United Airlines warning letter to Pilots about safety

[Herod]

Airbubba. 39 years as a professional pilot enough for you? OK, you're the captain. Why do you allow this behaviour?

[skyhighfallguy]

Lets all take a beat.

Most planes in air transport only have the tiller for ground taxiing on the left side. There are exceptions that I can think of. And the rudder pedals have limited nosewheel steering authority though it is not of great value in the area of the ramp (which some people call tarmac) or apron.

There are things a captain should not have to say to a copilot. For example:

Did you brush your teeth today?

Do you have on clean underpants?

IS TEXTING RIGHT NOW MORE IMPORTANT THAN LOSING YOUR: 1. Life,
2. The lives of the passengers, crew and innocents on the ground? 3. JOB?


Some things we should take for granted, but no longer can.


I had one copilot once about 30 years ago. We were taking off from a short runway, max weight, difficult conditions and i had to remind him to put down his damn cup of coffee and concentrate on his duties.

I would never think that I would have to explain that operating the aircraft was more important than drinking a cup of coffee. BUT I DID HAVE TO REMIND HIM>

So, kind of upsets me that some dedication has been lost to little sketch phones?

[PJ2]

skyhighfallguy;

Same same...we were above 10 on a high downwind in a 340, the other two guys were yakking about windsurfing; I got fed up with the lack of professionalism and disconnected the autoflight system, took both FDs off, disconnected the autothrust and told the distracted F/O to get me a visual behind the '67 on short final...they didn't even know where the airport was let alone "our traffic".

Complete, utter silence,...until touchdown. Then one said on the taxi-in, "We've NEVER seen that done before", referring to the disconnect and handflying to touchdown. I said "I know - it's about time you guys started paying attention to your profession", and left it at that.

Who knows whether they actually did...but on mentioning something about standards to the occasional slacker, I've seen "the pout" before. It used to be that mentioning something drew a "thank you" as one was always trying to improve. Not so today, apparently, (now retired).

It's a shame tho'...in my opinion having seen enough of it, this kind of tolerance comes from the bureacracy of management where the politics of advancement and advantage seem to be more important than knowing about one's real job, which is ensuring a minimum standard of behaviour including an ethical standard and duty to those behind the cockpit door. The UAL 'pull-up-yer-socks' letter said it all and while it is again a shame to see such a note, it is for everyone, not just the UAL guys and gals.

[etudiant]

The UAL 'pull-up-yer-socks' letter said it all and while it is again a shame to see such a note, it is for everyone, not just the UAL guys and gals.


Spot on, but sadly the UAL corporate culture was very much 'us vs them', so this message may fall on deaf ears, unless things have improved in recent years.

[skyhighfallguy]

about 30 or more years ago, UNITED lead the way in two things.

ONE was CRM, mainly because they had screwed up so badly.

TWO was the idea that the pilot was no longer a pilot, but a manager of systems.


UNITED , look back at yourself. YOU NEED PILOTS and PEOPLE WHO DON'T TAKE NO CRAP and SPEAK UP WHEN SOMETHING AINT RIGHT.


BUT you have trained your little monkeyboys that they should do what they are told. DRAGNET THEME INSERT HERE>

[AirRabbit]

Hmmm … some very interesting comments from the group on Captain Attarian’s recently published Safety Alert. I, for one, perhaps one of the few here, happen to believe that Captain Attarian probably took painstaking efforts to be honest while at the same time not sounding overly accusative or overly negative. It’s for each reader to decide individually whether those goals were achieved … and despite, or in concert with, the individual comments found here, I sincerely believe it took a lot of courage and a huge amount of concern and care on Captain Attarian’s part to even attempt to write such comments. But, I believe his efforts should be applauded – certainly not criticized – even if they only generate an undercurrent of grumbles and a stirring of memories. At least that would be a start.

I’ve always been of the opinion that anyone who regularly sits behind the controls of an airplane during flight is merely one error … an error that goes unrecognized or “mis-recognized” or is inappropriately, insufficiently, or inaccurately corrected … one error short of one of those “there-but-for-the-Grace-of-God-go-I” sorts of catastrophic and/or disastrous airplane accidents.

Further, while I agree that it certainly is a “…nicely balanced, yet brutally honest reminder from management…” I DO NOT believe that the person who “leaked it” is anywhere near a “halfwit,” and most assuredly should NOT be sacked or banned from the industry. In fact if there were a way to take Captain Attarian’s letter and reduce its thoughts to a convenient slogan, I would advocate such a slogan being hung in a well-lighted and easy to read spot, strategically placed over every one of the world’s airline crew lounge/briefing room doorways out to the ramp. The biggest problem with such an effort is the almost unavoidable eventuality that reading and taking such a “slogan” to heart is quite likely to soon become merely another thing to “see” without “seeing” and therefore forfeiting it’s meaning as something of value and importance, and relegating it to the same complacency that such a slogan would attempt to guard against developing in the first place.

Therefore, it is likely to fall to the individual flight crew members to “do the right thing” And that, in my opinion, will require the world’s regulators, supported by, and in concert with, all the world’s airline management officials and pilots' representatives, to take major steps to ensure that what is included in initial and recurring training efforts, and what is included in regularly conducted proficiency reviews and evaluations, are those issues that continue to focus on basic knowledge and the skills required to apply that knowledge – each of which simply must be based on a correct and complete understanding of the airplane and its systems, and an exhaustive regimen of practicing the correct (and that is both procedurally correct and situationally correct) performance of those skills.

As I’ve pointed out previously, the UK’s Royal Aeronautical Society has mounted numerous efforts to focus on just such goals. The most recent, I believe, has the very best focus to succeed in accomplishing just such a goal … the international effort to develop training and evaluation standards for pilots, instructors, and evaluators … to match the recently developed uniform standards developed for the involvement of flight training simulation devices. This effort should not be looked upon as a “once done – done forever” kind of effort. It should be a “living” and “breathing” effort, that is continually and regularly reviewed and examined – using the most recent memories and concerns, and being sure to specifically include all of the newest systems and equipment whose original design was to enhance or make easier the eventual operation of an airplane, into those deliberations and training/evaluation development efforts. Doing less than this level of effort would certainly qualify, in my not-so-humble opinion as the only thing professionals in this industry could do that could be described as “halfwit!”

And the "pro-active" efforts I have in mind do not include laying blame at anyone's door - as all of us in the industry have to accept our own part of whatever it is this industry does! We do not need to FIX BLAME ... we need to FIX PROBLEMS - and the best way I know to do that is to prepare our participants to maximum levels. We're all human ... and therefore prone to making mistakes - but perhaps if we all (that is ALL) work together - each one being invited to look over the shoulder of the other(s) to provide the best opportunity to prevent errors in thought or practice from developing - and, if (more likely, when) errors do develop, we will be able to recognize that error (those errors?) and take appropriate steps to correct them and avoid committing them in the future. Only through an ON-GOING series of efforts to review, evaluate, develop, and incorporate those things that we find necessary, will we reach the point that we're doing all we can. Anything LESS will be just that ... LESS.

[framer]

On a smaller scale....where does all this start?
Have any of you ever flown for an Airline that has a terrible safety culture and then flown with another which has a great safety culture? I bet many of you have. Why was one good and one bad?
Was it because one airline was very lucky with their recruitment drive while the other was very unlucky? Of course not. it was a direct result of the leadership within each airline in the preceding decade/year/month.
The Airline with the declining culture was most likely being 'managed' while the other was being lead by people/someone who could manipulate a group of people to guide their behaviours in a certain direction.
The leaders of our industry are responsible for creating and maintaining a positive safety culture within their respective airlines. How many are actively going about this? There are many ways to do it but first and foremost the pilot group needs to know what the expectation is and see the consequence of not meeting that expectation.
Undesirable behaviours need to be obviously challenged and desirable behaviours openly rewarded until the culture is moving in the direction needed. Then, the maintenance begins.
This is pretty basic stuff, successful leaders have been manipulating group behaviours for centuries. In our business people die if our leaders are not successful. Every six months the CAA/ FAA requires us to prove our skills and knowledge, maybe it's time that industry management were likewise tested.
In my mind, the fact that the letter had to be written means that United management have failed to create a positive safety culture and manage the change of new hires and seat changes. That is the same as someone saying to you " you have failed to keep your passengers and aircraft safe" .
Uncool.

[Huck]

You guys have to read the union response:



Dear Fellow Council 12 pilots,

By now you have seen letters from both Senior Vice President of Flight Operations Howard Attarian and ORD Chief Pilot Cal Janacek stating their concerns and suggesting that we, as pilots need to be safer and avoid the types of situations that are unfortunately becoming more prevalent at this company. Of course, we have all also seen recent media reports highlighting United’s safety problems.

Management stated that they want to be “brutally honest” with us. We also feel it is important to be brutally honest with you.

Safety starts with a strong positive safety culture, characterized by learning from mistakes, investigating facts, and addressing reporting and prevention in a non-punitive manner. This culture is currently lacking at United Airlines. This is the hard truth that we all face every day when we come to work.

The hard truth is that management is destroying the type of positive safety culture, which was once alive at this company. Management is embracing a culture in which economics and schedule is placed above safety, the science of flight, and the law.

Safety has one definition. Contributing factors to safety such as training level, a pilot’s personal level of experience, recent experiences in similar situations, proficiency, crew level of experience, and fatigue level are but a few.

A good safety culture embraces and supports the professionalism and experience of our pilots. It supports our pilots by providing them with robust training and a system that promotes the highest safety standard. It supports our pilots by “trusting them implicitly” just like VP Safety Mike Quiello has stated. What we actually experience on the line belies management’s public statements.

We once had a culture that empowered crews to confidently use these personal and subjective tools combined with robust training and positive support to make operational decisions, absent of impunity. In today’s culture, management uses safety as a weapon against us. We are threatened and intimidated when we make good sound judgments but strongly reminded in blunt communications to be safer.

We have seen a pattern of behavior from the ORD Chief Pilot Office. This pattern of behavior includes threats, intimidation, and outright bullying. We are also seeing an alarming increase of punishment (real and perceived) using the threat of re-training to “get a pilot’s mind right.”

Management brags about the safety culture and reminds us all of this in the recent communications. Unfortunately, management’s recent message is duplicitous and even offensive in nature based on their behavior.

Here is a list of some recent events and quotes, corroborated from individuals (pilots and others) involved in these events:

·Recently, after showing up on the flight deck to insert himself into an operational issue involving crew rest seats, the ORD Chief Pilot told a Captain, “don’t throw that safety **** at me” as the pilot sat in the cockpit and tried to explain the issue at hand.

·Recently, after a Captain determined that they were unable to safely operate an aircraft with a deferred APU (on an international flight covering hostile terrain with multiple and compounding deferrals). The pilot asked for the deferred APU to be repaired for the flight. The ORD Chief Pilot called this pilot at their hotel and aggressively counseled them for not operating the flight after they had raised safety concerns. After the pilot explained that the whole crew was in agreement on the decision to not operate the aircraft unless the APU was repaired, the Chief Pilot was quoted as saying, “You should have used CLR to get the other pilots to change their position.”

·Recently, a crew had a maintenance issue with an aircraft shortly after departure. The crew ran the appropriate checklist and spoke to TOMC and dispatch but they were unable to get the aircraft into the state that the checklist was supposed to get to. After confirming the checklist multiple times and determining that the problem was of an unknown and unsolvable nature, the crew elected to divert to a closer airport and subsequently continued the flight in another aircraft. They all agreed that a diversion was necessary. After the crew landed a mechanic and a management representative met the pilots and supported and complimented them on their decision to divert. The ORD Chief Pilot, despite objections from our safety committee, training committee, and MEC and LEC officers, sent this crew to remedial training. They were sent to training despite the fact that the FAR’s required them to terminate the flight early based on a malfunction of an unknown nature of a critical system. Even though the crew was dealt a bleed problem, the training curriculum that the Chief Pilot sent to the training center was a full LOFT, with many different scenarios that were not related in any way to the crew’s problem. The “training” curriculum, which was several pages in length, was reminiscent of an “appendix H” type rating check-ride. Fortunately, the instructors figured out that this was a witch-hunt, designed to intimidate and coerce this crew to succumb to economic and management pressure to complete the mission without interruption in the future. When the instructors learned of the nature of the crew’s problem on that particular flight, they produced the actual bleed line from that aircraft! The bleed line was split, wide open, which of course allowed super-heated air to escape, presenting a fire hazard. The crew’s decision to divert avoided what could have been a very bad situation for the safety of the flight. In the end, the instructors and the FAA were complimentary of the crew’s performance and solid decision-making.

·Recently, a Captain, who had less than 100 hours on the aircraft, objected to being ordered to fly as a relief First Officer, claiming that he didn’t feel safe flying in a seat that he wasn’t specifically trained for. The responses from the CPO were “your safety concern is not legitimate and I reject it,” and “you are putting your head in a noose if you don’t take the flight.”

·Recently, an Assistant Chief Pilot bullied a crew off of a flight during a pre-departure event that involved a passenger who was being deported. The passenger had been held in isolation the previous evening in the Kenosha County jail as a precaution as there was concern about exposure to the Ebola virus. The Captain was in the process of obtaining all possible information, as there was tremendous (and understandable) concern and angst from the flight attendants. Some of the flight attendants, who would have had direct contact with the passenger, were actually in tears as management was telling them that if they didn’t take the flight they would lose their jobs. The Captain was in the process of getting all available information to make a decision that would be in the best interest of the passengers and crew when the Assistant Chief Pilot, who was on the aircraft, gave them an ultimatum. The ultimatum was “go now, or get your belongings and leave the aircraft.” The crew was presented with the decision to rush and fly the flight with the situation unresolved or to leave the aircraft. They choose to leave the aircraft. The crew subsequently offered multiple times to take the flight after the issue was resolved and all crew members were comfortable with the situation, but were rejected by management. Absent interference from the CPO, this proactive Captain would have likely resolved the issue successfully.

·Recently a crew had an issue with crew rest seats (which was resolved prior to the cabin door being closed). Unbeknownst to the pilot or flight attendant crew, an Assistant Chief Pilot ordered the jetway pulled back up to the aircraft, burst into the cabin with no coordination, (or even making sure the emergency slide was disarmed as it wasn’t) and inserted themselves into this issue. Ultimately, the event distracted the crew to the point where a critical checklist was not properly run.

What do all of these events have in common?

·Pilot pushing, intimidation, and a lack of regard by management for a positive safety culture.

The ORD Chief Pilot, and other managers will argue that they support “genuine” safety concerns. The key word in this sentence is “genuine.” This is the cop-out that they use when they (the managers who fly hand picked trips and fly less in a year than most of us fly in a month) decide to insert themselves into YOUR decision-making processes. Your safety issues are only legitimate to them if it doesn’t interfere with economics. In the bathroom stalls at our training center, there used to be safety posters and propaganda. One that sticks out in our minds stated, “If you think safety is expensive, try an accident!”

How do you think the passengers would react if they heard a Chief Pilot use the words “don’t throw that safety **** at me” while in the cockpit counseling a crew?

The recent safety deviations that management has based their communications to us are real. They are a warning sign. Hopefully management will see it as a warning that the culture is broken. We need to see it as a warning to not succumb to threats and intimidation.

While we, as pilots, are always responsible for what happens on the aircraft, we are only one link in a chain. That chain should be anchored to a culture that supports safety, air science, and law over economic pressures. That chain should also be solidly anchored by robust training. This is something that is also lacking as the curriculums are being shortened with more (less expensive) computer-based training and less and less (expensive) instructor based training. There is also less and less CLR training and general safety training.

Remember the training, which was at least a full day, if not more, covering evacuation and human factors during emergencies? Remember when we used to study, as a learning tool, past accidents and incidents? Remember when we used to train, side by side, with the flight attendants as part of our safety training? This training is now condensed into a couple of hours and a few short, sterile videos. We are no longer trained on evacuation commands and such, but briefly taught how to open and close the doors. We are expected to teach ourselves how to operate and fly the airplanes - economics once again trumping safety.

As pilots, we ask for only one thing from our management; the positive support and tools we need to do our jobs. We used to be told that our decisions, no matter how conservative, would be supported if we acted in good faith. This is no longer the case. We look forward to the day where a safety culture returns to this property where once again management takes a positive approach to safety. Hopefully, it doesn’t take an accident to get us there.

Please continue to report safety issues and pilot pushing via the FSAP program and to us. We will continue to hold the line on your behalf!

Fraternally,

Eric, Carlos, and John

[Airbubba]

As pilots, we ask for only one thing from our management; the positive support and tools we need to do our jobs. We used to be told that our decisions, no matter how conservative, would be supported if we acted in good faith. This is no longer the case.

And, in the good old days, if you made a bad call, the chief pilot would suggest that next time you might want to do things a little differently. But, he would finish with 'that's just a suggestion, you were there, I wasn't, it was your call to make'.

Now, if you get some inflight maintenance problem you are supposed to get a kumbaya phone patch with maintenance, dispatch and a 'subject matter expert'. And, get this, if they tell you something wrong and you make an 'incorrect' decision, it's your fault because you trusted them. You're still hung out to dry by the feds since you are, of course, the PIC.

The old pilot and the dog joke about the future of flight deck automation has more truth than we realized in these times of blame and liability.

Fortunately, I don't think I have ever felt commercial pressure on a safety decision. I've had a coworker suggest we divert to a certain airport because he's a commuter and there are more jumpseats home there. Not exactly what I want on the CVR tape if it is ever pulled.

I realize many of the senior folks here have a hard time grasping why the Sky God Captain act no longer plays well in the U.S. As noted in some of the posts above, CRM has evolved cockpit leadership into a more democratic rule by committee in these enlightened times. The captain is the 'facilitator', he or she (or perhaps neither, a couple are always in transition where I work) promotes active sharing of information and identification of threats. Or something like that.

Anyway, we can always make the customary excuses about how management is mean and we took a pay cut so we're not going to do anything extra. However, I would argue that some of us need to pay a little more attention to flying the plane and less to some video game on the iPhone when we are the PF. Or, it will bite us.

[framer]

From the looks of that Union letter it is even worse than I had initially imagined.
I had imagined a lack of leadership and positive control of the ' safety culture' . This looks like a concerted effort to accelerate the natural decline in personal discipline that occurs in said vacuum.
Who is at the helm? These types of rogue managers who don't understand how safety works long term and act in the interests of commercial profitability ( short term) only are put there by someone....they are hand picked. Who is driving the United ship and allowing this?
It's quite sad to see from an antipodean perspective as we have long held the US in high regard in this area.

[glofish]

Working in the ME we tend to think it's only their middle aged mentality that pulls the airline industry down. I must discover that in the good ol'States the trend backwards is similarly unstopped.

Brace for the next elections if the GOP muppet wins.

It's all a$$ covering bs, nothing to do with safety culture, as the quote of that quarter pounded UA manager proves.

They can then say:
"We told you so in our open letter, it was on one of the zillions recent memos, you should have followed the instructions of these latest 20 online learning courses (each 30')".

By that they give themselves absolution of having cut all the real time training and increasing the FTLs to the absolute maximum limit and lowering T&Cs to the lowest common denominator.

It's a WE TOLD YOU so from an ignorant, cosy and handsomely paid 9 to 5 armchair.

[deadheader]

Union Madness

If the above truly reflects the union response to the memo, it is now a matter of public record why there is little option but to smash the unions. Clearly a little more dismantling is still required at UAL, lest we revisit 1970s incident rates too.

[Huck]

Smash who?

What?

On a pro pilot web board?

[aterpster]

deadheader:

If the above truly reflects the union response to the memo, it is now a matter of public record why there is little option but to smash the unions. Clearly a little more dismantling is still required at UAL, lest we revisit 1970s incident rates too.

The dismantling should start with their arrogant and hypocritical management.

[West Coast]

Labor deserves their share of the blame. More militant crews (usually L-UAL) will refuse aircraft for petty reasons, minor deferrals, etc but when called out will invoke the safety card. No one playing the game is as pure as the driven snow.

[PAXboy]

I'm a PAX of 49 years sitting.

PJ2 <extract>

... in my opinion having seen enough of it, this kind of tolerance comes from the bureacracy of management where the politics of advancement and advantage seem to be more important than knowing about one's real job, which is ensuring a minimum standard of behaviour including an ethical standard and duty to those behind the cockpit door

I have seen this in many walks of life but the kind where the chairs are already at ground level. In commerce, we no longer see a manager who has 'worked their way up'. When I took a Saturday job (aged 16) the manager of the department store told me that he had started by working Saturdays when he was 16. That no longer happens in ANY business. The univeristy is now seen as the golden steps and the only way to climb.

Huck quoted framer:

I read it as a plea to "straighten up and fly right even though we have failed to establish a positive safety culture and have allowed you to bust SOP's for years, failed to reign in the outlying cowboys, failed to empower the disciplined amongst you, and watched as human nature did it's thing and a large majority of you bowed to the pressure exerted to get the job done"

Huck You just described the management culture of the majority of american airlines....

Unfortunately, framer just described the management culture of almost every company I have known during 35 years of a working life. (Mainly in telecommunications and IT and with American companies and having worked internationally.) Nowadays, everyone aims to do the minimum and get the maximum out of it.

One simple example. One of my managers told me to cut all the maintenance contracts on a particular type of equipment. They said, "They're reliable and it's cheaper just to fix it when it goes wrong." I know that is not a direct comparison and that IT equipment was safely on the ground when it failed but that attitude has continued. I was told that in 1989 by an American Vice President of the company.

Someone has mentioned Fear Is The Hunter, don't forget to tell the boy pilots to read: The Tombstone Imperative: The Truth about Air Safety by Andrew Weir because every thread like this in PPRuNe could be out of that book. I'll get back to my seat now and shut up.

[Intruder]

From the looks of that Union letter it is even worse than I had initially imagined.
I had imagined a lack of leadership and positive control of the ' safety culture' . This looks like a concerted effort to accelerate the natural decline in personal discipline that occurs in said vacuum.
Who is at the helm? These types of rogue managers who don't understand how safety works long term and act in the interests of commercial profitability ( short term) only are put there by someone....they are hand picked. Who is driving the United ship and allowing this?

The VP of Flight Ops is Howard Attarian, who used to be Duane Woerth's #2 at ALPA. Apparently, he has totally lost contact with his roots as a pilot...

[aterpster]

Intruder:

The VP of Flight Ops is Howard Attarian, who used to be Duane Woerth's #2 at ALPA. Apparently, he has totally lost contact with his roots as a pilot...

like him always forget their roots as a pilot. In fact, he tossed those roots out the door when he became Woerth's lackey.

[Huck]

I'll get back to my seat now and shut up.

Please don't!

[Willit Run]

SOP's are good thing......up to a point.

Our company has taken it just a bit too far.
For years, I have been saying the Air Force is constipated with rules.
Our company is now constipated with rules. The more rules you have, the easier it is to break them unknowingly and maybe get a violation of some sort.

Common sense has to prevail at some point.