Originally Posted by Centaurus
I never thought I would see the day that I would give up talking about the subject of degradation of manual flying skills v automation dependency. But ethnic culture with all its deadly pervasive influence on flight crews will never change. Time to change the subject and smell the roses…
My first reaction to Captain Harry Nelson’s comments as reported in Andy Pasztor’s Wall Street Journal article on April 12, was quite similar to my good friend’s, Centaurus, post … but that was a knee-jerk reaction on my part. However, in the following nano-second, reconsidering what I had been pounding the table for during my last three and a half decades of teaching/preaching aviation safety (to anyone who would listen to an over-worked federally employed, safety inspector) my long-held attitudes (those that originally prompted and kept encouraging my “table pounding”) fought their way to the surface … and my non-verbal comment, directed to Captain Nelson (in his absence) was “…great, but where have you been for the last 35 years?”
This non-verbal comment, particularly in juxtaposition with referenced articles regarding the US FAA having recently published another Safety Alert for Operators, or “SAFO,” urging airline training departments to incorporate scenario-based training, particularly in go-around training curricula for pilots, reminded me of the necessity for someone, someplace, to continue to pound on that “table,” frequently and regularly, pointing out the importance of training pilots on the basic understanding of what training a pilot actually means, brought me to my senses. Of course, I agree with the basis of Captain Nelson’s motivation, AND with the premise of the FAA’s most recent SAFO ... but no one, anywhere, should never have relied so heavily on the "automatics" that there would ever be any doubt about the knowledge and/or ability of the human pilots (and there
are 2 of them!) to accomplish what is necessary to safely conduct that flight.
The basic thought is, and should always be, just as it has been – and should always be – recognize the training provided to airline flight crew members should be exhaustive and cover all the skills necessary to recognize the current “flight condition” of the airplane, at any time, know what that specific condition should be, and take the appropriate steps (i.e., make the appropriate control manipulations) to achieve the desired flight condition OR to correct that flight condition to the desired condition - from each moment to the next. That means … the training simply must include all the tasks that are, or might be needed, to safely fly from one place to another – properly and completely meeting and dealing with every expected (and unexpected) occurrence. This would have supposedly eliminated the need for recalling attention to performing missed approach/go-around maneuvers ... or any other specific skill set on which pilots should have been initially trained and periodically reviewed - and the concept of re-introducing "scenario-based" training, should not be necessary if the training methods used were, and remain, appropriate.
The training equipment currently available is the best that it has ever been – and when used the way it was designed to be used – it should result in each pilot having had the opportunity to see, assimilate, understand, and be able to apply all of what has been learned … and the instructors should have zero doubt about that point, or that instructor should not allow that student to be put up for any kind of evaluation of those skill sets.
The current training equipment is designed to be able to replicate the “real world” to an exceptional level, and when used correctly (which requires – actually demands - a knowledgeable and properly trained instructor), the concept of “scenario-based” training should be so imbedded in the training delivered that singling out such a specific aspect would logically be seen as wholly unnecessary – as this specific concept would have been the entire structure of the training, the practice, the learning, and the proficiency demonstrations – there should be zero doubt that the crew member in training understands and is comfortable in whatever operational “scenario” he or she might encounter.