Page 18 - Twin & Turbine January 2018

Jet Journal
Personal Safety Standdown
by Thomas P. Turner
Every year Bombardier Aircraft, parent company of Canadair and Learjet, holds a three-day conference in Wichita called the Bombardier Safety Standdown. The “BSS” began 21 years ago as an in-house meeting of Learjet factory demonstration and flight test pilots, and has grown
into an international by-invitation event capped at about 500 attendees annually. Although the BSS seminars and breakout groups are aimed at the corporate jet flight department, including pilots, mechanics, flight attendants, safety officers and senior management, there is a great deal that applies to pilots of single-pilot airplanes as well. It is especially so because we do not have a second pilot along to monitor what we’re doing, help during the high workload times, and act as quality control if we need it.
I attended the BSS six years ago and got a great deal out of it. When I was invited back this year I decided it was time for a refresher and to learn the latest that we can apply to single-pilot operations. To provide a feel for what we discussed and what I learned, I’ll provide some quotes from the 2017 Bombardier Safety Standdown:
“FAA enforcement actions have been cut 70 percent in the past five years. The emphasis is on education.” – Ali Bahrami, FAA Associate Administrator for Aviation Safety (the most senior FAA safety official)
“Flying safely and preventing accidents, may be entirely different things. Accidents come from things we don’t think we are doing in the cockpit – intentional and unintentional noncompliance.” – John DeLisi, Director, Office of Safety, NTSB
“You will perform at or just below your everyday standard under stress.” – Dr. Tony Kern, Col USAF (ret.), Convergent Technologies, Inc.
“Drugs and medications are evident in over half of all aviation accidents.” – Allen Parmet, MD, Senior Aviation Medical Examiner
“Every one of us will eventually do something stupid. The goal is risk management, not risk avoidance.” – Mark Briggs, Safety Management Resources, Inc.
“Don’t be ‘conveniently complacent.’” – Amy Grubb, PhD, Federal Bureau of Investigation
16 • TWIN & TURBINE
January 2018