Yet another very poor "GPS report"

[IO540]

This time from France, and doing the rounds of forums

http://www.bea-fr.org/etudes/etudegpsa/etudegpsa.pdf

Quote:

The airplane collided with terrain following a stabilized rectilinear path.
A GPS was found on board.

Quote:

Three pilots left for a day trip. They all used GPS receivers. During the final leg, the engine stopped due to fuel starvation, during aeronautical night.

There is no end to the people who write apparently authoritative reports but can't spot the hallmarks of simple poor planning.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

To this point in time GPS is hands down the best Nav Aid avaliable to general aviation.
To not use one if you can is poor airmanship as they are far more accurate than any other nav aid.
It goes without saying that one should cross check with a map when VFR.

[FlyingForFun]

Don't have time to read the report right now, because I have to go to work - I'll catch up with it later.

But, from the snippets that have been cut+pasted into this thread, it sounds like what the report might be trying to highlight is not faults with GPS, but faults with GPS training, such as people who think that the GPS somehow removes the need for good flight planning.

It might be true that, if they hadn't had GPS, these pilots might not have found themselves in that situation because they would have planned more thoroughly. Maybe that's what the report is trying to say? But if they had been trained properly, or even spent a bit of time thinking about the way they were using their equipment, they also would not have found themselves in the situations described.

I'll read the report later, and post back if this revises my opinions!

FFF
--------------

[pistongone]

I can't load the report, keeps freezing once the PDF file starts to load Any computer buff's here know whats going on? I cant ask my IT support as i am supposed to be working now

[scooter boy]

Gist of report = aircraft ran out of fuel while pilots were using the most precise navigational equipment currently available (in triplicate).

In other words, A/C ran out of fuel.

Fuel consumption does not increase with GPS usage as far as I am aware?

Quality of planning also not related to GPS usage as far as I am aware.


SB

[Anonystude]

Originally Posted by scooter boy

Quality of planning also not related to GPS usage as far as I am aware.

The trouble is, there're people out there who'd dispute this point.

[IO540]

I like the Jasper Carrot analogy

It is so tempting to write a spoof GPS incident study. Done correctly, it would be so close to one of these "quasi-official" creations that nobody could tell without a very close read, and it would generate a few gigabytes of traffic in all the usual places on the internet

Of course availability of equipment affects flight planning. I would plan a flight very differently in a TB20 with

KLN94 BRNAV IFR certified GPS with current database on 28-day cycle
KMD550 multifunction display (GPS moving map + stormscope)
WX500 stormscope displaying on KMD550
KCS55 slaved HSI
KI229 dual-needle slaved RMI (ADF+VOR)
2nd altimeter
2nd electric horizon (P2 position)
EDM700 6 cylinder CHT & EGT monitor with data logging
KN63 DME
KR87 ADF
GTX330 Mode S Transponder
2x KX155A COM/VOR/ILS (dual independent ILS)
PMA7000 intercom with markers
Shadin fuel computer, calibrated, linked to KLN94B GPS
KFC225 autopilot with flight director, ALT and VS preselects, tracks VOR/GPS/LOC/ILS
Antenna & power connections for a handheld GPS and ICOM transceiver
Electronic CO detector
Emergency equipment comprises 4 life jackets, 4/6-person raft, 406/121.5MHz EPIRB, Skymap 2 GPS, ICOM A22 VHF transceiver/VOR receiver
Jeppesen UK IFR Touring Guide, updated on 28-day cycle
Tablet computer running Jeppview/Flitedeck with current European database
20,000ft operating ceiling
4-place Oxygen system with demand regulators

to the way I would plan it if flying a beaten up old C152 with a broken AI, broken VOR, half working radio.

But that's missing the point of all this.

[QDMQDMQDM]

What a bizarre waste of resources this report is. The only message I can see is that carelessness kills, irrespective of the equipment carried on board.

What possible relevance does a GPS have to this incident:

<<28/09/97
Robinson R22
Helicopter
The pilot got lost during a crosscountry
flight. Low on fuel, he made
an emergency landing. The GPS did
not have an aerodrome database.>>

Since most aircraft now carry a GPS I think we'll see a lot more of these 'GPS Events'. Carb icing? Fuel exhaustion? Loss of control in cloud? Oh yes, down to the GPS, no doubt at all.

This weird obsession with the GPS as a double-edged sword, a fearsome tool, like a pocket knife in the hands of a 6-year old, borders on the fetishistic. I find it very strange.

QDM

[slim_slag]

Having read the report with an open mind I think it has value. It is not an attack on GPS that some with a close mind think it is, QDM is correct to say the message is that carelessness kills. The report is saying that GPS can become a dangerous tool if misused or if it makes you do things that you otherwise wouldn't do. It is saying that complacency kills, and some people become complacent because they misuse GPS. I see no harm in pointing that out, it is probably paints a very accurate picture of what happens in real life.

The example quoted by QDM may only give a brief summary of what happened. The report is quite clear on the report's limitations and should be read as such. My reading of the report says that GPS is brilliant technology, highly accurate, has technical shortcomings if not properly installed, and requires proper training to use properly. It doesn't say you shouldn't use it.

It's really a discussion about human factors and not technology, and I agree with it.

[Final 3 Greens]

"Equipped with 2 GPS receivers, the pilot was flying above the English Channel between two cloud layers when he got lost. When he noticed a hole in the layer he descended and landed hard in a field"...

I blame the people who put fields in the middle of the Channel

[dublinpilot]

I think the example the QDM*3 quotes is there to demonstrate something that IO540 has pointed out on numerious occasions here.

A non aviation GPS is pretty useless. It's not just our position that a gps tells us, but our position relative to things we need to know about. If your gps doesn't know about airfields, then don't expect it to be able to help you find it.

That is the purpose of that inclusion, I believe.

Some of the examples the document quotes are to show that certain pilots will allow themselves to go further into danger with a gps than they will without one. The report seems to draw (possibly not unreasonably) the conculsion that some vfr only pilots will continue much further into deteriating conditions, knowing that they can place reliance on their gps....then get disoriented.

I don't think this report is claiming that gps is the devil.....rather it is trying to highlight areas where pilot training on gps could be useful.

dp

[High Wing Drifter]

I agree with Slim mostly, the report highlights some important points that I don't think are necessarily related to just GPS training. It is an interesting consideration that planning the flight to use navaids and visual references does ensure you fully consider line of sight and visibility issues, or as the report puts it, thinking in 3D terms rather than 2D. I guess the report is advocating a belt'n'braces approach, that once you have determined it is possible to conduct the flight 'traditionally', GPS reduces workload. However, I suspect for some, the benefit of GPS is that it reduces the amount of time it takes to plan thus making the flying option more practically feasible in some situations, such as the travelling business man category mentioned in the report.

Chuck,

To not use one if you can is poor airmanship as they are far more accurate than any other nav aid.

Judging by your other posts you are somewhat more experienced than me. However, I simply cannot accept the notion that navigating with a chart or radio aids and not with a GPS reduces safety.

QDM

What possible relevance does a GPS have to this incident:

My reading is that he got lost (despite GPS) and was totally unprepared for the eventuality. Possibly because he didn't believe that he could get lost?

[slim_slag]

Sorry dublinpilot, but I totally reject any assertion that a 'non aviation GPS is pretty useless', but that's not the point either myself or the report is making.

If a GPS doesn't know where an airfield is, then all that means is you cannot use the GPS to find the airfield. If you try to use it to find the airfield and runout of fuel in the process then it's a human factor failure, not a GPS failure. It's called Pilot Error.

This is not "yet another poor GPS report", it's a very interesting human factors report that just happens to discuss one navigational technique out of many. No doubt the same discussions were held when they invented NDBs or VORs. The report has limitations that the report doesn't try to hide and should be read as such (which means read it).

[IO540]

If the objective was to produce a report highlighting human factors involved in different means of navigation

- dead reckoning
- conventional radio nav
- GPS

one could do that OK. However, such a study would need to include non-accident flights.

All we see, time after time, is report after report, article after article, saying how GPS can get you into trouble [if used incorrectly]. A lot of that is very true but it isn't helpful to anybody.

If I had the time and the resources, I would have a go at this. One would need to do a comprehensive survey of a few thousand active pilots. Start by contacting the CAA to get a grip on how many there are, how many hours they fly per year, how many hours they fly before they lapse, what types they fly, etc. You would need a lot of co-operation for that.

Then, knowing the approximate distribution, select a representative sample of pilots to interview, to establish their flight planning and navigation habits.

Then one could compare accident flights versus non-accident flights, and see what correlates with that.

Then, to tie up the correlations with causal effects, do detailed interviews with the accident pilots to see what exactly they did. Plus interviews with non-accident pilots flying similar routes to see what they didn't do!

Then one would have a survey on human factors in flight planning and navigation which would be worth reading.

Small wonder it hasn't been done yet. It's a lot of work. It would take one person about a year, I reckon. It's so much easier to produce yet another mickey mouse "study".

However, I simply cannot accept the notion that navigating with a chart or radio aids and not with a GPS reduces safety.

Well, not using the best available equipment must reduce safety.

One difficulty here is that you include "radio aids". I think very few PPLs use radio aids i.e. VOR/DME navigation for enroute, while many more PPLs use a GPS. GPS is so much more accessible and usable, while few pilots are going to say "I have never had VOR training but it looks like it could be really useful; let's find out how to use these VOR things".

So GPS gets a lot of stick - because you can buy one in a shop, charge the batteries, switch it on, and lo and behold, it tells you where you are.

Notice I said "flight planning and navigation". The two are usually inseparable in accidents. No good blaming a failure of GPS nav for a CFIT because the pilot (presumably flying in IMC) should have backed it up with VOR/DME. (A nav failure due to flying 080 instead of 180 on a VOR, resulting in a CFIT, would never draw a comment that the pilot should have backed up the VOR with a GPS, of course )

It's mostly to do with flight planning and cockpit procedures in the end. The whole job, not just whether one box was used and how.

[QDMQDMQDM]

However, I simply cannot accept the notion that navigating with a chart or radio aids and not with a GPS reduces safety.

And the moon is made of cheese.

A GPS gives you an instant, precise position with no twiddling of knobs, radio interference, short range, mental maths or squinting at charts and the ground, which latter is particularly problematic if the ground is the sea. It is the best aid (that's 'A' 'I' 'D') to navigation yet invented.

If you'd asked Jim Mollison, Amy Johnson, Charles Kingsford Smith etc if they would have liked a GPS and whether it might have improved their level of safety, what do you think they would have said? "Oh no, we don't need that. It adds nothing to what we already have."

Oh dear, yet another GPS is amazing / no it's not thread. But it is, so I have to muck in.

[dublinpilot]

If a GPS doesn't know where an airfield is, then all that means is you cannot use the GPS to find the airfield. If you try to use it to find the airfield and runout of fuel in the process then it's a human factor failure, not a GPS failure. It's called Pilot Error.

I don't disagree one bit. I don't think that the report disagrees either. It's simply pointing out that gps's come in various different types. Some are more useful that others. Pilots should be thought about the various different types, so that they appreciate the limitations. I don't think the report says that this is a "gps failure". But if a pilot is placing reliance on a gps to help find an airfield, when the airfield isn't in the gps database, then the lack of having an aviation gps is probably a "contributing factor". That's not a critism of gps, but rather of the pilot. I don't think the report says any different.
Incidently, I don't think the report ACTUALLY says that the pilot was using the gps to find the airfield, but that's the inference.

I am very pro gps. I wouldn't be without mine. But everything has a limitation, as we ought to know and understand them before using them. Is that really unreasonable?

[High Wing Drifter]

IO540.

Well, not using the best available equipment must reduce safety.

One difficulty here is that you include "radio aids". I think very few PPLs use radio aids i.e. VOR/DME navigation for enroute, while many more PPLs use a GPS. GPS is so much more accessible and usable, while few pilots are going to say "I have never had VOR training but it looks like it could be really useful; let's find out how to use these VOR things".

Yes, quite so, the reference to radio aids was deliberate because I was considering the practical difficulties of pure VFR/DR for more serious forays rather than a 1 hour flight to Shobdon for a sarnie. I agree that GPS is more accessible and usable and the sooner we have GPS approaches the better - for example. But I'm not convinced these things are related to safety per se. My statement does assume that the pilot is as equally competant and comfortable with navaids and DR as he is with GPS. With regard to "usability", I think it is clear that GPS reduces workload, I don't think there is direct link with safety and a reasonable level of workload that navaid/DR usage usually requires. Possibly the opposite as the moderate pressure probably makes for a more generally alert and aware pilot (I'm praphrasing the human factors book here).

Dublin,

That's not a critism of gps, but rather of the pilot. I don't think the report says any different.

I agree and I don't those sympathetic to the report's message are taking a pro/anti stance (me included QDM).

[IO540]

I don't think there is direct link with safety and a reasonable level of workload that navaid/DR usage usually requires. Possibly the opposite as the moderate pressure probably makes for a more generally alert and aware pilot (I'm praphrasing the human factors book here).

I don't buy that.

A pilot has plenty to do already. Enroute ops, he is watching everything, inside and outside, talking to ATC, etc. Terminal ops, he is a lot more busy than that, whether VFR or IFR. There is no need to create more workload to keep him awake.

I have plenty of automation but the only time I have been bored was flying 150nm legs on 5hr+ flights at FL100+ above a smooth overcast extending as far as the eye can see... and that sort of flying would be under radar control anyway; there is little option for doing it sub-airways anywhere in the UK.

Reducing workload means more brainpower is left to watch what is going on, which must help safety. I am under the impression that the airlines discovered this some decades ago.

The above assumes that the pilot knows what he should be doing, and only excessive workload is going to cause him to f*** up. This may be a wrong assumption, in which case increasing the workload is hardly going to do any good at all.

[High Wing Drifter]

IO540,

I suspected that I may regret inserting that sentence on workload!

I am under the impression that the airlines discovered this some decades ago.

Actually, the ATPL course cites one of the downsides of automation (aka workload reducing technology) as reduced arousal (not the word I would have used) and the subsequent reduction in awareness...and safety. Granted, this probaby applies to specific types of flights like long haul and has little relevance to our particular domain of discourse.

[IO540]

Actually, the ATPL course cites one of the downsides of automation (aka workload reducing technology) as reduced arousal (not the word I would have used)

In that case, Virgin should have the best safety record in the business

Especially on long haul