Why is automation dependency encouraged in modern aviation ?

[Vessbot]

Originally Posted by vilas

Absolutely! I​​​​​​ keep saying this all the time. Line flying is not a training flight. Some training is inevitable but should be kept to minimum. We are there not for ourselves but for a purpose.

I disagree with this, and strongly. Line flying is where the real training happens: every day, continuously. It’s where the habits are ingrained, skills developed, and the automatic reactions (mental and physical) set up for success or failure.

Actual training in the sim is just an initial scaffold to hold together a flight from beginning to end while following the SOP and profiles, and learning how to handle a few chosen non-normals, without everything falling apart. And then you do a few flights with a check pilot in the real plane to do your first few with a heightened level of safety backstop.

But imagine yourself having come fresh off training in your first airline operation, compared to say, a few thousand hours later. And think about the difference in how much you’re able to contribute then vs. now, in terms of situational awareness, predicting routine minor things going wrong, how overwhelmed you were, etc. For an even more stark comparison, imagine your then-self in command of the airplane!

What’s the difference between then and now? Of course, all of our cumulative experiences every day on the line. I’m sure you’ll agree that as far as SA, SOP, weather, traffic, ATC, and all that stuff we add about a thousand times more worth to the crew now vs. then, as a consequence of all that gathered experience.


But in what area do we not gather experience? Flying the airplane! If all the flying we ever do after getting signed off is below 1000 feet, configured, trimmed, thrust already set, and already delivered onto the loc and GS, then where do we gather this experience from? We don’t.

——

General reply to the thread:

Why is automation dependency encouraged, and hand flying proficiency paid lip service to? I know that everyone has the concept of proficiency in their brain, but it’s just an abstraction with no easy way to address. Put a few sentence preamble in front of every document to encourage hand flying? Sure. But what does that really do? It’s like knowing it’s bad to eat too much sugar. You know to keep it down overall, but how does that calculate on a particular day when you feel like a snack? You have the snack, on the this-day basis, with no contradiction between the this-day principle and the overall principle, because what you do on this day is a drop in the bucket that can’t possibly affect the overall amount in a meaningful way. But when the this-day urge happens every day, the calculus shifts without you realizing, and the overall principle is ultimately violated.

Just the same, every time on “this day” a reason (many times, actually an excuse) can be found why automation is the appropriate way to go. Every time, until after a while it turns out that an overall amount to maintain hand flying proficiency is never reached. This day, a specific reason - or 10 specific reasons - can be found to address the factors and decide to use the automation. But overall, by the nature of overallness, no specific reason can be called on to say that it’s the day to fly the plane. Always it can be pushed off to some vague next time, but the next time never comes.

To put it another way, it’s a problem with two competing opposite demands. On one hand, the safety, precision, and consistency of automation usage, and on the other hand, the safety of the pilot being proficient and comfortable flying the plane. But the triggers to specifically address those opposte demands aren’t symmetrical. The specificty of all the reasons to all upon automation usage ensure that it’s called upon virtually every time, while the triggers to call upon hand flying practice are too vage - really, non-existent. So, the situation is what it is.