Newsgroups: sci.aeronautics.airliners,rec.travel.air
From: rdd@cactus.org (Robert Dorsett)
Subject: Re: Airbus safety
Date: 02 Dec 92 03:49:48 PST

In article <ByL8Hp.LM8@apollo.hp.com> nelson_p@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>>Remember that the standard definition of an airline pilot's job is 99.999%
>>pute boredom, and 0.001% pure terror (I forget where this quote came from,
>>and the ratios may be incorrect) - if this is anything like true, maybe
>>human pilots really are on the edge of extinction ?
>
>   _New Scientist_ had an article devoted to this about 3 issues ago.
>
>   Basically they said that as the % of "pilot error" crashes increases
>   we may already be at the point where more lives would be saved by
>   pilotless airplanes.

This is certainly a debatable contention.  Airbus certainly seems to believe
it: but it's also in the business of selling products "differentiated" by
their style of protection.

The reality of the situation is that the safety record has remained pretty
much constant since the late 1970's--note: not the early 1980's, when the
first automated aircraft were introduced.  It has stabilized at about 1500
lives per year.  What IS true is that as mechanical failures are isolated
and fixed, the proportion of pilot-induced failures must, necessarily, in-
crease.  The problem facing the industry is how to get the death rate to
zero: we don't seem to wish to recognize that, with current technology, it
may not be possible, and that we may see steadily diminishing returns in
our efforts to do so.

The proportion of pilot-error incidents range from 60% to 95% of the total
number of crashes, with Airbus generally supporting the latter figure.  The
problem, of course, is how one defines *pilot error*.  Is "pilot error"
pushing the wrong switch?  Suddenly pushing, instead of pulling, on the
yoke?  A psychotic break?  Naturally, none of these things: in all instances,
"pilot error" has been a case of a broader *system* failure, the system being
a combination of the pilot, his peers, the airplane, its interface, the
airline, and the regulatory backdrop.  In precious few cases were the pilots
"asleep at the wheel," or criminally incapacitated.

What is debatable is how many of these factors can be eliminated, simply
by increasing automation, reducing oversight authority, or transferring
responsibility for operations to ground controllers.

It is EXTREMELY important to realize that we're struggling against an *ideal*:
no crashes.  It is also important to note that if, indeed, pilot error is
*increasing*, then it's probably a result of over-automation in the cockpit,
since virtually no other part of the infrastructure has changed since the
late 70's.  The simple, short-term solution is to reduce the degree of auto-
mation, or at least bring the pilot back into the loop (not necessarily
exclusive concepts!).

You would have a hard time convincing me that the number of fundamental errors
would not increase GREATLY with ground-based oversight, that the safety
margins would not go DOWN, as people fundamentally distanced from the reality
of a flight have a go/no-go say.


>And moreover, the technology to do this either
>   already exists or is close at hand.

The technology isn't close to create safe, fully autonomous aircraft.
And, in lack of that, we'd need ground-based control, with a high degree of
automation in-flight.  The infrastructure needed to support this would be
exhorbitantly expensive (and who would run it: the dispatch controller, who
just sees a number on a status board, and wants to make his schedule?  A
government specialist?).  In addition, we'd almost certainly be replacing the
existing social and interface problems that currently exist in the *air*, with
a new, untried set of problems on the ground.

More than any other trend in aviation, this sort of talk, much of which seems
to originate with Airbus, and which deliberately, blithely underrates the
problems involved in reducing pilot authority, worries me that we've passed
the point of negative returns.  The problem, again, is not automation: to
paraphrase Don Norman, it's appropriate feedback.  Or, in mil-speak, the
minimum capability needed to carry out the mission requirements.  There is
abundant evidence that, in fact, this requirement can be met with *less*
automation, *better* interfaces, and keeping the pilots in the loop.
However, there is also evidence that flight deck design is engineering-and
marketing-driven, and that "good" human factors does not play a primary role
in flight deck design, except as a rubber-stamp on a pre-existing systemic
intent.

There is also increasing evidence that hybrid designs: with high degree of
automation, and relegating the pilot to a passive, supervisory role, out of
the loop, are *not* the way to go.


>   They said, however, that it would be a public-relations nightmare and
>   felt there was no hope of selling the idea to the public.

Was Bernard Ziegler the author of this article, perchance? :-)  It's
symptomatic of the technocratic solution: full-speed ahead with quantifiable
solutions, damn the pilots.  Even if we don't fully understand the
consequences of the resulting environment, when these solutions have to
ultimately interact with human beings, at least at some level.


>   People will
>   continue to cite those cases where coolness or quick thinking on
>   the part of the crew did save the airplane or at least many lives.

I wouldn't.  Rather, I would ask how well we understand the *totality* of
in-flight incidents and actions, which are corrected by appropriate air-
manship.  An old, true saying, is that a good pilot is a pilot who doesn't
have to show he's a good pilot.  Is the capability of being able to maintain
control in a thunderstorm really that relevant, when 99% of all pilots would
simply have flown around the same thunderstorm?


We can automate easily quantifiable issues: simple tasks.  Judgement and
airmanship has thus far evaded us, on all levels.  Until we get a grip on
it, talk of fully autonomous aircraft or ground control is nothing more
than science fiction.




---
Robert Dorsett
rdd@cactus.org
...cs.utexas.edu!cactus.org!rdd

Newsgroups: sci.aeronautics.airliners
From: rdd@cactus.org (Robert Dorsett)
Subject: New Scientist article
Date: 08 Dec 92 15:51:04 PST

In article <ByL8Hp.LM8@apollo.hp.com> nelson_p@apollo.hp.com (Peter
Nelson) writes:

>>Remember that the standard definition of an airline pilot's job is 99.999%
>>pute boredom, and 0.001% pure terror (I forget where this quote came from,
>>and the ratios may be incorrect) - if this is anything like true, maybe
>>human pilots really are on the edge of extinction ?
>
>   _New Scientist_ had an article devoted to this about 3 issues ago.
>
>   Basically they said that as the % of "pilot error" crashes increases
>   we may already be at the point where more lives would be saved by
>   pilotless airplanes.

I looked through recent issues of _New Scientist_, seeking the article
Peter referred to.  It appears to be a 2-page essay from the October 17
issue, entitled "Will Accidents Always Happen?"

The author of the article, Julian Moxon, has written for FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL
for a number of years: his specialty appears to be safety; he's produced
a number of good, comprehensive summaries and analyses of various crashes.

Peter's comment seemed to suggest Moxon was advocating pilotless aircraft;
in the context of previous post, I construed this as along the lines of
Bernard Ziegler's "The computer can do it better" rhetoric, and reacted
accordingly. :-)  Moxon's point, however, is a bit more, well, integrated,
and, if anything, far more ambitious.  It's less an attack against *pilots*,
per se, which has characterized Ziegler's remarks, but more a criticism of
the ATC system.  His basic point is that most crashes are landing crashes,
controlled-flight-into-terrain.  Some are caused by ATC malfeasance, some are
interface problems.  From the concluding remarks:

"More worrying is that the skies are becoming increasingly congested,
with predictions (despite the recession) of a doubling in air traffic movements
over the coming decade.  This puts extra pressure on the whole air transport
system, not least on the pilots and air traffic controllers in the front
line.  In general, the system is (or will be) good enough to handle the
extra traffic but--the statistics suggest--probably not good enough to
prevent crashes like that in Kathmandu.  It is as if we have arrived at the
bare minimum of accidents.  The challenge will be to maintain this minimum,
given denser air traffic.

"An inevitable question being asked in an increasingly automated world
is whether we still need pilots.  In many modern aircraft, the entire flight
apart from the takeoff can handled by the autopilot, once programmed.  But
for obvious reasons, this is an emotive subject, which aircraft manufacturers
carefully avoid in their official statements.  Still, some designers are
beginning to think seriously about the possibilities of making the flight
crew's role more to do with systems management than flying the aircraft.

"This would make the pilot part of a team including the entire air traffic
system.  Direct communication with the aircraft and its systems would be
established by a radio-borne digital data link.  This would send information
on the aircraft's behavior to the ground and receive navigation data and
commands that could be fed directly into its flight management system.
Global positioning satellites would meanwhile observe it constantly.

"Pilots worry that this would reduce them to little more than highly paid
observers monitoring the aircraft's progress through the skies.  But that
time is a long way off.  In the meantime, the focus remains on the behavior
of the human brain."

Those interested in a more extreme version of this would enjoy David
Learmount's interview with Bernard Ziegler, in Flight International,
September 23-29, 1992, Pp. 35-36.  Ziegler is sort of Airbus's chief priest.




---
Robert Dorsett
rdd@cactus.org
...cs.utexas.edu!cactus.org!rdd