A few months ago, Captain Sullenberger of USAir performed an emergency landing
of a USAir flight into the Hudson River. Previously, Sullenberger had been
involved in the implementation of Crew Resource Management (CRM) at USAir. CRM
has been credited with dramatic improvements in aviation safety and according to
aviation safety guru Robert Helmreich, is essentially “social psychology” – “the
study of how humans interact with each other and machinery…” Two keys of the
safe emergency landing of Sullenberger’s flight according to Helmreich were
communication – with the passengers – and the pilot’s “old-fashioned stick and
rudder skills”.
Data from Line Operations Safety Audit – a systematic observation of crew
practices – show that 98 percent of flights face at least one threat, with an
average of four per flight. A “threat” in this case is defined as anything that
decreases the safety margin and requires the attention of the crew. Errors per
flight were slightly less.
But, once errors or threats occur, the important thing to focus on is not the
error or threat in itself, but how to handle it. One of Helmreich’s lingering
concerns for years has been the automation of aviation. Sullenberger,
approaching the mandatory retirement age for pilots in the U.S. (60), had years
of experience and opportunities to hone his skills with “the stick and rudder
stuff”. Many younger pilots have only flown completely automated aircraft do not
get the chance to consciously engage and hone these skills. “I’ve always
advocated that pilots disengage the automation…for a while,” says Helmreich.
In life, as in aviation, we can also coast along with our own automation, be it
an education that tells us what to think, a corporation that feeds us our needs
or a society that encourages a certain behavioural norm. Sometimes there is a
call from within to move in a direction that accords not with expected norms and
as in aviation, there will be benefits to consciously charting our own
direction, even if it is more difficult than coasting along.
