Pilot Fatigue Flying While Tired

Pilot Fatigue Flying While Tired

                           

                                                      

I remember reading this interesting article last year about Pilot Fatigue; I want to share with the aviation community and analyze the possible consequences when crews flying while tired .

LOOKING up into the heavens at night, it's not hard to distinguish planets and stars from passing aeroplane lights. But a terrifying nosedive by an Air Canada flight in January 2011 shows that this is not always the case. The plunge was caused by a fatigued pilot who mistook the planet Venus for a United States Air Force plane, according to a report released this week by Canada's Transportation Safety Board.

The plane was halfway across the Atlantic ocean during a flight from Toronto to Zurich when the incident occurred. The first officer had just finished a 75-minute rest, though Air Canada flight crew are only meant to take controlled naps of up to 40 minutes to improve on–the–job performance. He initially thought Venus was a Boeing C-17 that was in the vicinity, but was corrected by the captain. The officer then took evasive action when he again thought the C-17 was heading towards his plane.

Fourteen of the 95 passengers and two flight attendants were injured during the 46-second event, which saw the Boeing 767 drop 400 feet and its pitch alter from two degrees up to six degrees down before the captain was able to react. Seven passengers were sent to hospital upon landing in Zurich, but nobody in business class was injured or even displaced, proving once again that it pays to be rich.

Coincidentally, the safety board released its preliminary annual summary  earlier this month and found that flying in Canada was safer in 2011 than in previous years. There were 932 reported occurrences—defined as an incident or accident—an 18% decrease from the 2006–2010 average of 1,135.

Source : The Economist

Hurricane Season 2016

Hurricane Season 2016

It’s Hurricane Season not only pilots need to know more about hurricanes, all people need to be prepare protecting the home inside and out: and follow all tips for hurricane season.

So, following a season with the fewest number of hurricanes since 1982, the 2016 Atlantic hurricane season is expected to follow up.

What is a hurricane? A hurricane is a severe tropical storm that forms in the Southern Atlantic Ocean, and Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, or in the Eastern Pacific Ocean too.

Hurricanes need warm tropical oceans, moisture and light winds above them which produce violent winds, incredible waves, torrential rains and floods.

Hurricanes rotate in a counterclockwise direction around an eye. In a hurricane the most violent winds occur in the area immediately around the eye, called the eye wall.

What is a Storm Surge? A storm surge is a massive dome of water often 50 miles wide that sweeps across the coast near the area where the eye of the hurricane makes landfall.

What is Tornadoes? Most hurricanes also include tornadoes. So, 70% of hurricanes that hit land spawn at least one tornado.

Storm Alerts:

Tropical Storm Watch: Winds 39 to 73 mph, may hit coastal area within 36 hours.

Tropical Storm Warning: Winds 39 to 73 mph, may hit a specific coastal area within 24 hours.

Hurricane Watch: Winds 74 mph or higher, may hit coastal area within 36 hours.

Hurricane Warning: Winds 74 mph, or higher, hit specific area within 24 hours, storm either direct hit, or passing blow.

Hurricane Categories:

CATEGORY 1: Winds 74-95 mph, storm surge 3.5 ft.

CATEGORY 2: Winds 96-110 mph, storm surge 6-8 ft.

CATEGORY 3: Winds 111-130 mph, storm surge 9-12 ft.

CATEGORY 4: Winds 131-155 mph, storm surge 13-18 ft.

CATEGORY 5: Winds 156 or higher, storm surge 19 ft. plus.

Providing tips for hurricane season not only helps keep pilots safe and people, but it can also help aviation safety. Always taking the proper precautions, collecting emergency supplies and creating a family evacuation plan in your home too. Safety is everybody’s business.

What You Should Know About Weather.

What You Should Know About Weather.

I want to talk today and post and interesting information that can either make a good review to all Pilots flying all around the world to avoid thunderstorms and turbulence. Many times you as a good and Safety Pilot you have to make decisions involving thunderstorms and turbulence flying.

In some tropical regions, thunderstorms occur year-around, for example in United States thunderstorms develop most frequently in Spring, Summer, and Fall. In the Arctic Region occasionally experience thunderstorm during Summer time.

In general, thunderstorms occur varies widely from Season to Season. Well to explain and to be more specific, thunderstorms in general are most frequently during July and August and least frequent in December and January, in to the United States.

In fact, the planet earth is unique in that its atmosphere, as Pilots when we encounter bad weather during our itinerary, sometime are affected by weather, but we need to understand what you should know about weather how can shake your flight, weather is complex and sometimes difficult to understand, our restless atmosphere is almost continuously in motion as it strives to reach stability.

You remember when we are a student pilot we receive training regarding some meteorological conceptions, and the atmosphere are classify into layers based on temperature.

So, preparation for your weather briefing before your flying is very essential to any Pilot, meteorological and aeronautical information is provided by continuous sources.

Everyone who flies no matter in what Country you are flying encounters turbulence, at some time or other. Turbulence varieties from bumpiness which can bother Crew and Passengers and also can structurally damage the aircraft or injure its passengers.

So , Aircraft reaction to turbulence varies with the difference in Wind speed in adjacent currents, size of the aircraft , wing loading , and also aircraft attitude.

All Pilots know the first rule in flying turbulence is to reduce airspeed; you need to know very clear your limitations and follow up the recommended airspeed for penetrating turbulence when you knowing where to expect a thunderstorm or turbulence.

To a respectable review and always remember Pilots: the main causes of turbulence are: Convective Currents, Obstruction to wind flow, and also Wind Shear. Turbulence also occurs in the wake of moving aircraft whenever the airfoils exert lift – Wake Turbulence.

Be alert all the time Pilots, any combination of causes may occur at one time. I'm interested in writing today on my safety blog about this important concern, regarding thunderstorms and turbulence to require and maintain a safe flight and land safely without any difficult.

I became interested in writing about this subject because when I read some information regarding incidents and accidents involved commercial aircraft, who have had problems with some of its flights.

I found it very important that we review these incidents and share and learn more about what’s going on and could be more dangerous if don’t emphasis the fatal magnitudes that could be happen .

So, I want to share this excellent information , go to the links and read the information , you will learn more about what I’m talking about it about turbulence .

Always reporting Turbulence at any time you could realize be dangerous for other crews. Pilots should report all the time locations, time (UTC or Z), intensity, weather in or near clouds, altitude, type of aircraft and when applicable, duration of turbulence.

So, duration may be based on time between two locations or over a single location, all locations should be readily identifiable, also keep in mind there are different types of turbulence, I want to refresh your memory, Light, Moderate, Severe, and Extreme.

Always remember the good and Safety Pilot is one that is a conservative Aviator and learns every day from the unexpected things that can happen in your Cockpit.

               

                                                Safe Pilots, Safe Skies. Always Fly Safely.

Source Caracol Radio Station Colombia

Avianca Airlines A 330, Andes Mountains on June 06th 2016, Flying Lima Peru to Buenos Aires Argentina Turbulence injures cabin crew and passengers.

http://caracol.com.co/radio/2016/06/06/nacional/1465184789_624470.html

Source: The Aviation Herald

Accident: Hong Kong A320 at Hong Kong on Aug 30th 2013, turbulence injures 6

http://avherald.com/h?article=467ab575&opt=0  

Accident: Thai A388 at Hong Kong on Aug 30th 2013, turbulence injures 39

http://avherald.com/h?article=467ab3da&opt=0

Accident: Copa B738 near Orlando on Aug 29th 2013, turbulence injures 5

http://avherald.com/h?article=467abb2c&opt=0

Accident: Naysa AT72 at Tenerife on Aug 4th 2013, turbulence injures 2 cabin crew

http://avherald.com/h?article=46781920&opt=0

The Team Concept and the Leadership inside the Cockpit

The Team Concept and the Leadership inside the Cockpit

Leadership inside the cockpit is the most important resource management; a cockpit leader is first end and primary a competent pilot. No matter which position you occupy in the cockpit, you must learn always to become a leader in that position. All pilot leaders must exercise to control others, so and also must maintain control in any abnormal / emergency situations.

I want to share again this interesting post, I wrote years ago on my safety blog, and also to understand the Team Concept when there are two or more crew members in a cockpit you have a team that must  work together to do the best job possible  for the team rather  than working separately as individuals.

I know sometimes learning team work is frequently difficult for pilots because almost all of their experience is an individual. Training occasionally is based on a single crew concept but some evaluations are made on an individual basis.

Though, in my experience as Aviation Accident Investigator, when accidents happen, the crew is evaluated as a team, they flying together, most likely with the same training instruction and also flying SOP (Standard Operating Procedures), this is the only consistent team performance evaluation being used to.

One of the most important functions to stay away from incidents and accidents any pilot leader is to develop a team concept within his or her group.  Fly Safe. Enjoy again the lecture.

The Pilot and the Leadership Command

Being a good leader as an Airmen or any other profession is very important.

Being a good leader involves many factor as such working with a good team, also deal with a difficult situation that are existing to us in any situation during the flight and of course to handling of any event during an emergency situation, the most important is the safety of the passengers and all the entire crew when you as a pilot in command have the responsibility to fly and valuable aircraft.

Being a good  leader however, means sharing the responsibility to work together to get a common goal as a team, sharing all that information in your cockpit, evaluating any risk that it may be present during any phase of your flight and  management of all the resources in the cabin are principal task .

The good administration of an excellent CRM: This is the most important section for the prevention of accidents.

Leadership is the skill of making a person to do something you want and done because he wants to do and much better, so it should know you as a pilot in command, must lead and always keep your cockpit open for any concern, a good communication will avoid a difficult situation that if not fixed on  time it can contribute  to an incident or accident at any phase of the flight .

Like a good airmen leader, you have to guarantee that everything is running efficiently inside the cockpit, make sure that your team works with you and always are happy and motivated, if something bothers them, or if they have other things to tell you in which not are agree with you, always try to express in a good manner and  their flights must be  always safer, the good leader is the one who shares his knowledge with his team, there is no better thing to share what has been learned in our  of life experience and understanding that we shared, everyone in this profession as pilots we  have learned from fatal accidents , Leadership and Learning are always indispensable.

 If you as a pilot has accumulated many flight hours and many years in this profession, this does not mean you are perfect and cannot be involved in an emergency situation, maybe one day you can be involve in any one, a good leader always learns from their students , coworkers and also from the mistakes of the past fatal incidents and accidents, maybe you as a pilot in command  have more experience and a lot of accumulated  flying hours  more than your colleagues in aviation , but never think and assume you know everything.

Each day of our life brings a new experiences to all of us, and remember always every flight that has been done is different from the last flight we done already.

As pilots we constantly learn new things in our profession. Always learn from the mistakes of the fatal accidents and consequences in the past, those accidents teach us that we must never lose the track that accidents can be avoided.

To be a great leader Airmen, always must be interconnecting and working together inside the cockpit, and maintain a good environment with your team and managing all these resources we have inside the cockpit to flying safely all the time.

It is good to learning the past fatal accidents in general and commercial aviation , this will teach you much more in this profession as pilots , leadership is an action not a position, most things in our life are difficult before they become easy, always fly with safety and  thanks all the time  because you have a good luck to be a good airline pilot  and be grateful to have  that position where you are in the present  ,  it is important  to have a good luck , but do not think you have a good luck in case of an emergency, the pilot leader must always be prepare and be  trained for the unexpected in any difficult situation that is present inside your cockpit at any time.

Always test your crew to maintain a high standard for all its flights and of course you as you as a good leader too.

Always listen and keep your cockpit open for any information, always remember that it is better to reach our destination late but safely.

Always is a good time to remember the right things and follow the rules to fly conservative, if you fly with a respectable safety you can get it and never be involved in any badly situation , make sure always that flying  is very  safely, air safety is the  principal commitment to all Pilots Leaders  .

Learn from others mistakes; don't have others learn from you/ Safety is the best way to work.

Always Fly Safely.

What is a Hurricane ?

What is a Hurricane?

 Hurricane

This is an interesting issue how hurricanes affecting air navigation and routes to airlines in different aspects during flying so, but what that mean hurricane? A hurricane is a type of tropical cyclone-the common term for all circulating weather systems (Counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere) over tropical waters.

During flying all pilots except those especially trained to explore tropical storms and hurricanes should avoid these dangerous storms, so in my last post I wrote about thunderstorms, the tops of thunderstorms are associated with tropical cyclones commonly exceed 50.000 feet, but winds in a typical hurricane are more strongest at low levels, and decreasing with altitude.

As pilots we need to know an additional hazard encountered in hurricanes is erroneous altitude reading from pressure altimeters, so very important to know also is these errors are caused by the large pressure difference between the border of the storm and its center, so for example one research airplane lost almost 2.000 feet true altitude navigating a storm while the pressure altimeter indicated a constant altitude of 5.000 feet, in short tropical cyclones are very hazardous to avoid them, to avoid the storm in a minimum of time , some tips are:  try to fly to the right of the storm to take advantage of the tailwind, but if you fly to the left of the storm, you will encounter strong headwinds which may expend your fuel supply before you reach a safe landing area. Let’s review the most common types of tropical cyclones:  

Tropical cyclones are classified as follows:

1. Tropical Depression: An organized system of clouds and thunderstorms with a defined circulation and maximum continued winds of 38 mph (33 knots) or less.

2. Tropical Storm: An organized system of strong thunderstorms with a defined circulation and maximum continued winds of 39 to 73 mph (34-63 knots).

3. Hurricane: An intense tropical weather system with a well-defined circulation and maximum continued winds of 74 mph (64 knots) or higher. In the western Pacific, hurricanes are called "typhoons," and similar storms in the Indian Ocean are called "cyclones."

Hurricanes are products of the Tropical Ocean and atmosphere.

Safety it’s in your hands Pilots, think Safety, Safety First is Safety Always!