EFB created madness (ASRS Callback - April 2018)

denverpilot

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DenverPilot
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Interesting read. I was behind on my reading materials and such here, so this came out in April's edition of Callback and I just got around to reading it.

The stories of how electronic flight bags (EFBs), otherwise known to the rest of us as "our iPad" are both creating distractions in-flight due to oddities in user interfaces, and also becoming truly useless due to freeze-ups... and even messing with two-pilot professional flight crews... shouldn't be ignored.

I've certainly seen both Foreflight and Garmin Pilot do stuff that got me to go "heads-down" for way too long messing with it, and also have seen important data cut off by zooming, etc... just like these stories. And, of course, freezes and lock-ups that "catch up" eventually, also...

Be careful out there with the electronics kids...

http://campaign.r20.constantcontact...41327&ca=0d40e601-b750-466c-910f-fadb0a1734cb
 
If those are the best examples they could cull from the database, EFBs are doing great! We have overall electrical problems affecting more than the EFB, poor mounting choices, a pilot who obviously prefers paper being forced to use one and, of course, pilots making the same kind of mistakes they always have, just in a different medium.

Here's a summary of my favorite.

"Hold northeast of SHAFF"
"OK, let's not look northeast of SHAFF on the chart."

Yep. They literally had to move the EFB screen enough to remove the northeast quadrant of the intersection from view to not see the published hold.

upload_2018-6-2_7-1-49.jpeg
 
If those are the best examples they could cull from the database, EFBs are doing great! We have overall electrical problems affecting more than the EFB, poor mounting choices, a pilot who obviously prefers paper being forced to use one and, of course, pilots making the same kind of mistakes they always have, just in a different medium.

Here's a summary of my favorite.

"Hold northeast of SHAFF"
"OK, let's not look northeast of SHAFF on the chart."

Yep. They literally had to move the EFB screen enough to remove the northeast quadrant of the intersection from view to not see the published hold.

View attachment 63666

Does the Jeppesen version of the enroute look different there?

Quite a few of the commercial side of things are still using Jeppesen for whatever reasons.

And their horrid EFB product.
 
My FF/iPad combo are essentially my "primary" for en-route IFR, just because the interface is much quicker and cleaner than the Garmin panel mount.
 
My FF/iPad combo are essentially my "primary" for en-route IFR, just because the interface is much quicker and cleaner than the Garmin panel mount.

No question there. Night and day.

I’m fascinated by the bizjet videos where they have all their charts in the panel. Those are cool.
 
Does the Jeppesen version of the enroute look different there?
Perhaps someone can post a shot but from what I recall when I used the paper ones, no. The IFR enroute charts are not significantly different. The northeast quadrant is still to the northeast of a fix and published holds are depicted.
 
Perhaps someone can post a shot but from what I recall when I used the paper ones, no. The IFR enroute charts are not significantly different. The northeast quadrant is still to the northeast of a fix and published holds are depicted.

I just wondered if Jeppesen put the hold depiction “further away” in relation to the fix on the chart. (More room for scrolling error on a partial chart like an EFB.)
 
Perhaps someone can post a shot but from what I recall when I used the paper ones, no. The IFR enroute charts are not significantly different. The northeast quadrant is still to the northeast of a fix and published holds are depicted.
The IFR low chart from my FF subscription

AEE82402-068B-4D37-8EFF-81F3C572D5BF.png
 
The IFR low chart from my FF subscription
Thank you!

Well that’s huge. Haha.

Wonder how they zoomed enough to miss that. Hahahahaha.

Maybe that particular NASA report was more of a CYA for a mistake than a real user interface problem on their EFB. :)
I was going to say that until I saw you already did.

I'll stick with my my original comment. The report seems to want to morph a bunch of other errors into an EFB interface one. If that's the best they can come up with...
 
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