Originally Posted by
737 Driver
Okay Wonkazoo, you win. I humbly concede. I guess we will all have to accept that any pilot can freeze up at any moment, people will die, and there's nothing to be done. There's no way to train, no way to learn, no way to improve, no way to avoid certain death for some uncertain number of people. The best we can hope for is that someday someone will invent the perfect aircraft and thus be able to remove the imperfect pilot from the equation altogether.
Excuse me if I choose not to live in that world.
Hes not saying "theres nothing to be done", hes saying people may react in a way to extreme stress that degrades their actions for a period of time. That reaction is obviously undesirable but unfortunately it may happen to anyone including you 737 driver, me or any other pilot, even if you think thats an impossibility.
It is a positive thing however that we are totally confident that we can deal with such situations effectively even though that might not turn out to be the case if we are unlucky.
In the light of this I think it is very wrong we criticise pilots for making mistakes under stress, yes learn from those mistakes definitely but dont ever think youd never ever make them yourself.