I teach according to a syllabus designed by others. It covers all the requirements in quick time. It is heavily orientated towards line operation SOP's. There is a token gesture towards manual flying, but only that required by the LST items; e.g. turns (even steep), stalls, raw data ILS and the SE ILS's & G/A's. This is not teaching the student to manoeuvre the a/c manually in a variety of real situations. Further, there is circuit training. Then they go on the line where manual approaches are discouraged and the type of circuit they flew in base training is not allowed. What chance have they got to develop manual skills. In the TQ syllabus I see far too often that the first reaction of a student is to engage the A/P and then, when misunderstanding why the a/c is not climbing, descending or whatever it is they want it to do, selecting VNAV in the hope that Captain FMC will sort it out.
So the problem is three-fold: lack of manual skills, lack of scanning basic performance parameters to ensure the a/c is doing what YOU want, and lack of a full understanding of what the AFDS system is capable of, and what it is not.
All in all, therefore, there is a lack of deep knowledge and skill in manipulating the a/c both manually and via the automatics. The SOP's are orientated heavily towards use of automatics and every scenario, (nearly) has been written with instructions. On an ideal day in and ideal environment you can get away with this. Then ATC turn you in short and you are high; you get this and a tailwind; you have to deviate from the ideal route/path for various reasons; ATC ask you to speed up/slow down; a whole variety of items that cause you to deviate from the ideal SOP profile. I see this big question mark rising out of the student's (and even line F/O's) head. Eyes spinning and the piano playing starts.
The easiest solution, even to the automatic orientated operators, is to increase the training & understanding of those automatics. That can be done in a sim. The deeper manual skills need to be on the line and that needs a cultural shift of Flt Ops management. In my B732 days manual approaches were the norm, necessary and encouraged. As an apprentice F/O you watched and learnt and practiced. Not anymore. There is no demonstration to watch from LHS. And with captains sprouting wings at 3000hrs, who've never had the manual skills this downward spiral is firmly spinning in motion.
I hear one large airline, after B777 SAN, is starting the TQ course with 2 sessions of basic flying with no FD or automatics; then add the AFDS and A/P and then add the NNC's. Building blocks. An enlightened Flt OPs dept and training dept. This will never happen across the board without XAA intervention. Perhaps they should be held more accountable when pilot error handling incidents occur.
Is it an adequate defence to say that all legal training and checking requirements were carried out. Bare minimums are often not enough. As has been said, the crew are the last insurance policy and line of defence and the pax expect better.
Interestingly, and perhaps adding weight to the argument, it that John T has noticed the trend in teaching in USA s I have teaching in EU. This is an industry-wide issue not a national one.
Last edited by RAT 5; 26th Dec 2014 at 13:23.