Nevjets

In regards to train to proficiency, I’ve never bought into the notion that the way the military trains is better. Their non-combat safety record does not seem to be better than airlines’.

JohnBurke

I never said he was, nor does the NTSB report state that.

It says what I said.

Nevjets

Before this ATP rule change, there were pilots getting hired with less than 300 hours! That means that when these pilots finally upgraded to captain about two years later, they were PIC for the first time when not under the supervision of their PVT/INST/COM/MULTI instructor. People don’t think about that. When a pilot is getting their certificates and ratings, although they do get some PIC time, it’s always under the supervision of their instructor or flight school. And when they become captains with 70 passengers, it will be the real first time they have command authority.

It amazes me when pilots advocate for something that would take us back to that possibility again. And it’s disingenuous to advocate abolishing the “1500 hour rule” under the guise of arbitrary and not also advocate to abolishment of ALL hour requirements in ALL regulations.

aeroengineer

To your point the most lethal airframe in the military to friendly pax appears to be the C-130 or some variant. I can think of two right off in the last 4 years that cost over 20 lives that were pilot error and one was maintenance (16 killed) but human error was likely still a factor. The one in Jalalabad was admittedly in a combat zone but not enemy related.

vdawson

I agree with your viewpoint completely. We are taught to recognize low airspeed in the first 5 hrs of flight training. It is inconceivable to me how they could have let their airspeed decay to that point or how the stick shaker didn’t alert them to that fact. The nose also did not drop, which is what happens in a tail stall. None of the pilot control inputs really made sense, but when a shot of adrenaline hits you the average person falls back to what they have done repetitively in training. The record does show that they had been trained extensively on how to recognize and recover from a tail stall. They mucked it up, no doubt, but I was just adding context to the conversation, not defending their actions.

sailingfun

The airline mission has no relationship to military flying. So vastly different they are solar systems apart.

rickair7777

It's not supposed to be. Non mission flying is training, and they incur intentional risk to achieve quality training so they can maximize combat effectiveness.

Essentially they trade lives in training for victory in war. Not pretty but there's no other way to slice that.

Nevjets

Well, I don’t have any imperial data. Which is why I used the term seems. But even just looking at civilian training (of all sorts not just certification) versus military training (including those training flights in which you fly from one base to another for repositioning), it seems like there is no comparison in safety.

Let’s face it, if airlines weren’t as safe as they are, less people would fly. Which equates to less profits. The airlines have a profit incentive that the military doesn’t have (and shouldn’t have). That alone should equate to the difference in safety, not withstanding you’re valid points about military flying. In my estimation, therein lies the difference in train to proficiency. Simply put, the airlines don’t need to train like the military (and vice versa for different reasons) because the industry is getting safer. Just marking the point that train to proficiency or training like the military doesn’t necessarily have a direct corollary with safety. Airlines train to proficiency (perceived as bad by some) and yet safety increases. Military doesn’t train to proficiency yet their safety isn’t necessarily increasing.

rickair7777

That all makes sense. Airlines do need to be safer than the mil, and adopting NATOPS (or the USAF equivalent) isn't going to help.

Also worth noting that the airlines don't hire military trained aviators any more than they hire wet commercials (anymore). They hire the end product, after ten+ years of operational flying. That's a whole person package, flight experience, organizational player, masters degree, clean living, etc.

To get the benefit of military training you have to "graduate" from the military with wings (and body) intact, and about 5K hours (or the fighter equivalent of fewer, but very busier hours). The washouts sell life insurance like anybody else.

SpringLanding

That crash was due to catostraphic system failure and the aircraft split into pieces during flight and without possibility of recovery.

Some military pilots volunteer to fly 50-60 year old airframes that are maintained by 19-23 year olds who do one enlisted tour and then get out. I am not denigrating their service, but it is different and for a good reason. The Navy practices cutting edge safety but has different operational and economic constraints and priorities than a passenger airline.