I recall times (this was the early days, mind) when some pilots found themselves wrong way up they resorted to engaging the FD (HDG/ALT) to recover control.

This usually happened during our (cough, cough) "night VFR" slinging operations in the Canadian Arctic. Usually it just made things worse because swinging loads confused the hell out of the stabilization system.

But it also happened sometimes with passengers.

As an ex-Chief Pilot I must say the idea that we have people in this industry who will give up a just "push buttons" scares the hell out of me.

I surely appreciate the wonders of modern technology, but you still gotta be able to fly the rocket.

If you can't, or won't, you are in the wrong job.

If you doubt me, check this guy out: Chesley Sullenberger

Sullenberger
 

I believe Captain Sullenberger's success was down to the aircraft's FBW system rather than any manual handling skills - which I'm sure he had and if he had been flying a 737 he would have needed them. Luckily he was in an Airbus!

G.

Two's in - great post.

HC - That depends on how you want to define the level of competency and what tasks you expect that competency to cover.

In the offshore world it may simply be to fly a manual ILS to recover to base - in other areas of heli aviation the manual competencies may be many and varied.

Try using automation to get a winchman onto a pitching fishing vessel in the dark and see how much use it is! Even the rad-alt hold might not be good enough to give the precision required.

I have been lucky to fly and teach the whole gamut of general handling exercises on every type I have converted to and spent much of my life assessing and honing the pure handling skills of many pilots as well as their use and monitoring of AP systems - both are vital skills and equally perishable.

Let's not pretend that we don't need to be able to fly the aircraft.

G.

This probably helped as well -

I think trying to merge a discussion about relevant handling skills for CAT and SAR into one conversation is always going to cause confusion. But knowing how you can't see beyond SAR I'll humour you. Yes for SAR there are a couple of different factors, one is that as you say it's generally necessary to manually fly a winch man onto a pitching fishing vessel. And it's quite tricky too, although like anything it gets easier with practice. Although even I know that radalt height hold is pants and so last century.

And secondly with SAR, in a call out if you get a minor malfunction it harder to terminate the mission whereas eg with offshore CAT it's easy and normally the best thing, to RTB. So like any design (physical or strategic) if you want to make the discussion about all things and all people, it will inevitably be diluted and dysfunctional. Therefore since this thread is about automation management and you are a manual flight apologist, perhaps you should start your own thread on manual flying skills in which all your big-balled hero colleagues can participate? No doubt when you eventually reach civvy street we will all benefit from your "right stuff"(!).

RVDT & CRAB
 

I'm sure Capt Sullenberger is a great guy and a fine pilot. It was his fortune on that day to be teamed up with the right equipment. The AP system did a fine job for him I am told by those that know about such things.

G.

CRAB - HC is right we are too diverse an industry to get up tight about one aspect. Of course if there were such a thing as an SAR 'rating' or for that matter an 'offshore' rating (and others similar ratings along the lines of professional skills and knowledge) then maybe we could provide more applicable training during the 'pre-hire' or immediate 'post-hire' phase of employment. Then we could address many pertinent issues in an appropriate context.

Just an idea. :E

G.

I always love it when you guys bang on about how little other than SAR I know - I presently fly and instruct on a single pilot IFR, glasscockpit, helo with a reasonably well appointed (although only 3-axis) AP so guess what - I do understand automation as I teach it and assess its use.

You also fail to see past the steam driven Sea Kings of old and still think of it in Mk31 AFCS terms because you weren't flying and instructing on the Mk3A with its duplex digital AFCS that was a very big step up in flexibility and capability.

Automation and the management of it in helicopters isn't new, cutting edge or a black art - believing that it is the only safe way to fly the helicopter is a worrying new fashion though.

Trying to belittle those that have a contrary view to the ivory tower offshore Gods is not a good basis for improving skills or safety but doubtless you know better than me about that as well.

I have been a civilian pilot for over a year now and seem to be managing quite nicely - the unfortunate thing I keep seeing is that civilian flyers often look down on the military way of doing things - don't ask me why.

Why?


But no, I don't think civilian flyers look down on the military was of doing things, they just get riled when the military guys steamroller in and say "no, you don't want to be doing it like that, you want to do it like we do in the military (because we are steely-eyed gods of the sky)". We had one like that in my company, nearly every sentence he uttered started with "when I was in the military we did it like x y z...". He grew out of it eventually.

I used to visit the guys in Aberdeen quite often (in the past). Some of them were well balanced in their opinions, they had a chip on both shoulders - did we meet back then HC? :}

Thats the second time in this thread you have mentioned the size of peoples balls HC.
Just wondering if you have some sort of inferiority complex to do with either hand flying a helicopter or the size of your balls in comparison other peoples.
Maybe that's where the comparator comes from

HC - I think very few mil pilots consider themselves to be steely-eyed gods of the sky but I can understand the frustration they feel moving to civil flying where there is limited training (compare a conversion to type between mil and civ) compared to that they enjoyed in the mil.

The mantra in the mil is to train hard and fight easy so you don't do the enemy's job for him - this clearly doesn't translate to civilian flying where the bottom line governs everything but when you have enjoyed the freedoms of mil flying, civilian stuff seems tame, over-regulated and under-resourced by comparison.

As for growing out of it - I think it is more like banging your head against a brick wall - it's nice when you stop as there is no way the system will change whilst beancounters control everything.

Great post TOD, but I think the be-all intent of that automation in them shiny big jets is to turn you lot into money saving accountants.

There was a great post on these forums a long time ago that went along the lines of something like this: "The difference between fixed wing pilots and rotary wing pilots is that for fixed wing pilots the job ends when they reach their destination, whereas for rotary wing pilots the job starts."

Automation is always improving and getting better at doing all that mundane stuff. The goal of automation has always been safety and efficiency, and when it is all working I do believe that's the result that is produced.

Degraded automation is an encyclopaedic volume all its own where the pilot has to fault find, improvise, challenge, ignore, crosscheck, etc a system that he/she has little insight into it's inner workings. It is in my experience that some people are just miles better at fault finding than others.

Hi CT, yes I would agree, however I would also suggest that we are all in the business of the aviation business. We promise to get our load of warm pink bodies to destination together with any baggage or cargo they throw at us, whether it is 13 in the back of a VFR fixed rod B212 (if there are any left these days) or our 615 destined for BKK. Automation has been a response to that contract. We add automation and levels of redundancy that increases the chances of being able to fulfil the mission, I suspect that the professional SAR guys are in the same situation though within different economic context. You rightly highlight the mundane, automation has been previously described as making the boring bits more boring and the exciting bits more exciting, or more properly decreasing the workload when the workload is already low and increasing it dramatically when the workload is high. Switching from landing on runway 16 to 23 at ABZ involved a simple change of trajectory in a 332L, now I have to plan the three runway changes into PEK by setting up my secondary flight plans in the cruise. I know if I'm down in the weeds and they reassign my arrival, the two of us up front will be doing the one-armed-paperhanger impression if we have not covered our bases properly.

You also touch upon another interesting aspect, that is the diagnostics of trouble in the automation. I have plenty of personal examples where the normally very reliable automation in its rare moments, attempts to deceive me. Having an understanding of the basic parameters is essential to filter out these misleading cues. The trouble is established and rigorous procedures are essential for the safe operation of automation, the difficulty then arises as to when to drop those procedures because they either are not or will not work (in this specific, previously unimagined situation). Back to the fundamental conundrum: how to train this suspicion into the new crews.

BTW, try and get 30 crew through JFK or DME - I envy the post flight duties in the rotary world. The nice thing though is the engineers do the wash and drying runs for us - no loitering to wait for engines to cool down!

I'm sure the ratio of training to operational flying in mil vs civvy is massively different, after all we aren't at war that much these days. The mil can do this because it is all paid for out of my taxes and isn't expected to make a profit. However it is unhelpful to keep banging on about it because as I said earlier, mil and civvy are different kettles of fish, and always will be. Of course the down side of all that expensive mil training is that they become too expensive to do anything mundane like non-combat transport (think Falklands) and of course non-combat SAR, hence the recent total privatisation.

I'd liken it to the thought that there is no point in being the safest airline / helicopter operator if you go out of business.

What we have to do is look carefully at what training we do and why, so as to optimise the limited training time we have. Make it all count.

Anyway a suggestion, why don't you stop telling us how wonderful the mil was (since nearly everything you say is not transferable to civvy) and I'll stop banging on about the size of the balls and ego of the mil pilots?

This is the important point (if slightly missed!) - does the addition of new fangled automation increase or reduce training requirement? Answer of course is that it increases it big time. So something has to give and this is my point, the need to be able to fly immaculately AP out or with just the basic AP is becoming a redundant skill. You just need to be able to get by without actually hitting fsd on the loc and gs for that once in several lifetimes need to fly manually. (I am of course talking about the latest generation with multiple redundancies, not the 20 year old tech that is not that reliable or redundant.)

And all that endless engine failure on takeoff / landing training - something that NEVER happens in reality - just how much time should we be spending on that vs the complexities of partial automation?

HC said

is that supposed to be ironic or just plain f:mad:in thick? :ugh:

I'm sure a nice cultured Chinny crewman might pop along to enlighten you soon HC

Do enlighten us as to the amount of military helicopter flying within a war zone vs that not within a war zone, say over the last 6 months?

But anyway, let's not allow your chip to derail a thread about automation.

War-zone ops
 

HC - I think you might be surprised by what is going on behind the scenes, maybe not squadron strength ops but meaningful stuff anyway - but that's another very different story.

The gist of all this is that training in civvy street needs to be more focussed and task oriented so that we ease gently away from the generic crap of yester-year that was only designed that way because we took 20 years to fall in love with flight simulators and had to be able to do EVERYTHING on the real aircraft.

Back in the eighties the UK CAA mandated autopilots for light twins working night ops in the police segment of helicopter aviation. They neglected to mandate the necessary training that should accompany the introduction of this equipment so the inevitable happened and a helicopter crashed (mercifully with no fatalities) due entirely to mismanagement of the autopilot. The lesson is there to be learned so we need to look at the ratio of training in a TR syllabus (remember a TR is a professional pilot transitioning on to a new, and usually similar,type) spent teaching how to do all those profiles and associated engine failures and spend some more time on getting to understand the automation. The engine failure exercises should be moved to the (context related) operational TR section that (should) follow the basic licence rating.

Now you can see why there are advantages in role related training leading to role related ratings. If money is tight then let's focus it on the areas needed most.

My New Year's Wish - Please deliver us into a world where Evidence Based Training has arrived for real.

G.

So what you are saying is the training given in the civilian sector has been pared to the bone to reduce costs (and therefore keep HC happy) yet is not actually fit for purpose.

The training in the military is far too extensive and therefore far too expensive (according to HC) and dares to produce people who can actually fly the aircraft quite well, with or without automation and who then have the audacity to question the other training ideas.

I am sure there is a happy medium but those of us who enjoyed a thorough and extensive training in varied military roles (rather than A to B and back again straight and level) both in the real aircraft and simulators will continue to wonder at where the civil aviation system is heading - fully automated aircraft with no pilots at all would seem to be the logical extension of the argument.

Let's hope not:ok:

Why not put your money where your fingers are and set up your own CAT undertaking - with lots of training of course. Then you can be the safest operator - for a few weeks until you go bust!

As to your "wonder", why not consider contributing something useful to this thread. I wouldn't go so far as to say civvy training isn't fit for purpose but of course it needs to evolve as the helicopters evolve,and it's certainly lagging behind at the moment. But I suspect you will be too busy telling us how wonderful it was in the mil to actually contribute anything useful and practicable. Please prove me wrong.

HC

I wasn't comparing hours flown, you were stating the above.

Chip? Don't have any old chap - just enjoying the banter - I hope your flying (diagnostic automation management and real manual flying) is more accurate than your statements on here! :ok:

HC - I can't give you the training system you need because you won't pay for it - the argument about going bust is the malaise of the helicopter industry from what I read on this forum - someone will always do the job cheaper and it will always be about short-term gain rather than long-term planning.

As long as the industry accepts this status quo, all the wailing and gnashing of teeth about training falling short of needs will never change anything.

It seems the industry can't pull together to raise standards (because they are statistically pretty safe and the bean counters won't pay the extra) and the regulators are reactive rather than proactive.

The reality is that we will continue to accept crashes like Norfolk and Sumburgh as an acceptable attrition rate for the money that customers are prepared to pay. You only get as much Flight Safety as you are prepared to pay for.

This thread started as a discussion about mismanagement of automation - the answer is clearly - more training ; the question is 'who will pay for it'? Until you solve that dichotomy then things will continue to steadily decline.

I agree that the luxury of the mil system being allowed to throw more hours at any similar problem - although not as easy to do nowadays (even the mil has budgetary constraints) - isn't likely to happen in the civil market but there doesn't seem any push to even try.

One thing that might help is if pilots designed AP systems rather than engineers, then we might have less complicated failure modes, degraded modes, diagnosis of system failures and an industry standard for naming things.

Big buttons and bright lights works for me:ok:

My nephew has just finished his MCC with a well-known budget airline and the AP system on a modern airbus has so many warnings, both visual and aural, even of minor system malfunctions, that it is easy to miss something important when wading through the niff naff.

The big advantage of flight automation is the savings in training and continual practice. There will be a time where a basic helicopter course followed by a Flight Management Systems course will enable one to be qualified to fly, sorry, operate helicopters on the North Sea. Then as individual costs go down then there will be glut of pilots available. The costs will then be reduced yet again because they can be offered peanuts for salaries as they are only automated bus drivers.

Until something that the pundits haven't dreamed up in the checklist happens.

Crab - so your line is "we (in civvy street) can't have a similar amount of training as the mil do, so might as well gives up and go home". Seems rather defeatist to me. In my (old) company at least, we did significantly increase recurrent and conversion training time in response to the new technology. But also that new time tended to get filled with knee-jerk extra items following crashery (eg simultaneous double engine failure in the cruise) that were put in for, predominantly, political reasons.

We may not be able to increase training time to match the mil, but there is a huge amount of scope to make better use of what time we do have. We need to dump extra stable-door-closing political rubbish, we need to dump historically important but no longer relevant stuff. In fact we need to look at the task, the failure modes (human and technical) and the reasons why we still crash, and devise training plans accordingly. Oops, I do believe I am sounding like Geoffers! Well, nothing wrong with that!

Anyway, it's a shame you want to be defeatist rather than being part of that debate.

HC - I suggest you re-read your own posts before you declare who is being defeatist in this matter.

I have no power to change what happens in the offshore world - you were in it for a long time as a very experienced operator and instructor I believe - how much did you manage to change it?

I don't mean to sound defeatist, I am just reflecting the comments made here by you and others - as you never tire of telling me, I know little of the offshore job.

You have lots of good ideas but who is going to implement them?

Crab - well my time is done (a little prematurely) but in my time I think I made some differences to both the usage of automation and the training for it. It was certainly an uphill struggle with resistance to change from many quarters including some crusty trainers, the older generation of pilots, and the CAA.

But for example we ceased doing a manual ILS on every check, instead doing approaches with partial automation to tick the "manual" box. That being infinitely more useful. Engine failure on takeoff after DP was presumed to be flown hands off by the automation. We started flying overlay approaches (ie coupling to FMS to fly a VOR or NDB approach down to DA (and through the missed approach)). And lots more.

It was quite interesting to see the slow but inexorable shift in line pilots' attitude from "can't I just fly it manually, it's so much easier" to loving the automation, to getting a bit close to "automation dependancy". And that of course brings up another point which is that optimising training depends amongst other things on where the company is in its cultural transformation from steam to automation, and the provenance of each pilot. So for example converting a crusty old line pilot onto the 225, nearly all the emphasis was on the systems and automation. It was presumed that they had basic flying skills. However doing a type rating on a baby CPL, one had to include lots more manual flying so that the trainee would gain confidence and skill in flying something much bigger than a Hughes 300.

So looking back on the period 2005 to 2012 which was when we got the 225 to when I had to retire, I'd say the culture regarding automation and the training for it changed dramatically in our company. Jobs like that are never complete though, but I suspect it is continuing.

I'm glad I packed up flying when I did.

FED - with you completely, it stops being flying and starts being watching - not the same thing at all:ok:

I'm struggling to understand how it helps on a dark and stormy night round the back of the Ben, updraughts, downdraughts, cloud base, snow shower........

I must be lacking in imagination to not grasp the benefit of being able to conduct an auto ILS, as opposed to being able to fly the aircraft :E

CRAB et al
 

It may have escaped your notice but CAT is about flying A to B and delivering the goods as safely as possible with maximum customers satisfaction. It is not meant to be nor can it deliver happy smiley pilots grateful for the 'workout' and opportunity to broaden or polish their skills. If you want to do that then go find a job that requires near constant application of those skills, fire bombing, SAR, police ops, etc. CAT is what it is. The only saving grace is that so far we have no Cat 3 Autoland so at least we get to do that part of the flight and in the offshore world that can be quite stimulating, especially at night and/or in bad weather.

It of course is a shame that nobody seems to recognise that hand flying skills DO require practice as they are easily lost with the passage of time. Quite what the regulators imagine that a generic series of OEI exercises that have remained virtually unchanged for 45 years will do to help I don't know. We need to get the word out to the rest of the world. The current model for pilot training in helicopters is not working as I continue to see pilots who by no stretch of the imagination can be described as truly competent but they continue to make it through the system because the 'tick-box' approach is dysfunctional.

I am fascinated by HC's ability to twist the CAA into agreeing that there is no need for a manual raw data ILS. I wonder how widely known that little wrinkle is? Such enlightenment is most uncharacteristic not to say out of step with the rest of EASA-land. Of course, if we were using an Evidence Based Training model there would be time and opportunity for both manual and 'modified' AP based approaches but don't get me on that. (i'll just give myself a slap for being so 21st century).

G.

Why 'Tick-Box' doesn't work
 

For months I have been searching for a suitable analogy to explain why the current (tick-Box) approach to License Skill Tests (LSK) and LPC/OPC's is dysfunctional.

Imagine that you are seeking a to qualify as an expert in English Literature. The test (LSK) is to recite verses from various Shakespeare plays as required by your examiner (TRE). The verses are detailed on a test sheet and there are 55 of them in two sections, Comedy & Tragedy, In each section the examiner will select twenty verses and ask you to perform them.

Knowing this you will receive instruction and practice at all 55 verses and chances are that with a bit of hard work the day before the test you can get things together enough to get a pass.

Now to my mind this doesn't even make you an expert in Shakespeare let alone English Literature.

If you can think of a better analogy please let me know for I will use it in place of Shakespeare if it will do the job and explain to those that need to know why we need to change the way we do things.

G :ok:

No it hasn't but dumping customers in the sea probably doesn't do much for your satisfaction feedback ratings;)

The CAT industry seems to want bus drivers and it appears they have trained exactly what they want.

CRAB
 

You're not going to get any arguments from me on that score but it is a little harsh to imply that giving our SLF a free bath is a habit. The occasional reality check maybe but don't forget the millions of flight hours we have delivered safely since the 1970's (1960's for a few).

It is a desire not to be complacent that drives us to do it better but you don't have to be a rocket scientist to recognise the huge difference between the dear old S61 and the EC225/AW139/AW189/S92 yet little has changed in the way we go about training and testing save that simulators are IN and have a huge potential to make a (cost effective) difference as part of a revised, updated, modernised, clear thinking, context driven pilot training system.

Keep up the good work but try to be a bit more constructive or understanding of our dilemma if you can find it in your heart to do so.

I read this morning that Cranwell's 11 week terms are being chopped to 8 weeks in the interest of ....... god forbid ...... brevity (not money of course)! The Light Blues will never be the same. They'll be taking away those nice brown leather gloves soon. :)

G. :ok:

Crab - All incidents of dumping passengers into the sea have been caused directly by lack of automation, lack of automation skills and/or lack of adequate automation policies.

It is for precisely this reason that in offshore land ( no paradox intended) much progress is being made in providing automation, training properly how to use it and mandating when it should be used.

Helicomparitor is correct that in some types a manually flown ILS on a PC is rather pointless as this mode of AP operation is not a possible failure mode. It is better to fly this requirement in "Degraded" mode, whatever that might be and in some types there are numerous degraded modes to practice and test.

In my small world I often see poor HMI skills when these modern AP aircraft are flown in ATT mode such that the pilot does not fully benefit from the stabilisation properties inherent in the system, in my opinion this is a symptom of automation dependency and can be managed by knowledge and training followed by sensible automation policies during line flights. ATT mode is the mode used at the very start and the very end of all flights even when automation has been mandated to maximum application. Therefore the time we spend in ATT mode can be minimal. No surprise then that many of the latest accidents/ incidents have occurred with the AP, or some axis of the AP in ATT mode.

Crab I understand your comments that the pilot is not "flying" but reduced to "watching". We call this "Monitoring" and it is a vital skill that needs strategy and in depth training to ensure safe flight trajectories. However, the pilots require in depth systems based training to understand the deployment phase of AP higher modes in respect to; Indications, Prioritisations and AP Behaviours otherwise not only are these monitoring phases rendered ineffective but lack of understanding may lead to interference in the flight control system by the PF.

Flight by automation requires significant and important skill sets if safe operations are to be assured. Theses skillsets are not divorced from hand from hand flying but they are different.

DB

The tick box says "manual" but what does that mean? In FW it would mean autopilot out. Oh but not if its FBW of course! In helicopters does it mean AP out? I don't think so! It means AP in with partial automation. I say that because the attitude and heading hold of ATT mode (ie basic autopilot) is clearly thus. But who's to say it shouldn't be a slightly more enhanced partial automation? You have to fly one bit of it (ie cyclic or collective) manually, the AP does the other bit. You're manually flying, just not all of it!

Anyway that isn't the argument we used - we had an enlightened FOI who also flew the type and could see the point. Part of which is that having to fly an ILS in ATT mode is not a feasible failure. And he soon realised that partial automation could be a can of worms and thus best trained for thoroughly.

Although tacit acceptance was probably as far as it got! With some of the Mesozoic folk at CAA having retired such flexibility is easier.

HC - in modern AH products, SEMA. or SAS mode makes for a more pragmatic "manual" ILS requirement!

Yes I agree and it's a good way to keep / check "proper" manual flying skills. It is just the routine flying of ILSs in ATT mode (basic AP) during LPC etc that I rile against, that being just a mindless continuation of AS332L practices.

It was quite a bit later than that. I was working as a police CP from the late 1990s until early 2000s when it came in. At that time we were operating an unstabilised (floppy stick) aircraft, not even a stick trim was fitted. Interesting night flying and we latterly trained for instrument approaches in that aircraft.

The accident mentioned about the police helicopter (Scottish EC135) was caused mainly by the pilot not understanding the autopilot and fighting it all the way to the ground, rather than allowing it to help him as intended. Surely that accident was caused by a lack of initial TR training if ever there was one.

It's only in the last few years that I've been checked on my ability to fly a coupled ILS. I think this was because some of the dinosaurs at the CAA didn't understand the systems themselves and somehow saw use of them as "cheating"!

Thankfully, the folks now in the CAA have a more modern mindset and an understanding of modern aircraft and how they need to be flown.

Try this one........

At my home base we have a nice shiny ILS. Due to a problem with the glideslope the UKAIP (and now the charts) says "No auto-coupled approaches to be flown" On the smaller end of our fleet, that basically means hand fly the bugger to minima, at the larger end it means really knowing the VNAV set up, but still be able to do it the old fashioned way, basically as the wildly out of date LPC requires.

However, we are a small company, we fly together often enough to be able to notice slips in skill sets. One area those slips formed a pattern was in very basic tracking and the mental arithmetic around it. Three years ago one of our trainers suggested that when aircraft were positioning, and the pilot had time then drop the upper modes and hand fly the old fashioned way. It has made a noticable change to the IF skills of all the pilots, especially those new to SP/IFR on-shore.

As a result we have seen a change in priorities with a move away from importance of the "set piece" LPC/OPC/IRR to Line Training becoming the more important area.

While an ability to fly the profiles and numbers to the required standard still exists, the ability to manage automation, and then seamlessly cope when it takes a walk has a higher priority here. My last major mechanical snag in an aircraft happened in 1995, since then I have lost count of the times the auto-pilot has decided to let me down in some way, in aircraft varying from the 332 to the 355 and quite a few types in between, from letting go each axis at a time on a 332, to a hard over on a 355, to the whole lot taking a duvet day on an S76 as the glideslope came in at Gatwick.

One exercise we carry out in the sim is to hand fly a precision approach just on the standby instruments. We do it because I once had to do it for real. It is unnassesed as far as final reports go as it isn't required anywhere on any of the CAA/EASA forms. However, it is a massive confidence booster for the pilots, and quite often results in the handing over of dollars from the sim instructors at FSI to the pilot on training as depending on confidence levels a $50 dollar bet is fairly usual.

Another area that I believe is letting pilots down is lack of robust SOP's. I have watched JAR replace CAP 360 and a level of SOP's disappeared, to compare a current EASA OM with a CAP 360 OM reveals a shocking reduction in both guidance and operational instruction to pilots. I certainly believe that a couple of the more recent off-shore accidents in the UK could have been avoided had the crews had the SOP's that existed under CAP 360 rather than JAR.

I have now turned into all the captains I used to get so frustrated with. Bald, greying, reading glasses and banging on about how much better it was in the old days. All I need now is a crew room chat about pension entitlements and golf.

A happy and safe New Year to all RotorHeads.

SND

SND,

I hope that trainer was rewarded highly for his words of wisdom?

FNW