Premium on Safety - Issue 36, 2020 - 9

Pilot Outlook by Region

Not On the List

LESSONS LEARNED

BY DAVID JACK KENNY
John Muir (not the Sierra Club founder, but a 20th-century
namesake) first published his classic How to Keep Your Volkswagen
Alive: A Manual of Step-by-Step Procedures for the Compleat Idiot in
1969. Later editions included the following caveat:
But think we must. The first edition did not say to put the huge
staples that hold the new clutch to the package into the clutch
assembly. However, it did not say to remove these clips. One
person put the clutch together, packing clips and all (and drove
a remarkable distance before the engine self-destructed).
His point is sound. The teams that construct, proofread, test, and
validate checklists do their level best to assemble sequences of
instructions that cover all plausible contingencies while leaving
nothing out-but it's humanly impossible to anticipate every
situation that might conceivably arise in flight. The imperative of
maintaining situational awareness begins with the situation inside
the cockpit, including details whose relevance might not have
occurred to the checklist writers.
The misconfiguration of an Embraer ERJ-145EP that caused a
runway excursion resulting in gear and tire damage provides
a case in point. The accident occurred at 11:37 in the morning
of December 22, 2017, on the return leg of a round-trip flight
between Bristol, U.K. and Frankfurt, Germany. RVR on Bristol's
Runway 27 was 500 meters (1,600 feet) in fog, with vertical
obscuration and surface winds of two knots. The flight landed
after a successful Category II ILS approach.
In its final report, the U.K.'s Air Accident Investigation Branch
(AAIB) described the pilot flying (PF) as a "captain-undertraining" with just 17 hours in the ERJ-145 that included four
Category II approaches, two "in actual conditions." He had
previously flown Saab 2000s for another operator. A "company
training captain" with 5,100 hours in type oversaw him, serving as
both pilot-in-command (PIC) and pilot monitoring (PM).

The crew had anticipated the Cat II approach because of the
forecasted fog. The PF started his approach briefing at 11:13 but
suspended it to pick up Bristol's ATIS broadcast. Attempts to
resume the briefing were interrupted by subsequent conversations
with London Air Traffic Control and the flight attendant. At 11:20
London instructed the flight to descend to 16,000 feet, slow to
250 knots, and expect to hold. At 11:25, they were transferred to
Bristol Approach. Bristol confirmed that conditions were above
Category II minimums and advised that they were number one for
the approach.
The flight was 30 miles from the airport, descending through
14,000 feet. After discussion, the crew decided this gave them
enough room to manage the descent and accepted direct
routing. The PF stated, "Speed brake coming on," but the FDR

Humans have a well-documented tendency
to see what they expect rather than what's
actually there, and this was a case in point.
didn't record speed brake deployment. He finally completed his
approach briefing at 11:27, after which the aural alerts produced
by radio altimeter checks disrupted crew communications for
the next couple of minutes. During that time the PM mentioned
that speed brakes would expedite their descent. The PF's reply
that they were already open coincided with a call from ATC and
apparently went unheard.
At 11:30 the PM specifically suggested using the speed brakes,
and the PF replied, "It is-oh, no, it is not. Who closed that?" This
time the FDR did record speed brake deployment. They requested
an additional five miles of ground track for the descent, and ATC
vectored them through the extended centerline before turning

Cost estimates for ab initio to first officer position vary from a
low of $50,000 USD to upwards of $150,000 depending on the
type and intensity of training. The Part 61 flight school is not
always the least expensive program, given that students tracing
this training path must acquire 1,500 flight hours of experience
separated into various buckets before applying for an Airline
Transport Rating program, which itself can cost upwards of
$20,000 USD.
For the foreseeable future in the U.S. it takes an ATP certificate
to get you flying in the left seat of a corporate jet and any pilot
training program that has aligned itself with one of several
regional airline pre-hire/tuition reimbursement programs is
currently busting at the seams with trainees. Equipment is being
acquired and upgraded (most with digital instrumentation,
touchscreen GPS, and EFIS). ATP Flight School responded to
the uptick in demand for pilots by updating and increasing its

fleet of aircraft to 170 Piper singles and twins and some Cessnas
at 40 locations around the U.S. It now graduates more than
60 pilots a month from its Airline Career Pilot program. ATP
focuses primarily on the domestic pilot market, with only two
percent of its 1,000 plus students hailing from outside the U.S.

Tuition assistance during training in the U.S.
is quickly becoming the norm.
After graduating the school's Airline Career Pilot Program, pilots
receive a guaranteed CFI job at an ATP school, where they can
earn as much as $42,000 annually (this includes airline tuition
reimbursement). The school offers full financing for students
through Sallie Mae and Wells Fargo.
contd. next page

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