Originally Posted by Clop_Clop
Now if the medical community are unable to accurately identify who belongs in the suicidal group accurately, how can anyone expect anyone else to identify the miniscule subset of that group. The ones that are capable of doing it in the air with people onboard.
As said previously, well said.
Had an airborne incident where I for a very brief moment didn't know whether I, copilot and pax were about to meet our maker, fortunately due in no small part to good training we came through unscathed.
That night Spouse and I attended a BBQ and a beer was quite unsettling on the stomach, the first sign of what was to come, the following two days were time off and spouse later said I kept taking showers, not aware of it personally as this conversation took place much, much later. Flying entered an ultra cautious mode, wouldn't allow copilots to fly, CP called me in and said you have to let them fly. Kept going to the GP with odd complaints, can't recall the nature of them now as this all occurred nearly three decades ago, but GP was unable to put a finger on the underlying problem. After eighteen months of this I reached a place where I could understand why people take their own lives, it was not something I personally saw as a viable option, but I did reach such a point of despair that I asked my good Lady to get me to the hospital ASAP where they bombed me out. Four months or so off work and happily returned to the cockpit for another eight years or so of gainful employment before reaching mandatory retirement age.
Diagnosis? PTSD triggered by the inflight event. What I was unable to understand was how an engine failure could so bring about the personal reaction it did where Vietnam events I had I just passed off as another day at the office. It was explained that each event is a thimble full of water placed in a glass, you eventually reach a stage where one thimble full more causes the glass to overflow. Bingo.
The take away lesson though is I worked in a small group of about twenty crews who had an extremely close working relationship and no one ever said "are you OK", though it must have been blatantly obvious I wasn't, nor did the GP, a long time family doctor, recognise what might be going on.
My take away from the experience is the extreme difficulty people have in asking "are you OK" and the difficulty the medical practitioners have in determining mental state. PTSD may be a sub set of the mental condition but it has lead to many suicides in our military cadre post conflict.
Captain of QF 72 was an ex fighter chap and retired early with PTSD following his out of control A330 event, I recommend counseling for any crew who has the misfortune to face such pulse raising events, what ever the cause.
Take care of each other and have the gumption to ask "are you OK".