Hi Bis,
I think that, deep inside, we agree more than we disagree.
What I was trying to say is that I object to those that state, in cases similar to this, that they do NOT blame the pilots but the airlines for these accidents.
A pilot is a grown adult and knows very well that he is not doing his job right when he doesn't follow checklists as trained. The fact that nobody has caught him acting that way, doesn't mean that he is not responsable and, like a child, is not liable for his own actions.
Other people in the system may have also failed in their responsability (to catch and fire him), but you can't say: "I don't blame the pilots, I blame those who trained him", when those who trained him DID teach him correcly how to follow checklists and how to lower flaps and how important it was to do it right.
I'm ok with "I blame the pilots and I ALSO blame those who trained him". In most cases.
But to pretend a pilot is always "blame free" because, if he does something wrong knowingly and against his training, it's still some supervisor working at the airline's fault for not catching him ... hmmm.
No matter what he does, he is never responsable.
If he doesn't lower the flaps because he was never taught how to do it right, it's because he wasn't trained better.
If he was very well trained on how to lower the flaps and all its safety implications but he still didn't comply/made a mistake, it's because he was hired/never caught/not fired on time.
I'm obviously missing something in that line of thought.
But anyway, as I've said before, "whose fault" is not the most important part but "what can be done to fix it".
At this point, I vote for a (much) better TOWS design, a (slighty) improved checklist system, a (?) better maintenance manuals/MEL/etc and to plant AV cameras on the cockpits with 8h recording time digital DVRs (total cost $200) that are reviewed often by the airline to make sure pilots make good use of the training.
Improved training, as I've said before, can never hurt either.
Last edited by justme69; 25th Oct 2008 at 12:11.