In search of aviation experts

Furthermore, in aviation it is bad form to speculate on an incident before the official report is tabled and the complete set of facts are known.

One reason for this stems from the fact that the spotlight may shine their way at some point and they would appreciate the benefit of the doubt initially. Such a courtesy does not seem to extend beyond the cockpit in many cases and the magnifying glass has been turned squarely on MH370’s crew. There was a photo taken of the first officer with female passengers, accompanied by the headline, “Playboy Pilot”. There’s the suggestion that one pilot may have murdered the other and placed the aircraft into a death plunge. And lo and behold, the captain even had foreign runways programmed into his home flight simulator! Now each aspect of this needed to be examined logically. Had there been a history of flightdeck security breaches? Were there psychological issues at play or was a clandestine flightplan to be found on the captain’s home computer? These are all valid questions in an investigation. But they are not valid headlines. To date, nothing sinister has been revealed from any of these lines of inquiry, but the damage has been done to reputations. There’s an old line about ‘mud sticking’.

Let’s consider a parallel universe.

Let us speculate that there has been a series of unexplained deaths at a hospital. Before any autopsies have been completed or a coronial inquest has been undertaken, theories are spread across the front pages of newspapers and speculation has gone viral on the internet. Not only are unfounded theories published, but so too are the names of the doctors at the hospital, complete with photos from their Facebook page. Apparently one surgeon even had the board game ‘Operation’ at home! Start your stopwatch people, the lawyers are on their way with defamation suits.

For MH370 the theories just keep on coming – hijacking, terrorism, pilot suicide, technical malfunction and so on and so on. Each one has its moment in the sun and is flashed across the world as a startling new revelation. Unfortunately, when it is disproven or shown to be baseless rumour there are no front page apologies. The headlines are simply replaced by bigger headlines with the old ‘news’ left to linger just below the surface. Ultimately I suppose alien abduction will have its run and the headlines will peter out, replaced by a new sensation from another corner of the world. Adding to the confusion, some of those throwing the red herrings into the media mulcher don’t have any first hand cockpit experience. They are espousing technical aspects of possible outcomes without an hour in their logbook. The background is researched, supposedly, from a range of resources of varying reliability. As a consequence, some of the information being distributed isn’t just misleading, it’s blatantly incorrect. Perhaps it sells advertising or gets hits on a website, but it is simply wrong.

So what constitutes an ‘aviation expert’ in this digital age? Most pilots reel at the concept of an ‘expert’ as such terminology sits next to complacency and they know that complacency can kill. Every pilot, private or professional, is a work in progress. They are constantly striving to master a skill that they know they never will, but revelling in those days where they get a little bit closer.

These same pilots have knowledge and opinions, but will offer them up with disclaimers such as “. . . but I wasn’t there” or “. . . it’s not for me to judge”. They will share the known facts, but the job of joining the dots is for the professional investigators armed with all the information. They can accept that journalists need to write stories, but will never comprehend when uninformed opinion or speculation is transmitted to the masses as if it were the absolute truth.

Pilots are the first to recognise that mistakes can be made and they are trained to highlight errors and learn from them. They understand the essence of safety reporting and the detailed process of an air safety incident investigation. What they do not appreciate is trial by media from those who have never felt the pressure of a cockpit on a dark wet night. Right or wrong, the crew of MH370 have no right of reply to the broad spectrum of innuendo that has been associated with their flight. Perhaps that makes them easy targets.

In contrast, there are a few respected aviation journalists who have failed to jump on the bandwagon. Early in the piece, David Learmount reminded us that the investigation into Air France 447 took a good deal of time and once again, MH370 may well call for patience. As the search in the southern Indian Ocean went into full swing, measured reports of the process emerged from the RAAF and other official bodies. Far from the sensational headlines sought by most news agencies they highlighted the one true certainty – this is very big undertaking with no guarantee of success.

The resources being dedicated to this search are more than extensive – they are mammoth. Around the clock, highly skilled professionals are attempting to answer the question on everyone’s lips and they don’t have time for whimsical ‘what ifs?’. The job at hand is to find MH370 and it’s like finding a needle in a haystack, when we don’t know with certainty which farm we need to search.

If the Boeing 777 is found and the black boxes are raised from the deep, we may ultimately have answers. Consequently, one of the theories currently in circulation may well be proven to be correct. However, the speculation and rumour that has surrounded this episode in aviation history has yielded very little worthwhile information in the mainstream media. Those responsible for propagating these stories have very little to offer. Instead, it is in the measured voices of the briefing rooms and the cockpits of the tireless search aircraft that we will find the true ‘aviation experts’.