Worldwide pilot experience too low?
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It’s true proper training is more important than hours. But the fact that European carriers have a good safety record is also probably due to the fact that you have it fairly easy in term of weather, very good ATC/facility compare to Asia/Africa for example.
Last edited by pineteam; 10th Jul 2019 at 10:01. Reason: Rephrase.
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Why are you referencing Africa if the buzz here is exactly about US vs Europe? How does Jet Blue record compares to Easy and Southwest to Ryanair? Can anyone demonstrate how 1500 rule have helped US airlines compared to their European counterparts who ALL using low time first officers?
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While every continent has its own specifics, I wouldn't say Europe is the easiest place to fly. Weather can be extreme on both ends of the temperature scale, whereas one hardly ever sees icy in Africa I imagine. As for the ATC, there are many places in Africa (and not only SA) that would be considered world class compared to the excellent service we see in Spain.
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It’s true proper training is more important than hours.
A very new pilot trained in a DA-20 will have mastered more of the plane and its capabilities in its intended operating environment in 100 hours, than that same very new pilot put directly into a DA-42. After the first 100 hours in either type, the pilot of the DA-20 will be safer in the DA-20, than the DA-42 pilot would be in the DA-42, simply because the DA-20 is simple, as its operating environment, and flying it will afford the new pilot the opportunity for settling into the environment before complicating it. With that 100 hours in a simple type, they'll be much more ready for the DA-42, because they can devote much more of their learning attention to differences, not still building basics - their learning sponge is more receptive to holding more knowledge, rather than that knowledge overflowing the sponge.
Learning piloting is very much a stepping stone process. Yes, you can take a direct entry MPL candidate and have them right seat in a jet in a 100 hours, but it is certain that their personal learning sponge has not yet opened up. There are things that they still need to learn. Maybe they learn them quickly enough, on rare occasions, we read that a skill was not as well developed as we hope.
Yeah, the 1500 hour 172 pilot is over qualified in a light single, and if they have the slightest aptitude toward piloting, their personal learning sponge is really ready to absorb lots more. They will need more type and operating environment training, but the basics of piloting will be solidly ingrained in them, and will be "unconscious competence" for their piloting skills for the rest of their career. The 300 hour MPL right seat jet pilot may have achieved "conscious competence" but they have yet to achieve "unconscious competence", and worse, right seat in a jet flying scheduled routes is a slow way to learn, compared to other piloting environments - I hear they use autopilots and autothrottles a lot!
A pilot with 1000+ hours in whatever simple plane is easier to validate for higher training, and will likely accomplish it sooner, because that experience has given them a sound, maybe even excess, basis for learning, their personal learning sponge is open to learn more.
Clearly it's working in Europe because if it didn't there would be many more incidents
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Training is good, and necessary of course. Not everyone will respond the same way; some will really try to understand the training and store it in their brain as well as be able to pull that knowledge out when required. unfortunately, many pay only a superficial attention and do not retain much of that training. I see that as common nowadays with multi choice tests, all the student wants is to pass the test, not to learn the subject. However that is not restricted to newbies.
However experience is at least as important as training, in my own opinion it is much more important indeed essential. Even if the person knows nothing about what goes on in the electronics bay or hydraulic system, he will see what happens when he moves that switch or lever and build on that experience. Experience makes the difference between a trained and a competent pilot. Which one would you like to have sitting up front when you go on a flight, especially if the conditions are tough?
When all the flight crews are inexperienced (that will happen when the current crop of senior pilots retire at age 65 and is happening as we speak), how do the newbies get their experience? Who is going to mentor them, help them understand what they are seeing and how to handle the things that are not in the books? Picture the last two 737MAX accidents, and how different those would have turned out if the pilots had had experience of trim problems, either in the sim or in an airplane? And we, as pilots, are remarkably inventive when it comes time to find things to screw up.
Sure experience in a C172 is good, but it is not a replacement for the experience of a couple of thousand hours flying as crew in a B777, handling problems, learning when to start slowing down for the approach, how to handle an ATC delay on descent, how to save fuel when on a long flight and been held down due to traffic, how to cajole a better clearance, how to recognizer and fly severe turbulence or penetrate a thunderstorm without radar or any one of thousands of situations that are not covered in training.
Lets face it; the pilot you want to see up front has grey hair, a few lines on his face and a scruffy appearance. He (or she in some circumstances) will have experience. He cannot get that from a book, or a computer. He got it by doing the job. If he was a real pilot he would have been passing on what he knew to his copilot, giving that guy landings, approaches, some difficult decisions to make, and helping him/her to be ready to take over when it was time to give it up.
But now we have a huge hole in experience. The guys at the top are only (seemingly) interested in maximizing their income in their last few years before being forced to retire, and the ones coming up are so junior they do not understand what could be passed on to them, being solely interested in taking advantage of the opportunity to get something for free and without any effort on their part. They don't understand the importance of what they are seeing and lack the experience to pay attention. It frightens me to think that when the baton is passed, the commanders of those magic ships of the air will be so ignorant and unready, and mostly totally unaware that they are not ready because they did not get the chance to learn from those who could have taught them.
Without skill and experience we will become just the same as what we see now in those countries that have the money to buy airplanes and airlines but do not have the experienced pilots to fly them.
However experience is at least as important as training, in my own opinion it is much more important indeed essential. Even if the person knows nothing about what goes on in the electronics bay or hydraulic system, he will see what happens when he moves that switch or lever and build on that experience. Experience makes the difference between a trained and a competent pilot. Which one would you like to have sitting up front when you go on a flight, especially if the conditions are tough?
When all the flight crews are inexperienced (that will happen when the current crop of senior pilots retire at age 65 and is happening as we speak), how do the newbies get their experience? Who is going to mentor them, help them understand what they are seeing and how to handle the things that are not in the books? Picture the last two 737MAX accidents, and how different those would have turned out if the pilots had had experience of trim problems, either in the sim or in an airplane? And we, as pilots, are remarkably inventive when it comes time to find things to screw up.
Sure experience in a C172 is good, but it is not a replacement for the experience of a couple of thousand hours flying as crew in a B777, handling problems, learning when to start slowing down for the approach, how to handle an ATC delay on descent, how to save fuel when on a long flight and been held down due to traffic, how to cajole a better clearance, how to recognizer and fly severe turbulence or penetrate a thunderstorm without radar or any one of thousands of situations that are not covered in training.
Lets face it; the pilot you want to see up front has grey hair, a few lines on his face and a scruffy appearance. He (or she in some circumstances) will have experience. He cannot get that from a book, or a computer. He got it by doing the job. If he was a real pilot he would have been passing on what he knew to his copilot, giving that guy landings, approaches, some difficult decisions to make, and helping him/her to be ready to take over when it was time to give it up.
But now we have a huge hole in experience. The guys at the top are only (seemingly) interested in maximizing their income in their last few years before being forced to retire, and the ones coming up are so junior they do not understand what could be passed on to them, being solely interested in taking advantage of the opportunity to get something for free and without any effort on their part. They don't understand the importance of what they are seeing and lack the experience to pay attention. It frightens me to think that when the baton is passed, the commanders of those magic ships of the air will be so ignorant and unready, and mostly totally unaware that they are not ready because they did not get the chance to learn from those who could have taught them.
Without skill and experience we will become just the same as what we see now in those countries that have the money to buy airplanes and airlines but do not have the experienced pilots to fly them.
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Of all the clap trap that’s been written on this site, this is by far and away the most outrageous bit of literary faeces I’ve ever seen. To claim that those coming through the ranks now are “taking advantage”, that they “want something for free and without any effort” is so disingenuous it shouldn’t really warrant a reply.
Those coming through the ranks now are going about it the only way they see possible, and paying a great deal for it. They are a product of corporate greed from the generation that went before them - those that claim to be the last remaining sky gods. Coincidentally, these sky gods are also the ones who willingly volunteer anecdotes of drunken nights downroute followed immediately by a long slog across the Atlantic on oxygen to sober up.
European airlines have been successfully taking 250hr wonder pilots and putting them in jets for decades. Not just locos, but legacy carriers too. Most of the current senior training standards captains at the big British airline were such cadets, now flying intercontinental to the very places some have described as more difficult than Europe.
Really.
Hoping people realize that time spent in an airplane in “peril” with valuable freight, but non-humans in the back, and a very real human pilot in the front, who is not dead, and who has no interest in assuming that status, and who spends his flight time learning to be “less close to being dead” preliminaralliy by manageing systems which want to slide out of line clandestinely while said pilot is listening to Art Bell, and playing fingerpaints with the St Elmo’s fire on the plexiglass, (biggest prepositional phrase I’ve ever attempted), is infinitely superior to anything somebody comes up with in a sim.
A pilot gets dead over the wilds of northern somewhere, does himself and his $150k C402 in, and there are a few packages that need to be accounted for.
He does that for 1500 hrs, doesn’t get dead, passes his ATP ride, and I think he’s ready for a right seat.
not really a simulator or part 142 program that’s gonna get you there...
Hoping people realize that time spent in an airplane in “peril” with valuable freight, but non-humans in the back, and a very real human pilot in the front, who is not dead, and who has no interest in assuming that status, and who spends his flight time learning to be “less close to being dead” preliminaralliy by manageing systems which want to slide out of line clandestinely while said pilot is listening to Art Bell, and playing fingerpaints with the St Elmo’s fire on the plexiglass, (biggest prepositional phrase I’ve ever attempted), is infinitely superior to anything somebody comes up with in a sim.
A pilot gets dead over the wilds of northern somewhere, does himself and his $150k C402 in, and there are a few packages that need to be accounted for.
He does that for 1500 hrs, doesn’t get dead, passes his ATP ride, and I think he’s ready for a right seat.
not really a simulator or part 142 program that’s gonna get you there...
Last edited by 421dog; 10th Jul 2019 at 21:14.
Experience is the knowledge or mastery of a subject gained through involvement in or exposure to it, generally referring to know-how rather than know-what; i.e. on-the-job learning opposed to book, class, learning.
Experience relates specific activity; aviation, flying, particularly context. That which a person is expected to be exposed to and how to react. This depends on role, task, and situation; and that any future need is a judgement - a forecast of the level of interaction in role, task, and situation.
Flying hours alone do not constitute experience, it’s the content of those hours and retention of that knowledge and skill, and transference of these across types and operations which are important. Also, a mindset never to stop learning.
The opening views in the thread is blatant hindsight bias. Similarly discussion of individual accidents, which can only conclude that the level of experience, or its application was insufficient for that particular situation.
Focus on individuals is again in hindsight, fundamental attribution error, unwarranted blame.
These views should not be used as a basis of training and levels of experience; pilots rarely encounter the same accident, situations do not repeat exactly. Thus the greater need is for experience in judging different situations, the unusual, not trained for events, and have flexibly in acting. Modern experience is more associated with agility of thought, awareness, opposed to physical skills.
Current levels of experience differ from previous; the issue is not that future operations will require same level, content, or quality, but that the combined crew experience should be sufficient for the situations crew’s are expected to manage.
Forecasting future challenges is difficult, Generic experience and skills could help. However it may be easier to limit the extreme situations that crews could encounter, with technical and operational improvements; and not to expect too much from the human contribution in an increasingly complex world.
Experience relates specific activity; aviation, flying, particularly context. That which a person is expected to be exposed to and how to react. This depends on role, task, and situation; and that any future need is a judgement - a forecast of the level of interaction in role, task, and situation.
Flying hours alone do not constitute experience, it’s the content of those hours and retention of that knowledge and skill, and transference of these across types and operations which are important. Also, a mindset never to stop learning.
The opening views in the thread is blatant hindsight bias. Similarly discussion of individual accidents, which can only conclude that the level of experience, or its application was insufficient for that particular situation.
Focus on individuals is again in hindsight, fundamental attribution error, unwarranted blame.
These views should not be used as a basis of training and levels of experience; pilots rarely encounter the same accident, situations do not repeat exactly. Thus the greater need is for experience in judging different situations, the unusual, not trained for events, and have flexibly in acting. Modern experience is more associated with agility of thought, awareness, opposed to physical skills.
Current levels of experience differ from previous; the issue is not that future operations will require same level, content, or quality, but that the combined crew experience should be sufficient for the situations crew’s are expected to manage.
Forecasting future challenges is difficult, Generic experience and skills could help. However it may be easier to limit the extreme situations that crews could encounter, with technical and operational improvements; and not to expect too much from the human contribution in an increasingly complex world.
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I don't understand what all the discussion (quality/quantity of experience, sim time etc.) is about since in the VERY near future, there will be no need for pilots at all in transport category aircraft. The technology already exists, but the biggest hurdle to implementation is SLF acceptance. Well, there might be a computer tech located somewhere on the aircraft to trouble shoot various systems glitches who will be able to set things right with just a few clicks of a mouse or the pushing of a few buttons. There will be no windows provided for the tech since there would be no need for him/her to interact with the physical world. Can you imagine that, controlling a large transport category aircraft by just manipulating a few buttons and knobs and not looking out the window? Oh wait ....
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Cheers, I think,
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Of all the clap trap that’s been written on this site, this is by far and away the most outrageous bit of literary faeces I’ve ever seen. To claim that those coming through the ranks now are “taking advantage”, that they “want something for free and without any effort” is so disingenuous it shouldn’t really warrant a reply.
Those coming through the ranks now are going about it the only way they see possible, and paying a great deal for it. They are a product of corporate greed from the generation that went before them - those that claim to be the last remaining sky gods. Coincidentally, these sky gods are also the ones who willingly volunteer anecdotes of drunken nights downroute followed immediately by a long slog across the Atlantic on oxygen to sober up.
European airlines have been successfully taking 250hr wonder pilots and putting them in jets for decades. Not just locos, but legacy carriers too. Most of the current senior training standards captains at the big British airline were such cadets, now flying intercontinental to the very places some have described as more difficult than Europe.
Truly, I drive or fly myself whenever it’s feasible. I have zero faith in the average CRJ driver, which is about all we have around here.
The best pilot I know, (USAF ex-f-16, 15 and U-2 ) flies professionally for a big US company with a penchant for 737s, and vociferiously doesn’t consider what he does for a living “flying”. He says company SOP adds nothing to his ability to meet a “generic challenge”, should such arise, and that flying his private planes as well as the warbirds he has access to are what keeps him sharp.
The best pilot I know, (USAF ex-f-16, 15 and U-2 ) flies professionally for a big US company with a penchant for 737s, and vociferiously doesn’t consider what he does for a living “flying”. He says company SOP adds nothing to his ability to meet a “generic challenge”, should such arise, and that flying his private planes as well as the warbirds he has access to are what keeps him sharp.
Last edited by 421dog; 11th Jul 2019 at 06:43.
Safety of an operation is dependent on multiple variables, of which crew competency is a factor. Routinely airlines will operate with a zero experience pilot in line training, with or without a safety pilot dependent on the local rules. That is not going to change, at least in this universe, people start at the beginning and add experience.
Mitigation of the risks of low experience or assumed limited competency comes from increased oversight, more restrictive operational limits, and adding good equipment and hopefully some balance of limited experience with pilots that have a modicum of experience but more importantly competency. Irrespective of how well or inadequate the original training and experience was, the majority of the operational learning will occur on line, where there is experiential reinforcement of hopefully remembered concepts and rules.
For basic flying required to fly a hi capacity RPT aircraft in a mature airline, you can consider the basics that exist out of the military training program, and remove the tactical stuff in the most part. Out of a 230-250 hr flight training program, around 150 hrs of that is related to "flight training", the rest is focused towards military centric stuff, formation, low flying, aerobatics, and initial weapons training, which add to the total competency, but are focused outside of the most basic civil task. Out of 150 hrs, the first 20 odd hours are gaining basic flight skills, getting around in a semblance of order from TO to LDG. The rest is related to learning instrument flying skills, navigation, and becoming comfortable in night operations. We are accepting of a minuscule amount of time in learning to fly multi engine aircraft, and in all honesty, for the most part that time is wasted, the concepts and skills of ME are pretty basic. As an industry since inception we have accepted new pilots being turned around immediately to train new pilots, was ever thus. In the main, these instructors do a creditable job, but it is inherently a lousy concept, but it is what we have always accepted as a norm. The use of simulators has the potential to be a better way of learning, and also it may result in considerable lack of confidence in the student, which can come back and bite. Incorporating basic flight training to beyond solo, simulator, and some advanced flying to give confidence would be a reasonable way to get a pilot into a program with multi crew and oversight that can manage the low experience. That is pretty close to the concept of the MPL.
Centaurus' concern of the new low experience pilot sitting solo in the front end as the old guy, like Centaurus and me have croaked defines the basic level of competency that needs to be assured to have the low time pilot sit in the aircraft without any other assistance.
I believe we need training that speaks more to the actual task the pilot will undertake, appropriate level of supervision, and associated operational limitations that maintain safety of operation. That is more or less the same issue that has existed since 1903, WWI, WW2, 10,000 day war, etc... the only difference is that we continue to improve the training tools that exist, but as always, effective utilisation of the tools lags technology as the rules move at glacial speed. Personally, I would not take issue to competent instructors teaching the majority of sim training in FBT (for nav and procedures including IF), and using FFS for limited tasks related to pattern work, unusual attitudes and similar tasks. Decision making, CRM etc, and much NNCL training is suited to PTT/FBT. For the aircraft flying itself, fly one of the modern LSA's, they outperform most "complex" aircraft and are cost effective, or stay with a 150, or better yet, put the J3 back into production. For advanced flying, strap on an S2A/C or similar. For twin training, it is a part of the FFS, and would give more rational training safer than we do today in a PA30/34 and similar.
There is not a lack of skills or training, there is a lack of imagination and effective resource use.
Mitigation of the risks of low experience or assumed limited competency comes from increased oversight, more restrictive operational limits, and adding good equipment and hopefully some balance of limited experience with pilots that have a modicum of experience but more importantly competency. Irrespective of how well or inadequate the original training and experience was, the majority of the operational learning will occur on line, where there is experiential reinforcement of hopefully remembered concepts and rules.
For basic flying required to fly a hi capacity RPT aircraft in a mature airline, you can consider the basics that exist out of the military training program, and remove the tactical stuff in the most part. Out of a 230-250 hr flight training program, around 150 hrs of that is related to "flight training", the rest is focused towards military centric stuff, formation, low flying, aerobatics, and initial weapons training, which add to the total competency, but are focused outside of the most basic civil task. Out of 150 hrs, the first 20 odd hours are gaining basic flight skills, getting around in a semblance of order from TO to LDG. The rest is related to learning instrument flying skills, navigation, and becoming comfortable in night operations. We are accepting of a minuscule amount of time in learning to fly multi engine aircraft, and in all honesty, for the most part that time is wasted, the concepts and skills of ME are pretty basic. As an industry since inception we have accepted new pilots being turned around immediately to train new pilots, was ever thus. In the main, these instructors do a creditable job, but it is inherently a lousy concept, but it is what we have always accepted as a norm. The use of simulators has the potential to be a better way of learning, and also it may result in considerable lack of confidence in the student, which can come back and bite. Incorporating basic flight training to beyond solo, simulator, and some advanced flying to give confidence would be a reasonable way to get a pilot into a program with multi crew and oversight that can manage the low experience. That is pretty close to the concept of the MPL.
Centaurus' concern of the new low experience pilot sitting solo in the front end as the old guy, like Centaurus and me have croaked defines the basic level of competency that needs to be assured to have the low time pilot sit in the aircraft without any other assistance.
I believe we need training that speaks more to the actual task the pilot will undertake, appropriate level of supervision, and associated operational limitations that maintain safety of operation. That is more or less the same issue that has existed since 1903, WWI, WW2, 10,000 day war, etc... the only difference is that we continue to improve the training tools that exist, but as always, effective utilisation of the tools lags technology as the rules move at glacial speed. Personally, I would not take issue to competent instructors teaching the majority of sim training in FBT (for nav and procedures including IF), and using FFS for limited tasks related to pattern work, unusual attitudes and similar tasks. Decision making, CRM etc, and much NNCL training is suited to PTT/FBT. For the aircraft flying itself, fly one of the modern LSA's, they outperform most "complex" aircraft and are cost effective, or stay with a 150, or better yet, put the J3 back into production. For advanced flying, strap on an S2A/C or similar. For twin training, it is a part of the FFS, and would give more rational training safer than we do today in a PA30/34 and similar.
There is not a lack of skills or training, there is a lack of imagination and effective resource use.
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While all the above are good points, commercial aviation continues to be safer than just about any form of transportation. The cynic in me says there is an "acceptable" hull loss rate, and as long as fatalities remain below a certain level there will not be much motivation to make any changes that will cost a lot of money in terms of pilot hiring or training.
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I personally think working oneself up the ranks from simple, more hands on aircraft makes the more comperent and experienced pilot.
However, having talked to certification staff and test pilots a few years ago, manufacturers are developing their modern aircraft in such a way, that the product is designed so that it can take a maximum amount of bad technique, bad decisions and beatings of the two "monkeys" sitting up in front, to make up and prevent hull loss at any cost by developing technolgy to counteract human error. This allowed low experienced pilots to slip through and low cost MPL concepts for airliners to function, as the machine and SOP would compensate for short-comings.
This seemed to work very well with the one or other exception. And now the 737 Max came along with a failed system, that was an intended further step in automation development - so that they did not even consider training the pilots for the system. A catastrophic failure.
So it remains pretty philosophical - but probably serves best to have both worlds: competent pilots in state of the art engineered aircraft.
In Europe it has become rare because GA is being politically strangled out of existence by every means possible and a narrowbody airliner is usually the only piece of equipment availiable for a 200hr MPL pilot to start on, with only a few exotic exeptions.
However, having talked to certification staff and test pilots a few years ago, manufacturers are developing their modern aircraft in such a way, that the product is designed so that it can take a maximum amount of bad technique, bad decisions and beatings of the two "monkeys" sitting up in front, to make up and prevent hull loss at any cost by developing technolgy to counteract human error. This allowed low experienced pilots to slip through and low cost MPL concepts for airliners to function, as the machine and SOP would compensate for short-comings.
This seemed to work very well with the one or other exception. And now the 737 Max came along with a failed system, that was an intended further step in automation development - so that they did not even consider training the pilots for the system. A catastrophic failure.
So it remains pretty philosophical - but probably serves best to have both worlds: competent pilots in state of the art engineered aircraft.
In Europe it has become rare because GA is being politically strangled out of existence by every means possible and a narrowbody airliner is usually the only piece of equipment availiable for a 200hr MPL pilot to start on, with only a few exotic exeptions.
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but probably serves best to have both worlds: competent pilots in state of the art engineered aircraft.
It takes me back to the decades old urban legend of the man who was given excess salesmanship on all the features of the motorhome he bought, without truly understanding them, nor their limitations. Once on the road, he put the cruise control on, and went to the back to make coffee. The more we have automation, and complex labour/skill saving systems, the more the pilot must recognize that, and the limitations of those systems. If the systems have absolutely no limitations, I guess we don't need the pilots anymore - and I will stop riding in airliners!