professional pilots who do not think it "safe" (and maybe not possible) to leave the ground without a radio. Some of those doofuses (doofi?) seem to regard a radio as a lifting surface: levitation is impossible without one.

[TomVrille]

To add a little balance to this discussion, let it be noted that faking one's way through the flight physical didn't always turn out well. Consider this account of his younger brother's death by Gen. Billy Mitchell:

"As he came in to land he had a great deal of speed. His front wheels hit hard and he bounced. He lowered the tail of his ship. The next time the wheels and the tail skid hit hard, and again he bounced. Apparently he decided to make another turn of the field, so he put on his motor and started to make a circle.
When he started to make the turn, the longerons or beams in the back part of the fuselage broke, and the ship fell to earth, and he was instantly killed. It was a weak ship.
While primarily his death was due to a weak airplane, I think that his eyes were not as good as they should have been, and that he stretched matters in his physical examination to get by the doctors, in his anxiety to be in the Air Service...
I have made up my mind more than ever to rely on the judgment of the doctors as to a man's fitness for flight. Our doctors prove their value more and more every day."

The other side of the coin!