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64
C
ULTURE is
the term which
describes the
characteristics
and knowledge of
a particular group
of people. It is a
broad term which
encompasses language, religion, cuisine,
social habits, music and art. Furthermore,
culture is shared patterns of behaviour
and interaction, cognitive constructs
and understanding that are learned by
socialization. Culture can therefore be seen
as the development of a group identity based
on patterns which are unique to that group.
Culture is not necessarily dened by
race, politics or nationality, despite that in
real life we do see some such correlations.
Culture is not a static thing: it grows and
changes. Cultures, or portions thereof, are
adopted and assimilated into other cultures,
particularly in our modern connected
world. Indeed, the roots of the word are in
“cultivation”, which means to tend the elds,
to grow and to nurture.
The purpose of culture is that it creates
a unity of purpose and ease of cooperation
between members of a cultural group,
no matter that some aspects of it may be
irrational or superuous.
Most discord in the world is based
on clashes of culture. Where cultures are
incompatible with each other yet come
together for common purposes or are
integrated through other circumstances,
friction and intolerance are certain to result.
There are deep psychological roots in
one’s own culture, which has been learned
from a young age. There are also strong
psychological responses to challenges
against that culture which become
embedded in one’s psyche.
COCKPIT CULTURE
The development of a consistent culture
among pilots and other personnel involved
in the operation of aircraft is essential to
smooth functioning and safety. Consistency
and cooperation automatically ow between
members of a group who have adopted and
live out certain ways of interacting.
Cockpit culture is a generalised concept
that for the most part attempts to counter the
hazardous attitudes which the United States
FAA identied among pilots. These attitudes
are anti-authority, impulsivity, invulnerability,
macho and resignation.
ANTI-AUTHORITY
Rules, regulations and checklists have
been developed for your own safety. They
are written in the blood of past pilots and
their passengers.
Humans are by nature ground-pounders
and unlike birds, have never evolved the
innate ability to y. They therefore have to
learn all the skills, instincts and ‘muscle
memory’ that help them to y an aircraft. The
rules codify these necessary qualities – and
a safety culture ensures that the pilot will
naturally follow those rules. As soon a pilot
begins to think the rules don’t apply to him
(or her), he loses his link to the lifelines that
have been created to keep him alive.
AOPA BRIEFING
REPORT: CHRIS MARTINUS
Pilot culture is an essential part of who we are and how we stay alive. Fortunately, pilot
culture transcends race, nationality, language, religion and the many other things that
divide societies.
PILOT CULTURE
The FAA hazardous attitudes and the antidotal thinking to avoid them.
www.sayer.com | February 2019
65
A culture that makes it taboo and quite
unthinkable to deviate from the rules is an
essential to survival.
IMPULSIVITY
Although the rules are the core of a pilot’s
reaction to a particular situation, they do not
cover every eventuality. When unusual or
unanticipated circumstances arise, the pilot
must exercise discretion and common sense
in decision-making. Where time is available,
he must think it through, rather than simply
taking the rst action that comes to mind.
Rules are reexes, exceptions require
contemplation.
INVULNERABILITY
We are inclined to think that accidents
only happen to other people. This natural
tendency is coupled to the inability to readily
contemplate one’s own death.
We don’t really want to think about bad
things, but when ying, there are just too
many things that can kill you – and your brain
never evolved to deal with them without
having to put in some effort on your part.
Every pilot should develop his or her
personal culture where a little too much
comfort or complacency will ring warning
bells.
MACHO
A great deal of condence is required
to y an aircraft safely. Uncertainty and
indecision is just as deadly as any of these
other cardinal sins. However, too much
condence and the urge to show-off is even
more deadly. A culture which places limits
on pilot machismo goes a long way towards
helping pilots to y within the limits of their
capabilities.
RESIGNATION
This is to a great extent the opposite of
excessive machismo and overcondence.
Yet it is one of the more pervasive killers.
Where the pilot is overwhelmed by
circumstances and fearfulness, does not
A culture that makes
it taboo and quite
unthinkable to deviate
from the rules is an
essential to survival.
COLUMNS
Social media is potentially hazardous to a safety culture.
February 2019 | www.sayer.com
66
AOPA BRIEFING
believe in his or her own abilities, perhaps
feels unwell or depressed, that is when he
just gives up.
This is very likely why so many pilots y
VFR into IMC and never turn back to safety.
It is an undoubted cause of those accidents
where the pilot had many options to avoid it,
but did nothing.
A ying culture which supports, mentors
and encourages condence goes a long
way towards preventing these tragedies. It
is therefore unsurprising that most airlines
expend considerable effort on developing a
corporate culture that gives effect to these
tenets.
CHALLENGES TO OUR CULTURE
One of the surest ways to destroy a
society is to attack its culture. No bullets
need be red, no prisoners need be taken.
In our online, connected society, we
have lost some of the ying club culture
which formed a strong feeling of unity and
conformity among those who y. The days
are fading where the elders of the ying
community would pass on their wisdom and
values to the newcomers.
New and aspirant pilots who have a thirst
for imbibing the knowledge and experience
of those who have been there before are not
exposed to that culture, nor do they develop
the sense of belonging to that cultural group.
The internet’s social media is a
marvellous resource for information and
news, but it falls dismally short of creating
and developing that culture that makes safe
practices habitual. Regrettably, social media
today is highly manipulative, suffused with
greed and the need to control its denizens.
It is lled with trolls whose acrimonious
comments cater to their own narcissistic
and often psychotic needs, as well as those
who unscrupulously abuse it to spread
misinformation for either nefarious purposes
or nancial benet.
A review of the ten most senior staff on
the CAA’s website reveals that an even more
pervasive problem is that our regulator has
no remaining pilot culture among their senior
executives. None of them have a background
which has inoculated them against those
hazardous attitudes which the FAA deems
so important to safe aviation.
The recent draconian use of regulations
to ground entire airlines on the basis of
paperwork issues is extremely worrying.
The groundings and consequent massive
damage to airlines like CemAir and the
penalisation of others for matters outside
their control, and for which they carry
no responsibility, is creating widespread
disrespect for their authority.
The lack of empathy for the plight
of passengers, aircrews and operators
as well as the self-congratulatory press
releases sent out by the SACAA drastically
undermines their own authority. In addition,
medical, maintenance and general
compliance rules are being enforced in such
a manner that, instead of supporting and
developing both general and commercial
aviation, is swiftly killing it off, together with
its underpinning safety culture.
It is broadly true to say that current
SACAA executives and their private-sector
associates are mostly political deployees
and opportunists who exhibit a far more
feudal culture than the cooperative safety
culture and nurturing which our industry so
badly needs, particularly in these times of
economic hardship. Most of their current
actions appear intent on bludgeoning civil
aviation into submission.
In a press release justifying SACAA’s
overreach in the grounding of CemAir,
Director Ms Poppy Khoza states: “It is the
Regulator’s view that anyone that does not
subscribe to the basic aviation principle,
which is safety rst, does not deserve an
opportunity to take to the skies.” The press
release continues with dubious platitudes
justifying this attitude. As ‘mother’ of South
Africa’s civil aviation, it appears to us that
she would rather bludgeon her baby into
submission, instead of nurturing it.
Our view is that she should nourish,
sustain and encourage the children which
have been placed in her care to conform to
a culture of safety – instead of beating them
to death.
j
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