3 ms·

There's no real reason to not have this exchange digitally/mechanically intermediated, in my estimation. A plane doesn't need to have both controls mechanicall

There's no real reason to not have this exchange digitally/mechanically intermediated, in my estimation. A plane doesn't need to have both controls mechanically linked, or both active at the same time. You could have a nice big toggle in the middle of the cockpit that is either 2 or 3 positions (L/R/Both). Toggling it will announce "Left/Right in control" and activate the stick shaker on the dead side and re-announce if any input is received. Panic isn't something that you can remove by training nor train for. It needs to be factored into the design that only one set of inputs is effective at a time.

colechristensen 5y ago
Panic is absolutely something you can train for and the human factor of flight controls is a central part of the design. Accidents heavily inform this design and training and control characteristics are always on the table as a response to incidents.
renewiltord 5y ago
Inevitably you will get "Plane crashed as pilot in command attempted to control plane while toggle was in opposing position" and someone will say "okay, you should add a warning light" and then the same thing will happen and someone will say "there are too many warning lights" and so on and so forth.
dragonwriter 5y ago
> A plane doesn't need to have both controls mechanically linked, or both active at the same time. If you have a switching control, mechanical or digital, it is a thing that can fail, and even if you assume it would be good before considering that, you have to consider the impact failure has on net utility, especially if a plausible failure mode renders both controls inoperable.
russdill 5y ago
Maybe instead some equivalent of the stick shaker that indicates your controls are being overridden
NickNameNick 5y ago
Didn't that switchable controls scheme contribute to one of the us navy destroyer collisions recently?
- db48x 5y ago
  Yes, although in that case it wasn’t a big mechanical toggle, just a software setting. And the bridge crew were not trained in how to use it safely, or to check if the controls they were using were actually operable.
bambax 5y ago
> Panic isn't something that you can remove by training nor train for. Of course it is. It's probably 50% of training. Panic increases the impact of mental workload and induces a kind of "tunnel thinking" similar to tunnel vision: you become fixated on one problem and one solution, without considering other parameters and options. But panic is caused, many times, by surprise and lack of competence. You avoid panic by becoming more familiar with specific emergency situations. And you fight panic by learning to recognize it early, reduce mental workload, organize and follow procedures. I find it worrying that this incident shows a lack of professionalism from the crew. When something unexpexted happened, they simply jumped on the controls at once, didn't communicate and simply blamed the plane. This is amateurish, and somehow... quite French (I am French).
jjav 5y ago
> Panic isn't something that you can remove by training nor train for. On the contrary, that's exactly what repetitive training of emergency scenarios is about. Panic happens when you get overwhelmed with multiple bad things happening and each one requires dedicated concentration, you don't have that much attention to give so panic sets in and you do all of the tasks badly. The solution is to train repeatedly so all the reactions are muscle memory (or mental "muscle memory"), which lets you remain comfortable and in control because you've done this a hundred times before. In SCUBA diving for example many fatal accidents are the overlap of simple problems that end up overwhelming the diver because they had not practiced it enough or recently enough.
eternityforest 5y ago
A less extreme(Since change can be it's own danger) solution would be an audible pilots fighting warning system.

colechristensen 5y ago

Panic is absolutely something you can train for and the human factor of flight controls is a central part of the design. Accidents heavily inform this design and training and control characteristics are always on the table as a response to incidents.

renewiltord 5y ago

Inevitably you will get "Plane crashed as pilot in command attempted to control plane while toggle was in opposing position" and someone will say "okay, you should add a warning light" and then the same thing will happen and someone will say "there are too many warning lights" and so on and so forth.

dragonwriter 5y ago

> A plane doesn't need to have both controls mechanically linked, or both active at the same time. If you have a switching control, mechanical or digital, it is a thing that can fail, and even if you assume it would be good before considering that, you have to consider the impact failure has on net utility, especially if a plausible failure mode renders both controls inoperable.

russdill 5y ago

Maybe instead some equivalent of the stick shaker that indicates your controls are being overridden

NickNameNick 5y ago

Didn't that switchable controls scheme contribute to one of the us navy destroyer collisions recently?

db48x 5y ago
Yes, although in that case it wasn’t a big mechanical toggle, just a software setting. And the bridge crew were not trained in how to use it safely, or to check if the controls they were using were actually operable.

bambax 5y ago

> Panic isn't something that you can remove by training nor train for. Of course it is. It's probably 50% of training. Panic increases the impact of mental workload and induces a kind of "tunnel thinking" similar to tunnel vision: you become fixated on one problem and one solution, without considering other parameters and options. But panic is caused, many times, by surprise and lack of competence. You avoid panic by becoming more familiar with specific emergency situations. And you fight panic by learning to recognize it early, reduce mental workload, organize and follow procedures. I find it worrying that this incident shows a lack of professionalism from the crew. When something unexpexted happened, they simply jumped on the controls at once, didn't communicate and simply blamed the plane. This is amateurish, and somehow... quite French (I am French).

jjav 5y ago

> Panic isn't something that you can remove by training nor train for. On the contrary, that's exactly what repetitive training of emergency scenarios is about. Panic happens when you get overwhelmed with multiple bad things happening and each one requires dedicated concentration, you don't have that much attention to give so panic sets in and you do all of the tasks badly. The solution is to train repeatedly so all the reactions are muscle memory (or mental "muscle memory"), which lets you remain comfortable and in control because you've done this a hundred times before. In SCUBA diving for example many fatal accidents are the overlap of simple problems that end up overwhelming the diver because they had not practiced it enough or recently enough.

eternityforest 5y ago

A less extreme(Since change can be it's own danger) solution would be an audible pilots fighting warning system.