Carr - Woolman Flight Appreciation Center

ALASKA AIRLINES FLYING GREENER

via www.youtube.com

Who's Looking After the Airline Crews?

via www.huffingtonpost.com

I have been an aviation enthusiast since I was a child. I have especially been an airline enthusiast that long. So, when I say, “Who’s Looking After the Airline Crews,” I say it with all respect for the men and women who each day serve people in the air and the ones working landside.

 

This is not territory I would normally address at the Carr-Woolman Flight Appreciation Center. The incidents of this month however, have led me to start thinking more about something that has been on my mind and heart since the infamous day of September 11, 2001.

 

Although all of our lives were changed forever that day, the lives of airline employees were certainly changed in a very profound way. I have worried since then that there are people in the industry whose emotional health was horribly damaged that day. That due to whatever reasons, they have never received the help that they deserve.

 

This is not to finger point at the airlines, the FAA or the individuals themselves. No, I just want to express my concern. Perhaps the American Airlines flight attendant and the JetBlue captain’s breakdowns of March 2012 were not due to post-traumatic stress from 9/11 or the subsequent security issues since. Perhaps they were due to the increased business pressures of the industry today and the personal stress that has caused. Perhaps not even that. I just want to say I care about those who serve us each day in the air. So, I wanted to see if there was any research out there looking at the issues of mental health and the airline industry.

My first find was an article from yesterday’s Huffington Post/AP article, "JetBlue Pilot's Rant Puts Focus On Medical Exams". I hope to provide other information that I can find.

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JetBlue Pilot's Rant Puts Focus On Medical Exams" 

By DAVID KOENIG and JOAN LOWY 03/28/12 06:19 PM ET

DALLAS — The case of the JetBlue captain who came unglued at 35,000 feet has focused attention on what some aviation experts say is a flimsy system for detecting psychological problems in pilots.

During required checkups every six months or one year, airline pilots are subjected to a battery of physical tests, but the doctor usually doesn't ask about their mental state, experts and pilots say. And many pilots would probably hesitate to tell the truth, for fear it would be a career-ender.

"It's very clear to every pilot that the moment you say yes, you've had an issue, they're going to deny your license," said John Gadzinski, a captain for a major airline and an aviation consultant.

Still, there appears to be little interest in beefing up the examinations because mental breakdowns in the cockpit are extremely rare. 

"Of the tens of thousands of employees (airlines) have, there are a couple that lost it," said Robert Francis, a former vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. "That's hardly enough evidence to lead to new regulations."

On Tuesday, Clayton Osbon, the 49-year-old captain of a New York-to-Las Vegas flight, started ranting about a bomb aboard and screamed, "They're going to take us down!" A co-pilot locked him out of the cockpit and guided the plane to an emergency landing in Amarillo as passengers wrestled Osbon to the floor. He was carried off the plane and taken to a hospital. JetBlue said he suffered a "medical situation."

The outburst came weeks after a distraught American Airlines flight attendant was taken off a plane at the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport for getting on the public address system and rambling about 9/11 and her fears the plane would crash. She, too, was hospitalized.

JetBlue Airways CEO Dave Barger said on NBC's "Today" show that he has known Osbon personally and that he is "a consummate professional," with nothing in his past to indicate he would be a risk on a flight.

Osbon, a pilot for JetBlue since 2000, was charged Wednesday with interfering with a flight crew. The airline suspended him.

 "Clearly, he had an emotional or mental type of breakdown," said Tony Antolino, a security executive who sat in the 10th row of the plane and tackled the captain when he tried to re-enter the cockpit. "He became almost delusional."

Airlines and the Federal Aviation Administration strongly encourage pilots to assert themselves if they think safety is being jeopardized, even if it means going against a captain's orders. Safety experts have studied several cases where pilots deferred to more experienced captains with tragic results.

The FAA requires all airline pilots to pass a medical exam at least once a year – every six months if they're older than 40, like Osbon. The medical tests are given by FAA-approved doctors who are supposed to consider psychological health in evaluating pilots. Also, the pilot's application for a certificate – his license to fly – asks whether the pilot has mental disorders or substance-abuse problems or has attempted to commit suicide.

In 2011, 1.5 percent of all pilots tested failed their physical. That figure includes cargo and private pilots, not just airline employees.

Treatment for mental illness does not necessarily end a pilot's career. In 2010, the FAA decided that pilots treated for mild to moderate depression could return to flying if they improved with treatment and remained stable for at least a year.

Many pilots say, however, that the doctors often skim over the psychological questions.

"I've never had a psychological part of the exam," Gadzinski said. Another captain for a major airline, who spoke on condition of anonymity to protect his job, said his own doctor keeps two files – one with accurate records, another for the FAA.

Merely asking a pilot about his mental health isn't a very effective technique for predicting whether he might have a breakdown during a flight, said Richard Bloom, an administrator at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University who holds a doctorate in clinical psychology.

"It's too easy to answer," Bloom said. "There is a great opportunity for deception, just like with many people at job interviews."

Bloom and several other experts said incidents like Tuesday's are so rare that more screening might not improve security or be worth the expense.

However, some, including Francis and another former NTSB member, James Hall, said the episode could have ended in disaster if Osbon had had a gun. They called for a review of a 10-year-old anti-terrorism program under which airline pilots who get special training are allowed to carry guns.

According to FAA records, Osbon passed a medical exam in December. Citing privacy rules, the FAA declined a request by The Associated Press to release the exam results and Osbon's answers to questions on the FAA application.

A 2006 study by the FAA of post-mortem toxicological evaluations of 4,143 pilots – mostly small-plane pilots – killed in accidents between 1993 and 2003 found that 223 were using mood-altering drugs such as antidepressants.

But only 14 of the pilots who tested positive for the drugs reported a psychological condition on their medical forms, and only one reported using a mood-altering drug on the forms. None of the pilots determined to have used neurological medications had reported that on their medical applications.

Incidents in which pilots have become mentally incapacitated during a flight are rare.

In 2008, an Air Canada co-pilot was forcibly removed from the cockpit and restrained after having a breakdown on a Toronto-to-London flight.

In 1999, U.S. investigators determined that the co-pilot of an EgyptAir plane deliberately crashed into the Atlantic but said they couldn't determine his motive. All 217 people on board were killed.

In 1996, a co-pilot of a passenger jet broke into a sweat on a flight from England to Italy and told the pilot he was afraid of heights, forcing the Maersk airlines jet with 49 passengers on board to make an emergency landing.

In 1982, a Japan Airlines jet plunged into Tokyo Bay after the captain, who had once been grounded for mental illness, reversed some of the engines. The co-pilot and flight engineer struggled but couldn't regain control of the plane. The crash killed 24 of the 174 people on board.

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Behind the Scenes at WestJet: Preview of Aviators Episode

via www.youtube.com

Delta Air Lines, Celebrates Tuskegee Airmen

 

For more on the Red Tail event at Delta Air Lines check out the Red Tail website:

Delta Air Lines rolls out the red carpet to honor the Tuskegee Airmen

 

NASA - Introducing the X-56A MUTT: Who Let the Dog Out?

"Introducing the X-56A MUTT. MUTT is one of the Air Force's newest X-planes, designated X-56A. The 7.5-foot-long aircraft has a 28-foot wingspan and will be powered by two 52-pound thrust JetCat P200-SX turbine engines. It is being built in California under contract to Lockheed Martin Corp., which will conduct the flight experiments for the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL). Dryden will oversee the flights for AFRL during summer 2012, and then take ownership of the X-56A MUTT for follow-on research after the Air Force tests are finished in early autumn....

....To maintain the long-term health of the structure and ride quality in a more flexible airplane, we need to actively alleviate gust loads on the airplane and suppress flutter, so gust load alleviation and active flutter suppression are two of the key technologies that NASA is working to advance....”

via www.nasa.gov

Airplane Art Quiz: Can You Identify That Airline's Livery? (QUIZ)

via www.huffingtonpost.com <------Take the quiz here. How did you do?

From the Huffington Post: "An airplane's paint job, or its livery, is like a calling card for an airline. They're noticeable practically every day -- at the airport, on advertisements, in the air -- but if they were nameless, would you know which airline's livery is which?

With countless airlines buzzing about the sky, keeping them all straight is a feat. So, we thought we would put together a little quiz to see how well you can identify those airplane tails. How many do you know?

All photos courtesy of the Associated Press."

 

Dryden and Transonic Research - YouTube

 

Ed Saltzman was a great engineer and a very fine man. It was a pleasure and an honor working with him. If you love aeronautics and its history, watch this program and learn. This was recorded in the 1990's, but I cannot remember what year. It would have been after the NASA meatball logo was restored as can be seen by its return to the front of the podium, but the worm logo had not been taken off of it yet. I am running camera on this one.

via www.youtube.com

Raw Video: Helicopter Falls Apart During Landing in Brazil

via www.youtube.com

Ok kids, do not try this at the airport. Ground resonance, pilot induced oscillation, call it what you will, I have never seen anything like this. Some reports said this happend on landing. It is reported to be a rescue helicopter. My guess is that they came into land to pick someone up then leave on a mission. The pilot kept the rotor revved up a little too high and stood on the breaks as it were. He thought he could handle it. He thought the chopper could handle it. It was like he pressed a "self-destruct" button. Helicopters are incredibly touchy aircraft to fly. I respect helo pilots a lot.  I would like to see how the accident investigation comes out on this.

Ground resonance is precipitated by a shock to the aircraft arising from excessive motion of a rotor blade in its plane of rotation thereby moving the rotor center of gravity from the axis of rotation. Click for more information on ground resonance.

Carr-Woolman Flight Observation Deck 8 - Developing the Convair 580

PROCEED TO THE OBSERAVATION DECK ----> :-)

Alaska Airlines Tests Scanning Method for Faster Aircraft Inspections

 

If you work in an industry with lots of parts to keep track of that are located in tight spaces, keeping them all tagged and cataloged is consuming work. That cataloging is usually done on your hands and knees or your tip toes or flat on your back getting into the tight spaces to access them. Alaska Airlines in partnership with Boeing and Fujitsu have found a new way to aid in this kind of work. Anyone who remembers Star Trek episodes where they "scanned" objects for information can appreciate this. This Boeing Company video was posted by YouTube user Altumkell. For more information about Alaska Airlines, visitors may also wish to head to Concourse A here at the Carr-Woolman Flight Appreciation Center located on the left hand side of the page. Gates A3 and A4 are for Alaska Airlines. Images of Alaska's world may also be seen at flight observations decks located at flickr such as Carr-Woolman Flight Observation Deck 14