Support systems

Two heads are better than one

One of the great advances over recent decades has been the everincreasing awareness of human factors on the flightdeck. The growth of crew resource management (CRM) has seen the draconian oneseat- fits-all attitude towards aircraft operations generally fade into history. Captains have been increasingly encouraged to call upon all available information from a range of sources and remaining crew members have been encouraged to speak up. The system is still far from perfect as humans are involved, but we’re getting there.

There was a time when a great divide existed between captain and copilot with the left seat seen as an all-empowered throne above the right of reply. In some cases, the ‘flightdeck gradient’ was so steep that the captain could hardly see the rest of his crew. And the flight attendants had little to offer more than milk and sugar.