The Hindu Business Line : Are long working hours endangering flight safety?

Robert L. Helmreich, professor of psychology, University of Texas at Austin, US, in his article "On error management: Lessons from aviation," states: "Pilots and doctors operate in complex environments where teams interact with technology. In both domains, risk varies from low to high with threats coming from a variety of sources in the environment. Safety is paramount for both professions, but cost issues can influence the commitment of resources for safety efforts. Aircraft accidents are infrequent, highly visible, and often involve massive loss of life, resulting in exhaustive investigation into causal factors, public reports, and remedial action. Research by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration into aviation accidents has found that 70 per cent involve human error.

"Error results from physiological and psychological limitations of humans. Causes of error include fatigue, workload, and fear as well as cognitive overload, poor interpersonal communications, imperfect information processing, and flawed decision making. In both aviation and medicine, teamwork is required, and team error can be defined as action or inaction leading to deviation from team or organisational intentions. Aviation increasingly uses error management strategies to improve safety. Error management is based on understanding the nature and extent of error, changing the conditions that induce error, determining behaviours that prevent or mitigate error, and training personnel in their use... "

AUSTRALIAN RECORD

Aviation has evolved into a major human factor study. Accident investigation studies in the last 30 years have identified "stress and fatigue" as the major causative factors. Australia is one country which takes as much pride in its cricketers wearing the "baggy green" as in its record in aviation safety. In the last fifty years, there has been just one airline accident — the Qantas overrun at Bangkok while landing in heavy rain. The Australian Transportation Safety Board (ATSB) has done an extensive study on "fatigue" and its effect on flight safety.

In most accidents where fatigue has been a factor, the error management by a tired pilot has been found to be wanting. Indian aviation would do well to take a leaf out of the ATSB report on fatigue.

Stress and fatigue are taken into consideration while formulating "Flight and duty time limitations for pilots". Stress is a killer even in normal life but combined with fatigue, it is a ticking time-bomb in aviation. Unfortunately, in India, this has gone into reverse gear.

With the rapid increase in aviation sector, one would have expected a major thrust in flight safety norms followed by countries which are very advanced in aviation safety studies.

Instead, a top official of the Directorate-General of Civil Aviation is said to be giving a blanket clearance to all airlines to extend the duty time wherever required. This happened during the foggy days in winter and continues even now.

DISASTROUS FATIGUE

The DGCA appears to have little idea of what could be the result of a wrong action of a tired pilot. Reaction times can become slow and this could be extremely dangerous in critical phases of flight.

For, example, if a fatigued pilot takes a wrong action, say, selecting the `flaps-up' instead of `wheels-up' after take off, he could send the aircraft crashing. Rules are made and executed by people who have never flown high performance aircraft and who have never really understood the effect of stress and fatigue.

The Caravelle crash in Mumbai in the 1970s is a perfect example of a fatigued pilot who took the wrong action, resulting in the death of all on board. Memory is very short in Indian aviation

The US' National Aeronautics and Space Administration had conducted studies on the heart rate and Beta wave patterns of pilots during a flight. These studies found that the heart rate goes up to 240-250 a minute during an approach and landing. This results in the adrenal glands pumping at an enormous rate to restore the sugar balance in the body. This rapid sugar depletion can result in wrong decisions. Combined with stress and fatigue, it is an unsafe situation. When pilots operate multiple sectors, the cycle that the body takes in this stressful atmosphere is difficult to comprehend.

STRINGENT STANDARDS

Medical standards for pilots in India are far more stringent than what is followed worldwide. We are still going by the assumption that the aircraft is not flyable if one of the pilots is incapacitated. Modern aircraft can be flown safely by one pilot, in an emergency. The requirement of Stress Treadmill Test that is repeatedly required once a pilot has crossed the age of 50, has added to the pressure. This practice has been done away with in other countries. Recently, a pilot of a private airline collapsed and died while he was jogging on the treadmill. Yet, we have increased the retirement age of pilots to 65. The number of those going down while undergoing TMT tests is going to increase. Is anyone accountable for this?

That is why the Western world has taken steps to have different duty cycles depending on the time of the day that a pilot operates and also the number of take-offs and landings that one does in a duty cycle. The total duty time is adjusted downward to cater for this. Contrast this with what we have in India. We have a fixed duty cycle, irrespective of the number of take-offs and landings, and regardless of the time of the day, which affects the circadian rhythm. Our flight and duty time formula evolved more than twenty years ago and we have not kept pace with time or the advances in safety studies.

Airlines are expanding rapidly but the number of trained crew is limited. Extension of duty time has become the order of the day, with no consideration on the effect on flight safety. The DGCA seems to turn a blind eye to this gross violation of flight safety and the skies are going to become more and more unsafe.

Recently, an international flight was operated by an executive pilot in total disregard of fatigue. The pilot concerned travelled as an additional crew member on the flight from India to Europe, probably a flight time of around 10 hours.

He, then, operated a flight to the US, an additional 11 hours of flying. In between, the aircraft was on ground for a couple of hours. Can the human body work efficiently for a continuous period of almost 24 hours, with so many time zone changes?

UNSCIENTIFIC REGULATIONS

This blatant violation was possible only because the DGCA has unscientific regulations on rest periods and flight duty times.

The present rules do not consider travel before a flight as infringement of rest. Thus, a pilot is allowed to travel as a passenger on any number of sectors before he undertakes his duty. All the airlines misuse this clause with scant disregard for flight safety.

The ATSB study on fatigue has identified that the performance level of a tired pilot is similar to the reaction due to increase in blood alcohol levels. The longer the duty time, the slower is the reaction time and response. Combined with intake of alcohol, which is prevalent in aviation, this could prove dangerous. A proactive and urgent review of the prevalent rules and regulations on flight and duty time is required. This could be successful only if the extensive studies done by experts abroad, who have considerable interest in flight safety, are taken into consideration. Several studies have shown that the effect of fumes in the cockpit can affect the health of a pilot. There is also the cosmic radiation for those flying at high altitudes. Do we need to add stress and fatigue to all these?

(The author is an airline pilot with 19,000 hours experience and specialises in accident-prevention studies.)

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