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Originally Posted by 172skychicken
It sounds like you're on the 900. That mentality is a holdover from the Mesaba days. A lot of the instructors, particularly in management, originate from the Mesaba side. Hence why hand flying isn't exactly encouraged on that fleet. Hand flying is very common on the 200, even in New York and in IMC. People aren't hand flying every approach by any means, but in my experience, it's a marked difference from what I observed in my time on the 900. This isn't supposed to be some 9E vs XJ ****ing match, its just what my experience has been. You may have noticed that hand flying has been an area of emphasis during CQ PVs for the past couple years. An annual training event is not going to keep someone proficient in manual handling. We have a ton of leeway for hand flying in our manuals. If they refuse to make the effort to stay proficient in day to day line operations, that's on them. Not the training department, the hiring department, or anyone else.
I am on the 900 now, but it wasn't very different for me when I was on the deuce. I have not noticed what you say about hand flying emphasis in CQ. I know there's 2 concurrent PV profiles, but mine didn't involve any. I completely agree that an annual event is not gonna keep someone proficient. We need regular everyday practice, and flying any (non-emergency) maneuver should be about as easy and routine as landing a 172, or pulling your car into your driveway.
I'm glad we have all the leeway that the SOP gives us, but which is markedly different from the general culture. I agree that the onus of regular every day practice is on the pilots, because they're the only ones capable of putting that decision into action on any particular flight. (Between the pilots, the onus is a lot more on the CA to be the leader and set the example.) But the training department has an ability to influence this too, as I detailed in my response below to Ninerdriver. And finally, no matter who it's "on," an "effort" is the responsibility of EVERYBODY who can do something influential, because in the end it's actual safety at stake and not just blame game points.
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Originally Posted by ninerdriver
Let's start with this:
- There are far more captains, including senior captains, who hand fly versus run 600-on-400-off. Maybe you haven't flown with the folks who turn the FD off and go raw data at 400 feet after departure, or the folks who stick it in pitch mode, because they understand the relationships among pitch, power, and airspeed.
That's right, I haven't flown with those, but for a tiny handful of exceptions. Have you? How often? Which seat do you fly in? I assumed you were a Captain, but I guess not. If we were both new and had only flown with a few Captains each, it would be expected that our samples might differ. But with two broad samples, it's more and more likely that they should overlap and we should see similar patterns. 1000 hours (over both fleets and 3 bases) isn't a huge ton, but it should be enough that my picture is at least fairly representative...
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- If you aren't watching folks hand-flying approaches often, then you aren't doing the ILS 4 at LaGuardia right.
I've only had that approach a few times, too few to extrapolate patterns from. But I remember on my last time, it was the CA's leg and I had to remind him about the note, both during the brief and during the approach itself. I don't doubt that it gets done wrong regularly.
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- Refusing a plane without an autopilot just because IMC is involved? The FMC still works. Just fly the FD and keep an eye on the raw data. It works fine, even when in turbulence and/or dodging thunderstorms. Is it easy? Not always, but it's safe.
Doing something that one never practices with the option (and mental security) to turn on the AP as a fallback, for the first time without that option? Outside of the scope of an emergency, that is extremely poor decision making. If people were hand flying approaches all the time? Sure. But as things are now? If I'm riding in the back, I would hope like hell that they don't take a deferred AP into an instrument approach.
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- It is *not* the training department's job to make sure one feels comfortable hand flying an airplane. It's their job to make sure that one is safe flying 121. It doesn't take a lot of observation of hand-flying to tell whether someone can or can't do it safely, regardless of comfort.
Note that I have been saying "comfort" AND "competence." As far as comfort, you're right. Unless one is coming from another jet, a newhire is guaranteed to be uncomfortable, and the only way to overcome that is to push past it by hand flying in uncomfortable situations as much as practical, under the watchful eye and mentorship of the CA. But when the CA's example is to never fly even under the most benign conditions, what is the new FO supposed to do? This makes the FO's willingness to push beyond even what the CA is doing, about 100 times harder. And if the FO has not done that thing in training? Then doubly so.
As far the competence, or safety, I disagree strongly that it doesn't take a lot of observation. It takes watching many repetitions, over a long time and under varying conditions, to reliably know that someone has something down. Seeing something once, only shows you that the person either got lucky, and/or that challenging conditions/distractions didn't knock them out of a tight groove for them to recover from. Seeing that once or twice and extrapolating that the person is A-OK? That's foolish naivete, and is only a fig leaf to satisfy the training record that it's been done, and that we can move on to the remaining checkboxes during the very expensive sim time and with a big queue of other trainees waiting their turn. Better not to run the risk of watching someone blow the maneuver and then having to repeat it multiple times.
Oh, and the number of times I was required to show that I can level off at an altitude, intercept a course, change flap setting or even change airspeed? Not one, but zero. How is this acceptable?