Pilots, Experience, and the Economy

[navel_gazer]

Hi Captain Hutch!

Some news articles I've read about Colgan Air/Buffalo incident, as well as some floating around about the airline industry in general lately, have promoted an idea that pilots are not being trained as well as they have been in the past, or that the industry is cutting corners lately.

One context was the first officer in the Buffalo flight who said on the voice recorder that she hadn't experienced icing and wouldn't know how to deal with it if she were in charge (I'm paraphrasing the article in the Wall Street Journal http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124212789938210353.html and a few others). I think there was an editorial recently too about how because pilots' benefits and salaries were being cut by the airlines, less people will want to be pilots and therefore years from now the quality of commercial pilots will be lower. That argument basically concludes that then air travel will be less safe. Regional airlines were singled out in particular.

Would you mind sharing your thoughts on this? It scares me to think that airlines are cutting any corners on training, and that pilots are becoming less well-prepared. It's hard for me to judge how accurate that idea is because news articles are promoting the "lack of safety" aspect so heavily.

And is the economic crisis having any impact on airline safety? Are pilots under pressure to fly unfamiliar planes, or in unfamiliar climates, or with less training, or when they are ill more lately?

I guess I'm trying to see how much of this is media hype and which are real issues that the industry is dealing with.

Thanks for any input!

[Barb-SAN]

Navel-gazer, I'm glad you asked this...I wanted to ask Capt. Hutch too, and wasn't quite sure how to phrase the question.

There's an ongoing conversation over at PPRuNe about this (amongst pilots), linked here... http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/362055-continental-turboprop-crash-inbound-buffalo-54.html
One of the posters there stated that he felt there should be "same-sex" crews, and mentioned the "male-female" dynamic (presumably a distraction). That comment also presupposes that all pilots have a heterosexual orientation, and a vulnerability to the "male-female" dynamic.

What do you think about that, Capt. Hutch? Is that an issue that's discussed much among the pilots?

It seems like requiring same-sex crews would make it very difficult for women to fly at all, let alone advance to Capt. rank, given that there are so few commercial women pilots.

It did occur to me that the FO was young, and from her photo, quite attractive, and the male Capt. was in his late 40's. Still...seems that they both know what "sterile cockpit rules" are, and as professionals would be equally responsible for following those rules.

Edited to add: This link was in Tom Bunn's weekly SOAR newsletter, relating to pilot fatigue (another aspect being considered in the Buffalo crash) http://www.buffalonews.com/180/story/667664.html

[MathFox]

At the moment I am downloading the materials from the NTSB docket; some information I found:
The captain applied with Colgan in August 2005, with limited PIC and turboprop experience. The First Officer was hired in February 2008, without previous turboprop experience. Both had to commute (from Tampa resp. Seattle) to Newark, where they were based.

There are different views on the Airline's safety culture:
"The manager of flight safety described the safety culture at Colgan as good." "The Q400 fleet manager described the company’s safety culture as good" "The director of flight standards described the company’s safety culture as good."
"The FAA aircrew program manager (APM) described the safety culture at the airline as “acceptable"" "The POI described the safety culture at the airline as “more reactive than I’d like to see, not quite as proactive.”"
(What's a POI?)

[MathFox]

Adding data...

The captain had most of his fying experience on the Saab 340. He converted to the Dash-8 about two months before the accident. The first officer had under a year Dash-8 experience. Sounds like a relatively green team (limited winter experience?)

[Barb-SAN]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/nyregion/14pilot.html?em

[navel_gazer]

Salon's "Ask the Pilot" touched on this at the end of the column this week: http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/2009/05/15/askthepilot320/index2.html

[Captain Hutch]

Navel_gazer,

Those are excellent questions that you have brought up and I am glad to provide my thoughts on them. Of course, as you know you are getting strictly my personal opinion, but I do hope to shed some light on this extremely important matter.

The good news I think is that most pilots began flying because they enjoy flying, like to fly, or love to fly. So it is easy to start out in a flying career because it is fun. So somewhere in the middle of all this is the heart of the pilot that likes to fly.

More good news is that the training has gotten better, I think at least at the major airline level. Pilots give other pilots training and checkrides and take pride in how well they do and are usually pretty tough on each other. Although I have never personally "busted" a simulator checkride, it's not unusual for a pilot here or there to have to go back and get additional training. Personally I think the airlines expect this because they could build in more preparatory rides prior to some checkrides but the bottom line dictates otherwise, and so they figure that someone who is slightly slower in learning the procedures (not necessarily a lousy pilot) will be the one getting extra simulator time, not the ones who don't need it and why waste time and money giving everyone extra time that some don't need.

The bad news I'm afraid is that yes, the bottom line as related to corporate greed and current economics is affecting the safety of the flying. When my own airline went bankrupt and started operating under chapter 11 a few years ago, corporate executives were given bonuses because they saved the airline money by eliminating the pilots' pensions. The reason given for these bonuses was that "the airline needs to keep good people". Huh? Why it is not a crime for an executive to receive a bonus or salary increase when the company that he is directing goes bankrupt is beyond my physics, electrical engineering, linguistics, 2 bachelor degrees, some graduate school in astrophysics, humble mind. My own salary went from a high (and peak) of about $185,000 per year in 2002 to $125,000 per year in 2006, the level that it is at now, as a Boeing 737 captain. Many of the pilots I work with are working another job to make up for the loss. Copilots and pilots flying smaller aircraft as a rule are making much less.

Commuting pilots, and that's as defined as airline commuting, are the norm rather than the exception. Where you might take a 2 hour commute in a car or train, the pilot will be riding in the jumpseat of some airline to get to his base where his trip originates. Either the airline closed his base to save money or he got displaced to another base because of seniority issues. It's usually more practical to keep your family in one location than it is to try to move to your flying base, since there is a good possibility your base will change. Airlines do however at times, seem to be sympathetic to the commuting pilot, but I have heard stories both ways. The fact is though, the travel time of a commuter does not figure into his whole duty time, but of course does contribute to fatigue.

The flying hour figure that you sometimes hear for how much a pilot flies in one month is quite misleading. For instance, a normal month might be 80 hours of flying per month. However that time is calculated from pushback time from the gate to arrival at the next gate--meaning the pilot is not paid for doing anything prior to actually starting the engines, like preflight, checklists, checking weather, dealing with maintenance issues, or a passenger that is so out of line that the flight attendant has to bring it to the captain's attention. So an 8 hour flight time day (max domestic) would easily be 12 hours or more (up to 16 hours) of on duty. Negotiated work rules might require an airline to pay 5 hours for flying time that day under 5 actual hours, but commuter airlines don't usually have these protective rules. Two 12 hour duty days in a row is extremely fatiguing and really requires recovery time of at least a day or two. Some of the rules are FAA mandated and some are negotiated by unions. 80 hours can be changed to 90 hours a month in some cases--very convenient for the company so they don't have to hire as many pilots and the pay is so low that the pilots need the money so they fly that amount. After years and years of flying, an 80 hour month of flying, with a minimum of a 5 hour pay per day if any flying is done at all, is a safe number. Of course, if your pay has been cut so that you need to fly more or have an additional job, then there is a problem. In my opinion the FAA needs to make rules to give the pilots more rest on more pay, because the companies are doing the opposite.

Sick pay policies are unsafe in my opinion because in some cases a pilot will have to fly sick or not get paid. Several years ago the policies were excellent, but unfortunately abused at times. Now policies are so tight that unfortunately pilots who are sick will be flying because they need the money. Sinus problems are endemic among flight crews and it only takes a few colds before you are penalized for being sick.

Experts will point to the numbers and say that flying is safer than ever. I was never so prouder to be an airline pilot than when Sully put that airbus down in the Hudson. We have better and safer equipment now than before. But unfortunately I believe we are riding a wave of pilot experience from years before but because of the low pay and working conditions it will be difficult to keep that experience in the cockpit. And experience, from my personal viewpoint is the most valuable commodity that you can have to guard against mistakes that will inevitably be made. Experience will keep the little mistakes from being big mistakes and two pilots and better equipment in the cockpit will catch each other's mistakes. (By the way, we have already covered pilotless aircraft in a couple of threads. No, I don't believe it will ever happen). I do not think that procedures, training, or equipment is being compromised at all. But the m.o. of "having to do more with less" absolutely will not work in the cockpit. The performance of the human body has a limit, I think, related to, among other factors, fatigue and experience. When you begin thinking that you can ignore these to save a few dollars, you begin to compromise safety. So, personally I believe that there will be more fatigue and inexperience related accidents happening in the future.

As to having opposite sex pilot and co-pilot, I actually do not think that this is an issue. Having flown with female captains and copilots over the years, most are as professional on the job as any other person and the dynamics between opposite sexes working together does not exist in the way that, let's say an office environment, might be present.

Well, I hope that this covers most of the issues.

Thanks,

Hutch :tiphat:

[navel_gazer]

Thanks for your detailed and informative response, Captain Hutch. I really appreciate it. It's good to get some perspective and to understand that while there are some real issues for the airlines to improve on, it's not really appropriate now for the general public to be fearful of flying due to some of these fatigue/training/compensation/experience issues.

Can you suggest anything for consumers like me to do to show the airlines that we are in favor of better conditions or compensation for pilots? I say that not just because, as a regular flyer, I care about having well-compensated, experienced and healthy people in the cockpit but also because I feel strongly that pilots deserve to be rewarded for doing such an important job, their extensive training, and the responsibilities they have. I never really knew that their salaries etc. were being cut and that seems kind of ridiculous and unfair. Frankly, I would not mind paying more for flights if it meant that the crews getting me to my destination were being properly compensated for their skill and work!

Anyway, thanks again for your insight!:)

[MathFox]

I guess there are two tracks to improve the working conditions of pilots:
One is political, lobbying to get the (FAA) regulations for duty days changed. Write a letter to the FAA and/or your representative (senator) in DC, suggesting to limit a pilot duty day to 13 (scheduled) hours (10 hours at night). (Note: The NTSB has been asking for years.)
Another option would be collecting data about pilot's wages at the different airlines, training and experience of the pilots, working hours, policy for sick calls and such. Then pick a few bad apples and refuse to fly with them. Bonus points if you can convince others to join in a boycott.

[Note, if you are willing to put serious work in either of the two options, I think you're better off joining forces with other frequent flyers.]

You'll find links to several scientific studies via http://www.eurocockpit.be/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=414