I was kind of agnostic on whether senior government officials presiding over aviation needed to be pilots. There were always multiple complaints about whoever took the reins of the various departments and few of those complaints ever had anything to do with aviation.
I can just see the nonsense that can develop with this kind of attitude. I must follow the instructions because if I don’t my career will be over so even though I see a plane on final I will pull the plane out because I am told to do so. I wish these political hack would stay I their lane.
A tragedy that the patients are in charge of the asylum. Unqualified individuals in important positions with hands on many levers. It has been proven, already, actions taken place have been done so without thought and with irreparable damage.
Immediate reaction; the entire air traffic system slows down. More delays and more late arrivals. Pilots will for really good reason have Duffy’s suggestion in the back of their heads and why wouldn’t they. That being said, bet money ground incursion events, or, close calls fall abruptly.
The days of hurry up get the customer, passenger to their destination at all cost are over. This will also happen in the air. The phrases “unable” and “say again” will become more widely used. All that being said, I don’t think it’s a bad thing. It is a move in the right direction regarding safety.
Technology advancements will improve safety as it mostly does. However, a pilot is going to protect their profession now, as they always do and should. How can anyone expect anything else to happen.
Because having to second-guess everything as though one minor mistake will mean they’re out of a job will lead to overall less safety because they’ll always be distracted by that looming threat.
How would you behave in your job (aviation or otherwise) if one minor mistake could mean the end of your career?
The corollary to this would be doing whatever he thinks he meant to do to pilots who make mistakes to controllers who make mistakes as well. And I’m about 110% sure NATCA would quickly explain to him in rather pointed terms why that’s a bad idea. Everybody makes mistakes. People in positions of authority and control have to recognize that. As noted, Duffy has no experience in the industry, no knowledge of the decades-long process to develop a safety culture, and no notion of how the Attila-the-Hun approach will wreck it. I hope he either gets a lot more understanding of aviation safety management or forgets he said this and moves on to something else like trying to repair Muskian vandalism or ensuring that FAA follows procurement laws and regulations when acquiring communications systems.
A couple of thoughts: 1. I agree that a return to zero compliance will set safety backwards. 2. I do not believe that any pilot completes any flight perfectly. The military demo teams start their debriefs with the pilots/aviators saying where they made errors in the flight profile. 3. I think that it is important that senior department officials have SOME experience in the purpose of the department they are leading. So, for the FAA, the administrator should be a pilot. For Defense, he or she should have had the opportunity to have been shot at (although I think that 4 star generals/admirals are probably NOT good choices.) 4. The umpire “out” signal could be interpreted differently. When an umpire calls the player out, he is not out for the entire game, much less the season or his baseball career. That is even true in other sports when a referee throws a player out of the game. It is just for that game. We will have to wait and learn how the current Administrator meant that signal.
Just an observation over the years of driving cars, motorcycles and airplanes. Accidents almost always happen in front of you and they almost always happen when you’re rushing. There are exceptions, but, they are far and few between.
I would say they don’t necessarily have to be a pilot. The FAA also is in charge of controllers and safety inspectors, and either of those would also give them insight into day-to-day operations.
But in any case, the FAA falls under the DOT, so in the case of Duffy we’re not talking about the FAA Administrator.
Aviation safety depends on clear-headed leadership, not theatrics. Instead of acting tough, the focus should be on policies that strengthen training, communication, and decision-making across the entire system.
Notice the silence of all the alphabet aviation groups after they had applauded the confirmation of Secretary Duffy!
There are two critical repeating issues that are 2D (vs 3D) that are low hanging fruit and perhaps a third. CRM assuming a “crew” is in the cockpit, remains one of the most important tools for mitigation of pilot error. Practice , Repeat.
2D incidents are typically not complex investigations given our experience with auto accidents. Analysis as to assigning responsibility to ATC or Crew or Both can be completed in days.
I agree with Russ in that there may be terminology confusion on the part of the Administrator.
Given the Administrator’s attention to the matter I would urge that any action be limited to 2D incidents.
Technology will catch up to the problem with ATC data being sent to on-board equipment resulting in Warnings and Alerts as well as collision detection and warnings.
Yes, it’s deafening. Kinda like “The nail that sticks out gets hammered down.”
No one was harmed but if these big mistakes by the biz jet crew had been a few seconds later with the 737 on the runway roll it would have been catastrophic.
We all make mistakes and learn from them but there are levels of mistakes and these were high level ones.
Not only crossing an active runway, without clearance, but also not LOOKING for and seeing the landing traffic ON SHORT FINAL. That’s two high level errors that could been fatal for lots of innocent people.
Takeaways?
This was not a case of high crew workload or task saturation and should never had happened.
Yep. The crickets from ALPA, AOPA and NBAA are kinda deafening.
What troubles me most about Transportation Secretary Duffy’s comments is that he’s the one who made them. He’s not the FAA Administrator. He’s a purely political appointee who also oversees the national highway system, vehicles, railroads, etc. Is there any precedent for a Transportation Secretary assessing blame and dictating consequences for an aviation incident?
Shades of Elizabeth Dole’s “zero tolerance” edict as DoT secretary that proved awful in her era and will again in this one. We’ve learned nothing.
Moot point bobd. Observance of precedent is now a quaint thing of the past along with norms and solidarity with allies which for 80 years has maintained an imperfect world order but one that staved off WW3.
Yes, bobd, there is a precedent: When the President of the United States blamed a mid-air collision on a human resources policy.