She was flying with a flight instructor in the role of student. I think that’s enough for a lay person to take those words at face value, not knowing what a PPL means. Even if they searched it up, they’d see 40 hours of flight time, and that’s similar to the requirement to give a teenager a driver’s license, and it may be hard to square that with landing a plane, which is a very intimating task to people who have mostly never flown an aircraft.
I’ve seen similar stories about incapacitated flight instructors and celebration of student pilots making it out safely, and I think the reporting is similarly “surprised” about a mere “student” getting out unscathed whether male or female.
To reinforce the point: This is a very stressful situation to place an experienced pilot in where essentially your copilot commits suicide during the flight. I’m sure there are a lot of experienced pilots who might make a mistake in the shock of that scenario.
She was flying with a flight instructor in the role of student. I think that’s enough for a lay person to take those words at face value, not knowing what a PPL means. Even if they searched it up, they’d see 40 hours of flight time, and that’s similar to the requirement to give a teenager a driver’s license, and it may be hard to square that with landing a plane, which is a very intimating task to people who have mostly never flown an aircraft.
I’ve seen similar stories about incapacitated flight instructors and celebration of student pilots making it out safely, and I think the reporting is similarly “surprised” about a mere “student” getting out unscathed whether male or female.
To reinforce the point: This is a very stressful situation to place an experienced pilot in where essentially your copilot commits suicide during the flight. I’m sure there are a lot of experienced pilots who might make a mistake in the shock of that scenario.