You'd be amazed how much SA you have what the other guy is doing after just a bit of time on fifi. Very responsive to handfly, too.

That being said, you're senior to me... it sucks, I hate it and you will, too.

Chuckle. Does the little fifi side stick thingy smack you in the giblets when the other guy pulls it full aft? That's how I know. ;)

I needed more room for my giblets due to them being so frequently smacked. The sidestick is much more appropriate to someone of my masculinity.

Yeah... that's the ticket.

I understand. I'm a metrosexual now, living in LA, as my giblets have been smacked frequently over time from under performing junior pilots. I always know where their yoke is.

I used to be masculine. I promise. Ask my wife.

Kindly go back and re read who the above referenced quote was directed to. (Hint: it was satchip, not you)

To keep my response (above) in context, here's exactly what satchip said:

What he claimed I implied is a complete misrepresentation of what I actually said. But you knew that already.

Yes, I remember, you described the article as "psychobabble." I don't know when you got hired but CRM has, in my opinion, made for a much better cockpit environment than we had in the 1980s. Back then there was little standardization and many Captains just did their own thing. CRM training was a little hokey in the beginning (the 90s) but it has come a long way since then. I thought the writer did a very good job of describing the history of the culture, its problems, and where we are now. You called it "cringeworthy" and "psychobabble." To each his own.

Then, your "discussion" went on to outrageously boast that such a similar accident could never happen at DAL because "we hire experienced pilots." That comment reeks of arrogance to me. The AF447 pilots obviously made mistakes. Critical mistakes that cost them their lives. It's fine to Monday morning quarterback them, it's important to do so for us to learn from their mistakes and hopefully not repeat them. But it's wrong, in my opinion, to claim that our pilots are immune from misreading instruments, misjudging, making bad decisions, etc... The fact is we're not. We're human.

Index,

CRM has improved safety. It is my opinion the biggest improvement has been active pilot monitoring.

Point of fact, Delta pilots had the exact same failure on more than one occasion and dealt with it. MD88 pilots seem to have that kind of failure every couple of weeks or so. :cool:

My criticism of the article was that the author, credible as he may be, went far beyond what those in the air safety community would consider a scientific consideration of objective findings. The article was written to entertain. That sort of subjective voyeurism isn't really helpful.

It is maintained the reason Air France and Delta's similar systems failures had much different outcomes came down to training and experience. (thanks to our stagnation, we are tremendously experienced :o )

Was there a CRM failure and a systems failure? Yes, those too. Like many accidents there is a long list of things of contributing factors and had not those links in the chain come together we wouldn't be having this discussion.

I though the airspeed inop thing at NW happened in the daylight? That might have helped the AF guys realize how high they were holding the pitch, vs. the dark of night.

We also had that AHRS fault Quantas had, but I do not know Airbus systems well enough to get into it. There were more than a few instances where our f-NWA bros demonstrated good pilot mojo.

Hey I know you're just making a joke. But please don't forget this is a public forum. The MD-88 has a very good safety record. You want to make jokes about the airplane... fine. But please don't imply the airplane is unsafe on a public forum where the intent of your post could be misunderstood. Thank you.