It’s a shame the the “LOOK AT ME!” Kid isn’t alive to collect his Charle Darwin Hall of Fame Induction award.

 

I agree that it's silly to be snap-chatting as you're following a pipeline. I also agree that distractions are a problem. I'd say a major factor in this problem isn't the distractions, but our guidance and regulation (or lack thereof) on these issues.

The fact is this IS going to happen, and it's nothing new. Whether with phones now, crossword puzzles in the 1980s or studying the overhead panel in any era, people have and will continue to do these things. Saying it's our duty to stay engaged is well and good, but it's also the same thing we've been doing since someone took a book flying with them in a PBY. So we're not going to fix anything with this approach. Is somebody listening to music or news on HF after TOC worse than the pilot monitoring reviewing the operations manual in cruise as he gets ready for training? Is reviewing that operations manual worse than reading a magazine? Is reading that magazine worse than doing your computer-based-training on the iPad in cruise? Is that worse than playing Tetris? Is that worse than editing photos that you're going to send to your girlfriend from the hotel? Is that worse than playing an accordion?

We need better guidance on this issue in the industry. Many of us have experience with someone who wanted to use their phone during a critical phase of flight. Maybe we are better off becoming more permissive in some regimes so we can become much more restrictive in others? I'm suggesting we formally define what most of us take for common sense on these issues. FWIW I like the idea of music stations and letting people read in cruise between TOC and TOD. Others may have a different take on things.

 

Guidance varies from operation to operation. But whether those directives come from the PIC, SOP, HBAT, AC or reg revision, to be effective, best to be consistent. Non-essential verbal com enroute is permitted, interesting, informative, fun, annoying, aggravating etc. Allowed to get out of hand, contributing factor for plowing into a top. At the controls crew playing interactive audio games, watching movies doesn’t fit safety culture doctrine. How much a risk it poses, you tell me? Of course, I'm a PBY, nose in a magazine guy.
Good post as usual.

 

Coming soon to a flight deck near you...


https://www.instagram.com/p/CxlPr2LLWdB/

 

Somewhere a parent is paying top $ for this. Judas priest

 

Latest crash where the pilot was using SnapChat...

https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/co...eb2x&context=3

 

That’s the ATP rule in action. God bless 1500 hours

 

What has that got to do with the price of tea in China?

Neither pilot required an ATP.

Neither pilot was flying for an airline.

It was a general aviation mishap.

The number of hours either one had, is irrelevant.

Neither was qualified to hold an ATP certificate.

There was no "ATP rule in action."

 

You should.
I will.
We just had a change to our FOM, apart from looking up information pertinent to the flight the use of PED’s is verboten.

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That's only an FOM rule because of a poorly worded, knee-jerk federal law, and also the knee-jerk optics of the public reaction if there was an incident and a pilot was doing anything other than staring unblinking and laser-focused at unmoving gauges for 6+ hours straight in cruise flight. Watching paint dry in other words.

Personally I'm fine with just reading, but not everyone is (some of them probably don't even know how to read anymore).