Sell me the Monitored Approach
 

How does it improve things over the normal way to fly a plane?

Brilliant for what it was designed for, low vis approaches to cat1 or cat 2 minimas in aircraft with limited or no automatics as the landing pilot doesn’t have to try to acquire the runway visually whilst flying on instruments at the same time.

In aircraft types where low vis approaches are flown automatically probably not so necessary, although personally I think cat3a approaches where the captain takes over when visual but up until then the f/o has flown the approach and flys the go around if needed are better than the system where the captain does the whole thing and the f/o monitors. But that’s a personal opinion, and others will think differently.

Having started my career with self-flown approaches, then transitioned to monitored ones, I’ve got used to the whole idea. Doesn’t mean it’s the absolute best for everything but I like the concept of at least one pilot thinking mostly about the G/A approaching DA/MDH. It also shares the workload, and involves the non-landing pilot in the operation to a greater degree than spending the whole flight watching someone else.

It also helps with stability. At 1,000R or whatever on a monitored approach, you have to assess how it’s going: if you don’t like it, you tell the other guy to G/A or simply do not take control, which effectively forces a G/A, which is easier to do than when you’re flying the whole thing and have fixated on the landing, with the PM on the edge of their seat.

On the whole, it’s a bit more CRM-y and inclusive, which is the way modern flying is.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....a7bbb12557.png

Try quickly saying the colours not the words. It takes up to three seconds to change a complex cognitive task, such as switching from instrument flying to visual flying. The Big Airline pioneered monitored approaches (and otjers helped) so that P2 flies the instrument approach and potentially the instrument missed approach while P1 takes over if visual requirements are met in time, preventing the handling pilot from having to switch cognitive tasks.
It’s also a great tool to help force a stable approach as P1 can’t take control until the aircraft is past 1000 radio AND fully stable (speed/slope/config), helping crews with a maxed out rushed approach make the correct decision and go around.
Finally it’s a great tool to force a crew to come up with an agreed plan from TOD to 1000 radio meaning briefings are thorough assisting crew SA and allowing the other pilot to intervene if the agreed plan or gates aren’t met.

Im sure I’ve missed something but is that enough?

I know many here will roll their eyes at this, however would you rather sitting in 1A quaffing champagne behind a crew flying a monitored approach or one who’s briefing was “standard Mykonos*). *pick an airfield of your choice.

Now I’m not saying it’s the only way to do it and lots of very professional crews fly very safe approaches “unmonitored “, however it’s all about marginal gains. When it all unravels and the holes in the cheese line up, it might just be the monitored approach that puts a barrier between a crew and an accident. Ever read the report of a British registered A320 at Glasgow when the Captain suddenly announced “I’m going Visual” and the First Officer replied “are you sure?”. They were lucky they were in an A320 in normal law. It wasn’t necessarily a stability problem, however an agreed plan would certainly have helped.

I hope that makes sense? Not preaching, just saying why it’s done, and I’m sure many will disagree.

ATB

LD

Edited to add that the control handover is different for approaches planned to terminate with an autoland.

Always liked it on difficult weather/wind days. As commander you can be P1/PM (with capacity to mange the big picture) during the approach and yet still take it for the landing.

Also facilitates a good brief. As P1 you’re briefing (before descent) the P2/PF (for the approach) on how you’d like them to fly the approach you’ll subsequently land. Very interactive. Easier to monitor the execution of a plan you’ve conceived and briefed.

All approaches are monitored!

Locked Door is spot on.
Monitored Approaches allow one Pilot to stay unloaded and concentrate on decision making and eliminates that quite demanding moment of transition from instruments to visual. I thought they were great. Unfortunately a change of Training Department saw them go. Pity.

Flying the A320 now, so really don't think that would be a better approach to how we do it (pun intended). When I flew turbo-props, doing non coupled approaches, I did like it. The PF, for us the FO, would be concentrating on flying the approach on instruments, and if nothing happened by the time he reached the DDA/DA, he would continue to fly, and at mins would call "Go Around" and fly the missed. The PM, in our case the PIC, would scan in and out, and if it was clear a successful landing could be made, he would say "my controls, landing", and land the plane, with the FO becoming PM. For me it seemed to work better than to be scanning instruments, and hearing "runway", and having to look outside searching for runway while hand flying. We flew a lot of non-precession approaches where the runway would not be 200 feet below and 2/3 of a mile straight ahead at mins...

The diff in a monitored approach vs a normal approach is in the fact that the Capt is PM. This allows the Capt (the pilot with the most experience and responsibility) to monitor. The Capt/PM is also always heads up in final phases of the approach, therefore allowing for an easy assessment of the landing conditions at minima. In my last company, it was used for all Cat II/III and NPA approaches with cloud base and viz below a certain limit. It works well. I know SAA used it for decades, BA also I believe. Who else?

Just for the avoidance of confusion, for an autoland the Captain is P1 and takes control at 1000 radio and looks out, the F/O remains on instruments throughout.

For a manual landing either pilot can be P1 or P2 with complete role reversal, it’s not a Capt / FO thing. If the F/O is P1 they will take over and land at the appropriate point just as the Captain would if they were P1.

For those that aren’t familiar, P1 is the handling pilot for the takeoff, climb and cruise and runs the pre descent briefing. P2 becomes the handling pilot just before TOD and flies the approach and P1 takes over and performs the landing once stable and below 1000R.

CM. All approaches are monitored! :ok:

Use of the monitored (shared) approach depends on the situation; the context of an approach.
Some situations warrant offloading the physical workload of the more experienced pilot enabling more time to assess the overall situation, e.g. a complex approach pattern or time critical decisions in low visibility operations.

On other occasions there are advantages in the more experienced pilot handling the aircraft for both the approach and landing, particularly where the manual feel of the aircraft is important - abnormal ops, limiting crosswinds. Getting into the loop early.

It is important to have a company philosophy, flexible - not a fixed SOP, with awareness of the risks of old style flying ‘all approaches captain only’. Thus using experience wisely, yet still enabling the less experienced pilot to gain experience for ‘command’ monitoring and assessment, decision making, and handling the aircraft.

The level of automation available, decision cue lights, verbal rad alt, and weather are other variables.
Also to have a specific procedure; verbal only is time limited thus min height restrictions. A mix of verbal / manual - hand tap on the thrust levers should meet the most stringent conditions in low visibility.
(Yes, PF has a hand on the thrust levers).

Crew awareness in low vis will be improved by the head up pilot providing a commentary - “contact”, “centreline, crossbar”, “green threshold”, “runway” etc; stating colour is useful.

There is no hard sell of a monitored approach; its your choice after examining contributory factors with reasoned judgment.

This issue is the classic ‘there is no definitive answer’ - ‘it depends’; uncertainties which the industry dislikes and often constrains with procedures with little thought of the factors above - ‘there is no one fits all’ in aviation.

I’ve flown three different monitored approach procedures.
BEA where the captain monitored the power with the copilot doing the poling..rubbish and developed because some of our older guys (late 40s plus) couldn’t cope with the beast. Often the senior copilot changed seats from P3 if it was going to be on limits.
Secondly BOAC where one pilot monitors the other along with the flight engineer(who had his own set of levers and would set power called for). Worked well and much easier to fly than the with analogue auto throttle with its lag.
Third was SR where the training was to a higher standard. CAT 1 either we could fly a manual approach and land although if the cloud base was below 500ft I would elect as a copilot to do a monitored approach with the captain landing purely because we were in the business of transporting passengers.
CAT 1 monitored could be hand flown and had a continue phase from minimum’s to 100 ft where the copilot would expect the captain to take over although he could still fly a manual go around.
I watched a naughty one from the jump seat after the MD80 diverted to Gatwick where continue was called although nowt was seen and at 100ft there was maybe a centre line light visible.
Part of the problem nowadays is the reduction of training and experience before a line pilot is released without a supernumerary. It can be a one man band. How it works with old f@rts relying on the automatics and fatigue is another question.
I would add that I’ve had control taken from me, taken control from others and regretted that I hadn’t taken control earlier or properly but that’s all 25 years plus ago.
Still a fan of a well executed monitored approach.

Thank you guys/gals. Must say, my eyes have been opened somewhat.

I think CW247 you are process orientated versus outcome orientated.

What is the desired outcome? A safe and controlled, stabilised landing in any/inclement weather.

Does the monitored versus non-monitored approach produce any verifiable difference? If so; choose your process accordingly. If no difference in the data then it’s whatever you personally choose.

If you choose a process when there is no verifiable difference then you are kidding yourself.

bp, “Part of the problem nowadays is the reduction of training and experience before a line pilot is released without a supernumerary. It can be a one man band.” Interesting thoughts.

Reduced training because past operations indicate a high level of safety. Assumption that past safety can be equated to to future risk.
Low experience Captains, self training on the job, favours Captain only procedure; with inherent risks of low experience. Also, few if any opportunities for the other crew to gain experience. (cf crosswind limits)

A downhill spiral; but then perhaps the industry is ‘safe enough’ for these operations - until the next event. (Side debate is if simulation provides sufficient ‘experience’ for actual operations vs the non-reality of being in a ‘training machine’).

Boeing 99, re outcome.
Outcome may not reflect the actual risk of the operation, where for the same conditons outcomes can differ.

Not ‘what’ was achieved (history, outcome), but ‘how’ this is to be achieved (future, a judgement) - monitored approach procedure - process.
Past success (outcome) is no guide to the future, only complacency.

Personally, I never like the change of PM and PF at TOD. I find it weird to suddenly change roles at this point, after hours as PF, having flown and guided the aircraft from push-back to TOD to the best of my ability, only to have the descent, STAR and approach, meeting all the speed and altitude constraints - the fun stuff - done by PM !
Likewise, as PM it doesn't feel quite right to fly "someone else's" descent and approach. If conditions are low viz or dictate an auto-land, then PF can still be PF from taxi out to DH, and PM can still be eyes out and change roles at DH to land.

If conditions are windy with low cloud base rather than still air, misty low viz, I find it much better for the landing pilot to manually fly it in from at least 4 miles - preferably 7 - to get into the groove, so by the time they get to DA/DH, their control responses are tuned in and up to speed, enabling a nicely coordinated and well controlled decrab and touch-down. By doing this PF will also know how close to control limits they might be getting, giving them a more informed opinion about whether to go-around or continue, (visibility notwithstanding).

Being given an aeroplane at around DA/DH on a windy day to flare, decrab and land without having had a few miles to get used to the conditions of a bad weather day is quite challenging ! - arguably more so than looking up from the instruments to the runway and transitioning to visual flying.

Pea
My point is that on initial training jet fleet a new copilot with a low number of sectors let loose on a normal line captain without a safety pilot can be a liability.
Simulator flying is not line flying and automatics aren’t a substitute for skill and experience.
When the whale was introduced a mate who had been fleet training manager on a smaller Bus phoned me as he was dropped in the deep end having to train from both seats without anyone supervising..in his 60s it was too much INHO.

Judging by the crosswind landings seen on YouTube it seems many pilots these days do not decrab in a crosswind - is it now acceptable to land with drift? Have the aircraft manufacturers beefed up landing gear to cope with the stresses? To us old timers it looks like abuse of the machinery!

You old timers are the management and training pilots of today who dictate to and create the standard to which new pilots train to. So where does the buck stop? Training departments who are so afraid of management that the AP is the only choice?

safetypee; you take my thoughts further - the ongoing outcome that is desired is safe and stable approaches and landings. A one-offf is irrelevant. So again if the ongoing outcome of unmonitored approaches results in the same level of safety as monitored approaches then the choice is personal taste/operator’s belief and it’s not based on data, just inertia and possibly a sense of “we’ve always done it this way and it’s worked out well so far”.

The only large operator I can think of that does monitored approaches has had a series of reasonable high profile failures in procedures in the last few years - cowlings at LHR/RTO at LAX/Gear pins at LHR. Maybe it’s time to have an honest appraisal of the processes and frank look at what the desired outcomes are.

@Discorde, abuse it certainly is, and there is no excuse for not aligning the aircraft with the runway during the flare just before touch-down; that's what the rudder pedals are for. But let's not open that can of worms !!

To quote the Airbus FCTM

"In the case of strong crosswind, in the de-crab phase, the PF should be prepared to add small bank angle into the wind in order to maintain the aircraft on the runway centerline. The aircraft may be landed with a partial de-crab (residual crab angle up to about 5 °) to prevent excessive bank. This technique prevents wingtip (or engine nacelle) strike caused by an excessive bank angle."

Boeingdriver99

What have either of those events got to do with monitored approaches? Please try to stick to a reasoned debate not unnecessary mud slinging.

Every airline has had incidents, the important thing is to learn from them and increase safety.

In a highly reliable industry it is difficult to assess safety from outcome - failures; we don’t know; and the important issue is ‘knowing what we don’t know’.

There are many factors which could be cited as contributing to modern safety, we cannot quantify them, more often because of human involvement - the human contribution.
The industry judges that CRM and SMS contribute to safety, but we are unable to explain why, thus we are reluctant to ‘ditch’ them. The most quantifiable safety improvement is from technology, where the latest systems appear more reliable than humans; but alternatively we don’t know how often (or how) humans saved the day - adjustments in normal operation.

Where monitored approaches are judged (not proven) to have equivalent safety to alternative procedures, then the advantages of wider experience for all crew members could be beneficial, but always dependent on context. With the very latest systems the least experienced pilot could fly and monitor a fail-op auto-land, experiencing the real visual conditions - placing the simulator in perspective, but still retaining the more experience pilot as an overall monitor. Correspondingly simulator training would focus using technology, and avoidance of adverse human involvement. (See Ziegler's views; BD99 thread in Safety, CRM, … )
Again, depends on context, it is not a universal answer.

The value of this type of thread is its subjective nature; many views and opinions, which if well argued, in context, provide valuable knowledge of airline and equipment operation;- what happens in everyday operations and a more meaningful view of safety.

Because as safetypee points out it is difficult to assess safety from outcomes. Systems and procedures are where one should look for safety because safety is occurring all the time! More often that not things happen safely. But when things go wrong it can be a sign of systemic problems - larger issues within an organisation as a whole with regards to attitudes and attitudes to procedures and design of procedures. For example; doing things a certain way because they’ve always been done that way without regard for hard data.

I don’t think noting three separate incidents that are all of public record and all had procedural errors all under a large, linked system is ‘mud-slinging’ but I do think calling ‘mud-slinging’ is taking it personally and introducing emotion into a pretty emotionless conversation.

Never flown a monitored approach, but I read this thread with interest. Particularly the bits about one pilot telling the other pilot how the approach will be flown.

Is this something that’s briefed in Europe? Unless I’m doing something wildly out of the ordinary, or unexpected, I don’t even know exactly how I’m going to fly my approach until I get there. The plan changes as the situation progresses, and you just adapt and carry on.

The other thing that gives me pause with the monitored concept is how does one learn from one’s mistakes? Traditionally, if the PF screws up, he/she has a chance to recover, or GA and try again. This seems like it’d be difficult with monitored approaches.

I appreciate the potential benefit of a monitored approach of the wx is sketchy, but for normal operations, it does seem a bit superfluous. But again, I’m looking in from the outside.

Yes, only done it a couple of times but I don't like swapping PF and PM roles at TOD. A certain large B ritish A irline used to do this, but I never flew for them.

It disrupts the flow of the flight in my head, whether I am PF or PM. And as you say, telling the other pilot how you want them to fly the descent and approach is weird and anyway you don't know exactly until you get there.

If conditions (or an auto-land) dictate that PM looks outside on finals and lands the aircraft, fine, but otherwise, I don't like swapping at TOD.

1) The procedure puts an absolute stop to willingly busting minima/stabilization criteria by PIC under older-generation CRM environments (with steep cockpit gradients and more). Hopefully, superfluous now.
2) On paper it looks much worse than it actually is.
3) It requires a positive decision to proceed towards the landing. Very different from the required positive decision to G/A, which is not easy to build under all circumstances. Pages 19-20 here [year 2000] and Page 48 here [year 2018]. You don't need to be go-around minded, the procedure is.

I flew at Big Airways for a while in the pre change of hands days and witnessed the angst when the process changed..”don’t like taking control on finals “ etc etc…..some people got so het up about the idea you’d have thought the management had threatened to shoot their pet dog..

…and then it was introduced and after a very short while I think everybody pretty much shrugged their shoulders and wondered what all the fuss had been about..


Buy the concept or not, it’s really not a big deal.

You completely misunderstand what a monitored approach is. No one is telling anyone HOW to fly the approach. The handover is effortless. It can be done pre TOD or even as late as the beginning of vectors for the approach. As with any other aspects of airline ops, if the training is up to scratch there is no issue. It’s simply a different way of doing the same thing. I’ve done it for 20yrs in B727, B744, A320, A330, A340 and A350. No issue at all. Train as you fight, fight as you train.

After the merger, back in the late 1980s, the BA flight operations management team was doing a lot of work (and arguing) trying to agree and introduce a common operating policy across all BA aircraft types. There were clear benefits from achieving this. Despite this, on the 747 Classic fleet, we decided in the end not to introduce the monitored approach mainly because of the perceived resistance that would probably have come from a significant proportion of the line crews, in particular the long-established longhaul pilots. Also, the flight engineers said they found it confusing trying to follow who was doing what, when and to whom.

However, for non-precision approaches, we did inroduce the montored/split/shared approach (call it what you will) because it worked very well in marginal conditions for the reasons stated by several of the posters on this thread. On a fleet which was due to be phased out in a few years time there seemed little reason to make the change for precision approaches where auto-coupling or autoland was available.

Were we right in not making the change? I believe so, because it is important for all crew members to have confidence in the SOPs and for them all to be singing from the same hymn sheet.

Never right or wrong; judged after consulting the users.
Safety is what we do; something was done.

:ok:

I think that’s a good summary of some of the important plus points. I can’t speak for any other operation, but where I work it’s not one person telling another what to do; it is HOW we as a crew are going to carry out a successful conclusion to the flight. A good briefing is interactive and can lead to changes of plan when problems and solutions are identified, whether you are doing a monitored approach or not. The P1 saying I’m going to do this, this and this while P2 sits in silence is no better than the P1 instructing the P2 to do it this way and no other. As FD says, monitored approaches help with cockpit gradients, even unintentional ones, plus checks and balances are more built-in.

After a while operating like this, it just feels natural, and handing control over after a nicely flown NPA or whatever, with the aircraft stable and in the best position to land that you can achieve is professionally rewarding in the same way that flying all the way down and putting it on the numbers is. It is easier, IMO, to one-man-band / fighter pilot an aircraft than it is to bring everyone one along with you, but the second scenario is the safer and often more successful one.

One of the best posts that I have looked at. Great post.

This is sadly the norm for many operators. Mentality like "safety is there, guaranteed". Destination minded all the way. Do not disrupt the network. Efficiency no matter what while in the corners of safety. Of course no guidance is documented because managers will have issues with CAA, but many operators expect you to deal with an issue firstly efficiently, and thats bad prioritization because it hides many dangers of misjudgement by the line pilots. There is no limit on how deep you get in that s**t.

“Sell me the monitored approach”

Why?

If your employer specifies flying your own approaches, then do it. On the other hand, if your employer is Big Airways, then expect to fly what is called ‘monitored approaches’. If you don’t want to fly the latter then don’t work for Big Airways!

I’ve seen some here stating they don’t know ‘how’ they are going to fly their approach until they get there. Well if you don’t know, how in the hell is the other pilot supposed to know when you go off piste? How are they supposed to helpfully monitor?

If we are talking safety, I can think of many, many, many landing/overrun/hot approach, accidents involving self flown approaches. I’m actually struggling to think of any accidents/incidents where one pilot’s approach is to be followed by another pilot’s landing? Am I wrong?

If it didn’t work well, you can take it from me, any big airline would have knocked it on the head years ago!

Also facilitates a more inclusive briefing - ie) how are you going to fly the approach for my landing? What modes are you going to use, what speed gates are you going to agree on etc? Rather than PF just droning on about the ILS frequency and course! Boeing recommend disconnecting A/P around 300-600ft AAL in order to transition to manual flight before the flare.

BOAC did it for many years with very few incidents until the BEA mafia arrived after they had changed their monitored approach “change hands” style..seem to remember the latter had quite a few incidents. Neither the airmiss with the stationary hotel nor the 777 prang demonstrated that the new BEA procedures were foolproof. (For the latter the captain ordered PF to uncouple from the glideslope which didn’t happen allowing the speed to fall below min drag until stall protection kicked in).
As for approach briefing any professional outfit does it with or without monitored approach.

This is kind of what I was getting at in my earlier question. I don’t know what speeds and modes I’m planning to use, let alone talk to someone else about it.

CA, I don’t think the idea is to say to the P2: “...and then reduce the speed to 180kts flap 5, asking for the flap lever to be moved then using the MCP to select the speed, then arm the glide slope capture with the APP button...”, etc. etc. It's more like “Supposing we get a sidestep on to the parallel runway at a late stage, how close in can we sensibly do it, and is it going to be different IMC/VMC?” or “If they clear us for the RNAV onto the opposite end, not the ILS, what are the traps to watch out for?” or “What do you think would be a sensible speed/config at XXXXX, given it’s a 3.3deg slope with a possible tailwind and a density altitude of 9,000'?"

I can’t speak for anyone else but that’s how I generally run things; you’ve all (including “heavy” pilots who may be up the front for the approach and landing) had a chance to discuss what may catch you out and how to avoid/mitigate it. That makes it a bit easier to monitor, although there are always the “unknown unknowns”.

Thanks FullWings. That makes more sense. Your briefings are still a lot more comprehensive than ours, but at least I can sort of buy what you’re selling.

It would be interesting for me to observe a line flight for a European operator.

"BRITISH AIRWAYS FLIGHT MANUAL CLARIFICATION
Of the procedure known in the US as a "monitored approach":

page1image48141616

page1image48147872British Airways Flight Operations Department Notice ...

page1image48166672There appears to be some confusion over the new pilot role titles. The following will hopefully clear

page1image47988080up any misunderstandings.

page1image47990672The titles P1, P2 and co-pilot will now cease to have any meaning within the BA Operations

page1image47998768Manual. They are to be replaced by:

page1image48002384Handling Pilot, Non-Handling pilot, Handling Landing Pilot, Non-Handling Landing Pilot, Handling

page1image48010368Non-Handling Pilot and Non-Handling Non-Landing Pilot.

page1image48015072A. The Landing Pilot is initially the Handling Pilot and will handle the take-off and landing except in

page1image48024000role reversal when he/she is the Non-Handling Pilot for taxi until the Handling Non-Landing Pilot,

page1image48032352hands the Handling to the Landing Pilot at eighty knots.

page1image48037632B. The Non-Landing (Non-Handling, since the Landing Pilot is Handling) Pilot reads the checklist to

page1image48045984the Handling Pilot until after Before Descent Check List completion, when the handling Landing

page1image48602192pilot hands the handling to the Non-Handling Non-Landing Pilot who then becomes the Handling

page1image48780544Non-Landing Pilot.

C. The Landing pilot is the Non-Handling Pilot until the "decision altitude" call, when the Handling

Non-Landing Pilot hands the handling to the Non-Handling Landing Pilot, unless the latter calls "go

around', in which case the Handling Non-Landing pilot continues handling and the Non-Handling

Landing Pilot continues non handling until the next call of "land" or "go around", as appropriate.

page1image48805936In view of the recent confusion over these rules, it was deemed necessary to restate them clearly.

page1image48814768This then should eliminate any confusion."