Rainboe, your assertion that the 737NG FGS is not ‘new’, because it uses the same components and appears similar to the 747 and 777, is made without substantiation, the presence of which might alleviate fears that the latter aircraft could suffer the same fault as in this accident.
Just because things look the same – enabling a ‘common’ crew interface, doesn’t mean that the ‘system’ (which I referred to) is the same. You probably realise that it is the component interface and operating logic which are the important contributors to the safety of the complete system.
As with human and organisational activities, times of change are opportunities for error; so too are the changes made to established designs.
Too often we make gross assumptions that things are the same, whereas in detail they may not be. How do we view a line training flight – normal or a change involving threats and opportunities for error?
----------------------
The focus on blame in this thread, and occasionally in our industry, contributes little if anything to improving the safety of our operations.
Blame is an emotional reaction, a need to hit-out, do something, to achieve a level of self-satisfaction, or express frustration, perhaps because ‘you’ as an interested individual could not have done anything to prevent the accident.
There is a place for blame (and punishment) in society, but it’s not normally exercised by those at the workface and it has no place in an investigation into the contributory or causal aspects of aircraft accidents.
The industry needs an understanding of what and why events happened in this accident. The contributions could involve technical or human aspects, unsafe acts, latent conditions, threats or errors. By establishing these aspects the industry should have opportunity to change what is currently in place and thus improve safety.
It’s relatively easy to identify technical aspects, although software engineers might offer a different view. Complex, yes, but the underlying theories are well defined.
However, with humans there might be many differing interpretations of the observed behaviour, differing theories of cognition, rational or irrational decisions. We lack the means to have the same understanding of the situation as did the crew; we do not know what knowledge was brought to bear on their thoughts, or biases and beliefs which could have shaped their decisions. These, in most cases can only be opinion, best judged by the more experienced in human interface and operational issues. We at best might speculate.
There is opportunity, indeed a need for individual pilots to consider their opinion of the accident – “could it have happened to me?” Such judgement requires skills of thought, which as in operations should be used to weigh the evidence without jumping to conclusion, to consider other viewpoints, to subdue unwarranted bias, and being prepared to change belief.