Human Factors In Aviation Essay

One of the most controversial and important air crash linked to human error of the modern world happened on the night of February 12, 2009. Colgan air flight 3407, operated by Continental Connection, was on final approach to runway 23 at Buffalo-Niagara International Airport as it disappeared from radar. The aircraft was a Bombardier Dash 8, a popular twin engine medium range turboprop Airliner used by many regional carriers. The aircraft entered an uncontrollable stall crashing into to a neighborhood 5 miles northeast of the airport killing all everyone on souls on board. The Captain, Marvin Resnlow and first officer Rebecca Lynne were behind the controls the night of the accident. The NTSB report determined error by both pilots cause the aircraft to crash. Thus, pilot fatigues, improper recovery form a stall were contributing factors. The victim’s family members pushed for congress to overhaul airline regulations. The NTBS investigation delivery multiple findings that eventually led to a modernization of airline operations and pilot training.

Nicholas Carr, the author of “All Can be Lost: The Risk of Putting Our Knowledge in the Heads of Machines”, expresses the major concerns towards technology. In this story many crashes and devastating accidents are presented. These accidents could have easily been avoided through the proper knowledge of the air staff members. As a result of technology, pilots are trained less expensively and therefore are unable to react in urgent situations. For example, they now rely on auto-pilot to do more of the directing than they rely on themselves for. This idea is expressed throughout many other stories, demonstrating the lack of knowledge due to the increasing use of technology. One main point that Carr makes is that individuals are constantly starting

Crashes are rare, and most of the time are consequences of many unrelated factors. Many believe that airplane crashes are the cause of bad piloting or harsh weather; but other factors are overlooked. Suren Ratwatte have been studying airplane

As a collaborative case study, we analyzed the American Airlines Flight 1420 accident using the SHELL Model. The SHEL Model was developed by a Professor Elwyn Edwards in 1972 and it was later modified to the SHELL Model by a human factors consultant named Frank Hawkins. We can see all the human factors that were involved in the accident utilizing following aspects software, hardware, environment, liveware and liveware. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) conducted a thorough investigation and determine that the American Airlines Flight 1420 was a runway overrun accident caused by human factors.

Managing your stress properly will not only make you feel better, but it will help you handle tough situations with a clear head. Managing any issue with an overly emotional state of mind will not be of much benefit.

System flaws account for scheduling issues. When there are not enough pilots to cope with the heavy traffic flow, the same pilots are being scheduled more often and for longer periods of time. “CAPA has suggested lowering the actual duty time of pilots to 12 hours in a 24-hour period, with a two-hour window to account for delays. The current 16 hours of duty time often makes it difficult for pilots to get an actual 8 hours of rest in each 24-hour period.” (82% of Americans…)

     Once you recognize there’s a problem, take the action necessary to correct it. A lot of the methods used to relieve stress can also

Flight 1420 was a disaster that taught the aviation community several important lessons. All the Seven Major Elements of Aviation safety can be seen as contributing factors but the greatest factor was human error and the impact of pilot fatigue. With proper preventative measures, the pilots probably would have had the time to arm the MD-82’s spoiler system and the flight would have touched down safely.

Stress is a topic that interesting for people to discuss, but hard to know the best way to deal with it while we are people helping. The author seeks to educate us about stress, the different types and also the dreaded distress. Distress can come quickly and ruin our days, and effect us emotionally, which affects our productivity and effectiveness (Collins, 1995). Stress is simply our own psychological response to the demands and pressures of everyday life (Collins, 1995).

‘A general view of accident causation in complex systems’, in Human Error, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

The purpose of this study is to examine the performance of pilots flying multiple types of aircraft in an experimental setting. Pilot performance will be assessed by written tests and simulator sessions. This study will build on a previous field study, Pilots Flying Multiple Aircraft Types or Multiple Flightdeck Layouts, which was conducted for AVS 4504 Aviation Safety Analysis. The results of that study showed a need for a simulator study to further identify if pilots have issues maintaining currency in multiple types of aircraft.

The science of human factors in aviation has a come along way since the days of the Wright brothers in 1913 but it did not actually start with them. According to Dr. Bill Johnson, Chief Scientist at the Federal Aviation Administration, human factors “dates back to the 1600s when Leonardo da Vinci drew the Vitruvian Man, with all the anthropometric measures, [when] he was trying to decide if a human was strong enough to propel an aircraft” (FAA, 2012). Long after the work of da Vinci, human factors has brought advancements to aircraft design while creating a greater understanding of the human role in mishaps.

      It is critical to understand important stress management skills.  If stress is not dealt with, it can result in a burnout, or perhaps worse, "People who experience high levels of anxiety are four to five times more likely to die of a heart attack or stroke" (Morrison

As a ramification, it is difficult for human operators to anticipate faults within the system and prevent and manage the risks incurred by an operational accident accordingly, making them “incomprehensible”. Therefore, organisational accidents in complex systems are inevitable as despite defensive measures implemented to mitigate their risk, such as the training of operators and regular maintenance, the fragile design of the systems is the core reason why accidents occur.

If we can find the answers to these questions, then I believe it is possible to limit and slow down the number of human errors in aviation, thusly slowing the number of accidents and lives lost due to human performance.