It isn't the automation, it is the Pilot Monitoring, CRM and Culture

The aviation rule making committee for the 1500 hour ATP rule did take into consideration your point of view though. If you look at the point that if you go to an 'aviation college' a few hundred hours are knocked off the requirement. I think that is a happy medium between giving credit for the academic knowledge and 'go out and fly' approach.
I suppose that's some "middle ground". But that sort of supports the thought that hours are minuscule in the whole scheme of things. This rule is suggesting that someone with more "book" or "ground" training is equal to someone with more hours but less class work. So in your opinion, tell me how someone that graduated say....UND or ERAU is better equipped to fly a crj with 1000 hrs the I am with 1500? And to add to that, lets so I have a bachelors in business admin. And a crj transition training certificate.

The hours just seem pointless when put into that kind of perspective. And I believe most of us on this forum have, at some point or another, suggested that an aviation degree is useless. But I guess it's not....it saves you 500 hrs right?

But can an aviation degree help you fly a single engine approach in icing conditions? Or any other emergency for that matter?
 
I suppose that's some "middle ground". But that sort of supports the thought that hours are minuscule in the whole scheme of things. This rule is suggesting that someone with more "book" or "ground" training is equal to someone with more hours but less class work. So in your opinion, tell me how someone that graduated say....UND or ERAU is better equipped to fly a crj with 1000 hrs the I am with 1500? And to add to that, lets so I have a bachelors in business admin. And a crj transition training certificate.

No just because you went to UND or ERAU that doesn't make you a better prepared to fly a RJ. It is simply rewarding you for the theory knowledge you gained by attending a school like that. If you look at the European Pilot Certificate Curriculum, it is VERY heavily focused on academia. I don't agree with that academia approach fully, but I don't think it is bad to 'reward' those who go through a program were you study that in a college setting.

The hours just seem pointless when put into that kind of perspective. And I believe most of us on this forum have, at some point or another, suggested that an aviation degree is useless. But I guess it's not....it saves you 500 hrs right?

But can an aviation degree help you fly a single engine approach in icing conditions? Or any other emergency for that matter?

The aviation degree can't help you fly an approach or handle an emergency. However, the academics behind the degree are important and should be 'rewarded' in a way. I think the compromise reached with the 1500 hour rule and aviation universities is a good one.
 
I suppose that's some "middle ground". But that sort of supports the thought that hours are minuscule in the whole scheme of things. This rule is suggesting that someone with more "book" or "ground" training is equal to someone with more hours but less class work. So in your opinion, tell me how someone that graduated say....UND or ERAU is better equipped to fly a crj with 1000 hrs the I am with 1500? And to add to that, lets so I have a bachelors in business admin. And a crj transition training certificate.

The hours just seem pointless when put into that kind of perspective. And I believe most of us on this forum have, at some point or another, suggested that an aviation degree is useless. But I guess it's not....it saves you 500 hrs right?

But can an aviation degree help you fly a single engine approach in icing conditions? Or any other emergency for that matter?

Every single flight hour you get is important whether you're attending clown college in Little Rock or aviation at ERAU. It all counts towards that goal to fly airplanes for living. I doubt they are handing out preferential hiring to those UND and ERAU graduates with 1000 hours.
 
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This 51%/49% crap about Capt/FO authority has got to stop. The FO hits the ground at the same time the Capt does. If you fly with me and don't speak up when I'm making one of my daily missteps because of some perceived authority gradient, I'm gonna get the chain of command and beat you with it.

Fly the airplane by the book, obey the damn rules, be a leader not because of the seat you're in but because the responsibility and authority granted you by the chunk of plastic in your wallet.

Along with Boris's complacency post earlier in this thread, Dugie is right on the mark. My airline's SOP was spelled out to the letter and as the FO, I followed it. When I moved to the left seat I was shocked, dismayed, and sadden at the complacency and laziness of my fellow crewmembers....and this is at a major US carrier.

"When it's your leg, fly it as if you are the captain." I would brief. Few ever did.

Tip: Take the job seriously...it's expected of you.
 
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I actually saw the crew the morning of the accident. Talked to the jumpseater in the back on the drive home after I landed from my commute home.

I also worked on the Colgan crash.

Anyway, there were a ton of errors with the flight crew on that flight, yes it was a real factor. The position of the INCR REF switch was missed, wrong speeds bugged, a trending loss of airspeed, etc are some of the many. The culture of Colgan eventually changed after the accident. It morphed from a punitive safety culture to a just safety culture. It took a lot of time, but it did happen....
Sorry about the personal loss, it explains your passion on this issue.
I know you have a lot more informaiton on the crash than I but i have followed this one from the beginning.
There seems to be a LOT of "etc"s in this crash; I'm curious if the checklist items you mentioned were missed due to misunderstanding of systems, errors in training, lack of positive communication in the cockpit, "talking below 10k" (pre-occupied), etc. Were there specific CRM errors identified or were all these errors just lumped into CRM failure as a catch all?

I don't get what you are saying with your P.S.
I was just letting you know that I'm not asking from a 121 perspective.
 
Are you speaking about the Rio-Paris AF447 ? If so it is a lot more complex than just PM or CRM and might not really fit with the others mentioned. As for the culture within the company, let's just say that it has evolved A LOT in the past decade, old guys retiring, old habits retiring. There are many tools available or made available after the AF447 to help flight crews. As to fly the plane, you are free to hand fly the plane whenever you want to. But with the 340 it is a rather uneventful thing, at any stage of the flight. It's heavy, very stable, auto-trimmed, will stay in whatever attitude you tell it to stay... The culture at AF has always been a mix of bravado and pushing luck. It comes from the time France still had colonies. We've always had the longest domestic flights in the world (and still do, CDG-RUN : 5810 mi or better yet CDG-PPT : 9800mi !). Those guys back in the days all had the right stuff and it kind of stuck for a long time, it is slowly fading away, for the better. So monitoring, reporting etc. sure, Flight Analysis has some pretty thorough stats on each flights, but unless something really serious happens it's just used for stats and not so much for enforcing of discouraging certain type of behaviors. Sim rides, line checks are there to make sure you are safe and proficient.
 
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Sorry about the personal loss, it explains your passion on this issue.
I know you have a lot more informaiton on the crash than I but i have followed this one from the beginning.
There seems to be a LOT of "etc"s in this crash; I'm curious if the checklist items you mentioned were missed due to misunderstanding of systems, errors in training, lack of positive communication in the cockpit, "talking below 10k" (pre-occupied), etc. Were there specific CRM errors identified or were all these errors just lumped into CRM failure as a catch all?

Well, the procedures for the INCR REF speed switch wasn't standardized by our company the time of the accident, there were errors in training, no CRM/TEM training at Colgan, basically a lot of things that led to a bad situation. The things that led to the bad situation would have probably been stopped the low speed though if we had properly trained CRM/TEM and stronger Pilot Monitoring duties/skills.
 
Indeed.

I have flown with a number of Captains who include in their morning "get to know you" brief and chat the fact that 75% of CFITs are with the Captain as PF. They use this as a reminder that they are fallible. Similar to the "if you think I'm doing something strange, speak up. I'm probably making a mistake" line.
 
A lot of the posts on this thread discuss elements of CRM, and the individual thoughts are not wrong.

Basic flying skills are important.

Identifying threats is important.

How and why we make mistakes as individuals and crews is important.

Setting an open tone in the cockpit is important.

Good aircraft management is important.

I think everyone that flies is very aware of these individual points.

What we tend to lack as an industry is application and practical use and integration of these important individual elements to manage a flight safely.

Giving pilots a system and a set of tools integrating these ideas in whatever operational culture is defined at a company is what is lacking.

Because most CRM training trends to focus on communication, the hazardous attitudes, and "team building"exercises, most people tend to associate those items alone with CRM.

What is needed is combining these individual elements to build a true crew environment. Take the individual elements to create a true crew working environment that allows the crews to identify approaching situations that will task saturate them and methods to mitigate that situation.

Approach the lessons with management of highly automated aircraft, discussing various situations to leave everything hooked up to just flying the aircraft and various stages in between. As is always pointed out, there is no absolute yet there is a most appropriate setup to keep task saturation at a minimum. So integrate the elements of CRM and TEM and create a set of tools that help create a cockpit environment that empowers crews to evaluate the best way to manage the aircraft with the last task loading and maximum SA.
 
Well, the procedures for the INCR REF speed switch wasn't standardized by our company the time of the accident, there were errors in training, no CRM/TEM training at Colgan, basically a lot of things that led to a bad situation. The things that led to the bad situation would have probably been stopped the low speed though if we had properly trained CRM/TEM and stronger Pilot Monitoring duties/skills.

I've also got to add, with regard to the thing that finally killed the 3407 crew: reducing power for the approach.

If you've never done this yourself before, you either have auto throttles that won't let you, or you didn't notice when you pulled the power back to slow and got distracted by something.

I've done it before, though I obviously only lost a few knots before realizing what was happening. I've seen captains do it, and a quick "check speed" gets us back on profile.

When you do idle descents for long periods of time, it'll happen eventually. When you do decelerating approaches for long enough, it'll happen eventually. Hell, right after 3407 we had a crew do the exact same thing, but recovered from the shaker properly.

Were they bad pilots? No, they were distracted by figuring out how to not run headlong into a thunderstorm. It's EASY to end up having both sets of eyes outside the aircraft trying to figure out how to fix something.

Instead of lambasting our pilots, we put this into our CRM program and learned how to try to prevent it from happening again, because it could have been any of us.
 
I actually saw the crew the morning of the accident. Talked to the jumpseater in the back on the drive home after I landed from my commute home.

I also worked on the Colgan crash.

Anyway, there were a ton of errors with the flight crew on that flight, yes it was a real factor. The position of the INCR REF switch was missed, wrong speeds bugged, a trending loss of airspeed, etc are some of the many. The culture of Colgan eventually changed after the accident. It morphed from a punitive safety culture to a just safety culture. It took a lot of time, but it did happen.

I don't get what you are saying with your P.S.

To be fair Seggy, that CA should never have been in that seat in the first place. Instrument rating - failed. Commercial multi - failed. Hired at Colgan 2005 initial Saab SIC type - TTP additional training. 2006 Recurrent PC Saab - failed. 2007 ATP upgrade Saab - failed. These were far too many failures for someone with only 3,300 hrs total. I read through the accident docket interview summaries, especially about his training at Gulfstream which happened after he had obtained all his licenses. Downright scary! This guy couldn't fly, period. The only reason he lasted as long as he did was a massive use of AP to cover airmanship deficiencies.
 
To be fair Seggy, that CA should never have been in that seat in the first place. Instrument rating - failed. Commercial multi - failed. Hired at Colgan 2005 initial Saab SIC type - TTP additional training. 2006 Recurrent PC Saab - failed. 2007 ATP upgrade Saab - failed. These were far too many failures for someone with only 3,300 hrs total. I read through the accident docket interview summaries, especially about his training at Gulfstream which happened after he had obtained all his licenses. Downright scary! This guy couldn't fly, period. The only reason he lasted as long as he did was a massive use of AP to cover airmanship deficiencies.

I don't argue that point. You are right, he shouldn't have been in that cockpit.

But he was. Why?

I will say that it does point to a cultural problem with Colgan. Among many other things, they didn't have the resources to properly screen their applicants as well as a bad training environment. So he is covered in my theory one way or another.
 
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Are you speaking about the Rio-Paris AF447 ? If so it is a lot more complex than just PM or CRM and might not really fit with the others mentioned. As for the culture within the company, let's just say that it has evolved A LOT in the past decade, old guys retiring, old habits retiring. There are many tools available or made available after the AF447 to help flight crews. As to fly the plane, you are free to hand fly the plane whenever you want to. But with the 340 it is a rather uneventful thing, at any stage of the flight. It's heavy, very stable, auto-trimmed, will stay in whatever attitude you tell it to stay... The culture at AF has always been a mix of bravado and pushing luck. It comes from the time France still had colonies. We've always had the longest domestic flights in the world (and still do, CDG-RUN : 5810 mi or better yet CDG-PPT : 9800mi !). Those guys back in the days all had the right stuff and it kind of stuck for a long time, it is slowly fading away, for the better. So monitoring, reporting etc. sure, Flight Analysis has some pretty thorough stats on each flights, but unless something really serious happens it's just used for stats and not so much for enforcing of discouraging certain type of behaviors. Sim rides, line checks are there to make sure you are safe and proficient.

From what I understand about the accident, yes, I do think it fits into the model nicely. Yes, there were a lot of things that went wrong well outside the control of the crew, but it was quite recoverable (as is most accidents), if it was properly caught what was going on. I read the CVR. It was interesting what they were saying when discussing the weather and hearing what was going through their minds. You may disagree, but I think there were some CRM issues that could have been managed better. Of course it is easy for us to say that now, but as one who also had company pilots stall an airplane with a lot less going on that they did in the AF447 Cockpit, I understand on how you would want to support your fallen crew members.

Also, y'all go CDG to PPT!?! I thought that was through LAX?
 
Yes there's a stop at LAX, like 2 hours and then boom another like 9 or 10hrs... Crayyyyzeeee !
I absolutely agree and everyone does inside the company, about the CRM, there was also severe fatigue (Rio is quite the festive place) and questionable route planning. AF has a fairly open cockpit "vibe", where you can speak freely your mind, disagree, argue and ultimately reach an agreement. It has been a culture shock, put some things into perspective, and it is definitely a safer company. So the accident served a purpose if you'd like. It is very, I mean VERY easy to get into a work numbness in our A340's, 777's etc. Those are hyper automated a/c's, make most of the work for you and just require half a vigilant eye most of the time. They are kinda like a rottweiler on steroids. 99.9% nice and easy, but when they snap, better be on top of your game. After 2 days of partying, meeeeeeh...
Excellent thread BTW.
 
I think it should be the Captains decision. A rejected take-off is probably one of the most dangerous maneuvers and as it is very, very, very, very rare that if you go flying you would be in worse shape than if you make a decision to abort, having one person make that decision is probably the safest course of action.

However, it comes down to proper training and guidance to allow for that responsibility to fall on the Captain alone.

Before every trip or every flight with a new crew we have to brief the rejected take off procedures to get everyone on the same page. We also have a chart of very specific guidance on considerations for rejected take-offs in the low and high speed regime. It is also a big point of emphasis during recurrent training items.

Fair enough. How would you feel about changing training so either pilot could call the abort? Support your answer. Just trying to wrap my head around it better.
 
Serious question for you guys: I've always heard that there's no time for VFR charts in transport category jet aircraft. Everything is out of the Jepp Airway Manual, with the route backed up on an IFR enroute chart - although for the most part you program up (or download) the route into the FMC and then follow LNAV/VNAV while referencing and briefing the plates when appropriate.

Historically I've heard the excuse that it isn't feasible to carry around every sectional/TAC/WAC chart in your cockpit, and too time consuming to find the right one, unfold it and find your destination airport when briefing each approach. Nevermind the fact that everything happens so much faster in jet aircraft and you're trying to stay several steps ahead of the airplane. However this is 2014, and tablet based apps like ForeFlight have revolutionized our situational awareness potential by literally putting your GPS position, course, altitude and groundspeed on any VFR or IFR chart you want. With many companies already transitioning to tablets as EFBs for IFR charts, what is the harm in switching over to the VFR sectional tab at the end of your approach brief if you anticipate a visual approach? What used to be prohibitively time consuming now takes about 5 seconds.

While I don't have access to the Jepps, I went back and looked at the NACO charts for the intended destinations of the last three high profile wrong airport landings (C-17 bound for MacDill that landed at Peter O'Knight, Atlas 747 bound for McConnel that landed at Jabara, and finally the Southwest 737 bound for Branson that landed at Clark Downtown airport). I was surprised, because I've seen plenty of NACO plates which depict nearby airports with similar runway configurations in the plan view - but none of the airports they mistakenly landed at were on any of the NACO plates for their destinations. In each case, they could have briefed the approach plate perfectly and would still have no idea to expect to see another similar airport prematurely. While both the 737NG and the 747-400 (and up) have the EHSI/Navigation Display MFDs, they are based on 1990s human factors engineering and the airports are displayed as simple circles (which clutter up the screen and are often turned off!), so there's no clue in that the other runway could be aligned with your destination runway. You could certainly notice you were heading to the wrong circle eventually, but it sounds like the common factor in all these incidents is that both crew members transitioned from "heads down" to looking outside 10+ miles out, and then didn't adequately crosscheck or back up with the IAP on the way in.

Surprisingly, I think this CNN op-ed author laid out the problem very well:
http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/13/opinion/goyer-airplane-wrong-runway/

The problem is there are two distinct modes of operating an airplane, by reference to the instruments and by visual reference. With very, very few exceptions, every flight ends with the pilot turning off the autopilot (if it was engaged), taking physical command of the plane through the flight and power controls, "acquiring" the runway visually and landing. Sometimes that process happens in the last 10 seconds of a flight, sometimes in the last five minutes.

It's that visual acquisition of the landing runway that's the trap. When pilots see what they believe is the right runway, they're going to land there unless some big alarm goes off in their head. It's simply human nature, and pilots are humans. They proceed to disregard the instruments and simply "hand fly" the airplane to a landing, that is if the co-pilot doesn't alert them to the flub.

All the while the navigation instruments "know" the plane is headed to the wrong airport, but the pilots don't pay attention because in their mind they've already found the right runway, so why even bother to look at the instruments?

The CRM/Threat Assessment discussion thus far has been fascinating, but even if the crew backs up the approach with the IAP and realizes through proper crosscheck that the instruments aren't agreeing with what their eyes are telling them, they will still be surprised and confused. My question in all of this is how is the crew supposed to be expected to assess procedural threats for a VISUAL landing when they are configured and equipped with only instrument charts? In all three of these high profile cases, a cursory 2 second check of the destination airport on a VFR sectional would alert the crew to the threat of seeing the wrong airport:

1.) In the case of the C-17 in Tampa, the Knight airport has the same runway orientation as MacDill and is located on a similar north/south peninsula jutting into the Tampa bay! It is not depicted on the ILS/LOC Rwy 22 (NACO) approach chart.

2.) For the Atlas 747 Dreamlifter in Wichita, there are THREE airports with similar layouts along the ILS/LOC Rwy 19R final approach course to Mc Connel AFB (Cessna, Beech Factory and Jabara)! None are on the plan view on that NACO chart.

3.) For the SWA 737 going to Branson, MO, the Clark Downtown airport is not shown in the plan view on the RNAV (GPS) RWY 14 plate, but the geographic differences are huge. Clark is on the southeast corner of a large town, bordered by a large river on the west side an a large highway on the east. BBG is in the middle of nowhere much further south from town, and well east of that highway.

With these glaring differences in mind, it almost seems hypocritical for crews to fly a STAR, brief an instrument approach and then accept a visual from ATC (often rushed either to get ahead of other traffic or just get-there-itis). What good is threat assessment if you're trying to apply instrument-only threats to the visual environment? Backing up with an instrument approach and good CRM/instrument crosscheck should work 100% of the time if everyone's on their game, but it is a defensive and reactionary measure meant to rescue the crew once they've already gotten confused, and it's human nature to look outside once you think you know where you're landing.

With that said, I think there is a visual vs. instrument procedural training aspect to this problem, and I wonder if consulting an EFB tablet-based sectional/TAC during the approach brief (or supplementing with it as a moving map during the visual) would improve crew's situational awareness and foresight into what to expect when accepting a visual approach in the 121 environment?
 
Serious question for you guys: I've always heard that there's no time for VFR charts in transport category jet aircraft. Everything is out of the Jepp Airway Manual, with the route backed up on an IFR enroute chart - although for the most part you program up (or download) the route into the FMC and then follow LNAV/VNAV while referencing and briefing the plates when appropriate.

Historically I've heard the excuse that it isn't feasible to carry around every sectional/TAC/WAC chart in your cockpit, and too time consuming to find the right one, unfold it and find your destination airport when briefing each approach. Nevermind the fact that everything happens so much faster in jet aircraft and you're trying to stay several steps ahead of the airplane. However this is 2014, and tablet based apps like ForeFlight have revolutionized our situational awareness potential by literally putting your GPS position, course, altitude and groundspeed on any VFR or IFR chart you want. With many companies already transitioning to tablets as EFBs for IFR charts, what is the harm in switching over to the VFR sectional tab at the end of your approach brief if you anticipate a visual approach? What used to be prohibitively time consuming now takes about 5 seconds.

While I don't have access to the Jepps, I went back and looked at the NACO charts for the intended destinations of the last three high profile wrong airport landings (C-17 bound for MacDill that landed at Peter O'Knight, Atlas 747 bound for McConnel that landed at Jabara, and finally the Southwest 737 bound for Branson that landed at Clark Downtown airport). I was surprised, because I've seen plenty of NACO plates which depict nearby airports with similar runway configurations in the plan view - but none of the airports they mistakenly landed at were on any of the NACO plates for their destinations. In each case, they could have briefed the approach plate perfectly and would still have no idea to expect to see another similar airport prematurely. While both the 737NG and the 747-400 (and up) have the EHSI/Navigation Display MFDs, they are based on 1990s human factors engineering and the airports are displayed as simple circles (which clutter up the screen and are often turned off!), so there's no clue in that the other runway could be aligned with your destination runway. You could certainly notice you were heading to the wrong circle eventually, but it sounds like the common factor in all these incidents is that both crew members transitioned from "heads down" to looking outside 10+ miles out, and then didn't adequately crosscheck or back up with the IAP on the way in.

Surprisingly, I think this CNN op-ed author laid out the problem very well:
http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/13/opinion/goyer-airplane-wrong-runway/



The CRM/Threat Assessment discussion thus far has been fascinating, but even if the crew backs up the approach with the IAP and realizes through proper crosscheck that the instruments aren't agreeing with what their eyes are telling them, they will still be surprised and confused. My question in all of this is how is the crew supposed to be expected to assess procedural threats for a VISUAL landing when they are configured and equipped with only instrument charts? In all three of these high profile cases, a cursory 2 second check of the destination airport on a VFR sectional would alert the crew to the threat of seeing the wrong airport:

1.) In the case of the C-17 in Tampa, the Knight airport has the same runway orientation as MacDill and is located on a similar north/south peninsula jutting into the Tampa bay! It is not depicted on the ILS/LOC Rwy 22 (NACO) approach chart.

2.) For the Atlas 747 Dreamlifter in Wichita, there are THREE airports with similar layouts along the ILS/LOC Rwy 19R final approach course to Mc Connel AFB (Cessna, Beech Factory and Jabara)! None are on the plan view on that NACO chart.

3.) For the SWA 737 going to Branson, MO, the Clark Downtown airport is not shown in the plan view on the RNAV (GPS) RWY 14 plate, but the geographic differences are huge. Clark is on the southeast corner of a large town, bordered by a large river on the west side an a large highway on the east. BBG is in the middle of nowhere much further south from town, and well east of that highway.

With these glaring differences in mind, it almost seems hypocritical for crews to fly a STAR, brief an instrument approach and then accept a visual from ATC (often rushed either to get ahead of other traffic or just get-there-itis). What good is threat assessment if you're trying to apply instrument-only threats to the visual environment? Backing up with an instrument approach and good CRM/instrument crosscheck should work 100% of the time if everyone's on their game, but it is a defensive and reactionary measure meant to rescue the crew once they've already gotten confused, and it's human nature to look outside once you think you know where you're landing.

With that said, I think there is a visual vs. instrument procedural training aspect to this problem, and I wonder if consulting an EFB tablet-based sectional/TAC during the approach brief (or supplementing with it as a moving map during the visual) would improve crew's situational awareness and foresight into what to expect when accepting a visual approach in the 121 environment?

You are incorrect on how Boeings display the runway you're planning on landing on. Even the 90's philosophy, with limited processing capability, give very good SA.
 
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