Look,we're up against a brick wall here arent we?The brain surgeon was just an analogy,maybe a poor one.The point is that all experience is invaluable in this business and many others.But experienced crews can still make mistakes I grant you,so its not a watertight guarantee but rather it offers the best chance.Let me try another example.
Gimli glider..well-known case of a 767 that ran out of fuel over Winnipeg somewhere.The pilot and co-pilot were both VERY EXPERIENCED.Been there,seen it all,done it all.The Captain was a recreational glider pilot and the FO an ex-military guy.What saved them that day was airmanship and experience,not familiarity with '67 line operation.What they drew upon had nothing to do with the ability to fly a '67 under normal line conditions.The FO knew of a disused military field from his former days as a mil pilot and the Captain knew how to sideslip and fly a deadstick landing.These things arent taught,they're not in some airline manual that you can acquire instantaneously.They're part and parcel of the most important attribute a pilot can have;namely experience.
Now,lets for the sake of argument put 2 different pilots up front in that '67 on that day.The Captain has hours sure,but his experience is largely confined to day-in day-out highly-automated airline ops.He joined out of flight school and worked his way up on 73's to left seat '67.He's reasonably conscientious,practices raw data manual flying every now and then and performs well in his sim checks.He's seen one dead-stick landing in the sim in his entire career.He doesnt fly recreationally and thinks you cant side-slip a '67,only a Cessna.And the co-pilot is straight out of flight school,he's got 600 hours under his belt,300 on type.He's conscientious too,knows all the SOP's and is a pleasure to fly with.I'll ask you a question.If you were a passenger on that flight,which crew would you want?We'll assume that both crews fall into the same trap of not loading enough fuel.Be honest now,thats all I ask.
I cant reiterate just how important experience is.Without it,airmanship is impossible.It provides self-confidence and the ability to intuit a situation and think laterally.Dont think for one moment,Tigs,that your ability to overcome untested waters was down to anything but experience and the self-confidence that prevented the slow creep of panic that would have subsumed a lesser pilot.
You know,people always cite the tenerife collision as the reason why we have CRM today.Always listen to your co-pilot,they say.Actually,all that crash demonstrates is that steep cockpit-gradients are not only flawed but lethal.If ever there was a crash to demonstrate that inexperienced pilots dont belong in the right seat of a commercial airliner,this is it.An experienced high-timer in the right seat of that KLM 747 would have prevented the Captain from taking off at all costs.If he had had the experience,he would have had the self-esteem and confidence and he would have acted.Or the KAL cargo out of Stansted where the co-pilot let the Captain fly the aircraft into the ground following an ADI freeze.Or the 320 in Bahrain where BOTH pilots didnt know how to fly.Never mind the 320,they didnt know how to fly period.Or the 737 in Sharm-el-Sheikh,another case where fundamental basic skills were lacking.I could go on and on.You dont solve these by putting cadet pilots in the cockpit and telling the Captain "Listen to the guy next to you".You're telling the Captain to listen to someone who cant possibly know anything yet.Its not his fault,its just a fact of life.You solve it by ensuring that both the Captain and co-pilot are experienced and that both are listening to each other.
Of course,the new breed of airlines dont want this,they want the cadets who pay for their training,and they'll lower the leftseat upgrade threshold because they cant find anyone else to fill the seat.Dont tell me its about CRM.Its economics.