Another training question.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

I have another question for the paint by numbers mentality instructors.


This nonsense about you should not teach anything that is not in a company SOP's ( That vary wildly from company to company on the same kind of airplane. ) leaves me with a question.


There is a saying that goes.


Monkey see, monkey do.


If the monkey does not see something how is the poor little monkey supposed to know how to do it?

[Eric Janson]

I worked for a flag carrier in Asia where this was how things were done.

They hired cadet Pilots with 200 hours so I guess they had to have stringent SOPs - the guys had no experience to fall back on.

If something happened outside the SOPs they were lost. You really couldn't blame the poor cadets - they were being taught by people who lacked a lot of basic knowledge as well. Asking questions wasn't encouraged.

After 6-7 years operating in this environment with limited handling experience (most Captains wouldn't allow manual flight until short final and autothrust off was a huge no-no) these Pilots would be up for Command assessment.

After years of the above they were expected to be instant Captains. Failure rates on the Command course were 50%+ but nobody ever thought to ask "WTF?"

The only thing that surprises me is that there aren't more accidents.