Human Factors study or training guide?

[storchy neil]

:thumb_up:another powder monkey :wasnt me:neil

 

 

[icebob]

Oh, I was told he was a parking ranger:laugh::big_grin::big_grin: most dangerous job except for meter maids maybe?????

 

Bob.

 

 

[Guest Elwyn]

Good'ay Brett there is a good book on human factors it's written by Dyson-Holland for RAA pilot certificate called Ground Training Manual Human Performance & Limitations (Human Factors)

 

Cheers

 

Elwyn

 

 

[Guest Brett Campany]

Good'ay Brett there is a good book on human factors it's written by Dyson-Holland for RAA pilot certificate called Ground Training Manual Human Performance & Limitations (Human Factors)Cheers

Elwyn

Cheers Elwyn, I passed my HF exam a little while ago but this information will be greatly appreciated by those other new students who'll have their exams coming up.

 

 

[Yenn]

No I wasn't a powder monkey, although I once had a run in with a powder monkey who left a job with unexploded sticks and dets all around. Not related to the supposedly dangerous job I did. people have watched me work and commented that I was mad to do the job. Keep guessing, but I held a riggers and a scaffolders ticket among others.

 

 

[storchy neil]

power poles neil

 

 

[slartibartfast]

High-rise window washer or rigger (can I have 2 guesses?).

 

 

[Tomo]

Police officer? Nah! Those bush pilots in the Tartic have it pretty tuff, maybe one of them!

 

 

[Guest Crezzi]

Oh, dear! what have I done!

You have shown how ill informed you are !

 

 

[Yenn]

Destiny Flyer. No not an inspector, but I did apply once for a job in NT and knocked it back when I discovered I would be the bloke starting up their safety surveillance scheme for the whole NT. I think they liked my background and the fact that I had a pilots licence, but I didn't want to sit in an office at any time.

 

 

[Guest Nelson Smith]

Mybe un snike milika

 

 

[Tomo]

Howdy Merv...

 

No I didn't take it the wrong way, But the comment was made not in connection with the accident at all, just a bit of dry humor to stir a certain trike pilot who don't like Jab's!(no offense intended!!)

 

Thanks for your concern though, and I will change it to....er...mmm? not sure.....!i_dunno

 

I tend to like ya a bit too!:thumb_up:

 

 

[Yenn]

To folllow up, what I did for years was work as a steepljack, mainly building concrete chimneys, but also a lot of rigging and high swinging scaffolding'

 

Iv'e had a pretty good look at the book of words and some of it makes sense, but i was tought all that when I learnt to fly. In my opinion a lot of it is padding and some is irrelevant. While the book says we should use good English I consider a lot of it is very poorly put together.

 

I believe I will be able to do the course and exam later this month, but I would really like to see the questions at some time. I am not sure if doing the course I will have to do the exam, or if the succesful completion of the course is a pass anyway. That is if I can pass!

 

 

[Bryon]

My guess is that you were a dogman on a crane before all the safety regs stopped you hanging about

 

 

[Guest Elwyn]

Not sure what would give you that idea Bryon

 

 

[Bob1957]

Human Performance & Limitations

 

I am using the Dyson-Holland book to study and will be going for the exam soon, I have found it very interesting and anything that can help safety is after all, a number 1 goal and I have found it very educational, I dont know about any one else but I find memorizing things a big help esp in emergencies. I always remember if up flying and the fan stops to say out loud (FXXX me im in trouble) ie check, fuel, mixture, instruments, ignition, throttle. or (bum ffish) brakes undercarriage mixture fuel pump on and on full tank prop Fine, instruments, safety belts and hatches. or (onus) over north under south, I have found that if one practices over and over then it sticks in ones head like 30 days has september aprill june and november all the rest have 31 days except february has 28 or 29 every leap year. And I am waiting for this site to be up and running in the new year so I can do the exam online. http://www.avstar.com.au/

 

bob.

 

 

[FlyingVizsla]

Raa hf

 

Husband & I did the RAA HF exam some months ago. We live a long way from an RAA school so I was waiting, and waiting, for the on line version. An instructor sold us a photocopy of the RAA book for $70 and we later found it at Natfly RAA stall for about $16. Husband read it (he left school at 13) and found it repiticious and confusing in parts and some words needed explanation. He gets the safety message drummed into him at work so found some of this boring.

 

I relied on my extensive reading in HF (6 texts from the 1980/90s sit on my shelves), ppl, voracious appetite for the crash comic analysis, flying teaching and my exam experience from 3 degrees, 2 diplomas and many other courses. He beat me! He says by a few lucky guesses- but I think he's just being modest to keep the hot dinners coming ......

 

The exam is more about the book than HF and I would agree with previous posts that it is poorly written, does not sing the same song as our Govt health messages and it has missed an opportunity to reinforce the HF message in a practical way.

 

For those who have not done it - get the RAA book. Some questions can only be answered from there. Heuristic decision making is not mentioned in any of my books because it was not coined until the 1990's. A brace of questions on the exam I did are taken directly from the book and have the correct answers there (not having read it in context I didn't give the right answer). I read the book after the exam.

 

Passing the exam is not the issue, if you can, attend a course, read other books, read the analysis of past accidents/near misses. You also need to be au fait with CASA rules & regs, as they stand now (don't assume they are still the same as the book - things can change after publication). CASA regs apply to RAA pilots (despite what I hear from some of them). Learn where to find them and keep up to date.

 

For RAA - selling the HF idea could have been better - particularly having everything ready to go on day one - on line, info on texts, exams etc. Some of my RAA friends regard HF as an unnecessary load of ### and intend to continue flying without it or intend to give up rather than do it. Does not help when the instructor is also confused about HF, CASA regs and interpretation of the questions. There needs to be some (more) work with instructors convincing them that HF is a worthwhile exercise. A good PR exercise would help.

 

Sue

 

 

[facthunter]

Human Factors.

 

In my aviation career I have done quite a bit concerning Human Factors. I have met many people who have been ADAMANT that that it is a crock of sheet. When they did the courses they were often the ones who needed it most, as it turned out. I am happy to go on record as a strong advocate for Human Factors being covered as part of our training and it should be ongoing.

 

It is a shame, if the courses are being presented in such a way as to require the learning of new terminology and concocted process flow charts, some pyramid or whatever, as the main prerequisite for a pass. These things change constantly for no obvious reason.

 

There is the potential and need for an interactive digital exam to be produced that would cover this topic very well and be fun to participate in. It would be Educational and self testing as well.

 

I have been subject to these well over 20 years ago, relating to other aspects of aviation knowledge. They do a good job of teaching/ assessing the subject, at the same time as you work your way through untill you have completed it it correctly. If you make a mistake, the programme tells you and you work through that part again.

 

Some people who run the courses, currently, tend to the view that they are a requirement that we must ALL do and no-one is going to fail , so let's get it done and everyone pays and everyone is happy. It is out of the way. NOT IDEAL REALLY. It can (and should ) be done a lot better. Nev

 

 

[turboplanner]

Some of my RAA friends regard HF as an unnecessary load of ### and intend to continue flying without it or intend to give up rather than do it. Does not help when the instructor is also confused about HF Sue

Sue they are crazy to think like that.

 

HF was introduced as a direct result of injuries and fatalities caused by human factors, so it's one of the good things to come out of CASA. We certainly had a thread where the people who didn't like it picked on some of the more preripheral subjects, but we've since had posts on this site which clearly indicated that an accident, or accident avoided was related to human factors.

 

HF is something which the most experienced, and best pilots seem to get caught on.

 

For example I read about a guy who rebuilt Spitfires, and had two, one with a prop rotating to the left and one to the right.

 

As part his prechecks he had to set offset rudder trim to counteract the torque of the engine.

 

One day he set the rudder trim, let's say left, but had overlooked the fact that he was flying the one requiring right trim.

 

The aircraft rolled over on takeoff and was destroyed, he was seriously injured.

 

 

[FlyingVizsla]

I agree with you. Most of the guys who think human factors is a load of old cobblers are the ones who would most benefit from it. For many it is simply ignorance of what HF is. I spent a lot of time trying to convince my husband to do it - too many of his friends had convinced him it was nothing but bureaucratic nonsence forced on us by RAA kowtowing to CASA. It was either do it or give up flying from Sept 2010.

 

These old RAA pilots are a self reliant lot who fly visual in aircraft they built or self maintained. I don't blame them for getting resistant, especially if they have been flying incident free for years. The idea of an exam frightens them too. Perhaps an open book style would be better or discussion during the exam (I did help him with the meaning of words - couldn't help with heuristic tho).

 

I would like to see the questions more general:

 

eg There are restrictions on flying after:

 

a) Diving

 

b) Drinking alcohol

 

c) Taking some drugs

 

d) All of the above

 

That at least gets people thinking - gosh! you can't fly after diving? - I better have a look at that. Rather than coming up with the depth vs the hours restriction - especially as I don't go diving and never intend to - if I ever did I know there's a restricton and I'll look for it then.

 

The confusing nature of the exam has engendered a lot of discussion but a lot of it negative. The way questions were read (or remembered) often missed the point of the qn. Eg from the Emergency section of the ERSA - staying with the plane. The point was What the Section Said, not what you thought best given your circumstances. Yes, there was a lot of discussion about staying / not staying with / in the plane (and I thought that a lot of it was good decision making practice) but most just saw it as an example of a wrong answer and a reason to resist HF. The Emergency section of the ERSA is there when you need it, but Pilot judgement will be needed - eg if no one will be looking for you for hours and you saw a house a km away, then you wouldn't stay with your low wing (collapsed u/c) bubble canopy with temp set to soar to 45 deg. A different approach to the question would help.

 

After I did the exam I was determined to volunteer to re-write the exam and the material. I frighten my husband with the volunteering I do, so I have left it hoping that RAA might get around to it using someone smarter than me.

 

I wasn't offended - why was it a FEMALE pilot who got into so much strife of a HF nature. Why not just call him/her Chris (or other unisex name). Better still - use some real life examples - ATSB has plenty of these, meticulously researched. Or use some published examples from books like "They Called It Pilot Error" and the like (I'm too slack to go out to the shelves... it must be Christmas).

 

My 2 bob's worth.

 

Sue

 

 

[Vorticity]

Yeah, I was a bit disappointed by the exam. I was fortunate to be put onto a HF course conducted for proffessional pilots. It was brilliant! Unfortunatly it was only a refresher so I have always been keeping an eye out for the full course and a willing sponsor:laugh:

 

The instructors where ex military and now flew the helicopters for inspecting powerlines from the air. The content included decision making, crew resource managment, perception all sorts of 'in the cockpit' topics that where relevant to flying.

 

Have many of these 'human factors' deaths that triggered this training (and I do belive in it as a worthwhile concept) involved the pilots unhealthy diet or leaving their aircraft after a forced landing in a hot climate??

 

Lets hope that this has been a first attempt and that it will become more relevant as time goes on.

 

 

[Spin]

I also recently did the course and passed the exam. Whilst I strongly support the idea of an HF course, I think this one has suffered in the execution. I'm not trying to be funny but despite a couple of degrees and a job that calls for reading a lot of technical and legal material, I found the written material pretty indigestible.

 

Fortunately my instructor presents a very practical course which covers the essentials for the exam and also got me thinking a bit about how HF applies to me, so it ended up being relatively easy.

 

 

[Yenn]

When I started flying the human factors side of it was drummed into me by the theory and practical trainers, and I found the later having to do a course to be mainly an exercise in being seen to be doing something. I find a lot of the training now is just putting buzz words into your head, and unless you know the buzz words you will fail. Who knows what Shell pertains to? No not the expensive liquid which keeps you up.

 

Even worse is the use of things like HF. I always think of high frequency, and don't mention ADF.

 

 

[metanoia]

I would guarentee that a (vast) majority of GA, GFPT aspirants would not pass the exams RAA is using at present.The

reason RAA members are required to do the exam is a question the RAA board can address.

 

But I must say that the 'generic' HF book is an extremely difficult read.

It wouldn't surprise me if GA pilots failed the RA exam - for all the reasons that others have mentioned. Having not too long done a course and passed the exam, I have to say that I was left wondering what exactly the purpose of the exam was. I'm not sure that it tested my _understanding_ of the syllabus - which you'd think was the whole point of the exercise.

 

One thing that crosses my mind is that the RAA could do worse than work with someone who has an adult-education background to improve the exam (and maybe supporting education materials.)

 

Having said this, I'm glad that the RAA is trying to educate pilots (and student pilots such as me) about HF. I wish that the RTA (or its equiv. in other states/territories) would do the same before issuing car or bike licenses!

 

 

[Bob1957]

When I started flying the human factors side of it was drummed into me by the theory and practical trainers, and I found the later having to do a course to be mainly an exercise in being seen to be doing something. I find a lot of the training now is just putting buzz words into your head, and unless you know the buzz words you will fail. Who knows what Shell pertains to? No not the expensive liquid which keeps you up.Even worse is the use of things like HF. I always think of high frequency, and don't mention ADF.

Yes it can be a bit confusing unless you read up on it, I have found the Dyson-Holland book make sense, Now if you think of things like mem jogers like (onus) which means over north under south, which is a good mem joger for your magnetic compass.or east means least & west is best which is to do with flight planning & using WAC charts, anyhow The "Shell" Model of Human Factors is just a mem jogger of different things that can effect a person or Pilot concerning The components of the model are if you are looking down on it it has an L in the middle and to the left of the L is an S & to the right is an E & above the first L is an H & below the middle L is an L and we are the middle L or the Liveware and other things have an effect on us ( Liveware) to Hardware such as seats controls ect. or (Liveware) to Software ie proceedures, computer programs checlists etc. (Livware) to Environment ie using flying suits or oxygen masks disorientation etc. (Liveware) to Liveware is the interface between the pilot & other people. anyway if that hasnt confused you lol It helps of course if you have a bit of counselling background but please read the book and after awhile it will make more sense but of course as you read and then pass the exam you might forget 80% of it after all isnt that whats happened with most of us when we did all those exams back whenever like Flight Rules & Proceedures, Navigation, Meteorology. I am waiting for the test to come online then I will do it. 2009 Avstar Solutions :big_grin: