Allowing students to crash (in a simulator)
 

This one is aimed primarily at MCCIs and TRIs...............I'm looking for opinions here and also (if possible) company policies and philosophies (you don't have to tell me who you work for but it would be useful to know if it's an FTO, TRTO, military or airline).

I have been having a "heated debate" with a member of the management at my workplace over the issue of allowing students to crash the simulator (or not allowing as the case may be). My argument is that it can be a valuable training point if done in the right context, his is that it is psychologically damaging and may cause the student to learn that crashing is OK! We are both people with strong opinions neither is keen to budge, but I would add that I have the backing of my fellow MCC instructors.

To add some meat to the bones, I run MCC courses (predomininantly) for airline sponsored students and it is obviously a key objective of MCC training that we approach the operation of the sim as realistically as possible and make the training as effective as it can be. A huge part of the course is about decision making and communication - and we encourage the students to try to make safe decisions and if there is any doubt to err upon the side of caution and take the safer option, even if it's less commercially expedient. In simple terms - play safe and resist company pressure to cut corners and take risks.

However, occasionally you get a student who repeatedly takes risks, applies the wrong technique, ignores (or hasn't learned) the SOP or just doesn't listen to advice and instruction - and it is my belief that sometimes you need to allow a scenario to develop to a point where the crew have missed all their opportunities to rescue the situation and a crash becomes inevitable. e.g. : 1) They repeatedly fail to "confirm" thrust levers before shutting down an engine and on an EFATO select the wrong one to idle or 2) take-off in mountainous areas with navaids set incorrectly (again - despite being picked up on it a number of times previously). I argue that sometimes the students need to be shown the consequences of their actions or inactions and that one of the advantages of a simulator is that you can allow a crash to occur and no-one really dies.

However, the gentleman in question is of the belief that you should freeze the sim just before impact and reset so that the students are not traumatised by the simulated crash. He believes that it teaches the students that it's OK to hit the ground. Needless to say, I do not agree.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not advocating that we don't use "freeze and reset" because again, used properly, those are useful tools allowing you to stop, analyse an error, reset and try to eliminate that error. All I am saying is that once in a while you have to let it go all the way to the point of impact in order to shake up a lazy, over confident or sloppy student. This is a philosophy that I have seen applied during my time in the RAF and over a couple of decades working with airlines.

What does the PPRUNE instructing community feel?
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Edited to correct a few typos - I've probably still missed a few.

moggiee,

Our FTO has no specific policy about this.

Part of me, it may surprise you, is sympathetic to your colleague's viewpoint. While I don't think the practice 'teaches them to crash', I'm not convinced of the training value of hearing/feeling the actual crunch. His argument could plausibly be interpreted that it conditions them subconsciously to think 'well, I survived that'.

My own practice is, if impact with (simulated!) terrain is inevitable through inadequate decision-making, to switch out of IMC once they've lost the plot, and allow the final LOC situation to ensue for a bit. Then I freeze the scenario before impact, often with a horrendous imminent situation on the screen, and with that picture visible, discuss the chain of events and decisions leading to the fatal predicament, and all the implications of what is about to occur.

I suspect that the fruitless struggle with the controls while the horizon perhaps swings violently or terrain looms, generates more resolve to avoid similar results. The trainee experiences the agonising feeling of actually losing control, rather than the artificial and paradoxical experience of somehow surviving the crash.

As in the best horror movies, the imagination can have a far more powerful effect than explicit (but harmless) depictions.

Thanks for posting this very interesting question. Looking forward to other opinions, my views are not writ in stone.

Best,

justanotherflyer

p.s. great to read you are instilling those attitudes towards commercial expediency - music to my ears

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edited for clarity of thought - I hope!

when I am on training for type rating, I remembered we crashed the sim 4-5 times for each pilots.

we tried to avoid it, due to the full reinitialization which can take minutes.
Outside of this, instructors are free to do what they want!

My experiences of crashes in sims-made me realize that I had to be much faster on the "my controls," in reality! When I saw how quickly my sim partner could kill us....and I felt like we were going to die, as we also
used to treat the box like a real aircraft... I realized that my previous "policy" of letting him get further than 100% comfortable in the aircraft could have dire consequences.

I believe the effect would have had the same feeling if we froze just before impact, but we were permitted to crash the sim 3 times with the one partner and twice during my initial type-rating with another guy. I never asked them what they felt about it, and no longer have contact with either of them.

If I ever become a sim instructor, I would probably not use theoretical personal ideas between instructors, but try to get several instructors involved in trying both methods and talking to the "victims" as a part of the de-brief. However, I don't believe any of them would ever come to think that it is "OK" to crash....

Great question...looking forward to reading other opinions.

Interesting responses, thank you.

For further clarification, we don't have a departmental policy as such other than to say "it's up to the individual instructor to decide how to operate". I let the instructors use their judgement and experience to decide how far to push it.

As said above, sometimes the "late break out from cloud" is a real eye-opener for the student and can be extremely effective for making a point. On other occasions, a last second freeze followed by a "hot debrief" whilst the windscreen is still full of mountainside may be more appropriate.

In a nutshell, I suppose, my position is that we should not so "NO" to letting a student crash but leave it to the experience of the instructor in the sim at the time. After all, what is the point of denying yourself a training opportunity?

Of course, in an ideal world the student listens to what we tell him, flies to the SOP, makes good decisions and stays out of trouble. In an ideal world.............

I am not a sim instructor just a humble pilot who gets turfed into the lurching cave of terror twice a year.

Sick Squid posted about his experience but I can't find that post. It was quite illuminating.

I think the idea of pausing the sim and revealing the terrain/building/whatever you were about to clatter into a very good technique for highlighting the point.

Crashing a sim is awful. Just horrible. Especially when you know it's happening and can do nothing to stop it. (ie a sim fault or something).
It's happened to me a couple of times.

We had paused the sim for some reason at 1500' AGL in an unusual attitude. The sim was not behaving as it should. We advised the instructor that this was not a good position to "release the sim". We tried our best to get it stable but we crashed. Both of us were just shocked and speechless. We looked at each other and asked for a coffee break.

During my command sim assessment it faulted as well and crashed on the last sim ride. I was gutted. I thought I had failed. Fortunately, the instructor recognised the problem and passed me. :ok:

If you have one of these in your employ, you (and the rest us) will be better off by chopping them and allowing the candidate to pursue a different career. Idiots like this have no place in civil aircraft. When you get in the sim. you should already have been taught appropriate techniques, learnt the SOP's (to a reasonable degree) and learnt to listen to instructors. So, there is no need to allow the sim. to crash, just crash the prat.

As Moggiee lists his location as "Middle East" maybe he is not allowed to do that!

Piltdown Man - it's MCC. Whilst it would be lovely to think that all the students are as diligent as you would hope, the facts are that many have been spoon-fed through and IR and so we try to use the MCC course as a big "WAKE UP" call to them and instill some good practices.

The students are cadets for an outside customer - the sponsor makes the yes/no decisions.

I'm not an MCC instructor
 

But when I did the MCC course we never managed to crash it. However nearer the end as we had finished the course we were allowed to "play" with it.

So in our "wisdom" we attempted a barrel roll in the King air sim just for fun.
The plane crashed!

However the question being asked: "Should you let them crash?"
Well if you deem they should be able to cope with what you just taught them, yes.
Then debrief where it went all wrong and how it could have gone differently.

Again I'm not an MCC instructor. Just an instructor.

We've crashed the sim many times, not purposefully!

Extreme weather/ windshear scenarios and introductions to hot/ high/ heavy scenarios coupled with losses of engines create kobayashi maru style no-win scenarios (or at least incredibly difficult to win scenarios!)

There is always the student who arrogantly believes that "he could have got out of that situation", which is why I believe there is more merit in allowing him to actually crash than not. That said I do see both sides of the argument. I suspect that with the correct attitude it is not necessary to allow it to crash, but otherwise it is a very useful training tool.

Moggiee - I think your location gives the reason for your question and why you have to be a bit savvy about how you run your section of the training.

So, is the sim. a modern airliner with functional EGPWS and internal warnings? If it is, you'll have to let matey boy have the heads up before the crash. Before the smoking hole, the machine will (should) let rip with a cacophony of words like "Terrain!" "Too low flaps!" and "Pull up!" etc. It's reasonable to protect the sim. from him but if you can sell him a crash (ie. he has to believe that it was his fault and not yours or the sim.), you may have something to work with. And assuming it's a two crew operation, what has his colleague got to say for himself? And later on, can you imagine what a more experienced captain would say and do to this guy if he tried this either on line or during an Ops. Check? Unless of course he's in the LHS when we'd all like know the name of the airline to avoid.

I have to admit when I was upgrading from Flight Engineer to First Officer after an absence of flying for 7 years because of my seniority, my instructor let me crash after I let the speed get too low on a single engine approach and trying to go-around, my whole world flipped sideways as we hit the ground and all I remember saying was "Come on you f*cking bitch !"

I never forgot the importance of speed control in a jet after that.

To smash the sim or not to smash the sim, THAT is the question.
 

Another point to consider before you go down that path is how well do you know the thought processes of your students? How will they interpret the simulator crash?

Will the students you speak of look upon the crash event as a result of their own poor performance, critique themselves, and be more motivated to study and perform well. [/SIZE][/FONT][COLOR=black][FONT=Times New Roman][SIZE=3]Or will they blame you for “ganging up on them”, accuse you of some prejudice or fault the syllabus and your ability to run the simulator or training session? Will they look upon the crash as some predetermined destiny, fate, simulator malfunction or just bad luck?

Do not assume they will react to the simulator crash the same way you would if you were the trainee. Are you are training in a cross cultural environment? If so how does the individual react to the public humiliation of having crashed a simulator in the presence of another pilot and the “foreign” instructor?

What exactly is it you are trying to accomplish? How does allowing them to crash the simulator accomplish your objective?

Years ago as an FO sometimes I would observe the Captain do something quirky. I came to call these habits I noticed thermal scars because when I asked the Captains why they did this or that invariable they would answer with “I got burned once doing..”

Many Western pilots are motivated not to make mistakes again by negative emotions associated with past failures. For example.


We screwed that up once and will not let it happen again. However not everybody thinks that way nor processes a simulator crash in the same way as you or I would.

Crash the sim or do not crash the sim, the decision is up to you. I cannot recommend either option because I do not know the company training philosophy or the larger culture you are dealing with. I know you want to do your best for your students, I am sure you will make the right decision for the right reasons. At least I hope you do because your students will be sharing the same airspace with the rest of us.

Thanks again for the input, chaps.

For the record, the sim is relatively modern but thankfully doesn't have EGPWS (or even GPWS). This places a greater reliance upon situational awareness and monitoring.

Allowing students to crash is very much an option of last resort. I only use it to make a point when students rely upon a) the other pilot to do their thinking for them, b) the instructor to rescue them, c) luck, d) don't speak up as PNF/PM and therefore allow the other pilot to "kill" them or e) rely upon whichever deity they believe in to save them.

Sometimes the requirement is to make a point about monitoring and responsibility. Sometimes it's to show them that actions have consequences. Sometimes it's to wake up a lazy student and sometimes it's to knock back an arrogant, risk-taking one (and that may involve a degree of public "humiliation"). In my experience, the response from the student is very rarely negative and if it is, is usually the types who have a negative response to any type of training!

Whatever the circumstances, it's not something that done lightly but can (if done right) be useful (in my opinion).

PS: with hindsight, perhaps I should have put this in "Instructors and Examiners"

Moggiee:Sure, as realistic as possible, but still not reality. There is some protection on the airplane, and ATC instruction that would sometimes prevent a crash in the real life.
It is better to freeze the sim and use some time to speak about what leaded to the situation. After a crash pilots are sometimes not good listeners, as they have to cop with what could be the failure of their life: sometimes pilots build their ego on their job.

For the very special and stubborn pilot, I admit it's not easy to deal with. Wouldn't be better (and possible?) to delay the training and have a discussion with him or his chief pilot?

Better: yes (possibly extend instead/as well as delay).
Possible: unfortunately not - for reasons that I can't go into.

Rich, I seem to remember you letting me crash on my MCC - and it demonstrated quite nicely that a second engine failure after the GA from a single engine approach is sometimes simply unrecoverable, and we should just do the best we can. If that counts as a crash - I'd call an off-airfield dead stick landing in the Somerset countryside a crash!

As an instructional technique allowing students to make mistakes is well founded. Ideally they should see the full results of their mistakes if they consistently refuse to acknowledge that an error (human or otherwise) has been made. This may be more difficult on MCC courses due to the relatively short length of the sim part of the course, so fewer opportunities for the student to mess it up that badly. However, if that consistent refusal to a) act as a crew b) keep standards up is visible early on, why not let them get to the point where a crash is guaranteed and then freeze the sim for a discussion? Based on that discussion you can then judge the impact and use your own discretion next time :E...