WASHINGTON – New details about the crash of an Asiana Airlines jet have renewed questions about whether a culture of strict deference to more-senior pilots can compromise air safety.
Documents and testimony from the National Transportation Safety Board this week showed there was confusion and poor communication in the cockpit of the Asiana jet as it approached San Francisco International Airport in July. Two of the pilots told investigators they opted against voicing critical concerns or grabbing the controls because they were subordinate to the instructor.
The co-pilot, who was sitting in a jump seat at the back of the cockpit, told investigators that the plane seemed to be descending too quickly from a high altitude. He “prepared in his mind to recommend something” to the two more-senior pilots at the controls, “but he did not.”
The pilot flying the plane was an experienced flier who was being trained on the Boeing 777. But when asked whether he considered aborting the landing and circling around as they came in too low and too slow, he said such a “go-around” manoeuvr should be done only by the captain or an instructor pilot.
“That is very hard to explain; that is our culture,” investigators quoted him as saying.
The pilot also said he was momentarily blinded by a beam of bright light. He wasn’t wearing aviator sunglasses because he said that would be disrespectful in the presence of a superior like his instructor in the next seat.
After cockpit culture was identified as a factor in several South Korean airliner crashes in the 1980s and ’90s, procedures and hierarchies were overhauled in Korea and elsewhere, including the U.S., improving that situation. But the Asiana crash on July 6 thrust the issue back to the forefront.
The plane’s tail clipped a seawall, and the aircraft spun down the runway. Three Chinese teens died, including one who was run over by two fire trucks as rescuers rushed to the scene; 304 people survived, the vast majority without major injuries.
The National Transportation Safety Board hasn’t identified a cause of the crash yet, but during a daylong hearing Wednesday much of the testimony focused on confusion about automated speed settings and pilot training.
Board Chairman Deborah Hersman said all international airlines have their cultural differences but that it wasn’t an emphasis of the hearing.
“Certainly in any cockpit on any airline from any country of the world, there are cultural issues that can come into play,” she said.
She added that investigators were trying to focus on all issues carefully and fairly and dealing only with the facts of the situation.
“We have not talked a lot about cultural issues in today’s hearing and I would ask you to reserve judgment until the NTSB finishes its fact-finding in this matter,” she said.
After the hearing, John McGraw, a former high-ranking Federla Aviation Agency official who is now an aviation consultant, said there are long-term issues involving cockpit hierarchies.
“There is a cultural element here,” McGraw said. “It’s not just Asian — there are a lot of cultures around the world where people don’t want to challenge their superiors.”
Nationality aside, pilots have a culture of their own that can create complications, McGraw said.
“Pilots don’t like to admit that they should do a go-around when the approach isn’t going well” because it looks bad to the passengers and irritates superiors by burning more fuel, he said.
Robert Francis, a former vice chairman of the safety board who is not involved in the current investigation, said evidence of deference in the Asiana cockpit points out the need for the airline and Korean aviation officials to pay more attention to “cultural issues” in pilot training.
Still, Francis said the cause of the accident apparently wasn’t cultural issues but the pilots’ failure to realize they were making a dangerous approach.
“There’s nothing more basic than monitoring your airspeed, and they clearly weren’t doing that,” Francis said.
So-called “crew-resource management” programs at many airlines stress that pilots shouldn’t hesitate to raise safety concerns or correct an unsafe action, even by a more-senior captain.
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Follow David Koenig at http://www.twitter.com/airlinewriter and Martha Mendoza at https://twitter.com/mendozamartha.
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AP Airlines Writer Koenig reported from Dallas, AP National Writer Mendoza reported from San Jose, California, and AP writer Stephen Braun contributed to this report from Washington.
