The dumbing down of the industry with high levels of reliance on automated flight not really understood by those who operate it will lead to more of this.
Unfastened cowlings have nothing to do with reliance on automated flight...
It's good practice to use a level of automation appropriate to the workload, and it's very unfortunate if the situation/snag/defect/occurrence has led to the absence of said automation.. just when you could do with it.