Degradation of will to learn how to fly

[abgd]

"forget studying for the tests, it's a waste of time, you will never use that knowledge again. Just buy xyz publisher's service for preparatory tests and do the tests over and over again until you reach sufficiently high scores. Don't think, just memorize what is the right answer for each question."

If sufficiently good databases exist, it may be that trying to learn the material without also memorising the questions doesn't get you competitive scores... even if you know the syllabus well.

[Romeo Tango]

forget studying for the tests, it's a waste of time, you will never use that knowledge again. Just buy xyz publisher's service for preparatory tests and do the tests over and over again until you reach sufficiently high scores. Don't think, just memorize what is the right answer for each question.

This sounds bad but remember the micromanaging system of rules that flying (especially commercial flying) now runs on. If a rule based system is insisted upon you have to expect pilots to learn the "correct" answers by heart rather than thinking of the best thing to do at the time. Not always the same.

[Pace]

I can remember studying the FAA papers for the ATP and then going to a specialist company in the USA who literally brainwashed you to pass. A month later you forgot most its all about ticking boxes

Pace

[rnzoli]

Originally Posted by Romeo Tango

This sounds bad but remember the micromanaging system of rules that flying (especially commercial flying) now runs on. If a rule based system is insisted upon you have to expect pilots to learn the "correct" answers by heart rather than thinking of the best thing to do at the time. Not always the same.

But human memory fades and if not tickled regularly with challenges, we all forget the tickbox exercise. Computers are far more consistent at following rule-based systems and this way they slowly, but surely, take over the ordinary pilot jobs in scheduled air traffic scenarios. The nasty side-effect is that these computers are rendering today's pilots redundant and pushing them down on the capability curve. So when trouble strikes and computers are unable to cope for some reason, it is becoming more and more likely that pilots can't cope either. AF447, QZ8501, French aircraft, French pilots at the controls, flying the aircraft into the ocean - it's more than just coincidence.

WIth the unstoppable advance of automation, we will soon have to make up our minds: either we continue to believe that ATPs have to be top talents and then raise the training requirements significantly again, onto the level of test pilots, OR we start degrading the requirements into "Light" ATPL for flying push-button aircraft only, with autoland features etc. Some of the pilots already aim for this spot apparently, according to the OP.

A similar transformation will take place in driver licenses issuance. With the advance of Google-cars etc. People in them will be only passengers, even if they sit at the front window. So is there any reason to give them the same training as we give to drivers for ordinary cars? Will they be interested to learn anything about driving, when they know they will own a super-smart automatic car? Nope, I am sure their will to learn parking manouvers will be ..."degraded"...

[Big Pistons Forever]

It would seem to me that the large number of ATPL exams filled with aeronautical trivia, function only as a barrier to entry.

Canada and the US have much less onerous theoretical exam procedures, yet an overall slightly better safety record than European Airlines.

Finally if the stuff on the European exams was so important to know inorder to be a safe airline pilot, why does every European ATPL I know tell me that if they were forced to rewrite the exam they would have to do the entire study course over again if they were to have any hope of being successful.

In contrast I am quite confident I could write the Canadian ATPL exams tomorrow and pass them.

[Romeo Tango]

I suppose the trend of crashes caused by tired/forgetful pilots versus the accidents caused by "special circumstances" catching out computers will crossover sometime soon (if it has not done so already). Then most of the pilots can be sacked and the flying can be done by rule based software. Maybe backed up by a few real pilots in an office who can manage most of the unusual circumstances by remote control.
The bureaucrats will love this - they can then invent as many rules as they like until aircraft become illegal.

[rnzoli]

Originally Posted by Romeo Tango

The bureaucrats will love this - they can then invent as many rules as they like until aircraft become illegal.

Aircraft probably not, but manual piloting could be banned! There are already calls for making Google-cars not only permitted in the future, but mandatory whereever possible, to increase safety on the roads. Same will happen for scheduled air traffic within 50 years from now.

But is this really a problem, or just a natural signal, that the field of aviation has matured enough by now, therefore mankind's top talent should move onto something else more challenging again? E.g., space exploration, mission to Mars and the like?

[ChickenHouse]

But is this really a problem, or just a natural signal, that the field of aviation has matured enough by now, therefore mankind's top talent should move onto something else more challenging again? E.g., space exploration, mission to Mars and the like?

In principle correct, but if mankind would have had todays attitude before, we would not have made it off the tree, or maybe even out of the oceans. Top talents nowadays are shot at, not nurtured to expertise and elite. In rat experiments they call it density stress, resulting i.e. in cannibalism, and with nowadays bars and cages, mentally and physical, we are on a similar track. From experience of the last decades, I doubt we overcome this without a major war of some kind. Mankind does have a bad reputation for learning without real pain and disaster.

[Romeo Tango]

mankind's top talent should move onto something else more challenging again? E.g., space exploration, mission to Mars and the like?

Unfortunately much of our top talent seems to end up in the financial industry where they try to find a clever ways of screwing money out of the other clever people in the city and/or careless/stupid people in the general population. ie NOT progressing humanity.

.... though they do keep the grand houses in the home counties in good repair.

[rnzoli]

CH, do I hear the classic "older generations were far better than the current and new generation" complaint? Although every generation states the same due to the progress of mankind, it is actually not true, new generations are different, because they can and will surely rely of achievements of earlier generations, instead of re-inventing stuff all over again. Its unfair to criticise younger generations only because they have an easier life, since the fundamentals for that easier life were laid down by the older generation.

Originally Posted by ChickenHouse

if mankind would have had todays attitude before

There is not one monolithic attitude, but quite many different ones. There were mediocre and also very talented individuals during the entire history of mankind. We are cheating ourselves, if we pick talented people from the past to compare with mediocre people from present times. Older people feel the influx of medocracy in their fields (e.g., music), often because the various aids (e.g., synthesizers, auto-tuners) make it easier for ordinary people to achieve what was only possible for experts before. This is why top talent needs to migrate to new areas constantly or expand the borders of their current area of expertise.

Top talents nowadays are shot at, not nurtured to expertise and elite.

Due to jeolousy, this has always been the case. Whenever there was a bright mind around, there were immediately mediocre individuals, who felt the need to attack them as soon as possible. (Just think of Galileo Galilei and his discoveries..).

Mankind does have a bad reputation for learning without real pain and disaster.

I agree on that. Given the extremely well documented wars in the past, and the horrible consequences, I am amazed how many people cheer wars and war propaganda. But a good sign for me is that there is still a surprisingly strong interest in WW1 and WW2 in new generations (from the smarter end of society of course), and guess what is helping this? Wikipedia, Google, Facebook, PC simulator games.... in addition to the traditional books, memoirs, scientific articles.

[9 lives]

This is why top talent needs to migrate to new areas constantly or expand the borders of their current area of expertise.

Except when it comes to the basics of hand flying a plane. If the "top talent" would like to hire this out to a person with good piloting skills, and not touch the controls themselves, that's fine. But if that person wants to fly the plane themselves, there are some skills to be mastered, and they are now century old skills which really have not changed.

We must be able to maintain adequate flying speed for the G we would like to fly (usually 1), and be able to do that with a minimum of systems assistance, anticipating common failures. We must be able to arrest our descent rate when approaching the ground, and keep the plane straight along the landing path. And, the other basic handling, navigation, and lookout skills needed to assure a safe flight.

There are some aids to these tasks, but it is fair and appropriate that an examiner "fail" such systems to assure the pilot can complete the task on their skills alone.

Aviation has developed some good advancements, which have become so mainstream that certain skills become very rare, and arguably no longer needed for flying common modern aircraft. Starter motors fit this description. Hand propping is no longer an element of PPL training. But automation for light aircraft will never reach the level of reliability required that the certified plane can take all non pilot occupants for a flight in controlled airspace, at a cost bearable by the average light aircraft owner. When we start seeing pilotless airliners, that evolution has begun, but the light aircraft won't be able to depend upon those systems for a number of reasons.

I think Ipads and similar new technology are great, and as I learn those new skills, I appreciate being able to search a database, or select "last" or "invert" to save leafing through pages of paper... But, I can still find my way home with only a VOR, or an ADF, or a chart, and I can still glide a taildragger onto the surface with a decent landing in a crosswind. Once I'm established in the downwind, all the techy toys will be put away, and it'll just be me and the plane.

Hands on piloting skill cannot be replaced by tech, only aided in some phases of flight.

[Pace]

WIth the unstoppable advance of automation, we will soon have to make up our minds: either we continue to believe that ATPs have to be top talents and then raise the training requirements significantly again, onto the level of test pilots, OR we start degrading the requirements into "Light" ATPL for flying push-button aircraft only, with autoland features etc. Some of the pilots already aim for this spot apparently, according to the OP.

I love the confidence placed on automation and computers in this thread and hence the new breed of push button pilots

I know even on highly automated aircraft like the A320 the pilots spend half their time resetting circuit breakers and my own experience is that the automation will let you down at the worst possible time.
do not rely on autopilots or the vast array of pilot aids and computers to help you as only a fool would trust them with his/her life

The Lear 45 has 21 computers which regularly go wrong and cost a fortune to replace.
When these things go wrong like when flying in Berlin with minima RVR and 200 feet cloud base with bad icing I had a complete autopilot and flight director failure ! What are you left with? Hand flying and you should even in a high powered jet be able to hand fly it as accurately as the autopilot.

I never see a time when automation will take over as no automation will ever take over some of the system failures which require multiple actions and none will cover the system failures of its own systems

There have been enough warning accidents by button pushers where the authorities are now bringing back basic handling skills into the training

i see a reverse in training back to basic flying and handling skills and more on upset handling rather than a continuation to more and more button pushing pilots which is showing not to work

Pace

[thing]

Interesting posts on this topic. I haven't much to add other than shouldn't an aspiring pilot student take pride in being able to navigate with a stopwatch and chart? Why do people learn how to sail yachts, why don't they just buy motorboats? Surely it's about being able to employ the esoteric and antiquated skills we learn as pilots?

Sure I have a GPS but it's only there as another aid, in the same way as I will switch on the VOR and ADF even in crystal clear weather flying a local milk run. If they are in the aircraft why not have it switched on? But I sure as hell know that I wouldn't get lost if I was left with just Mk1 eyeball and a map, because I enjoy using them when I occasionally do a 'no aids' trip to some place I haven't been before, just for the hell of it. Isn't that part of the enjoyment of private flying or am I just being a bit weird?

[rnzoli]

Originally Posted by Step Turn

But automation for light aircraft will never reach the level of reliability required that the certified plane can take all non pilot occupants for a flight in controlled airspace, at a cost bearable by the average light aircraft owner.

100% agree. Private flying for pleasure will remain the main area of hand-flying. A little bit like oldtimer cars these days (there is so limited fun factor in modern cars).

[rnzoli]

Originally Posted by Pace

automation will let you down at the worst possible time.
do not rely on autopilots or the vast array of pilot aids and computers to help you as only a fool would trust them with his/her life

No news, everything tends to fail under high-stress conditions, when you need it most. Humans too! Neither technology nor humans are fail-safe, so the question is where is the cross-over point in safety. Due to the disappointingly poor human performance in recent tragedies point out how many victims also trusted these poorly performing pilots, incapable of solving basic flying challengers under perceived (not real!) stress.

I never see a time when automation will take over as no automation will ever take over some of the system failures which require multiple actions and none will cover the system failures of its own systems

Perhaps you don't see ahead long enough? With srinking size of electronics, designers can stuff far more comupters on-board. Yes, this increases the failure probability of individual units, but this also provides "majority-choice" (1 out of 3, 1 out of 5) protection, with computers running even different versions of software to reduce risks of single-point-of-failure in the software.

i see a reverse in training back to basic flying and handling skills and more on upset handling rather than a continuation to more and more button pushing pilots which is showing not to work

This is the alternative strategy where we rather need good troubleshooters on the level of test pilots in the cockpit. Might also work, but I am afraid it will be more costly than getting technology safer. It's a competition for avoiding the crossover point.

[foxmoth]

All this talk of automation - why do these people bother learning to fly, to me they may as well just get someone else to do the flying while they sit in the back reading the newspaper!

[rnzoli]

I am not sure either, here is a couple of no-thrill guesses, why someone would try to get a pilot license without trying to learn to fly:

- money - commercial pilot jobs pay well compared to other industries and the scene lends itself to entry barriers shifting to investment rather than airmanship capabilities

- parental pressure - your dad was a pilot, your granddad was a pilot, your aunt is still a pilot, so you obvouisly MUST become a pilot too

- showing off - you did everthing from parachute jumping to scuba diving and your friends also did that, so now it's time to show off with something they can't afford

There are some other rare possibilities too, such as would-be terrorists or individuals with suicidal tendencies - unlikely, but happened before.

Did I miss any other plausible reason?

[Pace]

such as would-be terrorists or individuals with suicidal tendencies

With such a clever automated aircraft I am sure it will be able to smell out potential terrorists or those with suicidal tendencies and either refuse to start or it would eject the potential terrorist enroute and carry on on its merry way to a landing at destination on its own
Quite easy voice recognition and a simple lie detector technology

Pace

[Romeo Tango]

I don't think you can say that because automation has been unreliable in the past it always will be unreliable.

The fact is electronics (as well as mechanical stuff) is getting more reliable quite quickly - compare a current iPad to a PC of 20 years ago. Compare a car of 1980 to 2015. More and more stuff just works and one is now quite surprised if they don't. Plenty of exceptions, but they are getting fewer.

Building a robot aircraft that can fly passengers reliably is perhaps limited more by passenger perceptions than anything else. If not it soon will be.

[Pace]

RT

As in all things in aviation all is fine until its not fine. Flying is fairly easy until things go wrong in either mechanics or weather or both.
How will automation ever fully handle an engine failure or an engine failure with an engine fire or a battery overheat, complete electrical failure or a multitude of multiple failures.
How would automation deal with severe weather? violent windshear extreme crosswinds, severe icing or even navigating through a wall of cells?
It is too simplistic to get an aircraft to fly automatically with mechanical and weather limits. real life is not like that

Pace