PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Could data mining help with the automation vs. hand flying debate?
Old 28th Nov 2013, 01:11
  #7 (permalink)  
alf5071h
 
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: An Island Province
Posts: 1,257
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like on 1 Post
Zionstrat2, interesting thoughts – green field thinking.
Unfortunately most commercial aircraft already have the alerting and warning systems you suggest: stick shaker- approaching the stall (advanced with manoeuvre), stall warning - imminent or at the point of stall, glide slope alerting from the instrument display and EGPWS.
The underlying problem appears to be with the human, with a lack of awareness or comprehension of these alerts, and most important, a weak general awareness when approaching these conditions.

Data can be useful, but it requires interpretation in context, which in this instance is the situational context of the pilot – what is seen, understood, planned, knowledge recall/use, etc. These cannot be recorded as data, and even if observed by another pilot, the view could be biased – ‘I wouldn’t do it that way”, but neither view would be incorrect or known to the other pilot; human factors – cognition.

Various reports and studies cite a range of issues, which appear to reflect the problems of an increasingly complex operating environment where the interactions are tightly wound-up; ‘close coupled’ in systems theory. There are indications of this in recent FAA and BEA reports, providing that the issues are considered as a whole. A major safety problem is that we humans - the industry, like to simplify issues and deal with them separately, and also inadvertently are biased towards fixing the human (blame and train). However with a wider view it may be possible to identify changes in task expectation, complex airspace requirements, reduced training time, and the expectation the automation will manage everything, etc; but not to overlook the important aspect of how all of these aspects interact and together affect the human.

At times, the industry overly focusses on the human, whereas wider consideration of the operational system may provide a more balanced view; also that solutions appear to be proposed in areas which suggest that we don’t fully understand the problem.
A complex situation rarely has a simple solution.
alf5071h is offline