History Main / ImprobablePilotingSkills

** Yes, this means that the SU-35 can ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54fKamyyAF4 backflip.]]''

-->'''Baloo''': [[CrowningMomentOfAwesome If you can't fly, don't mess with the eagles]]!

* Colonel Jack O'Neill from ''Series/StargateSG1'' pilots an F-302 on a couple of occasions, despite a conspicuous lack of pilot's wings on his uniform.

* The real life epitome of "If It Flies..." would have to be [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Brown_%28pilot%29 Captain Eric Brown]], [[UsefulNotes/BritsWithBattleships RN]]. He's officially credited with having flown [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_flown_by_Eric_%22Winkle%22_Brown 487 different aircraft types]] in his career as a test pilot (and that's only counting basic models), including everything from Mach 2 jets to gliders and from helicopters to airliners, often hopping between up five separate types in a single day's testing. He even taught himself to fly helicopters with nothing but the instruction manual, [[InstantExpert mere hours after first seeing one]].[[note]]Brown and his companion had assumed that the Americans who were going to deliver the helicopters to them would have a trainer to give them at least a crash course. When this turned out not to be the case, they read the manual and [[LiquidCourage took a stiff drink]], then got down to business.[[/note]]

* The real life epitome of "If It Flies..." would have to be [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Brown_%28pilot%29 Captain Eric Brown]], [[UsefulNotes/BritsWithBattleships RN]]. He's officially credited with having flown [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_flown_by_Eric_%22Winkle%22_Brown 487 different aircraft types]] in his career as a test pilot (and that's only counting basic models), including everything from Mach 2 jets to gliders and from helicopters to airliners, often hopping between up five separate types in a single day's testing. He even taught himself to fly helicopters with nothing but the instruction manual, [[InstantExpert mere hours after first seeing one]].

!!Examples

[[folder:{{Anime}} and {{Manga}}]]

* The [[ComicBook/{{Blackhawk}} Blackhawks]] exhibited just about every type of improbable flying over their [[LongRunner long run]], but ''White Hole Engines, Inc.'' is undoubtedly the most common. Typically, the Blackhawks are depicted as being able to reach any location in Europe (and sometimes outside Europe) and return to Blackhawk Island with little trouble - even when the location is ''deep'' within Axis territory, like Czechoslovakia in 1940.

[[folder:Film]]
* In ''Film/{{Apollo 13}}'', one of the astronauts, Jim Lovell, is seen this way by his elderly mother, who states that if they could get a washing machine to fly, he could land it. Maybe she's right. Normally, the Apollo capsules were flown with assistance from the flight computer with the main engine. After the accident, not enough power remained, so the flight computer was off. Also, the main engine was feared damaged, so the engines from the lunar lander were used. They lined up their target (earth) with an optical sight (read: crosshairs in the window).

* ''Film/TopGun'' is entirely based around this trope.
** Subverted with the flat spins. Watch out for that jetwash, Maverick!

* Dobbs from the German TV action show ''DerClown''. The movie ''Payday'' takes his badassness to the max as he flies multiple loops with his helicopter only a few hundred feet above ground while successfully [[HighSpeedMissileDodge evading heat-seeking missiles]].
* "Howlin' Mad" Murdock from ''Series/TheATeam'' is of the "If it flies" variety.
-->'''[[ThePeteBest Face]]''': Hey, I got us a Gulf Stream. Can you fly it?\\
'''Murdock''': Hey, brother, if it's got wings, you ''know'' I can fly it.
** He once helped Hannibal land a large passenger jet at LAX ''with his eyes closed'' (Murdock had been temporarily blinded by a gun that discharged in his face). The air-traffic control workers [[LampshadeHanging acknowledged]] how implausible it was.

* Colonel John Sheppard from ''Series/StargateAtlantis'' claims he can fly anything. He proceeds to do so over the course of the series. He's flown or operated helicopters, Air Force fighters, human-alien hybrid F-302 interceptors, Daedalus-class warships, Wraith Darts (without knowing the language), Ancient Puddle Jumpers, Ancient Aurora-class battleships, ''the city of Atlantis'', and ''an asteroid''.

* Lieutenant Matthew Scott in ''Series/StargateUniverse'' is able to fly the shuttle aboard ''Destiny.''

-->'''Starbuck:''' Every flying machine has four basic controls: Roll, pitch, yaw, and thrust. If you can figure those out, you can fly.
-->Touches a control, and the guns fire.
-->'''Starbuck:''' OK, don't touch that again.

* Pan Am 843. Seconds after take off from San Francisco International Airport, the right most engine on the Boeing 707 exploded and started a fire that caused 1/3 of the right wing to fall off. The pilots, managed to keep the plane with 153 people on board flying for 34 minutes and made a safe emergency landing at Travis Air Force Base.

* The If It Flies rule is present in ''TachyonTheFringe'', as [[Creator/BruceCampbell Jake]] cam go from a barely-fliable Mako to a top-of-the-line Archangel without any training.

* Averted in ''KerbalSpaceProgram'' due to fan opposition. Developers had proposed making experienced pilot Kerbals bring boosts to rocket engine performance. Negative reaction from the fanbase resulted in the idea being scrapped. Although the game still has it share of Aerody-whatsit, it's the same whatever Kerbal is in the command pod.

** One fan-created scenario based on DrStrangelove pits one ace-piloted Imperial Marauder, Space Marine Thunderhawk Gunship, or Tau Tiger Shark against an assortment of enemy interceptors and ground defenses in an attempt to maneuver through a series of canyons to reach a ground target. Needless to say, the bomber pilot has to be very, very good to pull it off.

Planes and most flying things tend to be fragile: if an unnamed character’s craft is so much as nicked by a slingshot's pebble, it will explode in a fiery conflagration. Not so the hero's craft, of course. Once he climbs aboard, any Personal PlotArmor he happens to be wearing is transferred to it and indeed quite possibly boosted. His craft may be missing a wing, so full of holes it looks like a sieve, and with one engine out, and he’ll still manage to shoot down five enemies with it before making an emergency landing. (Note that the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:B-17-battle-casualty1.gif B-17]], [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LveSc8Lp0ZE&fmt=18 Zivi Nadivi]] and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A-10_Thunderbolt_II the Warthog]] are TruthInTelevision.)

* An Israeli F-15 pilot, [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LveSc8Lp0ZE&fmt=18 Zivi Nadivi]], refused to bail out after crashing with another plane during a training exercise, claiming he could still return his plane safely to base and land it. When he climbed out of the cockpit on the runway, he said he would not have hesitated to eject for a single second if he had know that he [[http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2091/2112723594_21abfbfcfc_o.jpg had lost an entire wing]]. When American technicans arrived to evaluate the damage, they assumed a truck had crashed into it while on the ground.

* An Israeli F-15 pilot refused to bail out after crashing with another plane during a training exercise, claiming he could still return his plane safely to base and land it. When he climbed out of the cockpit on the runway, he said he would not have hesitated to eject for a single second if he had know that he [[http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2091/2112723594_21abfbfcfc_o.jpg had lost an entire wing]]. When American technicans arrived to evaluate the damage, they assumed a truck had crashed into it while on the ground.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Hardwar}}'', you are the only pilot who has the skills to perform crazy stuff with your Moth in the Titan moon, even if you're flying the smallest and weakest Moth in the game. [[ArtificialStupidity All of the other AI pilots including the police don't have such skills and are restricted to flying predictable patterns of which you can easily exploit even in their best days]]. In multiplayer, though, expect the other human pilots to utilize the same flying skills as you do so don't get cocky.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Hardwar}}'', you are the only pilot who has the skills to perform crazy stuff with your Moth in the Titan moon, even if you're flying the smallest and weakest Moth in the game. [[ArtificialStupidity All the other pilots including the police don't have such skills and are restricted to flying predictable patterns of which you can easily exploit even in their best days]]. In multiplayer, though, expect the other human pilots to utilize the same flying skills as you do so don't get cocky.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Hardwar}}'', you are the only pilot who has the skills to perform crazy stuff with your Moth in the Titan moon. [[ArtificialStupidity All the other pilots including the police don't have such skills and are restricted to flying predictable patterns of which you can easily exploit even in their best days]]. In multiplayer, though, expect the other human pilots to utilize the same flying skills as you do so don't get cocky.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Hardwar}}'', you are the only pilot who has the skills to perform crazy stuff with your Moth in the Titan moon. All the other pilots including the police don't have such skills and are restricted to flying predictable patterns of which you can easily exploit even in their best days. In multiplayer, though, expect the other human pilots to utilize the same flying skills as you do so don't get cocky.

*** Many quiet mentions are made of [[NumberTwo Tycho Celchu's]] piloting skills throughout the series, usually referring back to past feats, but the big example comes in ''[[JediAcademyTrilogy I, Jedi]]'' where he very nearly takes Corran apart with his AwesomenessByAnalysis style. Corran is not only an ace pilot, but a Jedi as well.

* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales'' has Launchpad [=McQuack=], who has the CatchPhrase "If it has wings, I can crash it." He can fly anything - even live animals, untested technology, and [[Recap/DuckTalesS1E4WhereNoDuckHasGoneBefore alien spaceships with controls not designed for his species]] - with excellent skill. [[CaptainCrash The only thing he can't do is land.]] He appears to have overcome this problem by ''WesternAnimation/DarkwingDuck'', or else maybe the [[CoolPlane Thunderquack]] just has auto pilot landing skills, or a thoroughly reinforced hull.

* ComicBook/{{Cyclops}}, leader of the Comicbook/{{X-Men}}, and one of the best pilots in the Marvel Universe. Remember, he's ''colour blind'' (those special glasses/visors he has to wear to control his EyeBeams leave him seeing everything red-tinted), but apparently his ImprobableAimingSkills, which are officially part of his power, allow him to maneuver better at the seat of a plane than a normal person. When he isn't leading the X-Men, he's usually working as a civilian pilot of some sort. This also seems to run in the Summers family. His grandfather Philip was an AcePilot in WorldWarII. His father Christopher was an Air Force and NASA test pilot elite enough that he was one of the only a few dozen pilots chosen to fly the SR-71 Blackbird (appropriately enough Cyclops later pilots the X-Men's own Blackbirds, the original version of which was a modified SR-71), before [[AlienAbduction being abducted by aliens]] and becoming the SpacePirate Corsair.

* WillSmith gets an If it flies in ''Film/IndependenceDay'' with the alien space craft. [[SubvertedTrope Then he crashes]].

* In the movie ''Literature/{{Biggles}}: Adventures in Time'', UsefulNotes/WorldWarI flying ace Biggles is able to work out how to fly a late 20th century helicopter by experimenting with the controls for a few minutes. Definitely a case of "If it flies..."
** The trope is actually lampshaded, with his American "Time Twin" (don't ask) telling him he can't fly it, he doesn't know how, to which Biggles just replies "If you can fly a Sopwith Camel, you can fly anything..." Well, the Camel ''was'' notoriously unforgiving of pilot error...

* It's not taken to the absurd lengths of the film mentioned above, but in the ''Literature/{{Biggles}}'' books, Biggles and his companions never seem to have much difficulty mastering the controls of whatever aircraft they're required to fly in each volume. Probably justified, as Biggles has been a professional aviator since the age of seventeen, starting out as a fighter pilot in wood-and-canvas biplanes and then spending the twenties and thirties in civil aviation before being called up for the Second World War; there can't be many classes of aircraft he ''hasn't'' flown at some point, and his colleagues aren't far behind him in professional experience. There's also a surprising exception: It was a plot point in of the earlier novels that Biggles was ''not'' [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrument_Flight_Rules IFR]]-certified. It never comes up again, so presumably he eventually corrected this gap in his skillset.

* ''AceCombat'' has this in spades. Beyond the HyperspaceArsenal, your character is easily capable of taking down multiple squadrons at once, while attacking ground forces, and avoiding their combined fire. Hard turns at over 1000 mph? Check. Flying the A-10 and F-117 well beyond supersonic in level flight? Check. Being capable of surviving multiple missile strikes? Check. Hell, if you do it gently enough, you can fly into, and seemingly bounce off of, the ground and water.
* ''{{Freelancer}}''. Let's begin the checklist, shall we?

* Incidentally, the modern more relaxed requirements for eyesight (i.e. eyeglasses or corrective surgery allowed) have paradoxally opened aviation for Bespectacled Eagle Eye pilots. The reason is that the visus value ("20/20") and refraction value (dioptric value) of an eye are two different values. The visus value measures the ''acuity'' of an eye (i.e. how accurately the eye can distinguish between two lines) while the refractive value measures if the eye is nearsighted (myopic) or farsighted (presbyopic). A person whose eyes have -2.0 dioptric value is hopelessly nearsighted without glasses (perhaps having 20/100 or 20/200 visus bare-eyed) but he may well have 20/10 acuity with good eyeglasses, making him a true eagle eye. Contact lenses are especially suitable for aviators.