Just after the previous post the latest issue (12-18 January) of Flight International arrived in my letter box. The annual airline flight safety review listed all the latest accidents and comment was made about the Flight International Crew Management Conference held in London in early December last year. It noted that loss of control (known as LOC) has been proportionally increasing as a serious accident cause. Here are some selected edited extracts:
"In the absence of appropriate change in statutory recurrent training requirements, there is no reason to believe this (LOC) is going to change. A vital component in an airline pilot's recurrent training has gone missing with the advent of high levels of automation, and at present this training has not been replaced.
The missing component is on-the-job mental and physical interactivity with the aircraft and its navigation systems that pilots used to get in "round dial" classic cockpits that lacked integrated navigation displays and highly capable digital flight management systems. All pilots learn the basic "raw data" capability during their ab initio training, but if they go straight on to highly automated aircraft they may never use it again.
That is not a problem until an electrical anomaly leaves them with nothing but standby instruments, or a reduced panel at night or in IMC. Training solutions to enable pilots to cope with this loss of line-flying practice might include the introduction of compulsory upset recovery training, and /or mandatory simulator time using raw data only during bi-annual recurrent training sessions.
But there is no sign yet that any aviation authorities are preparing to address this issue. ..... But with the reduction of pilot supply from the military, combined with the withdrawal of airlines from pilot training sponsorship, means that carriers are more likely to have to recruit self-selected, self-funded pilots who can only afford to train to the legal minima".
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Of course, all this applies only to foreign pilots, doesn't it? After all, the big accidents only happen overseas - never Australia
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