Lurking around now for awhile, I've finally come to the point I have to contribute something.
All the comments about how people can't fly anymore, automation dependency, etc, etc.
When a few decades ago the first advanced autopilots where introduced they where a great tool to advance safety! Airspace became busier, airplanes more advanced. Airplanes capable of landing in extreme weather. Reading the book faith is the hunter, holy
!! Those guys could really fly!! However, throughout the book, how many crashes where described? Automation has really reduced that. However, automation became so complex that accidents started to happen due to a lack of understanding the automation. Subsequently a lot of time training was spend on understanding the complex systems.
Same can be said about SOP's
Notable accidents, the airbus crash at Zurich I believe where a simple wrong push of a button led to a wrong autopilot mode and subsequent descent into terrain, or Swissair into Halifax, where sticking to SOP's delayed landing!
However, we have now come to the point where we realize there is a negative side to automation, namely dependency!!
Should we now all go back to hand flying?? Into our busy airport with much increased workloads? Will that make aviation safer?
Now, the reality of wide body flying for a major, say, you fly 700 hrs a year. Less than 10 percent of that will be flying in a terminal area where you can practice some of the flying skills, however most of that will be to major airports where you will be vectored into a busy airport with controllers you can hardly understand, hardly ever flying a standard profile, coming there once or maybe twice a year so you are also unfamiliar with the place! Is this the place to practice your manual skills after flying for 10hrs through the night? When most people on your time clock are just getting ready to wake up to go to work! As a wide body FO, I do about 35 to 40 trips a year to some of the busiest airports in the world. Should I, every time make a raw data non precision approach after a 9 to 12 hr flight just to prove I can do it. I can guarantee that that will not improve safety!!
Increase training? Every time I go to the sim, I have to satisfactory show hand flying skills, however, I'm well rested, not flying into busy airspac,e although we do practice going into all the places we fly to, using standard profiles, I can understand the ATC because it's done by a instructor from my own company, etc, etc.This does not accurately represent line flying!!
There is something to be said about increasing training, however we are now dealing with the low cost company's and passengers that demand lower and lower ticket prices! Your company can increase training all they want, but soon they will be out of business because they can't compete!
Now, coming to the mishap flight. I understand that the pilot flying was training, with 43hrs this was probably his 4 or fifth flight, probably still overwhelmed by the new aircraft and faced with a busy airport, with staccato ATC instructions and a inoperative G/S( something he probably practiced in the sim) etc, etc.
He messed up, sure enough!, but I don't think he woke up that morning thinking he was going to do a lousy job, I don't think he thought of himself of being a substandard pilot!
Just maybe, he read on here all the comments about Turkish in Amsterdam and thought, what a wankers, that will never happen to me....
As most people on here do.....
There is a trend on here as well as other boards, Turkish, Colgan, air France, professional pilots branding one another instead of asking why!!
I don't know the answer, but I do know that simply saying he was an incompetent pilot is not going to reduce this kind of accident. If it did, this wouldn't have happened after Turkish!!! Aviation has come a long way, instead of simply saying, he made a mistake, or ' pilot error' it's much more interesting asking, why did he make that mistake!