Whether you’re a pilot, a surgeon, or a president, experience matters:
Pilots with Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger III’s background are becoming the exception rather than the rule. Captain Sullenberger, readers will recall, carefully ditched his Airbus A320 close to a jetty in the Hudson River in January 2009 without loss of a single life, after the plane had been disabled by a flock of geese while climbing out of LaGuardia airport. It should be pointed out that Sully learned to fly at the age of 16, flew F-4 Phantoms in the air force, and had 40 years and 20,000 hours of mostly hands-on experience when he performed his heroics on the Hudson.
The problem today is that aircrew may log thousands of hours on the flight decks of modern airliners, but their actual hands-on flying experience may amount to mere minutes per flight. When things get frantic–whether through a mistaken input or a sudden runway change by air-traffic control during descent–aircrew can be so preoccupied punching fresh instructions into the flight-management computer that they may fail to notice their airspeed and altitude are falling precipitously.
One of my favorite TV shows is “Mayday” on Discovery channel. It examines various disasters but predominantly airline crashes. A recurrent theme is the disaster that ensues when humans and computerization interact on aircraft particularly when things like autopilots are “partially” disabled or make automatic changes based on false assumptions.
George Jonas is always an interesting read on matters aviation.
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/07/18/george-jonas-once-a-pilot-now-a-computers-sidekick/
Children of Magenta
{Magenta is the colour of the “fly to bars” in a modern Flight Director display in the cockpit)
I know I have posted this clip before, but it is very relevant to this post.
Automation in Aviation is not new. It was just sold by the manufacturers as more efficient. (cost and time wise)
From a commenter at the clip site:
I have been training for over 28 years and have watched this creation of auto-dependant pilots come to pass. Since I have been flying Airbus 320/1/330 , in the last 10 years, I have watched the situation develop towards the subject matter of this video. Snowpilot and his ‘children of magenta’ is the most and BEST common sense I have heard in the training arena for a long long time!
Listen and learn.
aye
I wonder how many pilots could perform a “Gimli Glider” these days?
I am a retired Air Force and then airline pilot who managed to avoid having to do a “Sully,” though my time was not without a few moments of stark terror among otherwise long periods of tedium. I saw much the same situation in the last few years with good people who had a few hundred hours in light planes, followed by thousands of hours in automation wonders. When the magic failed, they simply did not have enough experience to fall back on. Not their fault, just how the industry is these days.
The unintended consequences of the safety first culture.
Idiot proofing only makes more idiots.
“Captain Sullenberger. . . ditched his Airbus A320 without loss of a single life” — and without it breaking in half, which was the wondrous accomplishment, to me.
The article doesn’t mention the ‘rest crew’. On long intercontinental trips, the experienced hands take the plane off, get it pointed out over the ocean and then hands over to the rest or relief crew who basically sit there and watch for any warning lights. When the ocean is crossed the rest crew is replaced by the experienced crew who will actually land the airplane. It is possible for the rest crew members to log a thousand hours of flying without ever having to touch the control yoke.
Myself I want a bush pilot in the cockpit, one who flown into and out of impossibly small lakes and done thousands of landings in difficult weather conditions.
Fair seas do not an experienced sailor make.
Ok I’m freaked out. What are thoughts on keeping pilots around after 65 until this is sorted? Thanks but I’ll take the greyhair who likes to play in his citabria on weekends to the 30 year old equity hire every single time. And as someone who will be frequently travelling on non-western airlines, any advice on which aircraft to avoid?
A better interface design would allow pilots to choose the level of automation they felt most comfortable with
Give me a break! The writer makes a good point regarding training but “Cockpit automation” is a misnomer, perhaps cockpit convenience would be better. In terms of presentation to the pilots, the pilots always have the option of “raw data” just like in the old days.
Most of the cited accidents result from incompetence due to lack of training or incompetence due to pilot unions, not systems design.
…the pilots seem to have been unaware, until the last few minutes, of their proximity to the ground and of how slowly their planes were flying…
So is the writer suggesting that the cause is poor data presentation because now the pilot has six sources of airspeed and altitude rather than one?
Technology is not the problem.
When your number is up…it’s up, but if your’e not feeling lucky, avoid these.
Of 60 ranked airlines, here are the ten with the worst safety records, including the number of hull losses and passenger deaths in these accidents since 1983:
SkyWest Airlines: 3 hull losses; 22 dead
South African Airways: 1 hull loss; 159 dead
Thai Airways International: 5 hull losses; 309 dead
Turkish Airlines: 6 hull losses, 188 dead
Saudia: 4 hull losses; 310 dead
Korean Air: 9 hull losses; 687 dead
GOL Transportes Aéreos: 1 hull loss; 154 dead
Air India: 3 hull losses; 329 dead
TAM Airlines: 6 hull losses; 336 dead
China Airlines: 8 hull losses; 755 dead
The writer is quite correct to blame lack of training for many incidents, but totally incorrect to blame technology.
What does “worst safety record” actually mean in your view?
It seems you give a rather simplistic quotation of data but no real information.
For example you agglomerate South African Airways with GOL Transportes Aéreos, yet one carried many times the number of Pax than the other, so the actual rate of accidents is much smaller.
What are you trying to prove?
Sully’s amazing landing was based on more than his years of flying airliners. Apparently he was a very experienced glider pilot. When he lost all engine power he glided the plane in realizing what angle and speed he had to hit the water to prevent the plane from breaking up. A unique situation combined with a pilot capable of handling it. What are the odds?
About the same as pulling off a forward slip in a Boeing 767.
During my flight training, one of the best pieces of advice I received from an instructor was “Eyes forward and outside the cockpit, fly the airplane first”. The modern pilot can get caught up in the techy-wizardry of the glass cockpit where the basics of “stick and rudder” tends to get forgotten.
My favorite flight when I was not at the controls was in a Bell 206 Jet Ranger helicopter. The pilot, a former pilot for the U.S. Army in Viet Nam where he flew Hueys under heavy fire! He retired from the military and came to Canada flying fight fighting crews in northern Alberta and BC. This guy personified calm and cool. Just like Captain Sully! It was an honor to fly with him.
This is a good site for rating the worlds airlines.
http://www.airlineratings.com/airlines-ratings.php