GateHold
Nov 6, 09, 4:18 pm
This week in Patrick Smith's ASK THE PILOT column at Salon.com:
Planes and Politicians,
Plus, a Remembrance of Wings Past
"...Although what occurred over Minneapolis was a dereliction of duty on part of the crew, the media's fixation with the event was and remains vastly disproportionate to any danger faced the passengers. To have members of the U.S. Senate joining the fray ratchets up the hysteria even more. Of all the things government can and should be doing to improve commercial air safety -- from overhauling the lunacy of the Transportation Security Administration to dealing with the very real dangers of lithium-ion batteries carried as cargo -- for any lawmaker to spend even five minutes on a proposal like this is shameful. Here again we are witnessing one of this country's most wasteful and self-defeating tendencies: that of coming up with unrealistic, zero-tolerance solutions to problems that are either greatly exaggerated, badly misunderstood, or that don't exist in the first place....
...The truth remains that a vast majority of people have no real idea what the environment of a cockpit is like. They have little understanding of what an airline pilot actually does, and what the repercussions of certain mistakes are -- or aren't. Pilots are at times extremely busy; at other times there are long stretches of low workload. Duties come and go, ebb and flow, and an aircraft will not suddenly flip upside down or come screaming out of the sky if a pilot's attention is temporarily diverted. Indeed it often * needs * to be diverted. If you want to guarantee more tired and brain-fried pilots, the best way to do it would be through some of that "constant monitoring" that Senator Franken seems to be hinting at. Meanwhile, nervous passengers hear the term "pilot error" and it frightens them. Occasionally it should, but I don't always like that term because it fosters the ridiculous idea that * any * error is a potentially fatal one, and that for a flight to be safe its pilots cannot in some way err. In practice pilots make minor, inconsequential mistakes all the time -- just as any professional does in any line of work. There is no such thing as a perfect flight, and we will not, ever, engineer, automate, or legislate this reality away....
...And a quick thanks to the many readers who sent condolences and other kind words after the death of my mother. I was going through some of my mother's things a few days ago, and among the items I found were her American Airlines stewardess wings, an "AA" eagle lapel pin, and a "Stewardess Corps" pendant, all from 1965. They are rendered in sterling silver -- tarnished but beautifully engraved. It should go without saying that airlines no longer dispense sterling silver wings.
The first airplane I was ever on, big or small, was an American Airlines Boeing 727, in April of 1974. We flew from Boston to Washington, D.C., and they served sandwiches and cheesecake -- yes, in economy class on an 80-minute trip. The photo you see here, http://www.flickr.com/photos/globetrodden/406168224/in/set-72157600032577572/ taken by my mother, shows me and my sister walking up the stairs to that airplane.
There are some definite date markers in that shot -- the haircuts, the clothes, the old-timey air-stairs in lieu of the modern jet bridge. Astute viewers will notice one thing that hasn't changed though: the American Airlines livery. I know of no major carrier that has stuck with the same color scheme and logo for so long. The bare polished aluminum, the gothic tail bird and tricolor cheat… there's nothing particularly beautiful about it, but I hope they keep it going -- if for no other reason that it bucks the annoying "in motion" livery theme that is now so common among airlines. Take a look at the tarmac palette these days -- there are enough streaks, swishes, swirls and curls out there to make anybody dizzy, most of them indistinguishable from each other. Carriers want to appear slick, sleek, and modern, but they've jettisoned their identities in the process...."
The full article is available here:
http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/2009/11/05/askthepilot340
Entry to Salon is free.
Recently in ASK THE PILOT: Boredom and Fatigue at 35,000 Feet
http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/2009/10/29/askthepilot339
Planes and Politicians,
Plus, a Remembrance of Wings Past
"...Although what occurred over Minneapolis was a dereliction of duty on part of the crew, the media's fixation with the event was and remains vastly disproportionate to any danger faced the passengers. To have members of the U.S. Senate joining the fray ratchets up the hysteria even more. Of all the things government can and should be doing to improve commercial air safety -- from overhauling the lunacy of the Transportation Security Administration to dealing with the very real dangers of lithium-ion batteries carried as cargo -- for any lawmaker to spend even five minutes on a proposal like this is shameful. Here again we are witnessing one of this country's most wasteful and self-defeating tendencies: that of coming up with unrealistic, zero-tolerance solutions to problems that are either greatly exaggerated, badly misunderstood, or that don't exist in the first place....
...The truth remains that a vast majority of people have no real idea what the environment of a cockpit is like. They have little understanding of what an airline pilot actually does, and what the repercussions of certain mistakes are -- or aren't. Pilots are at times extremely busy; at other times there are long stretches of low workload. Duties come and go, ebb and flow, and an aircraft will not suddenly flip upside down or come screaming out of the sky if a pilot's attention is temporarily diverted. Indeed it often * needs * to be diverted. If you want to guarantee more tired and brain-fried pilots, the best way to do it would be through some of that "constant monitoring" that Senator Franken seems to be hinting at. Meanwhile, nervous passengers hear the term "pilot error" and it frightens them. Occasionally it should, but I don't always like that term because it fosters the ridiculous idea that * any * error is a potentially fatal one, and that for a flight to be safe its pilots cannot in some way err. In practice pilots make minor, inconsequential mistakes all the time -- just as any professional does in any line of work. There is no such thing as a perfect flight, and we will not, ever, engineer, automate, or legislate this reality away....
...And a quick thanks to the many readers who sent condolences and other kind words after the death of my mother. I was going through some of my mother's things a few days ago, and among the items I found were her American Airlines stewardess wings, an "AA" eagle lapel pin, and a "Stewardess Corps" pendant, all from 1965. They are rendered in sterling silver -- tarnished but beautifully engraved. It should go without saying that airlines no longer dispense sterling silver wings.
The first airplane I was ever on, big or small, was an American Airlines Boeing 727, in April of 1974. We flew from Boston to Washington, D.C., and they served sandwiches and cheesecake -- yes, in economy class on an 80-minute trip. The photo you see here, http://www.flickr.com/photos/globetrodden/406168224/in/set-72157600032577572/ taken by my mother, shows me and my sister walking up the stairs to that airplane.
There are some definite date markers in that shot -- the haircuts, the clothes, the old-timey air-stairs in lieu of the modern jet bridge. Astute viewers will notice one thing that hasn't changed though: the American Airlines livery. I know of no major carrier that has stuck with the same color scheme and logo for so long. The bare polished aluminum, the gothic tail bird and tricolor cheat… there's nothing particularly beautiful about it, but I hope they keep it going -- if for no other reason that it bucks the annoying "in motion" livery theme that is now so common among airlines. Take a look at the tarmac palette these days -- there are enough streaks, swishes, swirls and curls out there to make anybody dizzy, most of them indistinguishable from each other. Carriers want to appear slick, sleek, and modern, but they've jettisoned their identities in the process...."
The full article is available here:
http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/2009/11/05/askthepilot340
Entry to Salon is free.
Recently in ASK THE PILOT: Boredom and Fatigue at 35,000 Feet
http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/2009/10/29/askthepilot339