blame

It’s no accident — it’s a crash

By Dave English

Interesting article yesterday in the New York Times, titled ‘It’s no accident: Advocates want to speak of car ‘crashes’ instead’. It’s about safety advocates changing language use from a car accident to a car crash. The AP recently revised their style guide. Dr Rosekind of the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is on board, saying, “When you use the word accident, it’s like, ‘God made it happen.’” The thinking is that ‘accident’ may make us shrug our shoulders and think, oh well, what can you do, accidents happen. ‘Accident’ may trivialize that most common cause of traffic incidents: human … Continue reading It’s no accident — it’s a crash

Airmanship at a distance

By Dave English

This is a sad story. But important to think about. For we are all our brother’s keeper. The news headline this weekend was ‘Flight school sued over death of student‘. Fox5 reported: A 21-year-old’s dream of becoming a pilot was cut short when during flight school his plane came crashing down, killing him, according to a lawsuit filed Friday in Cobb County. The father of the young man filed that suit alleging the school was negligent by forgetting to refuel the plane. “I don’t want another family to experience that kind of loss,” said Michael Hughes. This was the reason … Continue reading Airmanship at a distance

Procedural drift and the sandbar

By Dave English

On 3 January 2015, the large ship MV Hoegh Osaka left the British port of Southhampton. An hour later she made a turn to port, then began listing markedly to one side. Soon enough the rudder and propellor were out the water. In flying terms, ‘departure from controlled float’ we could say. Fifteen minutes after the turn she was grounded on the Bramble Bank sandbar off the Isle of Wight. Settling down with a list that would eventually reach 52°. The ship was about half full, loaded with 1,200 Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles worth over $45 million. Now, this accident isn’t as serious as … Continue reading Procedural drift and the sandbar

How the Swiss Air Force learns

By Dave English

A great Swiss Air Force video shows us all how an enlightened high risk organization should use mistakes to get better, by moving away from a blame game and towards a learning culture. If people get blamed for their mistakes, the only thing one achieves is that people will keep their knowledge about mistakes, safety gaps or dangerous situations for themselves. Ask “why?” like a mantra to get deeper and deeper to the cause, to put yourself into the actor’s shoes and to understand, why the event had been happen. Mistakes or incidents can be seen as free lessons. If we … Continue reading How the Swiss Air Force learns

We will not accept any kind of lapses

By Dave English

It became public this month that Qatar Airways has fired all four pilots in the cockpit when their Boeing 777 tail broke a set of runway lights during takeoff from Miami International last September. They mistakenly left from an intersection thousands of feet short of the planned full runway length. It was a serious accident, no doubt. There was a visible tear to the aircraft’s skin, the pressure vessel was damaged, and MIA airport needed some new approach lights. The crew continued with the overwater thirteen plus hour flight uneventfully, apparently unaware of their close brush with disaster. But damage of … Continue reading We will not accept any kind of lapses