Pilot Machismo and Safety
11-20-2007, 06:46 PM
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Pilot Machismo and Safety
This is an article by James Wallace, aerospace reporter for the PI.
In March 1977, two fully loaded 747 passenger planes collided on a foggy runway on the island of Tenerife, killing everyone on the KLM plane and many on the Pan Am jet. It remains the deadliest crash in aviation history
But 30 years later, the most important safety lesson learned from the deaths of those 583 people has apparently still not taken deep root in some parts of Asia, where air travel is growing faster than anyplace else.
When the pilot in command of a commercial jetliner is not in control of the situation and safety is compromised, the co-pilot has a duty to speak up and take over.
It didn't happen in the cockpit of the KLM 747 at Tenerife, and it didn't happen in March of this year when a Garuda Indonesia 737-400 crashed at an airport in southern Java.
The National Transportation Safety Committee in Indonesia recently made public a detailed report of the 737 accident. The incompetence of the pilot in command of the Boeing jet is stunning. But even as the pilot ignored nearly two dozen audible cockpit alarms that the plane was landing much too fast, and at too steep an angle, the co-pilot just sat there in the right seat and went along with his captain as the speeding 737 approached the runway. The subsequent crash killed 20 of the 133 passengers on the plane, some of them media, as well as one flight attendant.
Both pilots survived. It remains to be seen whether they will be prosecuted.
"There has been a long, long list of accidents that could have been prevented if the pilot was not seen as God and the co-pilot had spoken up," said aviation author John Nance of Tacoma, a former 737 pilot for Alaska Airlines and now aviation safety consultant for ABC News.
That cockpit culture has changed in the United States and in Europe, but not everywhere, and especially not in some parts of Asia, Nance said. However, he noted that Chinese airlines have embraced the change in cockpit culture.
"Doctors are trained the same way. The natural propensity is we are supposed to be Capt. Kirk," Nance said of the fictional commander of the starship Enterprise. "But humans are fallible. If you have someone who is operating as if they are infallible then you are going to have crashes."
The Garuda Indonesia 737 landed at 221 knots, or 87 knots too fast, overran the runway, broke apart and exploded in flames.
The accident report said the pilot, during the airport approach, ignored a number of cockpit alarms that were going off, warning about the plane's excessive "sink rate" and also about "low terrain."
As the jet neared the ground at 1,517 feet per minute, the onboard ground proximity warning system twice sounded an audible "whoop, whoop, pull up, pull up."
A few seconds later, the co-pilot told the captain to "go around," meaning abort the landing. The captain only said to the co-pilot, "Landing checklist completed, right?" and continued with the landing.
When the jet hit the runway the co-pilot again told the captain to "go around." He did not and the plane crashed. Both pilots were uninjured.
The accident investigation report faulted the pilot for being "fixated on a particular thing rather than flying the plane correctly." It also said the co-pilot did not take control of the jet as company policy required.
"I'm not surprised," Nance said of what happened in the 737 cockpit. "The same problems still exist in some other places -- anywhere you have this macho attitude -- usually male -- that the pilot is God."
In the Tenerife disaster, the pilot in command of the KLM 747 was the airline's most senior captain and head of safety. He started the takeoff roll in the fog without proper clearance from the control tower. The KLM plane smashed into the Pam Am 747 that was still taxiing on the same runway. The KLM co-pilot was aware that the tower had not cleared the plane to take off, but he did not stop his captain from doing so.
With that accident, the issue of how a cockpit crew interacts with each other became "non-ignorable," Nance said. "We could no longer dance around the issue."
But it would take the December 1978 crash in Portland of a United Airlines jetliner with 181 passengers on board to set in motion a program to change that cockpit culture. The other two crew members in the cockpit of the United jet were so intimidated by the pilot in command they did not communicate their concerns about low fuel. As a result of that accident, United initiated the industry's first Crew Resource Management program, which is now used to train airline pilots around the world.
"It was extremely simple, but the execution involved a massive cultural change," Nance said.
Today, U.S. airlines make it clear to captains that they will be fired if they don't listen to the co-pilot. And co-pilots know they will be fired for not speaking up and taking charge in certain unsafe conditions.
But the Crew Resource Management program has obviously not changed the cockpit culture everywhere.
Nance noted that for almost five years, from the time of the crash of American Airlines flight 587 in the Queens neighborhood of New York in 2001, there was not one passenger death on a commercial jetliner in the United States.
That shows just how well the program has worked, he said.
"There is no other explanation. It's not mechanical. It is because of that change in culture in the cockpit, and where we see that culture has not changed we are still having the same kinds of accidents."
In April, less than a month after the Garuda accident, the airline issued a notice to its pilots reinforcing its mandatory policy that the co-pilot take over and execute a "go around" during an unsafe landing approach. Garuda stated there would be no disciplinary action taken against the co-pilot in such cases.
This is the NTSB report:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/dayart...rudareport.pdf
In March 1977, two fully loaded 747 passenger planes collided on a foggy runway on the island of Tenerife, killing everyone on the KLM plane and many on the Pan Am jet. It remains the deadliest crash in aviation history
But 30 years later, the most important safety lesson learned from the deaths of those 583 people has apparently still not taken deep root in some parts of Asia, where air travel is growing faster than anyplace else.
When the pilot in command of a commercial jetliner is not in control of the situation and safety is compromised, the co-pilot has a duty to speak up and take over.
It didn't happen in the cockpit of the KLM 747 at Tenerife, and it didn't happen in March of this year when a Garuda Indonesia 737-400 crashed at an airport in southern Java.
The National Transportation Safety Committee in Indonesia recently made public a detailed report of the 737 accident. The incompetence of the pilot in command of the Boeing jet is stunning. But even as the pilot ignored nearly two dozen audible cockpit alarms that the plane was landing much too fast, and at too steep an angle, the co-pilot just sat there in the right seat and went along with his captain as the speeding 737 approached the runway. The subsequent crash killed 20 of the 133 passengers on the plane, some of them media, as well as one flight attendant.
Both pilots survived. It remains to be seen whether they will be prosecuted.
"There has been a long, long list of accidents that could have been prevented if the pilot was not seen as God and the co-pilot had spoken up," said aviation author John Nance of Tacoma, a former 737 pilot for Alaska Airlines and now aviation safety consultant for ABC News.
That cockpit culture has changed in the United States and in Europe, but not everywhere, and especially not in some parts of Asia, Nance said. However, he noted that Chinese airlines have embraced the change in cockpit culture.
"Doctors are trained the same way. The natural propensity is we are supposed to be Capt. Kirk," Nance said of the fictional commander of the starship Enterprise. "But humans are fallible. If you have someone who is operating as if they are infallible then you are going to have crashes."
The Garuda Indonesia 737 landed at 221 knots, or 87 knots too fast, overran the runway, broke apart and exploded in flames.
The accident report said the pilot, during the airport approach, ignored a number of cockpit alarms that were going off, warning about the plane's excessive "sink rate" and also about "low terrain."
As the jet neared the ground at 1,517 feet per minute, the onboard ground proximity warning system twice sounded an audible "whoop, whoop, pull up, pull up."
A few seconds later, the co-pilot told the captain to "go around," meaning abort the landing. The captain only said to the co-pilot, "Landing checklist completed, right?" and continued with the landing.
When the jet hit the runway the co-pilot again told the captain to "go around." He did not and the plane crashed. Both pilots were uninjured.
The accident investigation report faulted the pilot for being "fixated on a particular thing rather than flying the plane correctly." It also said the co-pilot did not take control of the jet as company policy required.
"I'm not surprised," Nance said of what happened in the 737 cockpit. "The same problems still exist in some other places -- anywhere you have this macho attitude -- usually male -- that the pilot is God."
In the Tenerife disaster, the pilot in command of the KLM 747 was the airline's most senior captain and head of safety. He started the takeoff roll in the fog without proper clearance from the control tower. The KLM plane smashed into the Pam Am 747 that was still taxiing on the same runway. The KLM co-pilot was aware that the tower had not cleared the plane to take off, but he did not stop his captain from doing so.
With that accident, the issue of how a cockpit crew interacts with each other became "non-ignorable," Nance said. "We could no longer dance around the issue."
But it would take the December 1978 crash in Portland of a United Airlines jetliner with 181 passengers on board to set in motion a program to change that cockpit culture. The other two crew members in the cockpit of the United jet were so intimidated by the pilot in command they did not communicate their concerns about low fuel. As a result of that accident, United initiated the industry's first Crew Resource Management program, which is now used to train airline pilots around the world.
"It was extremely simple, but the execution involved a massive cultural change," Nance said.
Today, U.S. airlines make it clear to captains that they will be fired if they don't listen to the co-pilot. And co-pilots know they will be fired for not speaking up and taking charge in certain unsafe conditions.
But the Crew Resource Management program has obviously not changed the cockpit culture everywhere.
Nance noted that for almost five years, from the time of the crash of American Airlines flight 587 in the Queens neighborhood of New York in 2001, there was not one passenger death on a commercial jetliner in the United States.
That shows just how well the program has worked, he said.
"There is no other explanation. It's not mechanical. It is because of that change in culture in the cockpit, and where we see that culture has not changed we are still having the same kinds of accidents."
In April, less than a month after the Garuda accident, the airline issued a notice to its pilots reinforcing its mandatory policy that the co-pilot take over and execute a "go around" during an unsafe landing approach. Garuda stated there would be no disciplinary action taken against the co-pilot in such cases.
This is the NTSB report:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/dayart...rudareport.pdf
11-20-2007, 07:44 PM
#2
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You still see that "captain is always right" attitude in most of Asia and the third world. This is a lot of the reason that their accident rates are much higher.
UAL started crew resource management (CRM) training back in the 80s. It has developed over time to include many different aspects and continues to evolve.
Take my job as an F/O. Bob Buck talked about this in a couple of his books. When he started at TWA, he was lucky if he got to do any more than swing the gear lever. Today my job is much more involved. While the captain is still the final authority, it's much more of a team game.
UAL started crew resource management (CRM) training back in the 80s. It has developed over time to include many different aspects and continues to evolve.
Take my job as an F/O. Bob Buck talked about this in a couple of his books. When he started at TWA, he was lucky if he got to do any more than swing the gear lever. Today my job is much more involved. While the captain is still the final authority, it's much more of a team game.
11-20-2007, 08:27 PM
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The Garuda Indonesia 737 landed at 221 knots, or 87 knots too fast, overran the runway, broke apart and exploded in flames.
Not so many years ago CAL pulled something similar in a DC9 at IAH. CA's disregard for the cklist resulted in not getting the hydraulics set for landing, and the ldg gear did not extend. He landed it fast and gear up, and the FO let him do it. While we are much better in this country than when I started in this industry (25 years) we are not yet perfect. I'd say that while we have come a long way it's too soon to get smug about our accomplishments
Not so many years ago CAL pulled something similar in a DC9 at IAH. CA's disregard for the cklist resulted in not getting the hydraulics set for landing, and the ldg gear did not extend. He landed it fast and gear up, and the FO let him do it. While we are much better in this country than when I started in this industry (25 years) we are not yet perfect. I'd say that while we have come a long way it's too soon to get smug about our accomplishments
11-21-2007, 07:46 AM
#4
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Originally Posted by vagabond
This is an article by James Wallace, aerospace reporter for the PI.
This is the NTSB report:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/dayart/pdf/Garudareport.pdf
This is the NTSB report:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/dayart/pdf/Garudareport.pdf
Those solid state black boxes were completely barbecued, it's amazing what they can get out of them.
11-21-2007, 11:44 AM
#6
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Originally Posted by Sioux39
The article made a mistake about the KLM crew in Tenerife. If I remember correctly the FE did question the captain before they took off and he essentially told him to shut up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_V...zen_van_Zanten
