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Flying
Handbook Menu > Introduction
to Flight Training > Flight
Safety Practices > Stall Awareness
14 CFR part 61 requires that a student pilot
receive and log flight training in stalls and stall recoveries
prior to solo flight. During this training, the flight instructor
should emphasize that the direct cause of every stall is an
excessive angle of attack. The student pilot should fully understand
that there are any number of flight maneuvers which may produce
an increase in the wing’s angle of attack, but the stall
does not occur until the angle of attack becomes excessive.
This “critical” angle of attack varies from 16 to
20° depending on the airplane design. The flight instructor
must emphasize that low speed is not necessary to produce a
stall. The wing can be brought to an excessive angle of attack
at any speed. High pitch attitude is not an absolute indication
of proximity to a stall. Some airplanes are capable of vertical
flight with a corresponding low angle of attack. Most airplanes
are quite capable of stalling at a level or near level pitch
attitude. The key to stall awareness is the pilot’s ability
to visualize the wing’s angle of attack in any particular
circumstance, and thereby be able to estimate his/her margin
of safety above stall. This is a learned skill that must be
acquired early in flight training and carried through the pilot’s
entire flying career. The pilot must understand and appreciate
factors such as airspeed, pitch attitude, load factor, relative
wind, power setting, and aircraft configuration in order to
develop a reasonably accurate mental picture of the wing’s
angle of attack at any particular time. It isessential to flight
safety that a pilot take into consideration this visualization
of the wing’s angle of attack prior to entering any flight
maneuver.
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