Prepare for: Recovery from Unusual Attitudes (Instrument)
Recovering from nose-high and nose-low attitudes using only instruments.
Your CFI's syllabus and your airplane's POH come first. This page is a general study aid to help you show up prepared.
What you'll do
- Nose high, airspeed decreasing: add power, lower the nose, level the wings.
- Nose low, airspeed increasing: reduce power, level the wings, then raise the nose.
- Return to level flight and the assigned altitude and heading.
The standard you'll be held to
Quoted from the current FAA Airman Certification Standards for each level that tests this.
Instrument Rating ACS (FAA-S-ACS-8C)Task IR.IV.B · Recovery from Unusual Flight Attitudes
- Use proper instrument cross-check and interpretation to identify an unusual attitude (including both nose-high and nose-low) in flight, and apply the appropriate flight control, power input, and aircraft configuration in the correct sequence, to return to a stabilized level flight attitude.
- Use single-pilot resource management (SRM) or crew resource management (CRM), as appropriate.
Read it in the FAA handbooks
The official chapters behind this page. Each link opens the exact chapter, free on faa.gov. See the full Study Library.
Prepare the night before
- Chair-fly both recoveries.
Common mistakes
- Pulling before leveling the wings in a nose-low attitude.
Questions to ask your instructor
- How will you set up the unusual attitudes?
Check yourself
Something wrong or out of date? Report an error