Low Timers are Finally Getting Mainstream Press

I understand you're point, but I don't believe you understand the material behind the numbers you're throwing around.

Flying isn't safe by nature, we've established that. WHY is it safe. It isn't safe because it's statistically safe, it's safe because WE MAKE IT SAFE. The numbers you're fimilar with are from BEFORE super low timers in the U.S. training system were in cockpits, and as the times fell there was still a different system in place. The captain we're flying with now instructed, then flew freight and THEN got in the right seat of an RJ. WE on the other hand, have not had that same maturation process.

What about us makes it safe? It isn't the automation, because that can and does fail. It's a combination of an extremely complicated set of factors, including experience. We have not seen the fruits of what we're putting in cockpits yet, that'll take years.

But flying isn't safe because the numbers say it's safe, it's safe because WE make it safe. And it will continue to be safe or unsafe based on us, our experiences, and I've found experience is the best way to combat strange situations you can't simulate. The worst emergency I've had came right after my checkout in the aircraft (part 135 checkout) and left me thinking to myself, "This is IMPOSSIBLE, I just checked on this aircraft I know this can't happen...but...I guess it is..." When that one happened I leaned heavily on the guy next to me with 6,000 hours in type as captain, not the crap I was given in the sim or ground school before that.
 
I think if you take away the new technology that greatly enhances Situational Awareness, you will find low time pilots in quite a pinch between a rock and hard place. I don't know what its like flying those shiney jets (yet ;) ), but in the Beech 1900, I've found myself in many situations where I felt a bit of hair standing up on the back of my neck. And I usually shave that.

I don't think flying Airplanes can even be remotely related to driving a car, and neither should the accident statistics. I've shot approaches in the 1900 down to bare butt minimums through a mountain valley in solid fog. Came hauling in on an ILS with ice piled on the wings and landed in min 1200RVR with nothing more then a stupid ILS/VOR receiver and a radar altimeter. We've had days where if we weren't on top of our game the results could have been deadly. I can count on one hand how many times I've been on the edge of my seat in an automobile. I'm on to my toes now with Airplanes.

Low time pilots in faster, turbine aircraft = dangerous. I don't give a heck what any statistic shows. There will come a time and place when your fancy JET technology decides to Windows '98 Blue Screen and suddenly you're hand flying on steam guages the size of a peanut. I don't think for one second some wonder pilot with 400hrs of hand flying experience will be able to handle that situation nearly as well as a Captain with old roots experience. If you think that, well then you're kidding yourself. "Oh but the Captain is there." Poor, lame excuse. You're a pilot, you should be able to handle it.

The 1900 is a handful for those coming from light piston twins, but she's a pilots airplane. She can back you into a corner, but the aircraft is forgiving. Jet aircraft are not. They don't handfly like a Beech, they are a completely different animal and would be a challenge for a Beech pilot, let alone a low time wonder. Luckily technology has been reliable, and the worst case scenario hasn't happened. But to think that you're immune from disaster and that the technology won't fail is a deadly attitude. If you think it won't happen to you, better check that again. The people that died on 9/11 never thought it could happen either.
 
You've lost me again Jtrain. I understand fully what makes flying safe. Also, it's a far more dynamic thing then just pilot experience. There are hundreds of factors that go into this. But this is all about the stats Jtrain...It's about what is likely to happen, not what can happen. You are arguing that we base our assessment of this topic on very very unlikely what ifs! I'm just not someone who is going to obsess over a scenario that has a 1 in a million chance of coming to fruition. And I don't see it as justification to bar low-time peeps from the industry. I fully understand your point. But that will not lever my position.

The hard truth is that people are going to die in aircraft accidents. I just don't see that that low-time vs high time is that big of a spread. There is a difference certainly. But I live by likelihood. Not obscure what if's. I don't buy into fear and I don't like being the target of fear mongering either.
 
jtrain609 said:
The worst emergency I've had came right after my checkout in the aircraft (part 135 checkout) and left me thinking to myself, "This is IMPOSSIBLE, I just checked on this aircraft I know this can't happen...but...I guess it is..." When that one happened I leaned heavily on the guy next to me with 6,000 hours in type as captain, not the crap I was given in the sim or ground school before that.
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Don't mean to put you on the spot, but what type of emergency did you encounter? I ask out of pure curiosity.
 
Ok I see where we've gotta take this now.

You're saying, "The stats say it's safe, the stats don't lie!"

I'm asking you what make up the stats. Numbers are not simply numbers, they're a representation of data that comes out of the real world to try to describe to us what's happening. What I'm asking you to do is think a little deeper behind what makes those stats what they are, and why they look so good. They don't look good because flying is safe, we already established that flying is NOT safe. Something out there is manipulating the data and turning a naturally unsafe activity into something that has a traditional record of being safe.

What is it? I'm going to say experience is a very large part of it in addition as you said, many other things. We haven't seen the experience level drop out in our system until very recently (the last 5 years or so). Think about what happened with the Flagship plane that went up to FL410 and crashed. You might say it had to do with immaturity and lack of common sense, I say that both of those guys (Gulfstreamers) didn't have a traditional process to mature as pilots and that failed them. Sure, they might have been idiots, but we can fix up stupid with traditional, conservative methods and systems that are proven to work time and time again. I prove that one every day.
 
AngelFuree said:
Don't mean to put you on the spot, but what type of emergency did you encounter? I ask out of pure curiosity.
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Essential bus grounded out (tripping it off line, obviously) in a King Air. Took the outflow valve, boots, one of the bleeds (we found out right about then that the other bleed was screwed up and not operating correctly), instrument lights, the autopilot, an inverter and the AI, HSI and altimeter on the left side with it. This was while climbing through FL180 in ice and IMC.

Old story at this point, but the captain did a great job of coming back to shoot a partial panel VOR approach off the RMI into Oakland to about 300' above minimums.
 
RightSeatGirl said:
If in a few years accident rates skyrocket or even noticeably go up then even though I got in with 600 hours..I'll join the bandwagon to keep low timer's out of 121 cockpits. But until we have empirical data to take a valid position.
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Since you like the pot/kettle saying.....

So in a few years when you are the "gray beard." You'll be on JC defending your position kind of like.......The gray beards who have already been around the block are defending it NOW.

PS...You can't use the "they used to do it that way in the old days" argument.

In the "olden days" of the 60s/70s, newhires rode the panel for 6-9 years, then the right seat for 7-9 more years. It was also prior to the days of CRM and the Captain did basically everything. The FO was the radio/gear monkey. Right or wrong, that's the way it was. You didn't have 250 hr newhires upgrading to Capt with 1500 hours in a B707. These guys had several THOUSAND hours before they upgraded.

For all the "show me the data" people: Sorry, there will never be quantitative data to support any position. To be accurate, all airlines would have had to hire all pilots with the same hours and upgrade at the same time, at the same age range from the Wright Bros to infinity.

Should a teen ager who drives and texts while driving be allowed to continue because they haven't had a wreck yet? Should low time pilots continue because they haven't killed anyone yet?

Will you be just as sure of your position if you or a family member are a passenger/contributor on the accident that begins a new FAR (Written in blood)?
 
I just looked this up...The odds of being killed on a single part 121 flight are roughly 52.6 million to 1. Let's say for the sake of your argument that a mass injection of low timers into 121 cockpits makes that stat really change for the worse...all the way down to 1 million to 1.

What are we worrying about here exactly? I'm not obsessed with personal safety Jtrain! I never will be and I don't think being so is healthy...Why tip toe through life just to arrive safely at death?

This whole argument is ludicrous...I guess I just need to watch CNN more or something. I just keep missing all the stories of low time pilots crashing airplanes all the time....Silly me.
 
RightSeatGirl said:
I just looked this up...The odds of being killed on a single part 121 flight are roughly 52.6 million to 1. Let's say for the sake of your argument that a mass injection of low timers into 121 cockpits makes that stat really change for the worse...all the way down to 1 million to 1.

What are we worrying about here exactly? I'm not obsessed with personal safety Jtrain! I never will be and I don't think being so is healthy...Why tip toe through life just to arrive safely at death?
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Ugh.

I didn't ask about the stats, or how they'd change; I asked what made the stats what they are. I mean I suck with numbers, but I understand that numbers don't make up themselves. Variables make numbers what they are.

That's what I'm asking for, not not whether the reduction in safety is acceptable because obviously in my mind it's not.

And if you're not obsessed with personal safety, I dunno what you're doing in a 121 cockpit. A part of our jobs involves mitigating risk, and if you're not interested in doing that then, well I mean don't be to be cliche, but you're dangerous.

I'm aware that when I go skiing when I get off these reserve days it's WAY more dangerous to me than the flight home, but that's only my life I'm responsible for for. You're responsible for MANY more lives than that, and this should not matter to you.
 
There is a difference being being concerned and being obsessed. Some of you guys, from where I sit, are just lost in your anger and you are mad at people like me for not jumping on the bandwagon.
 
jtrain609 said:
Flying isn't safe by nature, we've established that. WHY is it safe. It isn't safe because it's statistically safe, it's safe because WE MAKE IT SAFE.
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Let me start off by saying I am no fan of 250 hour pilots in the cockpit - this is not the profession I fell in love with years ago at age three.

However, you should be aware of the true "WE" you refer to in "WE MAKE IT SAFE." If you simply mean pilots, that's unaccurately arrogant. Aviation is a team effort and pilots have but one part to play - it is the SYSTEM that makes aviation safe or unsafe. Engineers, mechanics, bureaucrats, and pilots all jointly affect the outcome of this transportation system.

It is my personal observation that engineering has suceeded in making easier to fly aircraft through innovations such as fly-by-wire control laws, centralized crew alerting, centralized flight displays, global positioning system, and so on. In these aircraft the machine synthesizes information into a more intelligible format for the pilot. In the older generation of aircraft the pilot needed to synthesize distributed information for himself - a much more difficult task. Similarly, modern control laws will automatically correct for some annoying flight phenomenon. From a purely stick and rudder standpoint (obviously there is much more to flying than that), a modern airliner is easier to fly than gliders I've flown.

As the engineering/technology piece of the safety pie has grown, it has become acceptable for the pilot piece to shrink. This might be accomplished while still overall making safety better, the same, or worse. It is certain that we are not as safe as we could be. That is unfortunate. Perhaps, though, by some economic cost analysis we are safe enough, and that is what is driving the industry.
 
Not really.

Check it out. I have like 1,000 hours right now, I'm a low time wonder. I only flight instructed for 9 months, which ain't that long. After that I was a training captain at a freight company for 9 months, which ain't that long. Now that I'm at an airline (which isn't exactly where I saw myself a year ago), I'm concerned about the lack of experience in cockpits, including my own. If you deny that there's a problem, there's no way to fix it. I accept there's a problem with my experience level and try as hard as I can on every flight to make sure that I better myself as a pilot and provide a safer ride to the folks in the back.

Honestly? I'm not out protesting this crap every day. In fact I'd much rather spend my time doing something else, but I'm sitting 2,500 miles from home right now while on reserve and not working so I can either:

-Discuss this
-Plan the revolution
-Sleep
-Read
-Miss home

I'm trying to do all I can to not do that last thing, and I'm not sleeping so that leaves me with this thread until the revolution starts.
 
Realms09 said:
Let me start off by saying I am no fan of 250 hour pilots in the cockpit - this is not the profession I fell in love with years ago at age three.

However, you should be aware of the true "WE" you refer to in "WE MAKE IT SAFE." If you simply mean pilots, that's unaccurately arrogant. Aviation is a team effort and pilots have but one part to play - it is the SYSTEM that makes aviation safe or unsafe. Engineers, mechanics, bureaucrats, and pilots all jointly affect the outcome of this transportation system.

It is my personal observation that engineering has suceeded in making easier to fly aircraft through innovations such as fly-by-wire control laws, centralized crew alerting, centralized flight displays, global positioning system, and so on. In these aircraft the machine synthesizes information into a more intelligible format for the pilot. In the older generation of aircraft the pilot needed to synthesize distributed information for himself - a much more difficult task. Similarly, modern control laws will automatically correct for some annoying flight phenomenon. From a purely stick and rudder standpoint (obviously there is much more to flying than that), a modern airliner is easier to fly than gliders I've flown.

As the engineering/technology piece of the safety pie has grown, it has become acceptable for the pilot piece to shrink. This might be accomplished while still overall making safety better, the same, or worse. It is certain that we are not as safe as we could be. That is unfortunate. Perhaps, though, by some economic cost analysis we are safe enough, and that is what is driving the industry.
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Valid points, but I'd disagree that it enhances safety by itself. Call me arrogant (or you can call me a pilot, pretty much the same thing I'd say), but when it's my butt strapped the pointy end of a projectile I'm concerned with my performance to make the aircraft do what it's supposed to do.

My background before I was doing this gig is as a philosophy student while working as a server administrator at a university. My experience with computers is that they should not be relied on completely and you should expect them to fail because in my experience they will. Unlike most folks, I actually understand what the magic boxes are doing and in my experience, it isn't pretty when they start falling apart and again in my experience, they do.

It sounds like you have the same kind of background (or possibly engineering). What would you say to the failure rates that we deal with in the systems that we're dealing with? Because that's a concern to me. I had an FMS crap out the other week and we had to fly raw data for about two and a half hours. Not really that hard, but if you haven't done it in a while it can GET hard and we had a situation or two where if one of us had not stepped in to fix something that was going wrong with the way we were operating the aircraft, or the way the autopilot was operating the aircraft.

What's the line? Trust but verify? That's how I feel about computers.
 
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the FAA publish stats saying that having between 500-1000 hours is one of the most likely times for accidents?
 
No, I'm not denying there is something to be concerned with going on here. And I really do care about safety and the people in the back. I'm just not convinced the issue is a "problem" that needs to be dealt with by categorically denying 121 employment to low-time pilots.

You know, a big part of this could be alleviated by re-thinking how new 121 pilots are trained. One thing I will say is that 2 months worth of training is just not enough for inexperienced people. But the airlines won't change that due to cost. So who is really to blame here, the low timer's for wanting to work, or the airlines for giving half arsed training. If they are gonna hire low timers then they should increase the amount of training to offset the inexperience.
 
Now we've got a discussion here.

The low timers are not to blame, they're simply the pawns that are being played here (myself included). The issues are hand are academic ones that have to do with training departments, management groups, etc.
 
RightSeatGirl said:
No, I'm not denying there is something to be concerned with going on here. And I really do care about safety and the people in the back. I'm just not convinced the issue is a "problem" that needs to be dealt with by categorically denying 121 employment to low-time pilots.
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Equally important as flying experience is attitude towards safety. A healthy combination of those two attributes makes for a pilot I want to be flown by.
 
True, and knowing your own limits is helpful also. The scariest feeling when I got to IOE was not what I didn't know, that was easy to compensate for. The problem was not knowing what I didn't know, and not having ANY clue where my bigs holes were gonna be.

That scared the piss outta me.
 
The only aspect I can shed light on the discussion is what has been mentioned previously, by avery, among others.

Take the plane out of the equation.

What you have left is a low time pilot. Statistics by the FAA among other sources, quote that the accident rate among sub 1000 hour pilots is greater than 1000+ hour pilot.

Now put into context training. Sure, the airlines send their new hires to flight safety or other places, and this trains the aircraft system and company profiles to the pilot - but it does *NOTHING* to alter their amount of experience.

So lets throw CRM into the equation. Why do Captains have more hours than FOs, (generally speaking)? Experience.

What I'm trying to do here is isolate the components instead of lumping them together. This is not emperical logic when there are so many variables. So take the variables out to isolate the components and you get a general picture.
 
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