Unless it's going really badly?

Who would know? Is there even evidence they have legs or get out much anymore? Discipline and mindsets - now there's an idea.

Well discipline might be a concept of the past. Forcing somebody to do the right thing may be replace by the more human approach of educating and motivating him.
on second thought discipline might be the cheaper way...

The a/c operator demands an on time departure, its quicker to open them, have a quick look, drop them back down, besides, you're on your own and its tricky/dangerous to try and put the stays in on your own. You need to open them again in a minute anyway so you just leave them like that for now.

You've just dropped the cowls down and are about to latch them....

Enter dispatcher,
"Eng? The captain wants you and we are holding boarding until he speaks to you, by the way we have a slot and the crew go out of hours in 30 mins. "

Enter refueller..

"Eng? The total fuel has stopped short by about 500 kilos and I've got a dash 8 on a quick turn round screaming for fuel!"

Enter loading supervisor...
"Eng? The aft cargo door won't close"

Ring ring..
"Allo, MCC here, the xyz123 will be with you in five minutes with a bev maker leaking all over the fwd galley, it will need a zonal inspection in the avionics bay"

That is not an exaggeration.

Perhaps, but it can also be brow beaten out of you by non technical aviation "professionals" who have no concept of the consequences when interrupting any maintenance task (or even a flight deck briefing).

When driven by performance related pay and an on time departure is a must, some just really do not care.

I make no excuses, just trying to offer a more realistic point of view.

There for the grace of... etc.

On an A320/737 ?

How so ?

Interrupted checks are always dangerous. So it is not the engineer that is causing the problem it is the people repeatedly interrupting that are doing so.

This is a management issue (not as in 'the management' but as in managing the jobs)

Each of those interrupts has differing levels of priority. Rather then the meanest or most friendly obtaining priority the jobs should be added to the engineer job list. Any direct tasking access to the engineer should be avoided, he should finish the job and associated checks then access his job-list to find the next highest priority job. Emergency interrupts to a job should be treated as the job being marked not-started so that there is no 'half finished' job.

Forcing this level of management discipline actually forces 'The Management' to realize when they are overtasking. Managing job allocation is simple with the current information systems and the engineer does not take random inputs just says to the captain, the loading supervisor, the refueller - "put the task on the list with maintenance and they might allocate someone else who is not in the middle of a job."

Ian W
In an ideal world Ian I would agree with you. However, on a line station, at night when there's perhaps only one or two on shift its a different story.

DaveReid

It's windy? You may have a chronic back injury. It may be -10c and you've lost all feeling in your fingers. who knows?

Then the 'management' have to accept the responsibility for putting place a flight safety hazard and the occasional incident caused by interruption of engineering checks. The problem being the 'only one or two on shift' and no organized method of 'tasking'.

Yeah, good luck with that. Something similar is happening in medicine--to reduce errors, nurses that are doing meds are now wearing a "don't talk to me" button while they are doing meds so they don't get sidetracked. Don't know how well it's working.

TURIN's scenario rings very true to me. Yet, until I retired from A320s years ago, I led a comparitively sheltered existence - enjoying longer scheduled turnrounds than the budget carriers, and a mangement that tolerated safety as a higher priority than punctuality.

In the early days, we had only CFMs. As a specialist line-checker, one of my concerns when observing external checks was to confirm that the cowling latches were properly observed as being flush with the nacelle. This can only be done by stooping low, and using a torch at night. my reports often reminded crews that the unlatched fan cowlings hang very low and close.

However short the turnround, the flight crew should check them after any engineering work - even if it's just a routine change of the chip-detectors. If that involves a pilot leaving the cockpit after the last of the pax have boarded, it's not going to delay departure more than 5 minutes at the most on an A319. And no engineer worth his salt would be offended by the flight crew completing a check that is one of its listed responsibilities.

Exactly the kind of thing you need to avoid! That "for now" moment. Is the moment when you may be distracted. Best to not let that moment occur in the first place. It only takes 30sec to latch the cowls!

I agree Ian

I recently had a dispatcher carry a tech log across from another aircraft, whilst I was changing a brake unit.

"I only need a quick signature"! He said.
":mad:"
He soon went off with his tail between his legs!:)

Without wishing to be a killjoy, I haven't seen anything in this thread that hasn't already been covered in the 1000+ posts following the BA A319 incident.

Dave,

Does that include your own contributions? ;)

Put the hinges on the bottom and the latches on top. :}

I was waiting for someone to ask that. :O

But yes, I'm as guilty as anyone else of simply rehashing what has already been discussed at length following the BA event.

With the fan cowl doors formerly, if not still, subcontracted to Bombardier Belfast.