Children of the Magenta (Video)

This reminds me of the BizHub (I think) commercial about how they used to fax on greasy fax paper and then the elder who spoke of floppy disks. In 20 years we will be telling the pilots that they are soft for their super duper automation that we haven't even thought of yet.
 
This reminds me of the BizHub (I think) commercial about how they used to fax on greasy fax paper and then the elder who spoke of floppy disks. In 20 years we will be telling the pilots that they are soft for their super duper automation that we haven't even thought of yet.
Automation is good, and it can be precise (RNAV DP, Cat III), but when it stops doing what you want to do you need to do your job and fly. I don't think that's ever going to change. I hope not. They get rid of my flight controls and I'll just quit. :)

Or, as I like to announce after the four clicks: "Motion's on!" :)

But seriously, this was a great video that gave me a lot to think about. I realized I was getting lazy with the use of autothrottles especially, and the last 5 minutes about turning it all off and flying an airplane hit home. I still see the automation (at least some level, even if it's just the autothrottles) as a valid fatigue mitigation technique when everyone has been up all night, but turning all that crap off as much as you can will keep you the most proficient.
You can sort of fly the airplane with the autothrottles on in a Boeing...sort of. At least they move when thrust order changes. But it's silly. Just turn them off.

With autothrust engaged in an Airbus (no TL movement), you certainly can't. Just turn them off.
 
Timely for me. Just got back from a contract trip in the Beatchjet (actually a Diamond :eek:). The C/A has more time than God, and is a very good pilot, AFAICT. But the autopilot (or maybe the FD, not sure) didn't capture in "APCH" mode for some damn reason. He was looking at the buttons and trying to figure out what was going on as the glideslope went almost full deflection "high". Totally capable guy, and it's not like we were in any danger being high (and I'm sure this guy would have flown the missed way better than I would have), but even when I brought it up, he wanted to "fix" the automation rather than hit the big red "cancel" button on the yoke and actually fly the ILS. It all turned out fine, of course, and I wouldn't hesitate to put my imaginary family on his plane, but come on people. If it's a Big Deal (let alone The End Of The World) if your FD and/or autopilot craps out on you, you need to turn the crap off more often. A raw data ILS should be child's play.
 
You can sort of fly the airplane with the autothrottles on in a Boeing...sort of. At least they move when thrust order changes. But it's silly. Just turn them off.

You can fly a Boeing just fine with the autothrottles engaged. Some people get up in arms about mixed-mode flying, but I stand behind their use when fatigue is an issue. Any other time, I turn them off to help maintain proficiency.
 
Problem here lies more in strict adherence to your company SOP's. Most companies will require automation engaged very early in the flight until very late, often to the point where a failure could be catastrophic. And if you override SOP's, Flight Analysis will send a nice report to your CP.
 
In ground school they showed us the one where the guy explains how to get out of an unusual attitude/upset recovery techniques. Interesting to say the least.

I was going to mention this. The videos are extremely good overall, but I was surprised AMR was still showing that in ground school in light of the 2001 Airbus crash.
 
I was going to mention this. The videos are extremely good overall, but I was surprised AMR was still showing that in ground school in light of the 2001 Airbus crash.

I haven't seen the video, but read extracts from what it said, and I don't see anything fundamentally wrong with it. His core hypothesis -- that the rudder is more effective at high AOA -- is true.

The root cause of the 2001 crash IMHO seems to be more rooted in very poor execution of the basic technique and in an incorrect scenario.
 
When Vanderburgh is describing uncoupling the autopilot and autothrottles on the video, he says "click, click" for both.

What are those two switch actuations he's describing with each click? Two presses of the same switch, or pressing two different switches? What does the first push vs the second push accomplish?
 
I watched the video on an overnight and it changed the way I flew the next morning. Good lessons learned!
 
I'd watched it a few years ago but what it really drove home to me (especially after reading US Airway's FOM 2 as well) is how poor our training is down here in Regional World. I know some places (ExpressJet and Eagle) do spend a lot of time on some things (our "CRM" block was 25 minutes... ExpressJet's is a day or so), but in general it is pretty sad how little they teach us and how much we need to go out and learn ourselves if we want the knowledge and skills.

Sorry Bob, but skywest does a great job on teaching CRM & role of automation.
 
When Vanderburgh is describing uncoupling the autopilot and autothrottles on the video, he says "click, click" for both.

What are those two switch actuations he's describing with each click? Two presses of the same switch, or pressing two different switches? What does the first push vs the second push accomplish?

The two switch actuations are as you say the autopilot and the autothrottle disconnect. First click disconnects autopilot second click disconnects autothrottle or vice versa. Could be two different switches depending on the aircraft. I've never flown a plane with auto throttle so I can't comment on the specific action. But the audience was the aa pilot group in general across all fleet types. I think the point he makes is you want to be off automation depending on the situation in which you find yourself.

Edit: just saw it was four clicks, the first click for the actual disconnect second click to silence the aural warning.

I have all the videos and can burn it onto a cd if you want. I don't know of the online sources as I'm pretty computer illiterate these days.
 
When Vanderburgh is describing uncoupling the autopilot and autothrottles on the video, he says "click, click" for both.

What are those two switch actuations he's describing with each click? Two presses of the same switch, or pressing two different switches? What does the first push vs the second push accomplish?

One click to disconnect the autopilot, one click to silence the siren. On the throttles, it's the same. One click to disconnect the autothrottles, one more click to silence the beeper. Four clicks total.
 
Thanks for sorting that out for the dumb fighter dude. In the King Air, it's one click and there's no way to silence that extremely annoying warning tone when you do. It's as if it's punishing you for turning the AP off!

I understand why the warning is there (needing to alert crews if the AP is accidentally kicked off), but that line of thinking definitley comes from a different mindset than I'm used to in the no-autopilot-or-if-they-do-it's-only-altitude-hold line of work!
 
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