Originally Posted by
CurtainTwitcher
llondel, how about taking it to the next level? Learning from others close calls & mistakes should be in our DNA
My hope is that there are many of us are now flying around with awareness of another potential "failure mode". I certainly am.
A punishment model is rarely the optimum method for imparting knowledge. Motivated professions learn much better when they seek to understand weaknesses in themselves and the system. A disciplinarian view of the world discourages this type of true evaluation in my experience.
True, I've always tried to learn from the mistakes of others because it's way less embarrassing that way (and when flying, way safer). However, a lot of people are in the "it can't happen to me, I'd never do that" camp until it does. I'm not saying this is one, but there are some mistakes you have to make personally before fully appreciating and understanding them.
I've always tried to blame "the system" for errors. Sometimes there is indeed gross negligence where the finger can be pointed at an individual or team, but for the most part they're following the routine where there are checks to spot mistakes and just occasionally something happens for which there isn't a check and we get a smoking hole. This one was saved because someone else thought it was wrong and spoke up in time, and that's probably another lesson to take on board, to keep an eye on what's in the air while you're anywhere near the landing point.