pcola Posted July 26, 2012 Posted July 26, 2012 but I'm in no way shocked because of the quality of pilot the Air Force puts out these days. And what is it that is leading to the deterioration of the pilot corps? They best and brightest are still being recruited. UPT still puts out a highly trained yet inexperienced product (imo.) The fault lies in the misplaced focus on career-oriented objectives. After UPT, qualities that do not involve flying are valued over those that do involve flying. This leads to a decline in the quality of aircraft commanders, instructors, evaluators, and flight leads. Which leads to indefensible mistakes. I don't think people are making excuses for the pilots' errors (assuming that was the cause.) People are asking the question of why do we have an environment where such errors are possible. Speculation aside, from what most of us have witnessed first hand, this is a valid question regardless of the ultimate cause of this particular incident.
10percenttruth Posted July 26, 2012 Posted July 26, 2012 And what is it that is leading to the deterioration of the pilot corps? They best and brightest are still being recruited. UPT still puts out a highly trained yet inexperienced product (imo.) The fault lies in the misplaced focus on career-oriented objectives. After UPT, qualities that do not involve flying are valued over those that do involve flying. This leads to a decline in the quality of aircraft commanders, instructors, evaluators, and flight leads. Which leads to indefensible mistakes. I don't think people are making excuses for the pilots' errors (assuming that was the cause.) People are asking the question of why do we have an environment where such errors are possible. Speculation aside, from what most of us have witnessed first hand, this is a valid question regardless of the ultimate cause of this particular incident. This.
Jaded Posted July 26, 2012 Posted July 26, 2012 We are creating pretty exceptional O-4s and O-5s though.
Toro Posted July 26, 2012 Posted July 26, 2012 Is there really going to be an SIB? REALLY!? Investigation, not SIB. It's a Class E. While I agree with all of the "airmanship falling to the wayside" comments, I seriously doubt working on a Master's degree or performing additional duties contributed to this particular incident. Landing at the right airport falls into the putting the gear down or making sure the wings are attached before you take off category - either you do it or you don't. Shack.
Chida Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 Think the crew filled out a MASAP report? It's non-retributional. It wouldn't surprise me. I knew this one guy (at band camp) who landed at the wrong runway at Little Rock National Airport. It has two parallel runways that are 8200 ft and a 6200 ft one that is off-axis by about 45 degrees from the others. He was a WO having his student do a circling approach and they did a T&G on the 6200 ft runway. Priority one for him after this was to file an ASAP report and blame his error on the approach's construction. I realize this is not as serious as the C-17 incident, since the TOLD for the Herk was probably OK and the PCN was probably OK, but I don't see it as an appropriate use of ASAP. It's simply a thing where he made a mistake and I think he should have just taken his licks.
Azimuth Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 (edited) And what is it that is leading to the deterioration of the pilot corps? In AMC, the PHOENIX programs. "Hey, this guy has three Q-3's in his FEF." "Yeah, but he's the Wing Exec/School select and got his AAD done. He's crossflowing to [insert MAF MDS] cause he's a fast burner." Edited July 27, 2012 by Azimuth 1
Champ Kind Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 file an ASAP report and blame his error on the approach's construction. LOL
Cornholio5 Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 I think its funny how awards such as IP of the year, AC of the year, so on and so forth go to the individuals who fly the least. It should be the opposite, but I guess that is Big Blue's rationale for awards....
daynightindicator Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 I think its funny how awards such as IP of the year, AC of the year, so on and so forth go to the individuals who fly the least. It should be the opposite, but I guess that is Big Blue's rationale for awards.... Maybe it's that way in your wing/command/MAJCOM, but I haven't seen that. The only beef I've seen with those awards (B-1 world) is that they're almost exclusively given to patches. Of course the argument can be made that your patches should be your best IPs anyway. Though I may have disagreed with the people who were selected over the years, I could never argue with their abilities or qualifications, even if I thought another dude was more deserving. The crap awards I've seen given out are for things like Flt/CC or CGO/FGO - I've seen those actually pre-determined to the point of forcing "opportunities" on an individual that they've selected to win the award for the sole reason of generating the bullets necessary to make it happen at the wing level. so as not to derail the thread, i'll offer my $.02 on the wrong-airfield deal... 100% fault with the crew and specifically the PIC/AC/ML. No excuse for this and it should be punished. I had a baseball coach when I was younger who told us that there were 2 different kinds of errors, mental and physical. Mental included throwing to the wrong base, not knowing the pitch count/outs, etc. Physical errors were missing a grounder, striking out, or dropping a fly ball. He told us he would never get angry at us for making physical mistakes but would pull us immediately if we made mental mistakes because they are 100% preventable. This was a mental mistake.
Cornholio5 Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 This was a mental mistake. It sure as heck was. Looks like they all got focused on that runway right in front of them and got compartmentalized on that. I went on google earth and changed the eye view to that of what the pilots saw being on final for MacDill and their long runway is very identifiable. Even if it wasn't, this approach should have been loaded up in the FMS and the pilots should have been crosschecking DME. I wish I was a fly on the wall in that cockpit. It will be interesting to hear the CRM that was going on.
Prozac Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 It sure as heck was. Looks like they all got focused on that runway right in front of them and got compartmentalized on that. I went on google earth and changed the eye view to that of what the pilots saw being on final for MacDill and their long runway is very identifiable. Even if it wasn't, this approach should have been loaded up in the FMS and the pilots should have been crosschecking DME. I wish I was a fly on the wall in that cockpit. It will be interesting to hear the CRM that was going on. Yeah, what a bunch of choads those guys were. This would NEVER have happened if you were on that jet.
Cornholio5 Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 Yeah, what a bunch of choads those guys were. This would NEVER have happened if you were on that jet. Seriously man? Do you honestly think that was what I was implying when I typed that? This could have happened to ANY ONE of us---especially after a long duty day. I was saying that there are tools in the cockpit, that if utilized properly, that can help prevent incidents like this from happening. The important thing is too see what happened so maybe fellow aviators can learn from this mistake.
Kaman Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 I was not expecting to see this happening on a nice day VFR kinda day...WTF are they teaching you guys in the AF these days?
matmacwc Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 I think everyone is trying to find a billion excuses here. They were staring through the hud, fixated at 1000' down the runway. They probably didn't take the time to look around, and if they did, they still need to do some homework to realize what MacDill should look like. They made a mistake and will probably pay for it, but I'm in no way shocked because of the quality of pilot the Air Force puts out these days. HUD doesn't have a steer point indication in it?
Snooter Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 (edited) Yeah, what a bunch of choads those guys were. This would NEVER have happened if you were on that jet. PI strike Edited July 27, 2012 by Snooter
brabus Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 What is with people being so attached to "max extent possible" means you must fly IFR 99% of the time? It also mentions unless required for the mission. My mission requires I get VFR flight training to maintain competency in a required skill. If I can fly VFR on the way back, out to the MOA, knock out some LATN, why would I not? Just don't understand a lot of people's aversion to VFR flying. 1
JeepGuyC17 Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 ... there are tools in the cockpit... There's the problem
Guest Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 Amen to that. I'm trying to rewrite our current fixed-wing IFR curriculum for international military pilots to include VFR emphasis...it's like pulling teeth with tweezers in the dark. Most of my Army aviators have the VFR down cold. The USAF fighter jocks, not so much...I've had to spend plenty of hours brushing up on the finer points of VFR myself due to the "max extent" rule (most of our guys go off to UPT/F-16 FOT), but I feel like we're doing them a disservice by not including elements of VFR in the curriculum/simulated sorties. Our students do quite a bit of flight planning using sectionals/TPCs, though. What the hell are you talking about? Seriously.
M2 Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 Maybe they got distracted playing 'Repeater'... That'll happen...
Hueypilot Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 (edited) Buddy of mine overheard one of the IPs telling his student copilot he needed to work on his master's degree during the debrief...and I'm not kidding! The careerists are starting early. FWIW, the IP was the wing exec for a while... And here I thought at the FTU we're supposed to teach airplane stuff... I'll add my .02 cents to this discussion. Master's degrees and other stuff have their place in taking away from our proficiency, but it's possible to get those things done AND still be a decent pilot. I have PME complete and an AAD (worthless TUI one at that) and I've still managed to not land at the wrong airport. The problem in my opinion is we're drifting away from the basics of airmanship. My comments below might not fully explain the C-17 incident, and fatigue might have played a role in that as well...but it underscores some trends I've noticed since I first started flying for the military 16 years ago. At least in my community, I've noticed a heavy emphasis on tactics, but very little on basic airmanship and the things we all take for granted. And in my community (C-130s), airmanship, airland and flying approaches is our bread and butter. We spend 95% of our time training to do airdrop (for good reason), but pay very little time doing the thing we do most of the time in the real world...flying to unfamiliar airfields in all weather. In my mind, that's where we (as MAF pilots) are having a breakdown. We spend so much time doing flagpole (sts) missions at home station where everything is canned and familiar, and flying in the AOR, that when we're given what seems to be the simple task of flying to MCF, we park a jet at a GA airfield instead. As an instructor, I like taking students to unfamiliar airfields when I have the time and letting them knock out some approaches...and what I see is they tend to flail because it's outside their normal habit pattern/routine. For the C-130 world, part of this is due to the RFIQ syllabus that removed the proficiency flights (airland/instrument) from the flying syllabus and now all the pro work is done in the simulator. The sim is great, but it can't possibly recreate all the distractions that a normal "real" traffic/radar pattern has. I'll often fly up to some uncontrolled airfields and watch students freak out when a bugsmasher checks in on the CTAF and they are trying to do a circling approach while looking for the other airplane. When I flew C-21s, though, that situation was standard and we did it all the time. But the MWS airplanes tend to be used in a much more predictable environment (ie, home station, AOR). Don't get me wrong, the AOR can be very unpredictable, but in reality, we still fly to the same 6-9 airfields over there too and once you see them all, it becomes routine just as flying around home plate is. I'm no C-17 pilot, but that's just an observation from the Herk world. We can fly TFM and airdrop all day, but God help us if we have to fly a procedure turn NDB at an unfamiliar airfield...or find the right piece of pavement when there's more than one airport in the vicinity. Edited July 27, 2012 by Hueypilot
Prozac Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 Seriously man? Do you honestly think that was what I was implying when I typed that? This could have happened to ANY ONE of us---especially after a long duty day. I was saying that there are tools in the cockpit, that if utilized properly, that can help prevent incidents like this from happening. The important thing is too see what happened so maybe fellow aviators can learn from this mistake. Sorry, bad takeaway from your previous post on my part.
StainedClass Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 While I agree with all of the "airmanship falling to the wayside" comments, I seriously doubt working on a Master's degree or performing additional duties contributed to this particular incident. Landing at the right airport falls into the putting the gear down or making sure the wings are attached before you take off category - either you do it or you don't. No training required, really. The SIB will probably be a human factors bonanza, but I'd be surprised if a lack of training/proficiency was causal here. Look, I've spent a long career (that will end at O-5) instructing, mentoring and sometimes defending my "guys". Lord knows I've made a ton of mistakes and bad decisions and luckily I've never hurt myself or anyone else, in part because someone took the time to instruct, mentor and sometimes defend me. You can blame this incident on whatever or whomever you feel you need to blame it on, but at the end of the day, it was caused by complacency and buffonery. Nothing more, nothing less. Hopefully, we will ALL learn from it and this particular crew will survive and live to fly another day. SC 4
jazzdude Posted July 27, 2012 Posted July 27, 2012 HUD doesn't have a steer point indication in it? Closest thing is the airdrop display. It would be neat if we had something similar for approaches.
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