2009 IPS North American Client Conference: Chaos, Crisis, Clarity

 

Jeff Skiles talked about his experience as co-pilot of US Airways Flight 1549 when it crashed into the Hudson River in New York on January 15, 2009 and how his experience and lessons learned relate to control engineers.

 

Jeff Skiles lives in Oregon, Wisconsin and is based as a pilot out of Charlotte, North Carolinan. Skiles was flying the plane at takeoff as copilot with Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger as the lead pilot of Flight 1549. No one was seriously injured when US Airways Flight 1549 made a water crash-landing in New York City's Hudson River shortly after takeoff on Thursday, January 15, 2009.

 

Skiles has found most people fascinated not only by their story but how they go about their profession as airline pilots. For most it is a mystery that goes on behind closed doors. Skiles noted that what they do in the cockpit is not so much different than what automation professionals do with the basic building blocks of training, teamwork, procedures, and information that is critical in any profession where human beings interact.

 

Skiles wanted to be at a pilot at an early age. Both his parents were hobby pilots so Skiles was in airplanes at a young age. As a teenager, they flew up to Alaska following the Alcan Highway in their little four seat airplane. His first job was pumping gas at a local airport to get money to fund his flight training lessons to get his pilot license. He became a flight instructor while going to college, where he received a bachelor of science in geology. He started as a cargo pilot for the U.S. mail flying to places like North Platte, Nebraska and Wolf Point, Montana. He then worked for a commuter airline flying turboprops. In 1986 he went to work for US Airways.

 

Flight 1549 was the last leg of a four day trip and he had just met Sully three days before the beginning of the trip. People are surprised at this because people think to work as a team you need to work together for a long time. It is their training and strict adherence to procedure that enables them to act as a team. One pilot is flying and one pilot is monitoring each with specific duties. Sully taxied the plane onto the runway and then said “your aircraft” and Skiles responded, “my aircraft” signifying the transfer of control.

 

 

Skiles proceeded to fly the airplane for takeoff and Sully called out the airspeed. “We have specific commands and callouts and are not allowed to engage in any extraneous conversation below 10,000 feet. “Having such concentration, procedures and strict uniformity helps us to work as a team. We know exactly what we are responsible for and what we can depend on the other pilot for.” At 3,000 feet they saw a line of geese right in front of the nose, and they were too close to maneuver around them. “They sounded like hail hitting the airplane and then both engines rolled back to idle,” Skiles described. “Speed is declining rapidly and I am pushing the nose over to keep the airplane flying.” 

 

Sully then took over the airplane by saying, “my aircraft” as Skiles responded, “your aircraft.” He and Sully assessed what they had and “it was clearly nothing.” Skiles worked through the dual engine failure checklist and Sully got on the radio and called “mayday, mayday, mayday!” They determined the safest thing to do was land the plane on the river. Sully informed the stewardess to “brace for impact.”

 

Skiles noted that even in this situation there were moments of levity they did not remember. When they listened to the NTSB tapes later Sully asked Skiles, “got any other ideas?” and he responded, “actually no.”

 

As Skiles walked back through the plane after the water landing he began throwing out the life vests located under the seats as noted in the flight briefing card which is “rarely read.” Passengers helped each other and there was no pushing or shoving. The entire flight took 5 ½ minutes; two minutes before hitting the geese and 3 ½ minutes to land in the Hudson River.

 

The politicians arrived and Governor Paterson coined the phrase the “Miracle on the Hudson.” Skiles commented, “Was it really a miracle? Sully and I brought a lifetime of experience and both have over 20,000 hours of flying experience.”  Skiles observed that their training, teamwork, procedures, and also luck made this possible. Accidents happen due to chains of small events and if you break the chain you can prevent accidents, and the biggest factor is human error. The airline industry tracks human errors to learn and improve training and procedures. They are allowed to report mistakes they make without fear of punishment to keep an overall database of mistakes to identify patterns.   Also, flight audits are done with someone observing operation in the cockpit to identify mistakes. The goal is to create better training and procedures to avoid errors.  Skiles observed that automation professionals track information in real time to understand and improve operations.

 

Skiles concluded by emphasizing that this and other successes are based on training, procedures, teamwork, and using real information to learn and improve. Good advice!