Problem checklists
 

Just starting with a given - I think that checklists are a good thing and that we should use them.

On the other hand, I am open to discussion about whether we should use a particular set of checks as do-confirm, read-do, or challenge-respond (probably not the latter for PPL flying), and similarly I don't necessarily think that a checklist needs to be written or read. Memorised checks (HASELL, BUMFICHWL, CHIFTWAP....) can be fine.

What I'm getting increasingly irritable about is what I can only describe as "CRAP checklists".


A few days ago I was trying to convert a new PPL from the C172 he learned on over to an AA5. He came to the flight equipped with a commercially produced checklist - the particular offending article was published by Pooleys. I'm guessing, but don't know for sure, that it probably dates back to when Cabair was using AA5s for commercial training and was copied from them. If so, it's another good reason why the Cabair name deserves to be forgotten forever, other than as something with which to frighten badly behaved children.


- 6 pages of exterior checks, actively encouraging my student to go around reading the checklist carefully and barely glancing at the aeroplane.

- Take off and airfield approach checks that jumped all over the cockpit, and seemed deliberately designed to prevent memorisation. Okay, I don't actually mind somebody doing read-do on pre-t/o checks, but I really want airfield approach / downwind checks memorised thank you very much, so let's make it easy to do so.

- I asked my student to stall the aeroplane. He said he couldn't remember the HASELL checks - so I calmly said "right, get your checklist out and remind yourself quickly". It turned out that they weren't in there - no variation on HASELL, just missing altogether. Okay, he should have memorised that as well, but where the heck is he supposed to learn it from if not the checklist he has from the aeroplane?


This isn't the first time I have come across this - I recall being handed a checklist in Canada the size of a small paperback novel for a C172 I was about to hire.

Alternately, I occasionally back-end in a 4 engine jet and am trained as "pilot's assistant" for challenge-response using the main checklist if required: that's two sides of A4 card ! We can all cope with that!



So who out there is writing and perpetuating these badly constructed, illogical checklists which alternately miss out important information (like HASELL checks) and encourage massive over-reliance on the printed checks (like the walkaround) ? And what can we do about them?

G

Problem checklists
 

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A number of years ago when CAAFU examiners ruled the roost I was taking my GFT 4 at Oxford. No criticism whatsoever, but being a good professional school their detailed checklists were a little different from what I was used to and as I had been instructing for about 10 years, I had memorised my basic checks. On the second circuit in the Twin Comm with my beringed examiner in the right hand seat, my memory failed me and the Oxford checks went out of the window! "I must do some I thought, or it will be curtains and I will be wasting a test fee".
"Brakes off, undercarriage down...with green light, mixtures rich, fuel on, pumps on, alternate air not required, instruments set...are you strapped in sir?"

The test continued and in the debrief my examiner enquired why I found it necessary to switch the landing lights on at the start of the downwind leg when I flew the first circuit but on none of the others. I explained that it was due to the Oxford check list which I could remember only on the first circuit.

"I see" He said while writing out my pass certificate!

P.P.

I wonder if there is an element of money making here. Flying schools sell them to there students for about 10 quid a pop.

The checklist we use is a laminated piece of A5 which was pinched off some american flying school a few years ago. Which is given to the students for free.

Don't forget, it's also based on the POH, unlike a lot of these "flip-book" ones that add all kinds of unnecessary crap. :D

Normal checklist one side, speeds and emergency stuff on the back. What more do you need?!

I used to use a set of Puma FRCs for a living- forget how many pages. The actual physical cards only ever made an appearence in an emergency- real or drill. Memory and flow were the methods used.

Checklist at flight schools are unfortunately a problem. I think almost all schools make two fundamental errors with checklists

1) Checklist should exist inside and compliment an SOP document. That is there should be a written SOP that tells new pilots all the "how" items, like what to look for on the walkaround, speeds and power settings for normal operations, correct use of the lights, examples of standard radio calls, etc etc. The actual checklist should never be used as a "how to fly" tool it should only function to aid the pilot in ensuring flight safety critical tasks/actions are performed. Since training aircraft are not complicated there are not that many flight safety critical tasks/actions so the checklist will be short.

2) The difference between an "do list" (ie you read an item on the checklist and then do it) vs a "checklist" (ie you do the all the actions as part of a flow and then when able check the list to ensure you haven't missed anything vs a memory recall check ( Ie check is done all from memory without going to the checklist) ; Is not well understood and incorporated in the checklist.

I fixed the checklists at both of the schools I do a bit of part time C 172 instructing at. We first wrote a comprehensive SOP document we could give to students and then redid the checklist.

The checklist are about half as long as they were before and follow a consistent pattern of a counterclockwise circle around the instrument panel always starting at the fuel selector

They are broken down as follows

Prestart: do list
After start: flow
Taxi: do list
Runup: flow
Before takeoff: do list
Cruise: do list
Descent: flow
Prelanding: Memory recall
Afterlanding: flow
shutdown: do list.

Genghis, you beat me too it this is one of my hot topics at the moment.

Most commercially produced checklists are awful in my opinion and often at variance with the POH/Flight Manual.

I could not agree more.

The walk round on a basic aircraft once the student has been taught is simple and logical - in my opinion you do not need a checklist to conduct same and in fact attempting to read a detailed checklist whilst doing so is detrimental to the task.

C195, I see this as the crux of the issue. These checklists encourage the idea that they are there to tell the pilot what to do rather than ask the pilot "Did you do this?"

A simple but classic example on the Pooleys PA38 checklist Before Start is "Throttle.......Set half an inch" but this is only appropriate for a cold start - for a warm start our POH says Throttle Closed. So for me the checklist should say "Throttle.......Set" and the pilot should have had the training and knowledge to know how to set the Throttle appropriately.

Exactly, "how" much throttle to use is a procedure not a check. Similarly the SOP for my student is just before he/she engages the starter they look around and then verbalize " towbar out, clear prop". The checklist simply says "start engine".

As for the walkaround the best way is to use the aircraft as a giant flow check. So the SOP is to start at the same place on the aircraft and work your way around it in a logical and consistent pattern.

What to look for at each part of the aircraft is written down in the SOP document to aid new students first learning how to do a walk around. Having it written down also stops the "good idea" club from adding bizarre, stupid, or unnecessary steps.

..........

A "flow" is simply using the aeroplane as the the checklist: effectively in a "challenge / respond" manner rather than a printed checklist.

Most of us do our externals in that way I'd venture, and many instructors: myself included: teach that approach to emergencies.


Incidentally
Most experienced pilots have their personal systems of-course. Mine is two 2-sided A5 cards, one generic, one specific to type, working like this:-

P1 - speeds / startup / limits / emergencies / key performance numbers.
P2 - systems knowledge, which pretty much never gets referred to in flight.
P3 - checks on the ground, I use this fairly extensively.
P4 - checks in the air, memorised, just there "in case".

So, in practice, P1 is the only page I look at with air under the tyres. In my experience, most experienced pilots of single pilot aeroplanes do something pretty similar.

G

In my view, the only time a checklist is read from is whilst the aircraft is stationary i.e. start, power checks, pre-takeoff vital actions, after landing and shut down. I don't think single pilots should be heads-in reading stuff while their craft is in motion, especially on the ground! I'm not too fussed about the exact list of things to do that folk do as pre-landing checks. I once flew a complex type with an old ex-airline instructor (great guy). I started in on my pre-landing litany 'brakes off, undercarriage down..' he interrupted me and said 'that's enough, you've done the important one!' Incidentally, I learned at a field where only base leg joins were permitted, so got used to calling them 'pre-landing' checks as quite often there wasn't any downwind leg to do them on. I do like the concept of 'touch drills' to reinforce in one's mind that an action has been carried out or a setting is correct.

TOO

You should stick with the manufacturers check list, right or wrong that is the only approved thing.:{
They made it, they got the aircraft approved using it, so were stuck with it, if you have any better idea's, go and get yours approved by the manufacturer and see how much that sets you back to get it approved.

Over complicating things...
 

I flew a few thousand hours on a variety of MEP aircraft (BN2P, BE58, PA31-350) and we had a simple A5 card. All airborne checks were memorised flows, with the A5 card listing the critical items.

I didn't know a pilot who didn't do reds/blues/greens. I think a lot of the more extensive checklist items for MEP aircraft are barriers to correct learning. There is quite a lot of background knowledge required to fly a turbo-charged engine, for instance, and how to carefully baby the engine to it's next overhaul interval.

I'd encourage newer pilots to read as much as they of articles like Pelican Perch, learn as much as they can from older hands and just generally sponge up as much knowledge as possible. Airborne checks need to be concise and cover the killer items. The rest of the small things we do to proficiently manage the aircraft should be ingrained airmanship.

Why do people feel the need to diverge from the POH/AFM?

Oh, and the 47 flip cards of flying school produced fun you need to go through to operate a C152!

Hmmm, checklists are part of a system; a system of training and checking, of teaching and knowing, of prioritisation, of error-management... I could go on.

'Landing lights... ON' has no place in a checklist. Pilots should be trained to turn the lights on before landing. The consequences of forgetting to do so are minimal. etc. Hardly any aircraft need a shut-down checklist. Turn everything off, that's all.

The manufacturer is sometimes right, by right, as timprice says. (And by default of the regulator which accepted that checklist). Anyone care to mention the common piston twin in which the shut-down procedure is the reverse of the usual T,P,M? Anyone like to explain why it might be right? If you've flown that type, what would YOU have done?

And finally, in tribute to the wonderful boys and girls at Cabair, who taught me to be a professional pilot, but nonetheless tried to get me to do 17 items of an approach checklist in a piston twin, I offer:

http://ti.arc.nasa.gov/m/profile/ade...umentation.pdf

which at least tells you not to put those 17 items into wingdings, yellow on orange, seventeen point upper case.:eek:

I predicted what happened on a flight the next day.
Sat in the back awaiting my turn with one other doing 1179 training.
Inflight shutdown of Seneca engine after failure to air-start.
The checklist ran in the usual fashion without a break after pulling the mixture. The guy upfront went straight for the wrong mags and killed the live engine!
Very interesting when several miles out over the Channel (which looking back was not very clever place to do this procedure).
Realising error he immediately switched them back on.
Very interesting flight.

Hi Ghengis,

A great topic and a subject which could use some work. No doubt you are on to is - which is why you asked the question! Here's my 2p worth.

I trained in the RAF where we learned the checklists by heart. We were professional full time trainees and the time and resources were on our side. And as we were ultimately training to fly single seat fighters, it was the best policy as learning them was the only option for that situation.

Later, in multi-engine training (not having made the single seat fighter path!) we used challenge and response checklists. They seemed slow and inefficient to us at the time, but with practice and knowledge, they became more expedient and relevant.

First type after training, (multi engine) we did the first part of the checks by memory (the Phase One checks). the Phase Twos were challenge and response largely confirming actions from the Phase Ones. This was a great system and very expedient. Now, modern airliners use an adaptation of this where the much reduced checklists are confirmation of pre checklist flows.

When I started GA flying, I was surprised at the way checklists were used. They were overly long, complex, inefficient and sometimes irrelevant. I got the impression that some were written to train pilots to operate their light aircraft they way the authors assumed airliners were operated. While instructing on PA28s, I often sat there watching the engine turn while the student struggled through the checks. I would frequently point out that they could become more familiar with the checks before the flight and use the time they were paying for in the air and not on the ground. But all the time, I was thinking that the checklists could be changed.

The only GA flying I do now is in a small aerobatic aircraft. Before my first flight on the type, I asked the instructor about a checklist and he responded that there wasn't one. "What sort of checklist do you need for an aircraft with fixed gear and no flaps?" was his reply. So we strapped it on, started it up and went flying using airmanship and common sense.

One point someone has made is that the POH is part of the certification process and that the checklist within is technically mandatory, no matter how bad it may be. You can add items, but not remove them.

This all depends on what you think a checklist is for. As far as I am concerned, it's to help you remember the vital things that will kill you if forgotten. What will kill you on start-up? Not a lot. Taxiing? ...erm. Take-off? Now here's a list building - Fuel, Flaps, Trim and Prop would help. After take-off, cruise, descent, approach etc. - this is standard flying. Landing - Gear, Flaps and Prop. Anything else is a bit superfluous. Adding pointless extras dilutes the importance of the "BIG" ones.

An example of this is my plane. It has seven airborne items, two after take-off, two approach and three before landing items. Why a bug smasher should be much more complicated is beyond me. The entire checklist is on one side of A4 in 12pt CAPs with plenty of white space, margins, logos and headings.

PM

A row of letters on the instrument panel (mnemonic) as an 'aide memoire' is the practice in gliders.

C - Controls, full and free and working in correct sense.
B - Ballast, Pilot weight within limits for aircraft. Ballast cushions/weights present or not as necessary
S - Straps are fitted correctly and tight. Passenger straps tight, untwisted and buckle fully fastened, or if flying solo are secured to prevent interference with controls and damage to airframe.
I - Instruments - Panel is secure, glasses unbroken, instruments reading zero or as required. Master Switch 'on', radio on correct frequency and volume adjusted (radio check on first flight of day).
F - Flaps - Check for operation, set for takeoff position. Name glider type and state "Airbrakes not fitted to 'glider type*' as appropriate.
Trim - Exercise for movement, Check friction if appropriate, Trim to takeoff position.
C - Canopy fully secured, resists upward movement, clear vision panel moves. If flying solo or with novice passenger, check rear clear vision panel is shut.
B - airBrakes, check fully open, half open looks balanced, closed and locked.
E - Eventualities - Number of aircraft in operation, wind direction, any lay-off required on winch launch due to cross-wind, landing options in the event of a cable break, approach speed for the day's weather conditions.

A glider is generally pretty simple, and that's our check list. There are a fair few on there which are equally applicable to a small aerobatic aeroplane.

The mnemonic is the only bit that is written down in the aircraft though.

The pre-flight check (signed off and double checked) and first flight of the day checks are separate from the above.

Even in gliders multi-thousand hour pilots talk their way through the above out loud. Its what keeps them alive.

* At our club there would be nothing unusual about a pilot flying three or four different types in the course of a day, so reminding yourself which type glider of you are in is essential if you are to avoid just saying 'flaps not fitted' in one which has them.