Airmanship

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Airmanship
This presentation provides an overview of
Airmanship in aviation. It is intended to
enhance the reader's understanding, but it shall
not supersede the applicable regulations or
airline's operational documentation. Should there
be any discrepancy between this presentation and
an airlines AFM /(M)MEL/FCOM/QRH/FCTM, the
latter shall prevail at all times.
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Introduction
This visual guide defines airmanship and
illustrates its importance to safe flight
operations. Its objective is to reinforce the
importance of airmanship as the basis of safe
flight operations. The material may be used for
self-study or as part of a formal training
presentation. The speakers notes provide
additional information.
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Contents

• Airmanship Defined
• The Building of Airmanship
• Violations
• Summary

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Airmanship Defined

• Airmanship is the consistent use of good judgment
  and
• well-developed skills to accomplish flight
  objectives.
• The consistency required of good airmanship is
• Founded on a cornerstone of uncompromising flight
  discipline
• Developed through systematic skill acquisition
  and proficiency
• A high state of situational awareness completes
  the airmanship picture and is obtained through
  knowledge of ones self, aircraft, environment,
  team and risk.
• (Kern, 1996)

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Consequences of Poor Airmanship

• Accidents and incidents
• Poor airmanship is a causal factor in almost all
  of the 70 percent of accidents that are
  attributed to human factors
• Operational weaknesses and inefficiencies
• Poor airmanship is responsible for operational
  weaknesses and inefficiencies that lead to
  increased safety risk, poor performance and
  wasted money

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The Building of Airmanship

• Judgment All of the elements of airmanship
  support good judgment and decision making, just
  as all of the structural elements of a building
  support its roof.
• Knowledge enables situational awareness, but,
  like judgment, it is also a trait that must be
  developed.
• In-depth knowledge of many subjects will support
  the thinking processes of Airmanship.
• Airmanship is founded on skills and proficiency
  it includes both technical and non-technical
  subjects.
• Discipline is the bedrock of airmanship it is
  the ability and willpower to fly safely.

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Discipline

• Discipline is
• Behavior in accord with rules of conduct
• Behavior and order maintained by training and
  control
• An individuals personal commitment to comply
  with rules and procedures
• The willpower and ability to operate safely
• The exercise of discipline requires
• Not accepting that rules must be broken to
  accomplish a job effectively
• Rejecting opportunities for shortcuts or doing
  things better
• Resisting temptation to break rules to impress
  others
• Control of personal attitudes and biases

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Skills

• Skills are abilities that are learned, usually
  through training, to
• achieve a desired outcome. Two basic
  classifications of skills are
• Perceptual-motor skills, which involve an
  interaction between a perception and a voluntary
  movement. Perceptual-motor skills are
• Taught during initial and recurrent training
• Required to fly aircraft in normal and emergency
  situations
• Cognitive skills, which involve mental processes
  such as comprehension, judgment, memory and
  reasoning. Cognitive skills are
• More complex than perceptual-motor skills
• Related to learning and recall
• Involved in gaining and maintaining situational
  awareness and in decision making
• Used when speaking, listening and understanding

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Hierarchy of Skills
Precision Precise technical and non-technical
skills result from personal endeavor
Efficient An aircraft commander controls the
aircraft and leads a team
Effective Broader, non-technical skills and
experience give efficient operation
Safe Continuing training, experience and
improving airmanship will enable you to operate
effectively as a crewmember
Unskilled Basic training provides only those
skills necessary to be safe
The most skillful pilot had the most experience."
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Proficiency

• Proficiency refers to competence in a specific
  area. Generally speaking,
• research has shown that it takes practice four
  hours a day for 10 years for a person to become
  an expert in a particular domain. With this in
  mind, it is essential that pilots do the
  following to become proficient at flying
• Practice flying at every opportunity
• Practice a variety of flying scenarios (e.g.,
  nonprecision approaches, hand flying, etc.)
• Create meaningful situations that will expand
  your experience base (e.g., fly new routes,
  learn a new aircraft, obtain an additional
  rating)
• Practice often and practice consistently, so that
  skills become automatic
• It is important to note that if a pilot
  transitions to a new aircraft, he/she may
• have to learn new skills or relearn old skills in
  the context of the new
• aircraft.

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Knowledge

• Pilots must possess comprehensive knowledge about
  the aircraft, nature
• of the flight, possible abnormal and emergency
  conditions, their own
• qualities and the qualities of their team
  members. Pilots must have a
• confident understanding of
• Aircraft
• Procedures, techniques, limitations
• Self
• Physical fitness and flying proficiency
• Sources of human error, methods of error
  detection, techniques for reducing the effects of
  errors
• Team
• Capabilities and limitations of crew, ground
  staff, engineering and ATC
• Common understanding of aircraft characteristics
  and operating procedures
• Environment
• Weather and terrain
• Organizational, political, regulatory and
  commercial environments
• Risks
• Identification and assessment
• Organizational standards designed to reduce risks
• Mission Statement

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Situational Awareness

• Situational awareness is knowing where you are,
  what is going on, where
• you are going and what is likely to come next.
  It develops when you have a
• mental picture based on accurate data.
  Situational awareness is a closed-loop process in
  which a pilot continuously seeks more or better
  information to gain and maintain it.
• Three processes in gaining and maintaining
  situational awareness
• Gather information through basic senses (vision,
  hearing, balance, smell, touch)
• Integrate and interpret (i.e., comprehend)
  sensory information
• Use information to project plans and actions into
  future
• Pitfalls in the development of situational
  awareness
• The senses can be fooled in some situations
  (e.g., illusions)
• Complete and reliable information may not be
  accessible, especially in situations you have not
  encountered before
• Information systems are not always reliable
• Incorrect expectations
• Distractions
• Extremely high (emergency) or extremely low
  workload (boredom)
• Overconfidence and familiarity with a situation
  that lead to failure to accomplish and repeat the
  three processes

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Judgment

• Judgment is the process that leads to a decision.
  Judgment is supported
• by all the other elements of airmanship. Similar
  to judgment,
• aeronautical decision making (ADM) is a
  systematic approach to the mental
• processes used by pilots to consistently
  determine the best course of action in response
  to a given set of circumstances.
• Good pilot judgment and ADM require the ability
  and motivation to
• Discover and establish the relevance of all
  available information relating to problems of
  flight
• Diagnose problems
• Specify alternative courses of action
• Assess the risk associated with each
  alternative
• Choose and execute a suitable course of action
  within the available time frame. (Jensen, 1995)

Judgment always involves a problem or choice, an
unknownelement and usually a time constraint and
stress.
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Airmanship Priorities

• Good airmanship based on sound judgment involves
  the
• following order of priorities
• Fly the aircraft Check attitude, speed,
  altitude, instruments and automation
• Navigate Know where the aircraft is and where
  it is going
• Communicate Discuss and review the issues,
  share tasks, back up each other
• Manage Take follow-up action and use
  appropriate levels of automation
• Monitor Check to see what has changed and take
  control when unexpected events occur
  These are the Golden Rules of flying.

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Airmanship Tips 1

• Be alert and ready for the unexpected
• Gather information before deciding
• Challenge and validate information
• Consult
• Evaluate consequences
• Ensure mutual backup and cross-check
• Check results of actions
• Be prepared to reject any constraint that would
  decrease situation control

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Airmanship Tips 2

• Be alert and prepared for typical
  flight-phase-related emergencies
• Consider trajectory as priority no.1 at all times
• Adhere to published procedures, when available
• Never leave a situation unresolved (ambiguity,
  doubt, disagreement, alert or cockpit effect)
• Prioritize tasks as a function of prevailing
  condition
• Keep all options open and be ready to change
  initial plans

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Airmanship Tips 3

• Stay ahead of the aircraft at all times
• Share experience and lessons learned
• and - last but not least
• Be aware, to be mentally prepared.

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Summary

• Airmanship is
• Founded on discipline (self, team, corporate)
• Continuously striving for self-improvement and
  optimal personal performance
• Airmanship requires
• A wide range of perceptual-motor skills
• A wide range of cognitive skills
• A wide range of knowledge (self, aircraft,
  environment, risk)
• Appropriate attitudes
• Airmanship can be developed through training
• and refined through practice and experience.

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References Links

• Redefining Airmanship, Tony Kern, 1996, ISBN
  0070342849
• Flight Safety magazine, Australia CASA
• http//www.casa.gov.au/avreg/fsa/index.htm
• Airmanship, Measuring up, Vector magazine,
  CAA New Zealand, http//www.caa.govt.nz/Safety
  Information, Publications, Vector
• Airmanship and Flight Discipline, Tony Hayes,
  Brisbane Valley Leisure Aviation Centre
  http//www.auf.asn.au/students/Airmanship.html
• Jensen, R.S. (1995) Pilot Judgement and Crew
  Resource Management. Avebury Aviation

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