Category Archives: CRM / Human factors

When all else fails

Last January 2024, just after the holiday season, I undertook a “training flight” to cover the recency regulation for my IFR qualification. In Canada, it is required to log 6 hours of IFR flying, shoot 6 approaches to minimum and accomplish this within 6 months of a proposed IFR flight. The weather was impeccably VFR.… Read more »

Risk management and the lottery

Good risk management is more beneficial than the hope of a lottery gain Recently, I literally fell off the PA-30 seat. All right this in itself would be quite an feat. figuratively speaking that was how I was struck to say the least. Carbon monoxide poisoning About 2 years ago, I wrote about carbon monoxide… Read more »

Paradigms

Paradigms or changing the way you see the environment. This not about the loose change in your pocket. Paradigms are about ones narrow view of the world. They are the basis of systemic stagnation. The last place one wants to hear about paradigms is in the flight deck. Cockpit resource management Understanding paradigms and their… Read more »

13 minutes

Many will claim that there is nothing more troubling than a fire onboard a wooden ship at sea. Aviators know there is worst: a fire in flight. Total recall 11 years ago I have written an article for the aviation magazine «Plein Vol». It dealt with fires in aircraft. I have decided to refresh this… Read more »

Hand flying, what’s going on?

Flying is a perishable good. Lack of maintenance will lead to the pilot’s ability degradation. This explains the simulator visits every 6 months. 6 months we say? Many carriers now have the « financial good fortune » to stretch this to 8 months. The recent and very thorough incident report by the BFU (Bundesstelle für Flugunfalluntersuchung /… Read more »

Spins again

The  Canadian Transportation Safety Board has recently published it’s accident investigation report of a PA-34-200T (Piper Seneca) at CYBW (Calgary/Springbank, Alberta). One can read all the simple details on the Canadian TSB report. My hearth is broken. An apparently perfect aircraft on the take-off phase, in ideal training flight conditions crashes vertically after a severe… Read more »

Lion Air Accident

The recent accident of a B-737 Max taking off Jakarta brings once again the perspective of technology into the human factors alley. We always, as humans, wish to point the blaming finger at one cause for an accident. This makes things simple and well set in a neat compartment of our mind. Now, Boeing a… Read more »