Cockpit Video Recorders to become mandatory
 

Received an email yesterday from a friend who works with the FAA in which he says the NTSB are drawing up a submission to the US government to request that Cockpit Video Recorders become mandatory on all US registered airliners by 1st Jan 2014.

Any confirmation of this from someone in the NTSB?

NTSB wants Cockpit Cameras installed ASAP - and gives reasons why

Nothing a well placed piece of chewing gum can't solve! ;)

Video players would also make long boring sectors more fun ;)

Except I think this has to do with video recorders.

However, there is nothing to prevent you from setting-up your iPad somewhere on the panel and watching a movie if you have a particularly long and boring flight!

The 59 year-old FO Gameel El-Batouti was caught exposing himself to underaged females in the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York. He was facing a termination hearing. The SU990 NTSB report leaves little doubt as to the cause of the crash. :ugh:

We have discussed this to death (sic) before on this forum (threads should be merged to avoid duplication) :)

The interest is in the timing of anything new.

The NTSB want stuff because it sounds good re: investigative tools

Those on the pointy end don't like the 100% invasion of privacy while only picking their nose (gut feeling that it may show up on U-twoob)

The pro-active safety professionals have their wants as well but this is not on their short list.

Well, there is the BEA recommendation for cockpit video of the instrument panels from the 3rd AF447 report.

I would like to see cameras in the cargo compartment first. How many fires recently could have been spotted a bit earlier, and how many questions could have been answered in recent accidents with a few cameras well placed in the cargo holds.

While the NTSB is free to recommend to their heart's content, it's another thing entirely for the FAA to adopt the idea. The NTSB has had many many recommendations sit there with no action for years.

This rule seems destined to sit as well, as airlines won't want to pay to install cameras and pilots won't want to be filmed. With countries all over the world deciding to use voice recorders as evidence in criminal prosecutions, I for one have no faith in any guarantee that video would be used solely for accident investigations.

"NTSB says video black-box will help solve plane crashes".
Amazing!
Surely, the best way to "solve plane crashes" is to prevent them happening in the first place.
But this would probably involve the NTSB, Airline management, Pilots, Engineers, ATCOs and Human Factors/Resources (oh, and other 'interested stake-holders'), sitting around a table and having meaningful and constructive 'conversations'. :E

The NTSB or any other entity knows what we say, what keystrokes are inputted to the computer, what control we touch, and even know what's in our overnight and flight bags.

What good would a video recorder do, other than provide goulish entertainment to You Tube right before the aircraft impacted terra firma ??

Being retired gets better every day. :ok:

lomapaseo . . .
 

The same was said 40 years ago about CVRs; did it stop pilots from talking **** in the cockpit?

Fact is, today's sophisticated minature cams can be focused on instrument panels, overhead and pedestal switch positions, NOT on seat occupants. :ooh:

Nobody recently argued that it was impossible to do

The current issue is should it be placed in front of other more productive tasks.

You sure got THAT right !!!

Why does a pilot's job require more privacy than e.g. a flight attendant? There are lots of professionals (both on the low and high end of the pay scale) who have no privacy in their workplace at all - and not by accident, but by the nature of their jobs. In a similar fashion, a job requirement for pilots would be to be observed by a camera at all times while on the job.

Or is the workplace privacy guaranteed in the contract? In this case, the new policy would have to apply to new entrants first and old contracts would have to be negotiated.

Sure, but the pilot community hasn't managed to do that, despite trying for over 100 years. Otherwise, we wouldn't have this discussion now. There isn't even a 100% understanding of what caused some past crashes. So some technical means to help understand past crashes and learn from them seems justified. Every cashier's office with a just few thousand bucks at stake is equipped with a camera recorder today, but a pilot's office with several hundred lives at stake isn't???

Wasn't the same (loss of privacy, no help against crashes) said about the CVR 40 years ago? And where would we be today without experience gained from past crashes using CVR? And how many CVR recordings (not actual crashes, but "pilots picking their noses") did leak to YouTube? There are some juicy recordings made from inadvertent radio transmissions or a stuck mic, but I think there are none extracted from the CVR. So this equipment offers some pretty good privacy.

In my opinion as a cowardly paying pax, pilots willing to sacrifice safety for a little bit of their own privacy simply don't belong in the cockpit.

Not sure about the value of cameras showing pilot's actions in an emergency...

But Use of cameras to see if the inboard engine is still in one piece, check for fuel or hydrolic leaks, or if smoke is evident in the cargo hold seems to be a better use.

Also landing gear cameras could be used to check for fire following a hot and heavy emergency landing.

Would such good video "coverage" of the aircraft reduce the instances where slides are deployed as a precaution after a heavy landing, suspected hot wheel problem or suspected fire in hold?


The next step could be a smoke hood/mask with an option to display instruments. The system could also include a forward looking camera (physically protected from volcanic ash or hail damage until turned on) this camera could also have "night vision" sensor with its own roll and pitch sensor info overlaid as the last line of defence of smoke in the cockpit electrical failure at night. Such a camera could run independently on a small backup battery.


Does seem perverse that there are cameras for the punters to see whats going on but none specifically to help pilots.

Video can be encrypted so even engineers and managers can't view it.
However the public will wonder what pilots have to hide if too much of a fuss is made about privacy!

They don't have a union, mate.

And those CVR's were only allowed after their use in discipline/enforcement was outlawed by statute. The reason they aren't on Youtube is because they are company property.

Your words in God's ear!!!

But no one is interested in actually helping pilots and eventually putting the blame on something outside of the holy "human error" saga.

Too costly for the other sides!

So we can all sit back and relax: The manufacturers themselves will oppose any video in the cockpit. The chances of having proof that the pilot's recount was right or that some system effectively screwed up is just too big!

I can see it now... by mail order... "PILOTS GONE WILD":} available on Blue Ray DVD:ok:

A rather "delicate" incident recorded in a Cathay Pacific A330 flight deck resulted in the loss of the participant's livelyhood with that airline!:}

There are several camera angles which would be very useful to me as pic; wheels relative to taxiway edge, wingtip clearance, cargo hold to confirm or not smoke warning. Depressing to note that none of these are even under discussion while there's an unlimited budget to provide fodder for lawyers.

So why can't a similar use of cockpit video recorders be outlawed too? This wouldn't impact the safety aspect of these cameras in post-crash investigations and would seem a sensible compromise. Even though I personally fail to see any reason for pilots to expect some super privacy. Isn't a cockpit camera (with discipline use allowed) similar to riding with a check pilot every time?

Paying passengers on some airlines are routinely observed by a video camera from the cockpit door - should I expect my nose picking onboard the plane to appear on youtube too? :eek:

Only as stage 3 of a 3 stage process.

Stage one. HD recordings of HR department activities regarding treatment of crew.

Stage two. Ditto, for flight planning/crewing/maintenance

Stage three (budget stretched now). Low def video akin to petrol station (gas station in colonial parlance) monitoring. Super grainy pictures leaving much to the imagination.

SLF here.

I regret to observe that those who never leave the ranch (board members and their lawyers) will always seek to rely on automation / computers / equipment / machines / etc. to do their job for them.

If they were on top of their jobs in recruitment, training and supporting crew in a unique job (which they do not properly understand) then they would not need to shout for ever more machines to cover their @rse.

So - this WILL happen and it will spread around the globe. The only hope is that, once the equipment is being developed - you can at least get some cameras in the hold etc. The weight of these is now down to a few grams and the extra hard disk storage required is, again, very light and cheap. So, doubtless, mgmt will find other reasons to say no. :ugh:

good one!

We can extend that to recordings of top management and board meetings:

'Who decided when, what, based on what indications'.

After all it's the shareholders money, the stakeholders pay and profit share and most of the time even the taxpayers money!

So if someone needs to be liable in a crash, metal or money, it should be possible to identify the responsible gals and guys.

After all we all thrive to improve safety in each and every aspect, don't we?
This includes my money!

Cameras in the cargo hold - good . Thermal imagers in the cargo hold - better. Seeing a 'hot spot' before it bursts into flames might buy some valuable time. Cameras enabling flight deck to have a look see at engine pods, landing gear, etc. - great.
Ac makers griping about cost and weight - plain bs. Every rinky-dink cellphone comes with a hi-res camera the size of a pinhead. Besides, with them ac makers experimenting with electrically powered wheels in order to do away with the towbars,tugs and taxi fuel, crews will need some good cams in lieu of a rearview mirror :)

All do-able technically and pictures could be a help to senior cabin crew in an emergency too...
Time taken to select an image and evaluate the scene precludes the usefulness of cameras in all emergencies though!

OK let me have my flight of fancy..
The camera wish list... select from below according to aircraft type
1 x each engine; cowlings, fluid, fire
2 x wings; flap condition and deployment, snow ice, deicing checks(?) fuel leaks
1 x elevators; snow ice, deicing checks (?)
1 x nosegear; tyre condition, deployment, brake fire.
1 x each main landing gear; tyre condition, deployment, brake fire.
1 x thermal cam in cargo holds; fire, security of cargo
1 x each passenger cabin; general surveillance including doors.
2 x wingtip clearance
1 x night/thermal/nose mounted forward looking; horizon of last resort?

A good image of control surfaces of wings on wide bodied aircraft need 2 or three cameras per wing...
The issues of lighting, glare, shadow and reflection of challenging subjects such as black tyres and reflective fuselage can be mitigated by using new HDR (High Dynamic range) imaging technology.

To reduce cockpit workload, cameras could be grouped into five groups; landing gear, cargo, control surfaces, engines, cabin. Automatically pre-selected into a group of thumbnails on a touch screen according to the phase of flight. Overridden if smoke and fire sensors in hold or engines are activated, whereby relevant cameras would be selected on screen.

The pitots are so important (AF447).... is a dedicated pin size camera/s with led a bad idea?.. would a thermal/night vision "horizon camera" have helped the AF447 crew? once they were out of heavy cloud?

One has to say that an interior shot of the flight deck itself would be the least useful in the above list:ok:

What's the difference between universal gossip and a rumour ?

Just to note, there seem to have been a number of recent incidents where a flight deck camera could have shed some light on why they occurred. In particular, in the AF447 and Ethiopian/Beirut situations the pilots were believed to be pointing at certain instruments and wondering "what it was doing" or whether its value was correct. A camera could inform us as to what instrument was being pointed at. In the Polish/Smolensk crash (and some others), an issue has been whether there was someone extra in the cockpit directing things or distracting from things. Again, a camera would have been highly useful in determining if this was correct, and if so, who it was. In EgyptAir or SilkAir, a camera would have removed all doubt as to whether the loss of control was deliberate, inadvertent, or due to some system failure or external influence.

While there certainly could be privacy issues, I don't think there is much doubt that for evaluating the cause of incidents, they would be quite useful.

Ducking now ...

A camera pointed toward pilots would help identify who is speaking as well as being a pointer to the degree of turbulence/vibration. A camera pointed at the instruments would serve as a backup of sorts if the black box was not recovered. A CF solid state media card can be easily protected as it is so small.

What's recorded in the orange box may not include 100% of what's displayed on the pilots' screens when electrics or software anomalies creep in. :ooh:

Really? Do you have any evidence of that?

What is recorded in an EFIS system is the output from the display management computers. What goes to the screens goes to the FDR.

The questions nobody seems to be asking is, will it improve flight safety or simply make life a little easier for investigators? Have the installation of CVRs prevented any accidents? Will the installation of video prevent any? Prevention is the supposed purpose of these devices.

What will be next? Caps with electrodes so brain activity can be recorded?

Is it not fair to say that the recordings are used to better understand how crews behave during real life emergencies, and adjust training accordingly to help prevent mistakes from happening again.

Yes, that's when everything works.

AF447 orange box did NOT record what was seen on BOTH screens. Read up on the preliminary reported factual data . . . :ooh:

Saying

is very different from saying

The RH displays on AF447 was never going to be recorded by the FDR regardless of the condition of systems or aircraft.

It is even so when not everything works.

The limitations of an FDR is the number of parameters chosen and their sampling rate. Both of which can probably be improved quicker and at less costs than installing one or more video cameras and associated equipment. Most QARs record more detailed data than the FDR already.

The desire to have cameras in the cockpit seems to me to be more about having the latest and shiniest tool even though it does pretty much the same as the old ones.

Old News
 

It appears that the article linked to the original post was written in 2004. I don't know of any recent impetus to install cockpit cameras.

Below quote is from the VS27 flight thread (which relates to a virgin flight turning back this month) where a poster describes action the crew took on a flight to Miami in 2004 following a similar smoke in hold warning.

It is shocking that one has to wait for transfer of heat into the passenger cabin for confirmation of a fire in the hold?


Would a camera in the hold have eased concern in this case? or given the crew of VS27 confidence not to deploy the slides?

Might well have stopped this one:

Link

But then the underlying problem would not have been discovered.

KBPsen . . .
 

Without straining your intellectual capacity, would you agree that your own conclusion and understanding of the limitations of the FDR suggests that a video recording cam would have separately recorded what was displayed on the RH screen? :ooh: