A "No Punishment"-safety culture is essential to a safe airline operation. It actually allows crews to openly report incidents - confidential or not - without the need of trying to cover the mistakes they made.
Aviation is one of the - if not the only - fields where such a philosophy exists. Try to figure out how many people die each year in the hospitals around the world because there is no possibility to learn from mistakes others made (their “mistakes” being buried in not a few cases...) and no chance to avoid systemic problems and erase them.
Taking off from a taxiway is a mistake. The only thing of interest is how to avoid such mistakes, not how to get after the guys who made it. A simple waste of time and manpower.
How many mistakes did you make while driving your car last year, some without you being at fault – and how many of them did you report to the officials to help them to cure possible accident hotspots on our streets?
None? Well, that’s the difference. Pilots report their mistakes. In good companies and mature legal systems they do this without fear. One of the reasons why it’s dangerous on the streets – an safe in the air.
Last edited by Frosch; 28th May 2010 at 16:07.