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Calmness under pressure a pilot requirement
(Newsday (Melville, NY) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Jan. 18--For pilots, a crisis in the cockpit triggers the same intrinsic response all humans experience when faced with danger: a rush of adrenaline, nervous sweat and a surging pulse as the heart strives to pump more blood.
But the difference between pilots such as US Airways' Chesley B. Sullenberger and the average terrified passenger is how pilots handle pressure-cooker situations -- when a series of swift decisions dictates whether an aircraft and its occupants will make it down safely.
"You've learned to focus on the emergency and what you're doing and not be distracted by anything else," said American Airlines pilot Robert Spahr, who safely landed a Boeing 777 in Miami after a bird strike took out one of the plane's three engines at 800 feet. "You do get some adrenaline, you become somewhat excited," Spahr said. But then the training kicks in, and "you focus in on landing the plane."
Schooled to respond quickly in worst-case scenarios, pilots rely on an array of protocols and checklists to help them stay cool during emergencies.
Some procedures -- such as how to respond to engine loss at takeoff -- are drilled in so pilots can instantly react to a crisis instead of flipping through a flight manual. Many are practiced over and over in flight simulators that help pilots rehearse for the most dire eventualities. Still other procedures dictate how entire flight crews respond to crisis, encouraging group decision making in an effort to avoid potentially tragic errors.
"I would say it's an ingrained template," said Col. Kenneth Knight, a flight surgeon and chief of the Aerospace Medicine Division, at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia. "Instead of having to think from a blank piece of paper, most of these situations, they will already have thought through or practiced in a simulator."
The protocols help pilots avoid panic in situations that would terrify most people.
In a crisis, potent biochemicals called catecholamines instantly flood the muscles, heart and brain. Those compounds include epinephrine -- commonly known as adrenaline -- and they act on the body in two ways: as hormones that recalibrate the heart rate, but also as neurotransmitters that force the mind to focus on the task at hand.
"Attention focuses narrowly" under pressure, said Christopher Burns, a Massachusetts information-management expert who has studied the outcomes of decisions made in crises. "Whether the brain works better is open to debate. I've never seen evidence that people get smarter the way they get stronger in a physical crisis, but people do get clearer."
That clarity can lead to a positive outcome, such as the US Airways jetliner's belly-landing on the Hudson. But pressure can also result in horrifically bad decisions, such as the captain of the Titanic's decision to plow through ice-choked waters in 1912. More than 1,500 people lost their lives as a result.
"When you have that epinephrine rush, your alertness is heightened," Knight said. But that can also lead to pilot errors, such as focusing too narrowly on specific problems -- trying to restart a failed engine -- while ignoring the larger conundrum of how to land the plane, he said.
Burns said bad decisions by individual pilots led to a spate of deadly commercial air crashes in the 1960s and 1970s. "They found out that crews sometimes had lifesaving information that the pilot wouldn't listen to," said Burns, author of a book titled "Deadly Decisions."
That led airlines to develop new models for how pilots function under pressure. They turned away from the go-it-alone cowboy approach once common among pilots and embraced so-called "distributive decision-making" involving all crew members. Developed by NASA in the late 1970s to improve air safety, those procedures have become standard practice for major airlines.
"The [US Airways] pilot, Chesley Sullenberger, had played a role in his airline's crew resource management," Burns said of the procedures, known by the acronym CRM. A spokesman for US Airways confirmed Sullenberger was involved in its CRM procedures and had also been an investigator at crash sites.
"Simply, it means he probably turned to the head of the cabin crew and said 'Get those people ready,'" Burns said. "He would have turned to his navigator and asked about the time to Teterboro, and made a decision that he didn't have enough time to get there. So decisions on what to do were distributed."
Commercial and military pilots interviewed this week said such protocols and training helped them get through tight spots in their own careers.
Capt. Justin Binder, an Air Force pilot assigned to the first fighter wing, relied on procedural checklists and the support of a wingman when he had to shut down one engine of his F-22 fighter aircraft over the Atlantic some 150 miles from Langley Air Force Base.
"Between the two of us we accomplished all the checklists for shutting down the engine," said Binder, 30, who maneuvered the plane back to Langley. "You panic after the fact. As it's happening, your training really kicks in and you don't have much time to sit there and think about what's going on."
Still, training and preparation can only take you so far in a perilous situation, said Tommy McFall, a former Navy pilot and aviation safety consultant who served as director of accident investigations at American Airlines.
"It's an anxious situation and you realize that this is not a drill, this is for real and you're only going to have one shot," McFall said. "You do follow procedures as far as they'll take you, but at some point when you've got to put the airplane on the ground, that's when the pilot has to use his own best judgment."
By Jennifer Smith and Delthia Ricks.
INSIDE FLIGHT 1549: Once danger was apparent Thursday, the flight crew initiated emergency procedures that helped save the 155 on board.
Minute by minute
3:24:54: US Airways Flight 1549 is cleared for takeoff.
3:25:51: Pilot tells the departure controller he is at 700 feet and climbing to 5,000. He is instructed to climb to 15,000.
3:27:01: Radar shows the plane intersects "primary targets"- probably a flock of birds -- while climbing between 2,900 and 3,000 feet. The objects had not been on the departure controller's radar screen.
3:27:32: Pilot reports to air traffic control: "Aaah, this is Cactus 1549. We hit birds. We lost thrust in both engines. We're turning back towards LaGuardia."
3:27:49: Controllers advise LaGuardia to stop departures. Tower officials are told there was a bird strike.
3:28:05: When asked if he wants to land at LaGuardia, the pilot responds, "We're unable. We may end up in the Hudson." Communication follows over whether the plane can land at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey, but the pilot says, "We can't do it. ... We're gonna be in the Hudson." End verbal communication with the plane.
3:30:30: The plane touches down in the water. Radar and tower personnel notify the Coast Guard, which responds, "We launched the fleet.'
One flight attendant each opens the left and front doors.
Flight attendants put everyone in rafts. Capt. Chesley B. Sullenberger scans plane several times.
Passengers open doors over the wings.
--Right slide opens automatically.
--Left slide has to be done manually.
Flight attendants give commands, "Leave everything. Come forward. Put your life vests on."
A third flight attendant in the rear of the plane is injured.
Source: Associated Press
To see more of Newsday, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.newsday.com
Copyright (c) 2009, Newsday, Melville, N.Y.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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