Interesting to read the latest Flight International editorial comment (26 May- 1 June, page 5). Selected extracts:
"As flight deck automation becomes so reliable it hardly ever fails, it is becoming more of a human factors problem.....pilots familiar with operating older aircraft, which had more variable reliability, are nearing the end of their careers, and there is a generation of pilots whose only experience is of operating aircraft with highly reliable automated systems....is the AAIB implying that younger pilots are less good than the older ones when things go wrong?..It seems so...Maybe that is because the excercises mandated in recurrent training programmes have scarcely changed since the days of the Super Constellation...so training no longer represents what crews are likely to have to deal with today.."
For years, Flight International editorials have made similar comments following automation related accidents and incidents and yet it seems operators and manufacturer's are simply not interested and blind use of automation wins every time.
In Australia, even the smallest turbo prop operators are embracing automation with indecent haste to fly like the big jets do, and this is showing up markedly when pilots of these regionals front up for a basic instrument flying assessment as part of the interview process for a jet job in the domestic airlines.
A surprising number of pilots with hours on the larger turboprops are shown to be frankly incompetent when faced with hand flown non-automatics raw data flight with some unable to stay with legal limits on an ILS. But these pilots renew their instrument ratings each year - not by hand flying but on the autopilot. Despite all this, they are still welcomed by the airlines whose interview technique is aimed almost universally at ticking the boxes of human factors questions. "Tell us about how you resolve conflict on the flight deck?" How would you describe your reaction if the captain was intent on making an unstable approach?" "Do you sometimes get angry with your fellow crew members?" State an example of threat and error management?"
No technical questions any more. Just psycho-analysis of the candidate. Can't fly raw data in the sim, mate? No problem: you won't ever need that again. The automation will just blow you away. Bournemouth, Amsterdam, Adam Air Indonesia, - nah! Just aberrations - nothing to do with automation complacency.
Operators and regulators should heed the Flight International editorials on the seemingly unstoppable tide of automation and start thinking outside the square for a change and before more lives are lost.