All articles by David Learmount – Page 3
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Safety regulators face balancing act to manage new technology
National aviation authorities (NAAs) today risk being swamped by the rate of technological advance, according to their leaders. At the same time many risk being starved of resources because aviation safety appears to have improved so much that governments are wondering if oversight could be done more cheaply.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Aviation struggles to attract new talent
Difficult though it may be for those in the aerospace industry to comprehend it, there is a real problem generating sufficient interest in aviation careers to meet the demand for highly skilled jobs like engineers, pilots and air traffic controllers.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Keeping flight crews ahead of flightdeck technology
Keeping airline pilot training relevant while flightdeck technology advances apace - and while airspace management demands ever greater flight trajectory accuracy - is a task that will end only when airliners no longer have flightdecks.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Safety - good flying or just good luck?
Again the world’s commercial air transport industry has smashed all records for keeping passengers safe – in 2017 there were no fatal accidents on scheduled mainline passenger flights.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Accidents cloud Latin American safety performance
When 2016 dawned, Latin America had not seen a fatal jet airliner crash for a couple of years. By the end of that year, however, there had been two such accidents, and when this article was sent to press there had been none so far this year. The question is, ...
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Air accident reports issued January-June 2017
A little more than a year after the 19 May 2016 loss of an EgyptAir Airbus A320 over the Mediterranean Sea, Egyptian authorities have offered no data beyond some basic facts that came to light in the first few weeks.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Airline safety record continues to improve
This year’s first six months have again smashed the record for safe airline performance worldwide. What other commercial transport mode can claim that in the first half of 2017 – globally – there have been only six fatal accidents, and the total death toll was 16?
-
AnalysisANALYSIS: Time to plug in your co-pilot?
Robotic pilots may first be asked to replace the human co-pilot in freighters. And after that?
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Can singles really do it?
Now Europe has cleared commercial operation using turbine-powered single engine aircraft, will they offer a significantly cheaper business aviation option?
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Business aircraft safety 'holding steady'
Accident figures for 2016 show business aviation safety performance is gradually improving, but a glance at the nature of the accidents themselves raises questions about underlying standards in the industry.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Airlines urged to restore 'blind flying' skills
The global air transport industry agrees that pilots still need manual flying skills despite their highly automated work environment. But it cannot agree on how best to maintain this competency – particularly in instrument flying expertise.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: How A320 changed the world for commercial pilots
As the world’s first digital fly-by-wire (FBW) airliner, Airbus Industrie’s A320 was positioned to bring commercial flying and flight management into the 21st century when it was rolled out in 1987.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Accident reports published in the second half of 2016
Synopses of accident reports published in the last six months of 2016
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: World airline accident review 2016
Airline fatal accident figures rose significantly in 2016 compared with the previous year, but the comparison is somewhat misleading because 2015 was the safest year in history by a considerable margin.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Latin America safety improves, but work needed
The past two years have seen few serious accidents in the Latin America and Caribbean area, and those that have happened have involved small turboprops. But two years is a short time in aviation safety terms and – given the region’s mediocre safety record over decades – not long enough ...
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Ryanair uses FSTDs to help pilots train themselves
Most airline pilots approach their annual recurrent training simulator time with apprehension. They perceive the exercise to be more about testing than training or learning, and with most airlines there is a lot of truth in that perception.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Long-looming pilot shortage may, finally, be near
A worldwide shortage of pilots – forecast for more than 15 years – has so far failed to materialise, but there are worrying signs.
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: How to turn qualified pilots into competent pilots
The European Aviation Safety Agency is working with airlines on a pilot training course that leads to an enhanced qualification. This is being done because the present system produces pilots with licences that make them legally qualified to fly, but half of whom – according to the airlines – are ...
-
AnalysisANALYSIS: Where next in the hunt for MH370?
More than two and a half years after Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing, none of the search organisations trying to locate the main area of the Boeing 777-200’s wreckage is voicing confidence. So where does the multinational search effort for the aircraft – and the 239 people lost with ...
-
Analysis
ANALYSIS: Air travel is safer than ever, but safety today is not all about accidents
In the whole of 2015 – the safest year on record by almost all measures - there were no fatal accidents involving jet airliners, but in the first six months of this year there have been three.