Captain offers the first officer the first leg of four hours. F/O acknowledges and the flight proceeeds normally up to the time the captain sees thunderstorms on radar 100 miles ahead across the planned track and realises a diversion around them is on the cards. The captain assesses it would be better to make a early diversion necessitating a minor heading change rather than a late diversion with greater heading changes.
F/O is PF and so far has made no indication of studying the position of the storms on radar. Captain calls ATC and requests diversion left of track to avoid weather. ATC gives approval. The captain directs the F/O to turn left on to a specified heading.
"The F/O looks over at the captain and says "So you are taking over control, are you?"
The captain nonplussed at this perceived sarcastic remark, asked the F/O what he was getting at?
The F/O replied that as it was his leg he should be the one to make any decision to divert and in his opinion there was no need to divert so early until a closer to the storm front.
The Captain could have done a better job by telling the FO he was concerned about the upcoming weather and asked what the FO’s plan was for dealing with what they were looking at. (For the casual non-pilot reader remember at 480 knots 100 miles is only 12 minutes away.) I am not saying the Captain is obligated to do so, but it might have avoided the negative result.
The FO comes across as rude and insecure. She/he also seems to be flying under a misunderstanding of what second-in-command means. Did she/he sign the release prior to departure?
It would be interesting to know what the experience level of the FO was as well as the national composition of the crew.
I try to set an open and supportive flight deck atmosphere and maintain as level of a flight deck gradient as I can. Rarely, but it does occasionally happen, I come across a FO that misinterprets my efforts as weakness on my part and then does something that (in my opinion) “crosses the line”. As a background most of the FO I fly with have between 6,000-8,000 hours of jet time, many were previously commanders flying RJs or turboprops and others still command “heavy” 4 engine military transports all over the world. The vast majority of them are a pure pleasure to fly with and I learn things all the time from them. We do not have any 250 hour pilots.
My conclusion; the Captain set himself/herself up for this negative experience by not correctly assessing the FO’s personality or their mindset. To preclude this event the Captain could have brought the weather issue up for discussion prior to initiating action. I would give the Captain only 3 out of 5 stars; just average.
The FO’s response was abysmal; she/he compounded the problem and represent themself in a very unflattering manner. The FO gets 1 star; poor – not disqualifying- but deficient and needing some correction/instruction and/or counseling.
** Sir Niall Dementia, above post, offers some excellent advice here**
A correction based on humour and understanding, if there's time, or done over a beer and a (relieved) laugh in the bar afterwards just seems to work for me.
My 2 cents worth……..given the very limited information I have.
Northbeach