Originally Posted by
ATC Watcher
Re the term "comfortable with " Good discussion . . It is not standard phraseology and the problem with all those non standards expressions is that they are subject to interpretation from both sides........
Even standard phraseology can be non-standard - take conditional clearances which can be quite convoluted! And I bet ATC didn't interpret the Captains "I'm comfortable" as being the truth given his position on the approach - but what do they do next? Of course, we are applying our view on what is normal both in initial understanding and then subsequent activity - read on.
I've mentioned "cultural dynamics" a while back and this links to
ferry pilots comment about the crew keeping each other honest - and ATC keeping them honest. I did a course some years ago with 3 guys from Pakistan - all 3 were the same Rank ... but one was a sort of Boss - on what basis I never found out. Not once in 3 months did I see the other 2 do anything professionally (or socially) without seeking the approval of the "Boss" even when, nominally, they were "in charge" of an activity and, as I said, they were of an equivalent Rank throughout. After 3 months I got used to this. All 3 were great blokes but No 2 and No 3 were not permitted to do anything on their own - professionally or socially. In such a culture, I could easily see a FO having no say at all in what the Captain did. Odd? To us Brits yes! To them? It was complete SOP!!!!!!
Use of "I'm comfortable!" is a red herring here - there are much more important questions as I suggested earlier. Even the "they were out of SA at the start" is questionable - deciding they (or the Captain deciding!) they could do something almost impossible would swiftly lead to SA setting in as the jet flew off ahead of them. So the cause may not be a loss of SA, but of setting themselves up so that that a loss of SA was an inevitable by-product. Does the "culture" then preclude the Captain from admitting he's lost SA and asking for help? Based on that course I was on - I could see that quite easily happening. So to blame loss of SA may well prevent looking further back as to why they lost SA in the first place and, having lost SA, why they may not have asked for help when prompted - which may be uncomfortable reading and, sadly, beyond rational solution.
The more one looks at humanity in all it's glory - the more one marvels as to how few disasters there are. Even "decision making" (thanks to the person who pm'd me a link to that topic) is an "art noire"!!!! Hell, it now takes me 10 minutes to get out of bed just after reading that link on decision-making!!!! Actually, it's almost time for bed in an hour or so .... so here I go assessing all the options I have relating to how to get from my PC to bed safely, ensuring the cat is in and the house locked up........