Risk of problem solution skills loss by civil aviation pilots in uncertainty conditions

Аuthors

Golovnin S. M.

Volga-Dnepr airlines, 14, Karbisheva str., Ulyanovsk, 432072, Russia

e-mail: xplane.manual@gmail.com

Abstract

Modern air transportation system is characterized by the great dependence on human, all its elements safe functioning determine the very same “human factor” playing a big role in management and stability of the entire system. In the course of time and aviation industry development, the role of the human factor in aviation accidents is being varied considerably. If for old aircraft, which were difficultly controlled and unreliable the human factor share was 5–7%, in the middle of the middle of the last century it was about 50%, and at present of the human factor is about 80% with the uptrend.

To reduce the risk of an aviation event, the Concept of Crew Resources Managing (CRM), based on the provisions of the human factor, is being actively implemented in modern civil aviation. This is a system of measures aimed at enhancing flight safety and effectiveness by the right implementation of human, technical and information resources, as well improving interaction within the crew, and the crew with the personnel of the other CRM components. CRM is an of practical implementation of the human factor principles.

The human factor as the cause of aviation event implies the human inability to react (interfere with) timely to an evolving or created emergency situation to avoid or minimize of this event aftermath.

One of the most important characteristics of a person is the response time of his reaction. In general, the response time is the time that passes from the moment of the an irritant occurrence to the motional response ending. In civil aviation, the ability to respond to irritants (signals, air traffic controllers' commands, aircraft cabin situations) is instilled in the early stages of training in flight schools. However, the practical development of reactions to events undoubtedly plays an important role in the development of the reaction rate under real flight conditions.

For this purpose, training programs for cadets include tasks for training with a list of events, which are practiced on simulators and imply the occurrence of the cadet's correct response to avoid an emergency situation development.

However, while delivering classes with cadets who are commissioned for a new type of aircraft after flight school graduation, it was noted that in the case of a series of one-type trainings, cadets began foresee a situation that wouldl be set by the instructor and developed while training process.

Thus, the effect of “suddenness” vanishes, and after all, failures or other predicaments, which may occur in flight, cannot be predicted in real flight conditions.

This regularity and foreseeing the possible scenario of situation development is able to abate significantly the pilots skill to respond and solve the unexpected problems and reduce the need for analysis and correct decision-making regarding a particular situation. As a consequence, the pilot's main skill “to fly a few seconds ahead of the aircraft” will be blurred and will subsequently be left without development, which will affect the further safe aircraft operation.

The following experiment was conducted to simulate alike situation with the cadets on the simulator. Ten cadets underwent a total of twenty training sessions, of which in 10 training sessions they knew that a simulated collision with the bird (imitation of broken glass) would be planned, and in 10 other cases the task for training did not indicated the planned collision with a bird.

The results were being recorded as follows: the training number and the number of people who could not properly perform the procedures while collision with a bird (imitation of broken glass) were recorded.

Thanks to uncertainty conditions modeling in virtual space (training device, simulator), these skills can be developed on the ground, preparing the pilot for action in almost any situation, and it does not matter whether the situation is caused by a person, a vehicle, or environment. Skills of action in the face of uncertainty will help the pilots in any case to make right decision and eliminate the problem in time.

Keywords:

flight safety, risks management, quality management, virtual environment, aviation specialists training, flight modeling, human factor in civil aviation

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