Skyservice Incident

[moeman]

I suspect that the individual who was at the controls of this aircraft was inadequately trained and it is now costing Sky Service a lot more than it would have cost to provide the pilot with the experience base he needed to prevent the accident.

Is this based on assumptions you have made, hearsay, or facts?

[Guest Starman]

It is based on an assumption I am making because of the fact that the aircraft nose wheel struck the ground at 12 G's, causing severe damage to the airframe.

I'm not making a judgement on the particular pilot's capabilities, only on the fact that he or she made a career threatening error. I'm sure that the pilot would give anything to replay that landing and do things a little differently. Whether the cause was inadequate training, fatigue, visual illusions, system failure or a combination of all of the above, the fact is that the event occured. Some of the factors which led up to the event may eventually be traced to cost saving in training.

"Penny wise and pound foolish" makes for sad airline shareholders...

And just as you might say that cutting corners in maintenance in order to save a few bucks will bite you big time at some point, cutting corners on the price of highly trained, highly motivated pilots will cost you a hundred times over when things like this happen.

[Altech]

Starman, very insightful information. Couldn't argue with you. Just wondering, though. Which airline do you work for? Because, all of a sudden, I'm trying to figure out which canadian airline, in the past, has bent more metal and taken people's lives along with it. Let's see, Nationair ... yep, AC, AC, and also AC. Was that as a result of "poor piloting" or poor training? Maybe you could enlighten us.

[Mitch Cronin]

Altech... with respect, that's not likely to help any...

Starman, thanks. (don't let him bait you... )

[Guest Starman]

I don't know which airline has the highest statistics on incident/accident rates per RPM, but I would be as interested as you to see the stats over the past 30 years or so.

However, I would argue that any time there is an incident traceable to poor pilot performance, there are many factors that contribute to that unacceptable performance level. Initial aircrew selection is a primary contributing factor in many cases, but training standards and the scope of the training matrix along with corporate culture and the regulatory environment are all causative factors that have to be taken into account and improved where necessary.

After all, there is one factor common to every incident of pilot error and that is that the pilot did not wish to make the error...

[IFG]

Hi, Starman - It's nice that most here successfully resisted responding to you as Altech did, I suspect many had the impulse, tho'; I reacted pretty much as Mitch did - not a characteristic posting IMHO. Forgive me, but your opening salvo was extremely arrogant (regardless of whether you live with it), not to say presumptuous of the cause of the PUJ incident, and for a pilot, jaw-droppingly cavalier in assessment of another's capabilities. But perhaps you're just having a trying day .

In examining any incident/accident, most would likely often agree that "training standards and the scope of the training matrix along with corporate culture and the regulatory environment are all causative factors". What raises the dander is that gratuitous mortar you seem to lob on the house of any pilot who happens to toil for a lower paying airline than the one you presumably do, since most of them likely feel they ply their trade with every bit as much conscientiousness and professionalism as you do. It relates to your tacit linkage between pay levels and the quality in initial pilot selection.

Without following down the dubious trail of validating that broad assumption about pay and individual pilot quality, if "initial aircrew selection is a primary contributing factor in many cases [incidents/accidents]", I wonder if you could cite one of them? Otherwise, it just seems to be another sweeping, unsubstantiated declaration.

As an aside re: statistics - RPM's, even ASM's would have little to do with it. Crashing once every X million miles in a 747 is no more safe (less unsafe?) than in a Beech 99. IAC, a rate per flight hour, or IMO per sector, is more on the mark. Numbers wonkery, I know

Cheers, IFG

[Guest Starman]

I guess I am paying the price for shot from the hip punched in on a bad day, but I wanted to make the linkage between pilot cost and the quality of the work done, and not for any particular airline but for the industry as a whole.

The job must be attractive in order to maintain the standard of professionalism we need to prevent incidents. Management must also put a high value on pilot training so that the quality of pilot work is not eroded.

All pilots, and all people for that matter, make mistakes. An attitude for constant vigilance and constant improvement is needed within each individual pilot and within the corporate culture in order to prevent mistakes that cost money and risk lives.

And I agree with you; an incident rate by number of sectors flown would be a more accurate gauge of a company's safety standards.

[IFG]

Amen to that - Cheers, IFG

[Canus Chinookus]