Are we facing a safety issue?
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An administrator gets paid by cutting costs, regardless of the company's position.
While they're at it, they can look at best practices for keeping the passengers calm. The latest batch of MBAs seems to have forgotten the wisdom of past generations: mammals become skittish and aggressive when enclosed together and denied food. Charging for meals may make a few bucks, but even giving out free crackers will calm the folks down and establish the proper power dynamic (provider-client as opposed to servant-patron), which, by the way, will help tremendously in an emergency.
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BBC - brain damaged pilots
Beanbag,
I am still uncomfortable that, as the BBC reported recently (again), BBC - Today - Can planes be poisonous?
many young pilots are being diagnosed with brain damage and yet those same young, keen pilots are not being informed of the possible, known risks from contaminated air.
Officially, it still isn't an accepted risk despite all the evidence.
It may well affect only around 30% of people exposed but it strikes me as a little short sighted to keep this subject - so secret?
Aerotoxic Assiociation - Support for sufferers of Aerotoxic Syndrome for the facts.
DB
I am still uncomfortable that, as the BBC reported recently (again), BBC - Today - Can planes be poisonous?
many young pilots are being diagnosed with brain damage and yet those same young, keen pilots are not being informed of the possible, known risks from contaminated air.
Officially, it still isn't an accepted risk despite all the evidence.
It may well affect only around 30% of people exposed but it strikes me as a little short sighted to keep this subject - so secret?
Aerotoxic Assiociation - Support for sufferers of Aerotoxic Syndrome for the facts.
DB
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DingerX,
Yes you are right, we would have the same problem. However I do believe that this is the basic underlying problem that has led us to the current situation. The LCC's told the public they could fly for less - much less & they bought it. Basic human nature. Pilots rushed to these new airlines as it was finally their chance to get into jets, as recruitment in the 'legacy' carriers was just a dribble. They thought that pay would improve as the new airlines became established. They were wrong! The public thought that they would continue to have a choice - higher priced airlines with all the service perks or the lower cost airlines where they gave up the service for a lower price. They were also wrong! The choice has almost ceased to exist as the 'legacy' carriers drive down cost in an effort to compete with LCC's & maintain market share. (Market share is everything to airline management). Service is starting to suffer.
Now that we are in this position, simply putting fares back up will not change anything as the airlines would simply say "thank you very much" & pocket the extra profit. As in most things in life, it will be quite difficult to restore what has been carelessly given away.
To be blunt, this only exists in an ideal world. It is a myth that the travelling public foolishly believe when they rush to purchase their super cheap tickets. As they say, perception is everything! Governments are only interested in keeping the vested interest groups from clamouring too loud & business is a very vocal vested interest group across all industries. Also, regulation is simply a compromise between the desired outcome & the cost to achieve it. And to have any chance of working it requires adequate enforcement, something that most, if not all, regulators struggle with. Add to that mix, the issue of some airlines having considerable influence over their regulator in certain corners of the world & you have, at best, doubtful government assured minimum standards of safety.
The final resposibility for safety in the air rests with pilots, despite what the regulators & airline management would have the travelling public believe. The pilots who have perished, along with their passengers, in recent years didn't want to die. They were doing the best they could with their natural ability, the training they had been given & possibly the fatigue they were fighting on the day. The events that they were required to deal with were just too much for them, given their ability, training & fatigue levels.
In order for the safety standards to remain as high as possible, pilots need to be properly trained & that requires time & money, which relates directly to ticket prices. You also need to attract the best possible people to the profession & that requires adequate renumeration & decent rostering to provide lifestyle & fight fatigue. That also relates directly to ticket prices. However, I don't believe that the relationship between these costs & ticket prices is as significant as has been suggested by some here or by airline management.
The public needs to be informed of the cost vs safety issue in a clear & unemotional way. Then they can realisticly decide what level of safety they are willing to pay for. The governments won't be doing this any time soon & neither will the airlines. Perhaps it is time that airline pilots all over the world stop stepping on each other to get ahead & finally come together with a united voice to get the message across.
Can I just butt in and say that I'm sick of the argument that "Safety in back is the fault of the meat in back that wants to pay so little?" If nothing else changed but that the tickets cost ten times as much, we'd still have the same problem.
Now that we are in this position, simply putting fares back up will not change anything as the airlines would simply say "thank you very much" & pocket the extra profit. As in most things in life, it will be quite difficult to restore what has been carelessly given away.
In every civilized country, an airline ticket is issued guaranteeing transport to a minimum standard of safety, that the government ensures through regulation. In most places, the suits and marketing types get angry if one airline advertises its superior safety: safety is something that is supposed to be equal across airlines.
The final resposibility for safety in the air rests with pilots, despite what the regulators & airline management would have the travelling public believe. The pilots who have perished, along with their passengers, in recent years didn't want to die. They were doing the best they could with their natural ability, the training they had been given & possibly the fatigue they were fighting on the day. The events that they were required to deal with were just too much for them, given their ability, training & fatigue levels.
In order for the safety standards to remain as high as possible, pilots need to be properly trained & that requires time & money, which relates directly to ticket prices. You also need to attract the best possible people to the profession & that requires adequate renumeration & decent rostering to provide lifestyle & fight fatigue. That also relates directly to ticket prices. However, I don't believe that the relationship between these costs & ticket prices is as significant as has been suggested by some here or by airline management.
The public needs to be informed of the cost vs safety issue in a clear & unemotional way. Then they can realisticly decide what level of safety they are willing to pay for. The governments won't be doing this any time soon & neither will the airlines. Perhaps it is time that airline pilots all over the world stop stepping on each other to get ahead & finally come together with a united voice to get the message across.
Dream Buster
Nice try at taking this thread further off-topic by slipping in your shop worn Advert for chicken-little nuggets
I am still uncomfortable that, as the BBC reported recently (again), BBC - Today - Can planes be poisonous?
many young pilots are being diagnosed with brain damage and yet those same young, keen pilots are not being informed of the possible, known risks from contaminated air.
Officially, it still isn't an accepted risk despite all the evidence.
It may well affect only around 30% of people exposed but it strikes me as a little short sighted to keep this subject - so secret?
many young pilots are being diagnosed with brain damage and yet those same young, keen pilots are not being informed of the possible, known risks from contaminated air.
Officially, it still isn't an accepted risk despite all the evidence.
It may well affect only around 30% of people exposed but it strikes me as a little short sighted to keep this subject - so secret?
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Aerotoxic - not really a joke.
Iompaseo,
Well i'm getting a bit fed up with telling people why they are seriously ill after a few years flying jets - the aviation doctors can't seem to work it out, whilst the specialists are just about to prove it - beyond reasonable doubt.
Both can't be right.
Ask Boeing, they have worked it out.
I'm so pleased that you don't appear to suffer (are you sure?), but just try to think of others....
DB
Well i'm getting a bit fed up with telling people why they are seriously ill after a few years flying jets - the aviation doctors can't seem to work it out, whilst the specialists are just about to prove it - beyond reasonable doubt.
Both can't be right.
Ask Boeing, they have worked it out.
I'm so pleased that you don't appear to suffer (are you sure?), but just try to think of others....
DB
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I read on these boards a consistently voiced concern, of those who should know, about the competency of future generations of flight crew. Does nobody in a position who should hear this concern actually hear it? Or do they turn a deaf ear?
GXER;
No. Yes.
It is bureaucratically inconvenient and career-suicide to attempt to turn the tide from within. We in the ranks who witness the daily operational decision-making are as King Kanute sitting in his throne with his feet getting wetter.
This is because the level of flight safety in the industry is being taken for granted and this is because, as experience is lost (because it is expensive so the accountants highlight it as the first thing to go), the newbies assume that "aviation is safe now". That is because they have no concept, no idea of how aviation "got this safe".
To me it is as clear as the lines on my face and hands...the accident rate is going to rise because of this. The regulator in Canada is abdicating its responsibilities and handing safety over to private corporations: the airlines. It is the deregulation, and privatization of flight safety. An independent voice is disappearing from aviation and being replaced by compliant, ignorant, ambitious bureacrats both within the airlines and within the regulator.
Even if a serious aviation safety matter such as an airframe limitation exceedence occurs in Canada, the airline may "quietly" decide to fly the aircraft anyway if the regulator isn't around to oversee the decision-making process.
In Canada there is now no one to go to, to even inform of the fact let alone someone independent of the airlines to take action. In fact even if they knew, the regulator would not take action at this point in the development of SMS.
We cannot go to the Minister of Transport because it is to his benefit to have the responsibiity of flight safety off his desk and onto the airlines. The protection of the Minister is paramount. While complex, such dynamics fundamentally prevent an "open conversation" about flight safety issues under SMS as it is presently constituted. Thus there is no point in going to anyone under the Minister.
The industry is such that it can absorb such inattention for a period of time. Good processes have been built into the system and good flight safety work is done by all airlines in Canada. The failures of SMS will take a period of time to emerge; long enough that the original causes will be gone, along with those who made the decisions.
Does nobody in a position who should hear this concern actually hear it? Or do they turn a deaf ear?
It is bureaucratically inconvenient and career-suicide to attempt to turn the tide from within. We in the ranks who witness the daily operational decision-making are as King Kanute sitting in his throne with his feet getting wetter.
This is because the level of flight safety in the industry is being taken for granted and this is because, as experience is lost (because it is expensive so the accountants highlight it as the first thing to go), the newbies assume that "aviation is safe now". That is because they have no concept, no idea of how aviation "got this safe".
To me it is as clear as the lines on my face and hands...the accident rate is going to rise because of this. The regulator in Canada is abdicating its responsibilities and handing safety over to private corporations: the airlines. It is the deregulation, and privatization of flight safety. An independent voice is disappearing from aviation and being replaced by compliant, ignorant, ambitious bureacrats both within the airlines and within the regulator.
Even if a serious aviation safety matter such as an airframe limitation exceedence occurs in Canada, the airline may "quietly" decide to fly the aircraft anyway if the regulator isn't around to oversee the decision-making process.
In Canada there is now no one to go to, to even inform of the fact let alone someone independent of the airlines to take action. In fact even if they knew, the regulator would not take action at this point in the development of SMS.
We cannot go to the Minister of Transport because it is to his benefit to have the responsibiity of flight safety off his desk and onto the airlines. The protection of the Minister is paramount. While complex, such dynamics fundamentally prevent an "open conversation" about flight safety issues under SMS as it is presently constituted. Thus there is no point in going to anyone under the Minister.
The industry is such that it can absorb such inattention for a period of time. Good processes have been built into the system and good flight safety work is done by all airlines in Canada. The failures of SMS will take a period of time to emerge; long enough that the original causes will be gone, along with those who made the decisions.
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2 jobs
I work 2 jobs now myself to support my family.
Job 1: Airline captain (to pay the bills)
Job 2: Driving a limo on my off days (pay for life)
I will continue doing this until the industry is picking up again. Than, I will probably quit job 1 because job 2 is easier work for almost the same pay...
Job 1: Airline captain (to pay the bills)
Job 2: Driving a limo on my off days (pay for life)
I will continue doing this until the industry is picking up again. Than, I will probably quit job 1 because job 2 is easier work for almost the same pay...
The industry is such that it can absorb such inattention for a period of time.
IMO working a roster that gives plenty of free time is critical to flight safety and having to work two jobs is just downright dangerous. As a personal example; when I am flying 50 hours a month I am enthusiastic about each work day. Before the shift I will enjoy the opportunity to order a coffee, review the routes, muse over latest NOTAMS, review some system notes, check my company email for operational notices etc etc. I enjoy it and feel a sense of satisfaction because I am well prepared. When I am working nearly 100 hours a month I do little of that. All my spare time seems to be spent sleeping or catching up on household chores, personal paperwork and if I'm lucky a catch up with friends for a coffee. There is no doubt in my mind that I am much more efficient and safe when flying the lighter roster.
Where exactly is the line in the sand when the reduction in flight safety becomes unacceptable? 60hrs? 75 hours? Who knows because every individual is different. One thing though is obvious to me, we have crossed that line.
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Forgive the intrusion (and I have no issues with the first half of your post), but surely in most airlines there is a mix of quiet months and busy months given the seasonal nature of the business, are you saying that it's unacceptable to have a mix? Even if you do 100 hours per month every month, FTLs will mean you have a few months off in most countries who have max 900/1,000 hours per year, let alone in some airlines where union agreements mandate less than that.
I don't dispute your safe comment, but how are you more efficient when you fly 50 hours a month? I might understand what you mean, however I can imagine the MBA man snorting when you make that comment. Equally, MBA man would snort when he hears words like "lifestyle" and "prestige" mutating into "safety", one is not the opposite of the other. I would agree mostly with sharksandwich - in some countries like the US currently, pay and safety are the opposite ends of the same spectrum given some pilots are paid so little they have to do other jobs, but for many still well-paid pilot jobs, pay and safety are not in the same ballpark.
I would suspect the line in the sand is not actual hours but the type of hours you are flying, ie; back of the clock / back to back shifts / length of shift or sectors and rest times, all of which makes it infinitely more complicated and easier for MBA man to ignore. Only legislators can cure this ill, MBA man will push the boundaries as far as he can.
I don't dispute your safe comment, but how are you more efficient when you fly 50 hours a month? I might understand what you mean, however I can imagine the MBA man snorting when you make that comment. Equally, MBA man would snort when he hears words like "lifestyle" and "prestige" mutating into "safety", one is not the opposite of the other. I would agree mostly with sharksandwich - in some countries like the US currently, pay and safety are the opposite ends of the same spectrum given some pilots are paid so little they have to do other jobs, but for many still well-paid pilot jobs, pay and safety are not in the same ballpark.
I would suspect the line in the sand is not actual hours but the type of hours you are flying, ie; back of the clock / back to back shifts / length of shift or sectors and rest times, all of which makes it infinitely more complicated and easier for MBA man to ignore. Only legislators can cure this ill, MBA man will push the boundaries as far as he can.
Even if you do 100 hours per month every month, FTLs will mean you have a few months off
but how are you more efficient when you fly 50 hours a month?
If you are not a line pilot then you have helped make my point that
It is very obvious to us as airline pilots but that is because we understand what makes up flight safety, those creating the legislation may grasp some basic principals but they don't have an innate understanding of it like we do. We are the canaries in the mine in that we are the first to sense it.
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PJ2
I think that aviation is the most obvious example of the differences of thought in long term planning. For the CEO's, and RM is an obvious example, long term planning may go out as far as 6-months depending on the exact disposition of their profit sharing plan. For flight safety types, a decade is not unreasonable. The robber baron CEO's are very aware that they can ride the coat-tails of their predecessors for a year or two, and mortgage the company safety record. This allows them to pocket their millions in bonuses for making the company more "efficient", and the real cost of their decisions will not be know until long after they have left. It's left to the active participants to pick up the pieces of the safety margins that are left, and make it work. As you state, the calibre of the entrants gradually weakens, leading to a decline in safety, followed by much gnashing of teeth, and wailing from the taxpayers that the government should do something. At this point the public is just a willing participant in the flight-safety mortgage scheme.
Of the 3 or 4 people that have approached me over the last four years with queries about entering aviation, none have followed through. Not because of doom and gloom from me, but solely due to a realistic assessment with actual details of the payback (or lack thereof) of the career. I left two viable careers to follow this one. I wouldn't make the same mistake again.
Sharksandwich
Though there is not a direct link between high pay and safety, rest assured that there will be a direct link between low pay and safety. The trained professionals will not be around in the next generation. But perhaps that is something best left to the kids to worry about, once it's too obvious to ignore. Colgan is the tip of the iceberg.
I think that aviation is the most obvious example of the differences of thought in long term planning. For the CEO's, and RM is an obvious example, long term planning may go out as far as 6-months depending on the exact disposition of their profit sharing plan. For flight safety types, a decade is not unreasonable. The robber baron CEO's are very aware that they can ride the coat-tails of their predecessors for a year or two, and mortgage the company safety record. This allows them to pocket their millions in bonuses for making the company more "efficient", and the real cost of their decisions will not be know until long after they have left. It's left to the active participants to pick up the pieces of the safety margins that are left, and make it work. As you state, the calibre of the entrants gradually weakens, leading to a decline in safety, followed by much gnashing of teeth, and wailing from the taxpayers that the government should do something. At this point the public is just a willing participant in the flight-safety mortgage scheme.
Of the 3 or 4 people that have approached me over the last four years with queries about entering aviation, none have followed through. Not because of doom and gloom from me, but solely due to a realistic assessment with actual details of the payback (or lack thereof) of the career. I left two viable careers to follow this one. I wouldn't make the same mistake again.
Sharksandwich
Though there is not a direct link between high pay and safety, rest assured that there will be a direct link between low pay and safety. The trained professionals will not be around in the next generation. But perhaps that is something best left to the kids to worry about, once it's too obvious to ignore. Colgan is the tip of the iceberg.
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PJ2,
Thanks for a thoughtful and lucid explanation (your trademark, if you'll permit me to say so).
It occurs to me that there are some striking parallels between the symptoms that are now seen as pre-cursors of the financial crisis and the indicators present in the passenger air transport industry:
robust, external regulation replaced by weaker or self-regulation; aggressive marketing; 'too good to be true' offers; quantity not quality attitudes; prudence and caution displaced or distorted by self-interest and short-termism.
I'm sure there are others I haven't identified.
Signs of an industry that, if not in crisis, is heading the wrong way.
Thanks for a thoughtful and lucid explanation (your trademark, if you'll permit me to say so).
It occurs to me that there are some striking parallels between the symptoms that are now seen as pre-cursors of the financial crisis and the indicators present in the passenger air transport industry:
robust, external regulation replaced by weaker or self-regulation; aggressive marketing; 'too good to be true' offers; quantity not quality attitudes; prudence and caution displaced or distorted by self-interest and short-termism.
I'm sure there are others I haven't identified.
Signs of an industry that, if not in crisis, is heading the wrong way.
bear11;
This industry has hearkened to the "snorting MBA" for far too long already.
Time was when real aviation people ran the airlines with a no-nonsense approach and a full comprehension of the business including the risks. Today's airline CEOs, COO's have no clue about what makes their business safe and what addresses the risks of aviation. As such they are not "leaders" in the traditional sense at all, but opportunists who know that the game regardless of one's business, is speculation on stock price, not running a bricks-and-mortar enterprise. jurassicjockey's comments are accurate and prescient in this regard but any airline pilot who has been in the business for longer than, say, twenty years or so knows all of this to be true.
Your comment about the MBA snorting after hearing about pilot working conditions, (the first reason being the shift to short-term planning, mortgaging good safety programs and established practises which keep their investment safe until they can leave), is an accurate reflection of how this business is currently run. The shifts from a "manufacturing" mentality to a "speculative" mentality has taken about thirty years since a number of political and economic events took place in the early 70's, (dismantling of Bretton-Woods by Nixon, repeal of Glass-Steagall under Clinton to name two major changes). That shift reached the airlines much later simply because the business does not lend itself to speculative behaviours but smart CEOs have learned how to reap millions in stock options alone even from this business despite the tremendous and chronic challenges of making any profit at all in the airline business.
The "snorting MBA" and the greedy CEO who takes great advantage of a speculative vs manufacturing economy, are essentially though not wholly the reasons why the airline business and the increasing risks to flight safety are as they are today. They have taken advantage of the tremendous improvements in safety, without comprehending why this is so. Any incidents or untoward trends are "normalized" as "part of the business" instead of hearkened to. In fact, not paying attention to trends is part of the mentality simply because "safety isn't a profit center".
The "canary in the mine" for this industry is actually the regional carriers where the accident rate has already begun to define how the rest of the industry will unfold over the next two decades.
With an absentee regulator in Canada and the FAA caught with their regulatory oversight pants down and now desperately playing catch-up after being either absent or very cozy with the airlines under their own SMS initiatives, the trend will advance until the fatality rate begins to attract the attention of the insurers and perhaps airline passengers themselves.
The time these trends take to unfold and gather momentum and then become noticed is much longer than the flying public's or even the regulator's memory but flight safety people know the patterns and are discussing them just as they are being discussed here.
DingerX;
I never, ever think of my passengers as "the meat in the back" and have never liked the term "SLF" which I consider disrespectful to those who pay my salary and are the reason I still have a pension.
That said, if I may, you need to broaden your view of the industry so that the "pattern which connects" - that pattern being discussed here - may be observed.
Customers in all businesses will, because of the way our economy is philosophically conceived, try for "the cheapest prices possible". While such economic behaviour seems "natural", unthinking cheapness in some areas of the economy is expensive, not cheap.
Demanding cheap fares is fair game within the limited thinking which defines the present economic values we all hold but there are consequences to such thinking.
Every once in a while we run across a situation in which there is a perceived (and likely real) risk to our well-being and we ponder, "I hope they didn't give this job to the lowest bidder". Why do we think that? Because we know that competency and address do not come cheaply. Retaining experience has a price. So does retiring and otherwise ignoring experience.
There are indeed, well-paying airline pilot jobs but they are rarer and rarer. The Colgan accident's First Officer Shaw's salary was about US$16,000/year; She was living with her parents in Seattle, commuting to work across the country and flying sick that day because the airlines, (MBA thinking) increasingly dock pay for calling in sick.
Captain Sullenberger was right when he stated in his testimony before Congress,
Captain Sullenberger's testimony is worth reading in full. The link to the pdf is here.
The lo-cost mentality has two problems:
1. Aviation can't be done cheaply. At some point, the system will break and aviation will kill. The problem then becomes "what is acceptable?" To be very blunt but realistic for a moment, the response to that question is different for families of victims than it is for CEOs and senior executives of airlines. It should be the same answer, however.
2. Aviation can be done less expensively and safely but at some point which, due to the nature of the business cannot be pin-pointed or for the MBA's, "quantified" in terms they can understand, the increase in risk to the operation curve will pass the return on investment curve and there will be an accident.
The business has to make money, but not at all cost. If the business isn't viable in balancing costs and the price it charges for its products, perhaps the price is too low? Certainly, costs are down to the bone, certainly with airline employees and not just pilots, most of whom now have no pensions and must take a second job just to make ends meet.
At some point, the investment in cost-control behaviours which are designed to enhance the stock price for investors (who don't give a rat's behind about the airline business or even know anything about it) will reach down into salaries and benefits, treating employees like an ATM machine. Because airlines consistently sell their product, (time) for less than it costs them, cost savings have to come from somewhere. Fuel prices, capitalisation costs for equipment, even senior executive salaries and bonuses cannot be controlled so suppliers and employees become the "snorting" MBA's targets. Colgan is a prime example of this but no airline either in the US or Canada is any different today.
So please don't take the comments personally but as a sign (of which there is ample, if one has their eyes open), that all is NOT well within this industry and that passenger safety is, for the first time in about 50 years, at increasing risk.
The difficulty in getting those who manage but have no aviation knowledge in seeing these issues is, to put it bluntly, extreme, even when they are shown animations and flight data of near-accidents. It is as though they know but don't care because they know they're in a short-term game and know they won't be in line for blame - that's for the pilots. Hopefully, the Colgan accident will be the US's "Dryden" but I doubt it; we are about ready for another Dryden in Canada.
"Love of flying" will bring some good and talented candidates to the business. But the business as presently constituted, won't keep the best. The best know what they are worth and will leave before finishing a career at an airline. "Turnover", a term familiar to Walmart and MacDonalds, will become familiar to pilot hiring committees.
In fact, it is revealing that those who manage airlines today expect that the kind of stellar candidate one wishes to hire and fly one's aircraft safely, will at the same time be stupid enough to not see these corporate values and dynamics and still apply for the job.
It just doesn't work that way. Those now coming of age and growing into the work force already have seen and know very well how business has treated their parents. These young people are already wise enough to such tactics and are taking measures. I know many "airline families" whose children are not going into the business but seeking their futures elsewhere.
For what it's worth, I think it is time for airline passengers to perhaps examine these issues with a bit more attention. In my view, up until a few years ago, passengers quite rightly deserved to "sit back and relax". They still have very good reason to because the business is still vastly well-run. But the trends are responding to fundamental changes and are expressed here.
Precisely. Except in Canada it is (so far) illegal to use pension funds for operations and do what the US has done to their pilots and other employees. Canada's economy has weathered the latest economic earthquake for good reasons but business leaders hate regulations...
"Cutting salaries" has it's own rewards, long discussed here and elsewhere. Like most planning strategies, such a solution is very short-term thinking.
Like any pilot who has put this kind of time in at an airline, I have seen these developments and changes in my industry first hand and quite frankly don't sleep well at night.
GXER;
I think you are absolutely correct in this. These are human dynamics at work here, not "aviation" dynamics. It is a management issue, a values issue, a priorities issue; It is NOT an aviation issue. Aviation just has that extra factor which makes it seem different - the capacity to kill innocent people through incompetence, incapacity, or negligence.
It is a complete mystery to me why airline managements cannot see this, or if they can, how they can sleep at night; we don't. I have shown near-accidents to the CEO of a major carrier and it never sunk in as to what was being viewed. It made the DFO's blood run cold, (though the effect only lasted a day or so), but not the CEOs; he had no clue. No CEO does.
PJ2
This industry has hearkened to the "snorting MBA" for far too long already.
Time was when real aviation people ran the airlines with a no-nonsense approach and a full comprehension of the business including the risks. Today's airline CEOs, COO's have no clue about what makes their business safe and what addresses the risks of aviation. As such they are not "leaders" in the traditional sense at all, but opportunists who know that the game regardless of one's business, is speculation on stock price, not running a bricks-and-mortar enterprise. jurassicjockey's comments are accurate and prescient in this regard but any airline pilot who has been in the business for longer than, say, twenty years or so knows all of this to be true.
Your comment about the MBA snorting after hearing about pilot working conditions, (the first reason being the shift to short-term planning, mortgaging good safety programs and established practises which keep their investment safe until they can leave), is an accurate reflection of how this business is currently run. The shifts from a "manufacturing" mentality to a "speculative" mentality has taken about thirty years since a number of political and economic events took place in the early 70's, (dismantling of Bretton-Woods by Nixon, repeal of Glass-Steagall under Clinton to name two major changes). That shift reached the airlines much later simply because the business does not lend itself to speculative behaviours but smart CEOs have learned how to reap millions in stock options alone even from this business despite the tremendous and chronic challenges of making any profit at all in the airline business.
The "snorting MBA" and the greedy CEO who takes great advantage of a speculative vs manufacturing economy, are essentially though not wholly the reasons why the airline business and the increasing risks to flight safety are as they are today. They have taken advantage of the tremendous improvements in safety, without comprehending why this is so. Any incidents or untoward trends are "normalized" as "part of the business" instead of hearkened to. In fact, not paying attention to trends is part of the mentality simply because "safety isn't a profit center".
The "canary in the mine" for this industry is actually the regional carriers where the accident rate has already begun to define how the rest of the industry will unfold over the next two decades.
With an absentee regulator in Canada and the FAA caught with their regulatory oversight pants down and now desperately playing catch-up after being either absent or very cozy with the airlines under their own SMS initiatives, the trend will advance until the fatality rate begins to attract the attention of the insurers and perhaps airline passengers themselves.
The time these trends take to unfold and gather momentum and then become noticed is much longer than the flying public's or even the regulator's memory but flight safety people know the patterns and are discussing them just as they are being discussed here.
DingerX;
Can I just butt in and say that I'm sick of the argument that "Safety in back is the fault of the meat in back that wants to pay so little?" If nothing else changed but that the tickets cost ten times as much, we'd still have the same problem.
That said, if I may, you need to broaden your view of the industry so that the "pattern which connects" - that pattern being discussed here - may be observed.
Customers in all businesses will, because of the way our economy is philosophically conceived, try for "the cheapest prices possible". While such economic behaviour seems "natural", unthinking cheapness in some areas of the economy is expensive, not cheap.
Demanding cheap fares is fair game within the limited thinking which defines the present economic values we all hold but there are consequences to such thinking.
Every once in a while we run across a situation in which there is a perceived (and likely real) risk to our well-being and we ponder, "I hope they didn't give this job to the lowest bidder". Why do we think that? Because we know that competency and address do not come cheaply. Retaining experience has a price. So does retiring and otherwise ignoring experience.
There are indeed, well-paying airline pilot jobs but they are rarer and rarer. The Colgan accident's First Officer Shaw's salary was about US$16,000/year; She was living with her parents in Seattle, commuting to work across the country and flying sick that day because the airlines, (MBA thinking) increasingly dock pay for calling in sick.
Captain Sullenberger was right when he stated in his testimony before Congress,
I am worried that the airline piloting profession will not be able to continue to attract the best and the brightest. The current experience and skills of our country’s professional airline pilots come from investments made years ago when we were able to attract the ambitious, talented people who now frequently seek lucrative professional careers. That past investment was an indispensible element in our commercial aviation infrastructure, vital to safe air travel and our country’s economy and security. If we do not sufficiently value the airline piloting profession and future pilots are less experienced and less skilled, it logically follows that we will see negative consequences to the flying public – and to our country.
The lo-cost mentality has two problems:
1. Aviation can't be done cheaply. At some point, the system will break and aviation will kill. The problem then becomes "what is acceptable?" To be very blunt but realistic for a moment, the response to that question is different for families of victims than it is for CEOs and senior executives of airlines. It should be the same answer, however.
2. Aviation can be done less expensively and safely but at some point which, due to the nature of the business cannot be pin-pointed or for the MBA's, "quantified" in terms they can understand, the increase in risk to the operation curve will pass the return on investment curve and there will be an accident.
The business has to make money, but not at all cost. If the business isn't viable in balancing costs and the price it charges for its products, perhaps the price is too low? Certainly, costs are down to the bone, certainly with airline employees and not just pilots, most of whom now have no pensions and must take a second job just to make ends meet.
At some point, the investment in cost-control behaviours which are designed to enhance the stock price for investors (who don't give a rat's behind about the airline business or even know anything about it) will reach down into salaries and benefits, treating employees like an ATM machine. Because airlines consistently sell their product, (time) for less than it costs them, cost savings have to come from somewhere. Fuel prices, capitalisation costs for equipment, even senior executive salaries and bonuses cannot be controlled so suppliers and employees become the "snorting" MBA's targets. Colgan is a prime example of this but no airline either in the US or Canada is any different today.
So please don't take the comments personally but as a sign (of which there is ample, if one has their eyes open), that all is NOT well within this industry and that passenger safety is, for the first time in about 50 years, at increasing risk.
The difficulty in getting those who manage but have no aviation knowledge in seeing these issues is, to put it bluntly, extreme, even when they are shown animations and flight data of near-accidents. It is as though they know but don't care because they know they're in a short-term game and know they won't be in line for blame - that's for the pilots. Hopefully, the Colgan accident will be the US's "Dryden" but I doubt it; we are about ready for another Dryden in Canada.
"Love of flying" will bring some good and talented candidates to the business. But the business as presently constituted, won't keep the best. The best know what they are worth and will leave before finishing a career at an airline. "Turnover", a term familiar to Walmart and MacDonalds, will become familiar to pilot hiring committees.
In fact, it is revealing that those who manage airlines today expect that the kind of stellar candidate one wishes to hire and fly one's aircraft safely, will at the same time be stupid enough to not see these corporate values and dynamics and still apply for the job.
It just doesn't work that way. Those now coming of age and growing into the work force already have seen and know very well how business has treated their parents. These young people are already wise enough to such tactics and are taking measures. I know many "airline families" whose children are not going into the business but seeking their futures elsewhere.
For what it's worth, I think it is time for airline passengers to perhaps examine these issues with a bit more attention. In my view, up until a few years ago, passengers quite rightly deserved to "sit back and relax". They still have very good reason to because the business is still vastly well-run. But the trends are responding to fundamental changes and are expressed here.
An administrator gets paid by cutting costs, regardless of the company's position. Two easy ways to cut costs are to cut salaries and to declare bankruptcy so that the pension fund might be raided.
"Cutting salaries" has it's own rewards, long discussed here and elsewhere. Like most planning strategies, such a solution is very short-term thinking.
Like any pilot who has put this kind of time in at an airline, I have seen these developments and changes in my industry first hand and quite frankly don't sleep well at night.
GXER;
It occurs to me that there are some striking parallels between the symptoms that are now seen as pre-cursors of the financial crisis and the indicators present in the passenger air transport industry:
It is a complete mystery to me why airline managements cannot see this, or if they can, how they can sleep at night; we don't. I have shown near-accidents to the CEO of a major carrier and it never sunk in as to what was being viewed. It made the DFO's blood run cold, (though the effect only lasted a day or so), but not the CEOs; he had no clue. No CEO does.
PJ2
Last edited by PJ2; 16th Oct 2009 at 15:55. Reason: add response to GXER
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PJ2, re; your finishing comments and GXERs, I would suggest that CEOs/MBAs don't need to get it. The only cure for this is the legislator/regulator - someone, to a certain extent, who has been long-absent in many forms of commerce given it hasn't fit the "pro-business" (Thatcherite) mindset we have seen in many governments in the past 20 years. We have seen low-fat regulation for most of that time, and we have just been witnesses to what has happened - or more to the point, been allowed to happen - in the financial sector as a result. Hopefully that lesson will sink in, and governments will examine their regulatory system plus the enforcement of it.
I concur with jurassicjockey, you cannot convince senior management who have to appease shareholders today in order to justify mad bonuses any more than you can convince a politician to draft a 10 year budget plan for the good of the economy when he is up for election in 2 year's time. The cocktail of these characters on one end, plus hordes of literally desperate wannabees with big bills and no concept of supply and demand on the other, is a very dangerous one.
I concur with jurassicjockey, you cannot convince senior management who have to appease shareholders today in order to justify mad bonuses any more than you can convince a politician to draft a 10 year budget plan for the good of the economy when he is up for election in 2 year's time. The cocktail of these characters on one end, plus hordes of literally desperate wannabees with big bills and no concept of supply and demand on the other, is a very dangerous one.
bear11;
I've been reading and discussing neoliberal economics and their expressions in Thatcherism and Reaganism since the mid-80's. I will tell you that some of the best books on the topic were available in Ireland; Dingle to be exact, was where I found a few. The Europeans also had far clearer views of the United States and its handmaiden PM in Britain. For years, one could not find such books in North America except for Chomsky, Zinn, McChesney, Parent and a few other observers who dared to think independently from Milton Friedman and the Chicago Boys. To digress a moment, they actually had a following along with other more obvious dissident activities but in the early days of the Vietnam War for example one risked getting shot (Kent State), jail, or at least tear gas for speaking out against the US government which was trying to spread democracy to the rest of the world but which was inconvenient at home. Some of those scenes we saw in the US in the 60s are now repeated in military dictatorships like Burma. When it first came out, I had to go to a 2nd level alternative bookstore to find Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent; I felt like I was buying porn, and to those supporting the neoliberal policies of Reagan and Thatcher, I suppose it was. We have, however, turned the corner.
Since then, and since the first few economic crises and crashes especially last October's, the dialogue has "broadened" somewhat into acceptability so one no longer need hide one's books from the rabid ignorance of the Bu****es in the US. Thank god for boring Canadian reserve.
You're right that the CEOs dont' have to "get it", and ironically that is precisely my point - they are excused from culpability (even with "accountable executive laws" ). If you've been reading the whole thread and others like this for the past few years here you will see common themes, among them the deregulation and privatization of flight safety. It is for this reason alone that I hold no hope whatsoever that the regulator will arrive anytime soon to do it's job. It has handed its job over to the airlines and that will go where it is going to go - all anyone who sees what is coming can do is try to retard the retreat somehow but "dissidence" and aviation are not bed-partners by any stretch and is usually greeted with the parental raised eyebrow and an, "are you mad?" As always, it seems kicking tin is preferred to preventative safety programs.
People in the lower ranks are doing earnest good work and, as has been observed, the changes spoken of here will unfold over years, not months. The difference between now and when the last great changes in aviation safety were made (radar, INS, basic computerization, TCAS, EGPWS,(thanks to Don Bateman of Honeywell and human factors CRM and finally the notion of the organizational accident first broached by prescient men like Perrow, and Reason but with unsung hundreds contributing), was the massive public dialogue now available through forums such as these. Even with the occasional bluntness, these forums are extremely valuable.
Too, the meaning of the word, "accident" has changed. In fact, we might say that the broad approach to industry flight safety has gone "left" while the industry itself has gone far "right", ostensibly with the same results as the economy has demonstrated.
PJ2
I've been reading and discussing neoliberal economics and their expressions in Thatcherism and Reaganism since the mid-80's. I will tell you that some of the best books on the topic were available in Ireland; Dingle to be exact, was where I found a few. The Europeans also had far clearer views of the United States and its handmaiden PM in Britain. For years, one could not find such books in North America except for Chomsky, Zinn, McChesney, Parent and a few other observers who dared to think independently from Milton Friedman and the Chicago Boys. To digress a moment, they actually had a following along with other more obvious dissident activities but in the early days of the Vietnam War for example one risked getting shot (Kent State), jail, or at least tear gas for speaking out against the US government which was trying to spread democracy to the rest of the world but which was inconvenient at home. Some of those scenes we saw in the US in the 60s are now repeated in military dictatorships like Burma. When it first came out, I had to go to a 2nd level alternative bookstore to find Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent; I felt like I was buying porn, and to those supporting the neoliberal policies of Reagan and Thatcher, I suppose it was. We have, however, turned the corner.
Since then, and since the first few economic crises and crashes especially last October's, the dialogue has "broadened" somewhat into acceptability so one no longer need hide one's books from the rabid ignorance of the Bu****es in the US. Thank god for boring Canadian reserve.
You're right that the CEOs dont' have to "get it", and ironically that is precisely my point - they are excused from culpability (even with "accountable executive laws" ). If you've been reading the whole thread and others like this for the past few years here you will see common themes, among them the deregulation and privatization of flight safety. It is for this reason alone that I hold no hope whatsoever that the regulator will arrive anytime soon to do it's job. It has handed its job over to the airlines and that will go where it is going to go - all anyone who sees what is coming can do is try to retard the retreat somehow but "dissidence" and aviation are not bed-partners by any stretch and is usually greeted with the parental raised eyebrow and an, "are you mad?" As always, it seems kicking tin is preferred to preventative safety programs.
People in the lower ranks are doing earnest good work and, as has been observed, the changes spoken of here will unfold over years, not months. The difference between now and when the last great changes in aviation safety were made (radar, INS, basic computerization, TCAS, EGPWS,(thanks to Don Bateman of Honeywell and human factors CRM and finally the notion of the organizational accident first broached by prescient men like Perrow, and Reason but with unsung hundreds contributing), was the massive public dialogue now available through forums such as these. Even with the occasional bluntness, these forums are extremely valuable.
Too, the meaning of the word, "accident" has changed. In fact, we might say that the broad approach to industry flight safety has gone "left" while the industry itself has gone far "right", ostensibly with the same results as the economy has demonstrated.
PJ2
bear11
On that I certainly agree.
I do expect the CEO/MBA's to run a business model. I expect the regulator to put forth safety models (with our help) and that the regulations then require each airline to incorporate one acceptable to the regulator.
I view boards like these as only an opening of what you all feel works best. To simply use up the available bandwidth wringing one's hands (not you of course) does little to promote solutions.
Meanwhile others may read what we write here.
I would suggest that CEOs/MBAs don't need to get it. The only cure for this is the legislator/regulator
I do expect the CEO/MBA's to run a business model. I expect the regulator to put forth safety models (with our help) and that the regulations then require each airline to incorporate one acceptable to the regulator.
I view boards like these as only an opening of what you all feel works best. To simply use up the available bandwidth wringing one's hands (not you of course) does little to promote solutions.
Meanwhile others may read what we write here.
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Bear11 said...............
" Even if you do 100 hours per month every month, FTLs will mean you have a few months off in most countries who have max 900/1,000 hours per year, let alone in some airlines where union agreements mandate less than that"
I understand your point but you are missing a serious fundamental about flying; it is not acceptable from a safety perspective to have a gradual erosion of capabilities from the beginning of a duty period to the end.
As a pilot one can be called upon to produce all the skill and experience one can muster at the last few minutes of a duty day/month/year.
To accept that a pilot can fly right up to the maximum permitted FTL`s
for a complete duty period, or for a maximum month or year for that matter, without experiencing a degradation of performance, is totally unrealistic.
Even the first day after a relaxing vacation period a pilot can be in the danger zone at the end of a maximum duty day with multiple sectors in bad weather.
My point is that fatigue is cumulative and is bloody dangerous; the fact that airline CEO`s and government regulators don`t seem to understand the situation is a tragedy, and any FTL`s that ignore the cumulative effect are not worth a pinch of coon-merde.
" Even if you do 100 hours per month every month, FTLs will mean you have a few months off in most countries who have max 900/1,000 hours per year, let alone in some airlines where union agreements mandate less than that"
I understand your point but you are missing a serious fundamental about flying; it is not acceptable from a safety perspective to have a gradual erosion of capabilities from the beginning of a duty period to the end.
As a pilot one can be called upon to produce all the skill and experience one can muster at the last few minutes of a duty day/month/year.
To accept that a pilot can fly right up to the maximum permitted FTL`s
for a complete duty period, or for a maximum month or year for that matter, without experiencing a degradation of performance, is totally unrealistic.
Even the first day after a relaxing vacation period a pilot can be in the danger zone at the end of a maximum duty day with multiple sectors in bad weather.
My point is that fatigue is cumulative and is bloody dangerous; the fact that airline CEO`s and government regulators don`t seem to understand the situation is a tragedy, and any FTL`s that ignore the cumulative effect are not worth a pinch of coon-merde.
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PJ2
It may well be career suicide to state that due to inadequate training accidents are going to increase. I do not doubt that for a moment.
May I offer a few points regarding this?
Forums such as this permit intelligent debate about matters that concern both airline staff and passengers. If a fundamental concern such as safety is raised then it is as powerful as any advertisement for an airline.
Whilst air travel is not essential it is largely an inescapable part of modern life. SLF invest money and their lives in air transport. I imagine that I am not alone in thinking that I would want to pay my fares to a company with both reliable aircraft and ground staff, (which as it is regulated is demonstrable to passengers) but also to a company who invest in the aircrew. A measured career pathway where the FD crew are taught appropriately, and gather substantial experience is not a privelege of select airlines but should be essential. Ive posted before about the trust that UK people had in BA and not without reason. To provide a long-term structure to air crew development is not optional it is essential and if MBA man thinks that it is not essential then he (or she) will see the company go the way of all things.
It may well be career suicide to state that due to inadequate training accidents are going to increase. I do not doubt that for a moment.
May I offer a few points regarding this?
Forums such as this permit intelligent debate about matters that concern both airline staff and passengers. If a fundamental concern such as safety is raised then it is as powerful as any advertisement for an airline.
Whilst air travel is not essential it is largely an inescapable part of modern life. SLF invest money and their lives in air transport. I imagine that I am not alone in thinking that I would want to pay my fares to a company with both reliable aircraft and ground staff, (which as it is regulated is demonstrable to passengers) but also to a company who invest in the aircrew. A measured career pathway where the FD crew are taught appropriately, and gather substantial experience is not a privelege of select airlines but should be essential. Ive posted before about the trust that UK people had in BA and not without reason. To provide a long-term structure to air crew development is not optional it is essential and if MBA man thinks that it is not essential then he (or she) will see the company go the way of all things.
I'm mid career in flying and starting to think about retirement in around twenty years time. The reality of the job has changed beyond what I would have thought possible when I started in the 1980s.
I remember the airline pilots of the 1970s, well paid, respected professionals who enjoyed a rewarding career and retired on a good pension.
These days it's a race to the bottom in terms and conditions. Final salary index linked pension ? Join the civil service. Loss of licence insurance, pay for it yourself. Training, come to us with the aircraft already on your licence and we'll have a look at you, done at your expense and risk. Oh and pay us GBP50 to recieve your application.
Nice roster doing 600-700 hours per year, dream on, you'll be rostered right up to the legal limits. 5* hotel on night stops, forget it, 3* and don't expect any special treatment as the company screwed the hotel right down on the room rate.
First class crew meals ? They had those once upon a time. Now expect to see pilots buying sandwiches at the airport SUBWAY/QUIZNOS/PRET A MANGER. Bring your own tea bags and you can have the hot water for a cuppa though.
Join a union to protect yourself, trouble maker, we'll fix you at your next checkride.
Now that all the standard extras have been taken away, the only thing left is the salary so let's get stuck into that. Reduced pay for new f/os and recently upgraded captains. Make an increasingly large % of your earnings dependent on your flying hours, no work = very little pay.
These days it's not worth going into flying as a career unless someone else pays, either the military or an airline cadetship(if they still exist).
Given the huge expenditure involved in training, uncertain and insecure job prospects, and lack of rewards at the end I couldn't recommend it to anyone.
The legacy airlines are a dying breed who are having to join in the race downwards to stay in business. Once, plum jobs such as Cathay or Emirates are now very average when measured against the old standards. British Airways are losing serious money trying to compete against RYAN AIRs 9.99 airfares.
The legacy airlines are in a difficult position vs the low costs. An LCC focuses on price that's all. A legacy airline has to offer a better service to those people prepared to pay more, make a profit doing it yet still keep ticket prices within a reasonable distance of the LCCs ie how much more can they get away with charging before the extra starts turning people away in large numbers.
With fewer pilots coming out of the military, fewer airlines offering cadetships and potential pilots doing the sums and coming to the conclusion that it's not worth the risk/reward we will see declining quality and experience on the flight deck (if we're not seeing it already).
Better hope all the automatics and protections work.
I remember the airline pilots of the 1970s, well paid, respected professionals who enjoyed a rewarding career and retired on a good pension.
These days it's a race to the bottom in terms and conditions. Final salary index linked pension ? Join the civil service. Loss of licence insurance, pay for it yourself. Training, come to us with the aircraft already on your licence and we'll have a look at you, done at your expense and risk. Oh and pay us GBP50 to recieve your application.
Nice roster doing 600-700 hours per year, dream on, you'll be rostered right up to the legal limits. 5* hotel on night stops, forget it, 3* and don't expect any special treatment as the company screwed the hotel right down on the room rate.
First class crew meals ? They had those once upon a time. Now expect to see pilots buying sandwiches at the airport SUBWAY/QUIZNOS/PRET A MANGER. Bring your own tea bags and you can have the hot water for a cuppa though.
Join a union to protect yourself, trouble maker, we'll fix you at your next checkride.
Now that all the standard extras have been taken away, the only thing left is the salary so let's get stuck into that. Reduced pay for new f/os and recently upgraded captains. Make an increasingly large % of your earnings dependent on your flying hours, no work = very little pay.
These days it's not worth going into flying as a career unless someone else pays, either the military or an airline cadetship(if they still exist).
Given the huge expenditure involved in training, uncertain and insecure job prospects, and lack of rewards at the end I couldn't recommend it to anyone.
The legacy airlines are a dying breed who are having to join in the race downwards to stay in business. Once, plum jobs such as Cathay or Emirates are now very average when measured against the old standards. British Airways are losing serious money trying to compete against RYAN AIRs 9.99 airfares.
The legacy airlines are in a difficult position vs the low costs. An LCC focuses on price that's all. A legacy airline has to offer a better service to those people prepared to pay more, make a profit doing it yet still keep ticket prices within a reasonable distance of the LCCs ie how much more can they get away with charging before the extra starts turning people away in large numbers.
With fewer pilots coming out of the military, fewer airlines offering cadetships and potential pilots doing the sums and coming to the conclusion that it's not worth the risk/reward we will see declining quality and experience on the flight deck (if we're not seeing it already).
Better hope all the automatics and protections work.