Below the GS at SFO again

[barit1]

Coagie:

...the airlines had many military trained pilots, who had to meet a high standard, both mentally and physically, to even begin their training, which was vigorous and thorough, especially in the basics of flying. Now, because of demand, and more military pilots staying in the military, instead of getting out to work for the airlines, we may not always get the quality of person, with the quality of training, that we used to get.

Interestingly, just today I heard the opposite point being made on a US network. Sequestration is cutting into mil. flying hours, causing enthusiastic pilots to look around for more flight time. At the same time, US carriers have their crew minimum hours raised from 250 to 1500 hours, thanks to Colgan etc.

Does truth lie somewhere in between?

[Auberon]

Can we stop with the disinformation regarding the SFO 28L PAPI already? It was in service for Asiana. They crashed into it and it was out of service while the runway was closed. It was repaired before the runway reopened. It was in service for EVA. It is in service right now.

[Coagie]

Does truth lie somewhere in between?

Barit1, probably, but, even though passenger aviation is getting safer, I think, most would agree, it's from technology, not quality of the pilots. A typical airline passenger wouldn't know Bernoulli's Principle, from Principal Bernoulli, at the local primary school, so they put their confidence in the square jawed, confident and competent, pilot flying the plane, that, they presume, knows Bernoulli's Principle from Principal Bernoulli, and put themselves in that person's charge. They may have to, at times, but, they don't want to find themselves in some slack jawed, mealy mouthed, pimple faced, goofball's aircraft. Humans want to feel comfortable, so, in the absence of the understanding of science, technology, or other factors, they'll go with, who they have confidence in. So the image of commercial pilots, is of commercial importance. No matter how safe the technology gets, as long as the flying public expects to have pilots, that know how to fly, operating the aircraft they are traveling on, human error will erode their confidence in air travel. Otherwise, passenger airplanes might as well be those driverless trains, that take you from terminal A to B to C to D, etc.

[Coagie]

By the way, EVA employ quite a few western pilots so before you lambast Asian crews, just make sure this crew is Asian maybe.

Armchairpilot94116, you could be right. Dependence on automation is a worldwide problem in commercial passenger aviation. No nationality or race is exempt. It does seem, sometimes, that some Asian education cultures emphasize rote memory at the expense of intuition, and, maybe, that's where Californian's joke about DWA instead of DWI (Driving While Asian, instead of, Driving While Intoxicated) began. If you just try to memorize every scenerio the vehicle might get into, and the proper response, rather than knowing why this and why that, you're probably not going to be a good driver or pilot. I think it's a cultural education thing, rather than a racial thing, as I haven't noticed it with 3rd or longer generation Asians in the US. Also, I think the Japanese do a good job driving and flying. Maybe it was some pretty good piloting that kept that 747, with the broken tail, up so long, a while back.

[junebug172]

Kids nowadays don't know how to fly visual approaches any more without aids.

The issue is not the ILS/PAPI OTS, the issue is the lack of actual flying experience by these jockeys......

Basic stick and rudder skills then learn automation. Most are learning right into automation and have nothing to fall back on when it fails.

[olbob]

Gann

I worked with and flew with Ernie. He and I collaborated on a series of historical aviation stories with my illustrations in " Flying Magazine" in the 70's. We then put them together with some additions into a book entitled, " Ernest K. Gann's Flying Circus" . He was from the old school of crusty and demanding aviators, much like the instructors that I was fortunate to have when I was a student. I can offer prints of all the paintings that were in the book plus many more. I have a website but I don't know if I am at liberty to post it here.

[PURPLE PITOT]

Landed 28R this afternoon. European accent and tail number. Briefed for the visual as per the atis. 1st norcal clears us for the rnav 28R. Next says intercept the radial. (sounds like a vis coming up and we can see the airport). Next says cleared for the vis. Number one (flying), does the "click click, click click' thing, tea and medals all round. Told to reduce to approach speed at about 8 miles. Looks like atc are being a bit more careful if you're not a regular.

Had a good look at the NTSB workings as we crossed the sea wall. There were a number of trucks, but the thing that stuck out was the burger van.

God bless america.

[claser111]

"Dependence on automation is a worldwide problem in commercial passenger aviation. No nationality or race is exempt."

Yes, the point is that most of the new guys learn to fly in a small cessna up to 200hrs then they jump into the RH seat of a 777, landing once a month after a fully automated approach, A/P goes OFF at 500ft and your job is just to flare to avoid an hard landing!

Take a Cpt that has started his career as cadet in the X Airline on a shiny modern widebody, assuming that after 11 years he has 10.000hrs (900hrs/year) and, if he is lucky, he can land 3 times a month (very lucky) always using full automation...it means 10.000hrs=396 landings...and how many of that are on Visual Approach or manual flight???

In US or Europe usually you start your career flying a small/medium jet then, once senior FO, jump on a widebody RH seat, for your command training you will comeback on a small plane and at the end of your career maybe you will get the chance to fly the big jet as a Captain.

I think this should be the way, the training, the experience and the old school.

[Gretchenfrage]

Dependence on automation is a worldwide problem in commercial passenger aviation

No, it is not a problem. It is an accepted fact. It's all about cost reduction for higher returns and cheaper tickets and each and every remedy to the above fact is instantly rejected if it implies more cost. No one in the driver seats is interested in a solution. The companies want to pay less for pilots, the industry complies with ever more automated jets and the slogans that anything that has a heartbeat can fly it, the regulators are in a tight grip by the politicians that install them, so they blabber whatever being told, the politicians are in a tight grip by the industry that pays them, the media love scoops and airline disasters provide them, the grand public is lured to believe that all of the above defend their interest and they just loooove the cheap tickets.
Nothing is going to happen, no one is pointing at the huge white Elephant in the room. They will all try to pull nice curtains around it, to build a remote little annex room to hide it, install nice little gadgets that helps it eat, drink and take a dump. That's all way cheaper than to train it to be able to live in the real jungle.

Modern pilots depend on automation, we have to accept the fact. They lack the basic training and basic experience the earlier generation had to go through. The industry needs cheap pilots now, so it generates the children of the magenta. Unfortunately the airplanes and the airports are not completely redundant and their automation is far from fool-proof. Evidently a pilot is still needed to fill the eventual gaps. That's the theory. Most of the new pilots can produce such gap-filling to a minimal degree in the sim, were tha program is know in advance and the trainers are from the new breed as well, so they pass even abysmal performances because that's about what they know.

Until the industry can come up with a almost perfect automated solution we have to accept such real life performances we see recently and it's cynicism. It's the calculated risk of todays world!
We can stop inquiring about the hows and whys, everyone knows what's going on, if we are absolutely honest.

[moosp]

Good post Gretch. Five pages of wanderings distilled into the facts of the matter.

[TacomaSailor]

KSAN - Never an ILS for 27

KSAN 27 services 95% of the landings and has only a LOC and RNAV approach. The landing area is about 7950'. As far as I can tell there has never been an ILS available for 27.

DL, BA, HA, FedEx, UPS, DHL, JAL all fly 767, 777, 787, DC10 equipment into KSAN on a daily basis with no difficulty.

I listen to many Visual approaches to 27 on a daily basis.

Why is it acceptable and easily accomplished at KSAN (JAL, DL, BA are all over 10 hour flights) while many complain about the lack of ILS at KSFO where there was almost 4,000' more landing area and no terrain during the approach?

Why is it standard practice to land heavy jets at KSAN with no ILS yet seemingly difficult at KSFO?

I am not a pilot so I guess I am missing something here!

[T-21]

Quoting from "Handling The Big Jets" 1970 ! edition by D.P Davies. "The autopilot is a great comfort,so are the flight director and the approach coupler. But do not get into the position where you need these devices to complete the flight. Keep in practice in raw I.L.S,particularly in crosswinds. Keep in practice in hand-flying the aeroplane at altitude and in making purely visual approaches."

I find it very disturbing that modern pilots seem to have lost basic flying skills and too much reliance on automation and computers . Start on gliders then light aircraft as part of the training you will be a far better stick/rudder pilot.

[fireflybob]

The dilution of standards is happening at all levels. If you learned to fly in the 1950/60s the vast majority of the instructors were experienced ex wartime military instructors and what's more the basic training aircraft were aerobatic (I know because my father instructed during WW2 and continued teaching until he was 81 years!)

Any new instructors were supervised and mentored by the "oldies" and woe betide if you did things like start the engine with the tail facing towards an open hangar door! When you learned to fly you almost certainly did some basic aerobatics and certainly stalling and spinning before going solo! This produced a much more robust pilot.

Fast forward to today - modern training aircraft are (rarely) cleared for aerobatics, have benign handling characteristics and training has resorted to the "tick the box" mentality with minimal depth of understanding.

IF the airlines want to up the standards we need a "centre of excellence" along the lines of Hamble or Oxford which are not run for commercial reasons but to produce the airline pilots and commanders that the industry needs worldwide rather than contracting out to agencies and then washing their hands of any responsibility. Am not holding my breath!

[framer]

It's not dangerous or difficult to land a jet without an ILS, it gets done hundreds of times a day ( maybe thousands).
It is dangerous to have pilots who don't have a solid background in manually flying aircraft being asked to do it once a year or less. (Ie when an ILS becomes u/s)
Training is the only answer to this burgeoning problem.
Training costs money.
The only solution is to mandate by law that the required training takes place, that way all airlines face the cost and simply pass it on to the passengers without losing any competitive ability.
It's that simple. Installing ILS's everywhere won't help. The same flying skills that carry out a visual approach are needed in other situations as well such as AF447.

[fireflybob]

The same flying skills that carry out a visual approach are needed in other situations as well such as AF447.

Quite - one wonders how some crews would cope with an uncontrollable fire in the cabin and having to land asap at the nearest airport (which has no or minimal landing aids or might even be closed - military?) in day visual conditions.

[tilnextime]

I can only speak for one military branch, but I would suggest that the "benefit" that arrived with some (US) military aviators is the breadth of tasks that they are called upon to perform as compared to what one experiences in airline flying. You didn't "bid" the types of flying you did based on seniority, you had to be capable of whatever your unit of assignment's mission happened to be, day, night (lighted and unlighted runway), IFR, VFR, improved airfield, dirt strip, ship's deck, single aircraft, multi-aircraft and so forth.

Are military aviators "better"? No idea - I've never performed a flight eval of a civilian pilot. Are military aviators required to maintain proficiency in a wider range of aviation and flying tasks? Absolutely.

[roulishollandais]

Originally Posted by Gretchenfrage

The industry needs cheap pilots no

The French first Minister just came back from South Korea : Discount to sell Airbuses is difficult, but they may give for free type qualification and a key ring Some decades ago they did the same to sell deltaplanes : They organized poor training to do the guy addict, and as soon he was ready the pay the bird, they took the money and the "instructor"/procuror was soloing the fool buyer, saying him he was high qualified on this wonderbird. Many crashes followed.
Airbus and Boeing seem to do the same with their crazy autotrim (depending on C*law,trimming for Nz=1 not for attitude/speed) and FLCH/On Des gadgets
That is how that crime industry works (Insurance companies help to do the crimes money valuable with raw reckoning...)

[A-3TWENTY]

Why is this kind of incidents more likely to happen in an asian carrier??

Easy.

In Asia QARs are used to punish. If you exceed any QAR parameter, a hard QAR , which in some cases is very easy to happen, you are punished with money, possibly downgraded and still have to lose your face seeing your name published in the company`s web page.

For this reason NO ONE flies manually. 100% of the pilots disconnect the AP , when the approach is full stabilized , between 1000-1500ft.

In China , FO`s are not allowed to be PFs unless when flying with instructors. And it`s not always. Only when they are assigned to. It means they might be scheduled to fly with an instructor without beeing PF because that flight is not an instruction one.

With around 3000 hours , in some companies 2700 hours, they move up to the LHS.

As Captains , they will keep flying only below 1500 ft , aircraft fully configured in an ILS approach. And PAPI.

I can see in their faces when for some reason an ILS is U/S and they have to make a NPA. The stress takes place.Imagine a visual approach !!!

When they are required to fly a visual app , without any aid , they simply don`t know how to do it.

In the airbus they can even fly the bird as a reference to keep the 3º. Not to talk about the lifetime 3º times distance rule.

It`s a complete lack of the most basic skills and airmanship.


I completely disagree with those who say this is an airport fault.

[sabenaboy]

I've written a few posts about basic flying skills which I think would add to the discussion in this topic.

Perhaps you would care to read what I have to say about it.
(Just the opinion of someone with more the 11 yrs and almost 9000 hrs experience on the A320 alone)

Maintaining Manual Flying Skills
Why would using automation be safer then manual flight?
Why would flying with automatics on be more cost effective?
Low time cadets are not dangerous if your airline has a good training department and SOP's!

[bugg smasher]

the children of the magenta

Very nicely put, Gretchen. That would also be a great name for a rock band, or a SciFi movie, or a....

By the way, visual approaches to the 28's require you to be at 1900' at the San Mateo bridge. That's the long metal thingy, just before the airport, going from right to left, or left to right, as you prefer, all the way across the bay, lots of shiny cars going back and forth, really hard to miss, unless your head is buried in the cockpit, or up somewhere else.

SAN MATEO BRIDGE, 1900 OR ABOVE, if you forget all else, at least remember that.