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I see that Luke was a competent pilot in Episode V so why was Han Solo piloting the Tydirium?

So far, I have a few hypothetical reasons:

  1. Luke may not have been a competent pilot at that time.

  2. Solo was a smuggler. Logically, if anyone on that ship could evade the Imperial military, it would be him.

  3. Solo just wanted to be the pilot

  4. Luke did not have much, if any, desire to touch the controls.

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moonman239
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    You know who else was a competent pilot? Han Solo. Why shouldn't Han pilot it? – phantom42 Mar 26 '16 at 14:17
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    You and your SO decide to go out for a drive somewhere. You both know how to drive and you're both decent drivers, and you share ownership of the car. How do you pick who drives? More importantly, who cares? – phantom42 Mar 26 '16 at 18:20

1 Answers1

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Off the top of my head, there's a few (obvious) reasons.

  • Han and Chewie are the more experienced pilot/co-pilot group on the ship. Luke's not idle though, he's operating as the ship's Navigator.

Han entered the cockpit of the Imperial shuttle as Luke was doing some fine-tuning on a rear navigator panel. - RotJ: Novelisation

  • Han is experienced with evading and working around Imperial ships and would have some familiarity with Imperial flight policies. Luke, by comparison is a glorified fighter-jock with extremely limited cargo ship experience.

  • Han wasn't expecting Luke to be in the strike team. He wouldn't have counted on there being a second qualified pilot on board.

It’s Luke Skywalker, bounding through a doorway to join the briefing. His friends are happy to see him back again so soon, and all the rebels are glad to see the hero of the Battle of Yavin return for such an important mission. RotJ: Beware the Power of the Dark Side

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