SavannahMann
Platinum Member
- Nov 16, 2016
- 13,907
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We learned long ago that the leading cause of airplane accidents was pilot error. A human made a mistake and the plane crashed. So we started trying to figure out how to eliminate human error. In the process, we have learned the wrong lessons. As usual for humanity.
There are so many examples of a fine pilot managing to pull off a “miracle” landing after an incident. Saving most if not all the lives of the passengers. Yet, those stories are getting fewer and farther between because one truth is coming home to roost. The effort to remove Human Error from the equation, has removed humans from the equation. The old school stick and rudder pilot who manages the emergency and saves the lives is essentially gone from our cockpits. Now, it is systems managers, IT professionals who hopefully understand the computer that is actually flying the plane.
Prosecutors, Transportation Department Scrutinize Development of Boeing’s 737 MAX
Prosecutors want to know how the 737 Max was approved. Well. It was designed and built, and approved the way it was for a simple reason. The airplane manufacturer is supposed to make planes that almost fly themselves. In the old days, if you had a pilot with 10,000 hours of flight time, you had a lot of experience in those hands. Today, that pilot with 10k hours has perhaps a couple hundred actually flying a plane, the rest is sitting there theoretically monitoring the computer. When an emergency happens, the pilot screws up, despite all the experience, because that experience is a lie. They don’t have 10k hours flying. They have a couple hundred hours flying a plane, the rest might as well be time commuting.
Accident after accident, event after event has shown this to be true. The Asiana Airline crash into San Francisco. The Pilots were not supposed to fly the plane by hand ever according to the airline. So they screwed up, and crashed. The Air France crash in the Atlantic. The pilots encountered the one in a million event and couldn’t fly the plane.
The problem with automation is that the humans become dependent. They expect it to work. They expect it to work and when it fails, they are at a loss as to what is supposed to happen.
Yes the automation does reduce the number of “human error” accidents, but it also guarantees that nearly any failure of the automation, will result in an accident where human error is a major contributing factor. Because the individuals sitting in the cockpit are not pilots, they are computer technicians who are just the most forward sitting passengers on the aircraft.
We’ve learned the wrong lesson. Instead of realizing that training and more training is the answer, we decided to eliminate the human error, by eliminating the human. Boeing is not more or less responsible than any other company. They just went with the same trend that everyone else has, because that is what the customer, and the people expect. We believe we can make the automation perfect, and in doing so, make the accidents stop. We are not perfect beings and anything we make, will never be perfect. Airbus has also had automation issues, as have pretty much all the manufacturers. Automation is supposed to ease the load on the pilot, allowing them to be more aware of the big picture. Instead, it is used to make the humans superfluous. And we don’t train things we don’t need, or people we don’t need. This is the result.
There are so many examples of a fine pilot managing to pull off a “miracle” landing after an incident. Saving most if not all the lives of the passengers. Yet, those stories are getting fewer and farther between because one truth is coming home to roost. The effort to remove Human Error from the equation, has removed humans from the equation. The old school stick and rudder pilot who manages the emergency and saves the lives is essentially gone from our cockpits. Now, it is systems managers, IT professionals who hopefully understand the computer that is actually flying the plane.
Prosecutors, Transportation Department Scrutinize Development of Boeing’s 737 MAX
Prosecutors want to know how the 737 Max was approved. Well. It was designed and built, and approved the way it was for a simple reason. The airplane manufacturer is supposed to make planes that almost fly themselves. In the old days, if you had a pilot with 10,000 hours of flight time, you had a lot of experience in those hands. Today, that pilot with 10k hours has perhaps a couple hundred actually flying a plane, the rest is sitting there theoretically monitoring the computer. When an emergency happens, the pilot screws up, despite all the experience, because that experience is a lie. They don’t have 10k hours flying. They have a couple hundred hours flying a plane, the rest might as well be time commuting.
Accident after accident, event after event has shown this to be true. The Asiana Airline crash into San Francisco. The Pilots were not supposed to fly the plane by hand ever according to the airline. So they screwed up, and crashed. The Air France crash in the Atlantic. The pilots encountered the one in a million event and couldn’t fly the plane.
The problem with automation is that the humans become dependent. They expect it to work. They expect it to work and when it fails, they are at a loss as to what is supposed to happen.
Yes the automation does reduce the number of “human error” accidents, but it also guarantees that nearly any failure of the automation, will result in an accident where human error is a major contributing factor. Because the individuals sitting in the cockpit are not pilots, they are computer technicians who are just the most forward sitting passengers on the aircraft.
We’ve learned the wrong lesson. Instead of realizing that training and more training is the answer, we decided to eliminate the human error, by eliminating the human. Boeing is not more or less responsible than any other company. They just went with the same trend that everyone else has, because that is what the customer, and the people expect. We believe we can make the automation perfect, and in doing so, make the accidents stop. We are not perfect beings and anything we make, will never be perfect. Airbus has also had automation issues, as have pretty much all the manufacturers. Automation is supposed to ease the load on the pilot, allowing them to be more aware of the big picture. Instead, it is used to make the humans superfluous. And we don’t train things we don’t need, or people we don’t need. This is the result.
