{"id":12278,"date":"2021-03-15T10:59:17","date_gmt":"2021-03-15T14:59:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ops.group\/blog\/?p=12278"},"modified":"2021-03-17T10:40:36","modified_gmt":"2021-03-17T14:40:36","slug":"expect-the-unexpected-evidence-based-training","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ops.group\/blog\/expect-the-unexpected-evidence-based-training\/","title":{"rendered":"Expect the Unexpected: Evidence-Based Training"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s aviation environment is complex but incredibly reliable<\/strong>. Our aircraft are packed full of automation, systems and redundancies designed to keep us safe up there. Fancy things like EGPWS, Flight Envelope Protection and TCAS are there to protect us.<\/p>\n

But herein lies the issue<\/strong>: because things are so reliable, the circumstances of the next accident waiting to happen are ever more challenging to predict.<\/p>\n

All that technology is still limited by us<\/strong> humans<\/strong>. One thing we do know is that human factors have played a role in between 70 and 80% of airline accidents and serious incidents over the past thirty years. In many cases these accidents have certain things in common \u2013 poor group decision making, ineffective communication, inadequate leadership and poor flight deck management.<\/p>\n

So it is clear we have an important role to play in making ourselves<\/em> more reliable too.<\/p>\n

Enter \u2018Evidence Based Training\u2019 or simply EBT for those in the know. And it\u2019s a revolution<\/strong> for pilot training.<\/p>\n

What is it in a nutshell?<\/h4>\n

In really simple terms it is about looking at data or \u2018evidence\u2019 to find relevant threats and errors and then changing the way we train pilots so they have the competencies they need to deal with them.<\/p>\n

Cool, so what does that actually mean? Let’s delve into things a little more.<\/p>\n

Out with the old<\/h4>\n

Traditional airline training was based simply on events that occurred on early generation jet aircraft from yester-year. There was a belief that simply exposing crew to those same \u2018worst-case<\/strong>\u2019 scenarios<\/strong> over and over again would be enough.<\/p>\n

The cyclic<\/strong> was born. A long list of bad things that can happen which you\u2019d periodically face in the sim. They tended to be manoeuvre based \u2013 you know the ones. V1 cuts, rejected take offs, go-arounds. As long as you flew them within limits you were officially \u2018competent.\u2019<\/p>\n

It was simply a tick-in-the-box approach to pilot training. But you couldn\u2019t help but get a nagging feeling the industry was missing the point: you have no way to predict what will actually happen to you<\/strong> when you go to work the next day.<\/p>\n

Modern aviation has a way of throwing things at us that we haven’t seen before<\/strong>. Computer failures, mode confusion, strange stuff. Just look at the tragic case of Air France 447<\/a>. Training in modern fly-by-wire aircraft has never been the same but it sadly came to late for that particular crew.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Both competent crews but can you think of unique scenarios the crew on the right may have to face compared to the crew on the left?<\/p><\/div>\n

In with the new<\/h4>\n

Over time the amount of data or evidence out there improved dramatically. There were a bunch more sources<\/strong> \u2013 flight data, LOSA programs and air safety reports to name a few.<\/p>\n

In 2007, a new industry-wide safety initiative emerged. It was led by IATA and began to use this evidence to identify relevant threat and errors that crews face for their particular operation and adjust training to better equip crew to deal with them. EBT was born<\/strong>. ICAO was sold on the idea too and hopped onboard in 2013.<\/p>\n

The emphasis is on crew effectiveness<\/strong> as a whole by developing a bunch of competencies \u2013 tools that pilots can use in any scenario, normal or abnormal. The training uses unscripted situations<\/strong> to develop crew management strategies, techniques and human factors that are just as important to safe flight as technical skills.<\/p>\n

Here is an example of the sorts of competencies that EBT training sessions look to develop (it really is the whole package):<\/p>\n