So you're telling me that an experienced pilot has never had control issues with a plane on its maiden? He took a plane that caught him by suprise and got it under control and not only flew it in control after that, but landed it...minor damage, yeah, but nothing serious.

Ive seen multiple times that a plane has gotten away from the pilot on a maiden, especially immediatly after takeoff. Its not that uncommon, thats why its a maiden and not a normal flight, your not entirely sure what it is going to do. We had a guy do that this weekend, a brand new Sukoi(sp?) from CMP...with the cg EXACTLY where the manufacturer recommends, it needed almost 1/2 stick of down elevator to keep it from climbing...and all that tail heavyness made is snap roll on pretty much every turn...he was wild..we were all ready to get out of the way and keeping our eye on the plane...but he got it back down on the ground...cracked the fuse but good for what he was dealing with..

And about your "doom on us"-"we're going to crash into the neighbors house!!!!" stuff...did he crash? no. Was he completly out of control? No. Did he get control of the bird? Yes.

I went to another feild that i dont normally fly at and got a chance on the sticks of a warbird, a corsair to be exact, and a pretty scale one at that. The owner was right next to me as I flew it. I took of (a little sloppy, but not too bad) flew it, did some gentle aerobatics with it, and landed it without incident...i nosed over taxing back in, but no big deal

You guys seem content to assume that everyone is a bad pilot and treat them as such. To me, thats disrespectful. Informing someone that they might be making a mistake in their choice of plane is ok...but to critisize and border on insulting people...its just childish. If it had been a veteran pilot that took off and the plane caught him by suprise, and he ended up over the pits but got control back, would he be treated like this guy? No, he would get a "nice save" from everyone around him...

This forum has a problem with that. I will stand up for this point every time its brought up. Just because someone is new, doesnt mean they are a bad pilot...it doesnt mean that you know their skill level. Hell, we had a jet guy almost tank a new jet a couple of weekends ago and he had been flying for 20+ years...does that means he should be treated like you're treating this guy...

I hate that so many people think that I have to take baby steps for everything. Luckily, the people at my feild, the people that actually matter, do not. They will make sure im safe in whatever i do, and provide help, but they arent going to tell me i need to buy 6 planes to throw away before i get into the bird i want...