rottenray
There is, frankly, no excuse for not being fully engaged in one's job. There is no excuse for being out of contact for "approximately 91 minutes" and there is no excuse for overflying a destination
I had thought that the great majority of posts in this thread had implied that the pilots were wrong. That said, nobody expected themselves to repeat the same error.
Now the rhetoric gets into the words in these posts with a great deal of emotion. As soon as the posts start placing blame against the individuals and calling for immediate punshment, then others chime in in their defence. as expected. THis goes downhill after that.
As you might surmise I like to be a moderate and look beyond blame, punishment and/or excuses. Instead of excuses I look for reasons, instead of blame and punishment I look for corrective actions, however severe they might be.
I can understand the reason offered to date being a distraction from expectations of duty. To me it was an excessive distraction. Many of us accept a degree of distraction driving a car, hopefully very few of us accept a level of distraction likely to lead to a significant increase in risk over time. The idea is what degree of management is necessary to minimize distractions that significantly increase risk. Don't kid yourself that you will eliminate all distractions.
I don't recall posts that implied the level of distraction was acceptable, albeit it did result in a safe landing in spite of the increase in risk. I wonder if there is room in this discussion to put away the black and white paint brushes and search for answers.
Of course we can just stay the course, continue our chalenges, and watch what our governments will screw with about this
