Hats, braid, big pilot bags. Age, experience, ego. Someone’s the captain, but the what is right always trumps the who is right when it comes to matters like gravity, aerodynamics, weather. “It is not who is right, but what is right, that is of importance.” Thomas Huxley Picture is a cool looking Pan Am 707 flying to Moscow.
Tag: CRM
Hint and Hope
From a major US airline flight crew operating manual: Do not HINT & HOPE. Works well for crew communications in the cockpit, as well as for ATC, mechanics — and maybe marriages?
A Superior Pilot Uses . . .
A superior pilot uses superior SOP to avoid situations which require the use of superior CRM. I think this is true. If I’m disciplined, if I follow standard procedures, it certainly doesn’t solve everything — but it means I have less need to involve the whole team and get creative. Saves that for the really hard stuff, the really …
This Hits Close
A new episode of the National Geographic Air Crash Investigation TV show, titled Killer Attitude is hard for me to watch. It describes the crash of a perfectly good Northwest Airlink Jetstream 31 from MSP to Hibbing, MN, on 1 December 1993. I was flying out of MSP that night, same airplane type, same airline. I knew the captain, Marvin. I remember …
A340 Engine Shutdown Video
YouTube has a great 15-minute video of an Airbus A340 crew running ECAMs and checklists that results in shutting down an engine in flight. For real. It’s been viewed a bunch of times, but I hadn’t seen it till today, so maybe you haven’t either. It’s an interesting, thought provoking experience. The Swiss airline crew were being filmed by PilotsEye.tv …
We are the Grease in the Cogs
Powerful four minute video by professor and pilot Sidney Dekker introduces what we find when we stop looking at accidents, and instead study highly reliable organizations. It’s resilience: the ability to accommodate change and absorb disturbances without catastrophic failure. And it’s not about reducing negatives, but rather promoting positives. The four behaviors that resilient teams practice are: Don’t take past success …
Full United Airlines Safety Memo to Pilots
Here’s the complete “brutally honest” safety memo sent to every United Airlines pilot this year. Lots of good points about airmanship, discipline and CRM: Date: January 9, 2015 SAFETY ALERT: Significant safety concerns Recent events in our operation have dictated that we communicate with all of you immediately. Over the past few weeks, our airline has experienced what we would …
A Very Bad CRM Book
I was so looking forward to The Pilot Factor: A fresh look into Crew Resource Management (2014) by Jean Denis Marcellin. Had heard about it online. Cool cover picture has airline pilot ripping off uniform shirt to show Superman costume underneath. Some glowing reviews on Amazon. Then I got the book and started reading. Oh dear. It’s a self-published stretched padded 100 …
Can You Use the Force on Others?
Interesting article on advanced crew resource management by Erika Armstrong. Can you use The Force on others? Pilot Persuasion: Effective Crew Resource Management