777 Crash and Fire at SFO

[Gabriel]

crews are trained and instructed time and again how wonderful HAL in the bus is and how he won't let you screw the pooch.

I don't think that any airline is training their pilots with this philosophy.
And if there is any, they are a minority and shuld be grounded by the relevant authority.

i'm sure that in a perfect world with perfect pilots, busses are pretty much foolproof.

That's wrong. The idea is to reduce workload, prevent pilot mistake, and yes, even not allow the pilot to put the plane out of the flight envelope.

But NOT to turn tue pilot into a decorative item. The airplane still need a pilot in command. And let me say it again: COMMAND.

Command is a closed loop: you must have a target situation, be aware of the current situationk, and take action to turn the first into the second.

In short, if the pilot in command is not monitoring the airpseed, he is not in command. And if the pilot in command is not in command, nobody is. Not even HAL 9000.

[3WE]

...COMMAND....

Command is a closed loop: you must have a target situation, be aware of the current situationk, and take action to turn the first into the second.

...if the pilot in command is not in command, nobody is. Not even HAL 9000.

Not so sure about this.

Let's start with the knob (or button) on the Autopilot called "Command" (abbreviated CMD).

And then this:

And you are cruising along at FL 30-something and the plane hits a bump that disrupts it's attitude, HAL/Otto/whomever sees that the planes attitude differs (situation) is different from the target situation, so it commands control movement to change the first situation into the second situation.

[Gabriel]

Not so sure about this.

Let's start with the knob (or button) on the Autopilot called "Command" (abbreviated CMD).

And then this:

And you are cruising along at FL 30-something and the plane hits a bump that disrupts it's attitude, HAL/Otto/whomever sees that the planes attitude differs (situation) is different from the target situation, so it commands control movement to change the first situation into the second situation.

And what's the part that you are not sure about? "Take action" can mean "let the AP do it", but that's "action" only if you monitor that the AP is actually responding as expected, so you have the closed loop. "Oh, the AT will take care of the speed so I don't need to monitor it" is not closed loop, and is not being in command.

[brianw999]

There was an excellent video here once that has sadly been removed by its author. It was of a guest instructor for American Airlines lecturing on the habit of pilots to bury their heads in computerisation when they should be disengaging automated systems and hand flying the aircraft. He cited one scenario of a crew that sees another aircraft on a converging collision course and who then take their collective heads inside the cockpit and start changing autopilot settings to solve the issue instead of keeping visual with the approaching aircraft, using a push button click to disengage the autopilot and hand flying the aircraft to a place in the sky where a collision will not occur.

Dictionary definition of "Pilot"

......."a person who operates the controls of an aircraft"

Specifically NOT a person who simply watches automated systems operate the controls of an aircraft.

[TeeVee]

I don't think that any airline is training their pilots with this philosophy.
And if there is any, they are a minority and shuld be grounded by the relevant authority.


That's wrong. The idea is to reduce workload, prevent pilot mistake, and yes, even not allow the pilot to put the plane out of the flight envelope.

But NOT to turn tue pilot into a decorative item. The airplane still need a pilot in command. And let me say it again: COMMAND.

Command is a closed loop: you must have a target situation, be aware of the current situationk, and take action to turn the first into the second.

In short, if the pilot in command is not monitoring the airpseed, he is not in command. And if the pilot in command is not in command, nobody is. Not even HAL 9000.

Gabriel, of course they are: being taught how HAL works and what it can do is training them. i didn't say they were training them with the intent that crews rely on HAL exclusively, but that is human nature. and i've been proven right in this matter more than once.

regardless of what the "intention" of the designers/engineers of the system was, in the real world it is going to be implemented by humans, which WILL, without any question whatsoever, fail. in that case, perhaps HAL needs to be given even more autonomy...

[3WE]

There was an excellent video here once that has sadly been removed by its author. It was of a guest instructor for American Airlines lecturing on the habit of pilots to bury their heads in computerisation when they should be disengaging automated systems and hand flying the aircraft. He cited one scenario of a crew that sees another aircraft on a converging collision course and who then take their collective heads inside the cockpit and start changing autopilot settings to solve the issue instead of keeping visual with the approaching aircraft, using a push button click to disengage the autopilot and hand flying the aircraft to a place in the sky where a collision will not occur.

Dictionary definition of "Pilot"

......."a person who operates the controls of an aircraft"

Specifically NOT a person who simply watches automated systems operate the controls of an aircraft.

On one hand, great post and sure, I agree.

On the other hand, the vast vast majority of pilots get this, and maintain balance, and make huge use of automation for safety while maintaining high levels of situational awareness and airmanship skills and healthy doses of hand flying.

The trouble is that all that mom and apple pie talk isn't much help when two guys have simultaneous brain farts doing a repeated operation for the 10-zillionth time, nor does it address what seems to be a frightening abiity for some questionable pilots to remain behind the touch screen...

[Gabriel]

There was an excellent video here once that has sadly been removed by its author. It was of a guest instructor for American Airlines lecturing on the habit of pilots to bury their heads in computerisation when they should be disengaging automated systems and hand flying the aircraft. He cited one scenario of a crew that sees another aircraft on a converging collision course and who then take their collective heads inside the cockpit and start changing autopilot settings to solve the issue instead of keeping visual with the approaching aircraft, using a push button click to disengage the autopilot and hand flying the aircraft to a place in the sky where a collision will not occur.

You mean this video: Children of the magenta line:

http://independentflightinstructors.com/instructors/2011/11/children-of-the-magenta-line/

Should be a mandatory lecture for every pilot flying an airplane with any level of automation, even if it's a Cessna 172.

[brianw999]

That's the one, well found Gabriel. It's been pulled from YouTube for contravention of copyrights.

[Gabriel]

That's the one, well found Gabriel. It's been pulled from YouTube for contravention of copyrights.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0rYX-Jn6o8

[3WE]

...Should be a mandatory lecture for every pilot flying an airplane with any level of automation, even if it's a Cessna 172.

Not at MY flight schools.

[Evan]

Aviate, navigate, communicate, automate, what's it doing now.

[elaw]

That's a great video! But I did notice one confusing thing.

Around the 13-minute mark, he makes the point the the pilot should always monitor what the automation is doing, and gives as an example an A310 that crashed. In the example, due to a throttle malfunction, the autothrottle reduced the thrust on one engine to idle during climb, causing asymmetric thrust. The speaker argues that had one of the pilots had their hand on the throttle levers, he would have noticed that one was moving and the other was not.

But... I thought in Airbus aircraft the throttle levers did not move to follow the action of the autothrottle? Or maybe that's just the newer ones? It seems to me if the levers don't move in response to the autothrottle, having your hand on them won't help detect a problem.

[Gabriel]

That's a great video! But I did notice one confusing thing.

Around the 13-minute mark, he makes the point the the pilot should always monitor what the automation is doing, and gives as an example an A310 that crashed. In the example, due to a throttle malfunction, the autothrottle reduced the thrust on one engine to idle during climb, causing asymmetric thrust. The speaker argues that had one of the pilots had their hand on the throttle levers, he would have noticed that one was moving and the other was not.

But... I thought in Airbus aircraft the throttle levers did not move to follow the action of the autothrottle? Or maybe that's just the newer ones? It seems to me if the levers don't move in response to the autothrottle, having your hand on them won't help detect a problem.

I think it was (and he says) A300, not A310.

In an A310 the failure would not have happened in the first place (at least not with the same failure mode) because, since the AT doesn't move the thrust levers, it cares very little if one of them is jammed or not. And, as you said, had the AT reduced thrust only on one engine due to some other failure, having the hand on the levers would not have helped.

[elaw]

Actually not to nitpick too much, but several articles I found online indicate the aircraft was an A310 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TAROM_Flight_371). And at 12:55 in (at least the Youtube version of) the video he says "As you may remember, an A310 aircraft..."

[ATLcrew]

I think it was (and he says) A300, not A310.

In an A310 the failure would not have happened in the first place (at least not with the same failure mode) because, since the AT doesn't move the thrust levers, it cares very little if one of them is jammed or not.

On the A300/A310 the trust levers DO move in A/T mode. The non-moving levers were introduced on the 320.