Interesting story tonight on 20/20

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asgcpa

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About cockpit automation.

An airline pilot says that they push 7 buttons generally for entire flight from New York to London.

Really interesting.
 
Yeah there is the 8th button to get the stew to bring coffee, and don't forget all the phone candy crush button swiping.:)
 
asgcpa said:
...An airline pilot says that they push 7 buttons generally for entire flight from New York to London...
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Clever, he's not telling you about the knobs he has to twist, levers he has to pull, switches he has to throw and pedals he has to push. ;)
 
Curious how many buttons were pushed setting up the FMS prior to the flight so that everything was pre-loaded....
 
[FONT=&quot]One of my instructors for my IR is a 777 captain. He flies ORD to China, Hawaii and London in it. I Xed out the name of his employer to protect the innocent. Here is what he said about the 20/20 show last night:

"The show is misleading. The fact is that about 99% of our landings are made using the electronic backup of an ILS, VNAV, or some other type of guidance (GPS, LOC, LDA, VOR, LOB BC, etc.) that helps the pilot align with the runway and the proper approach path. However, even though the pilot has this navigational guidance backup to refer to, the actual landing and manipulation of the flight controls on approach and landing is accomplished by the flying pilot (autopilot OFF) about 99% of the time. At XXXX Airlines, about the only time we do auto lands with the autopilot actually making the landing is when we would be required to do so, like during a very low visibility landing, or during training. In other words, almost NEVER. I, for example, have just over 8000 hours in the 777 and I've made, maybe, 10 actual automatic, autopilot-flown landings in 11 years on the jet. This is typical of all our pilots, even at the other airlines. So, don't believe what you see and hear on TV and radio. What gets pilots in trouble is when they make a landing on a runway without using any navigational backup that would confirm the alignment with the proper runway. Like a true visual approach, with NO navigational backup. We almost NEVER do that. And when pilot do, they sometimes end up in the news! Ouch!!!"

[/FONT]
 
That is pretty much my experience, also. However, even though all available navaids are tuned and identified, that does not mean the flight crew won't get tunnel visioned into seeing what they want to see.
 
The degree of automation here is not limited to fixed wing aircraft, either. I flew single engine UH-1s in the Army 30 years ago, and everything was manual. No autopilot or auto-anything. We had something called force trim we could use for the cyclic, which let the pilot set the null-resistance point for the cyclic stick during - mostly - instrument flight. We could also friction lock our collective to one setting when cruising along at a constant pitch/power setting.

A friend of mine who flew as my copilot a few times went on to a longer military flying career than I did, and has flown as a civilian since leaving the military. He was flying a Sikorsky S-76 for the oil industry in the Gulf of Mexico, and he explained to me one day that he really only touched the controls on takeoff and landing. Otherwise he set an autopilot and maniulated trim wheels and GPS navigation inputs and let the aircraft fly itself. I was amazed.

After BP's Deepwater Horizon debacle he had to stop flying in the gulf because the constant exposure to the fumes coming off the water was affecting he health, so he took a job flying a Bell 212 in Alaska. He wrote me after that saying how different the 212 was - much like the Hueys we flew together - all hands and feet on the controls at all times. He said he had forgotten how much fun that kind of flying could be.
 
I never listen to a word the media has to say about aviation, do people really believe they only touch 7 buttons? Simply look at the amount and length of checklists for any modern jetliner, there's more than 7 items on those checklists.
 
JordanDelaney said:
I never listen to a word the media has to say about aviation, do people really believe they only touch 7 buttons? Simply look at the amount and length of checklists for any modern jetliner, there's more than 7 items on those checklists.
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Normally I would agree with you 100%. In this case the guy saying all of these things "claims" to be a retired American captain. Sooo….. should they have verified this? Absolutely, but it isn't as grievous as when the newscaster weights in on an aviation topic without an "expert" IMO.
 
Alexb2000 said:
Normally I would agree with you 100%. In this case the guy saying all of these things "claims" to be a retired American captain. Sooo….. should they have verified this? Absolutely, but it isn't as grievous as when the newscaster weights in on an aviation topic without an "expert" IMO.
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Years ago 60 Minutes ran a piece on rolling odometers and had an "expert" demonstrate it in an old IIRC Valiant by reaching behind the dash with a coat hanger. I've rolled odies on most cars of that vintage and can tell you right now there is none that can be done in that manner, the easiest were Fords which you could pull the face off the dash and reset with an ice pick. All the rest required disassembly of the speedometer head, Chrysler products were the most difficult because they had an ink blotter that would stain the wheel if you tried to tamper with them indelicately. The media is full of ****.
 
JordanDelaney said:
I never listen to a word the media has to say about aviation, do people really believe they only touch 7 buttons? Simply look at the amount and length of checklists for any modern jetliner, there's more than 7 items on those checklists.
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The expert did not say they only touch 7 buttons. The expert said there are only 7 times that they manually hit the buttons. I think he was talking about phases of flight.

Like 1) takeoff 2) over to departure with a new heading 3) another heading change/altitude clearance to cruise 4) maybe a few altitude changes enroute over Atlantic 5) London approach vectors from cruise altitude on down 6) Enable APR mode on autopilot 7) Land.

I dunno. That's how I interpreted what he said.
 
polaris said:
The expert did not say they only touch 7 buttons. The expert said there are only 7 times that they manually hit the buttons. I think he was talking about phases of flight.

Like 1) takeoff 2) over to departure with a new heading 3) another heading change/altitude clearance to cruise 4) maybe a few altitude changes enroute over Atlantic 5) London approach vectors from cruise altitude on down 6) Enable APR mode on autopilot 7) Land.

I dunno. That's how I interpreted what he said.
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That would make much more sense, I didn't watch the episode I just read what was on here :D
 
Well, what a load. All that went to prove, to me, is that those shows are into sensatialization over accuracy.
 
JordanDelaney said:
I never listen to a word the media has to say about aviation, do people really believe they only touch 7 buttons? Simply look at the amount and length of checklists for any modern jetliner, there's more than 7 items on those checklists.
Click to expand...
. . . .
 

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