Ethics in aviation

    Believe it or not, the sky above our head are packed with people and airplanes. There is an invisible highw ay jetting passengers and cargo all over the globe. on average, there are "between 7782 and 8755 commercial aircraft in flight"(Travel and leisure) at any given time throughout the day. That does not take into account the thousands of cargo, private or military aircraft in the air. It is a monumental task to organise all of these airplanes and make sure they do not crash into one another at any given time. There are multiple layers of air traffic control that take care of this delicate dance and I will be talking about two of these entities, that being the air traffic control tower and the flight service station or FSS.          The control tower is the iconic tower that looms over most large airports. Control towers manage traffic roughly 30 miles in and around the airport. They are responsible for all departing and landing aircraf...

 The Airport and the Environment  Airports come in all shapes and sizes, from large International hubs to small grass runways and one thing can be true for all of them, they are home to some nasty chemicals. The world is slowly shifting its focus on greener, more environmentally friendly ways of transportation and the aviation industry is no exception. Aircraft require vast amount of fuel, oil and hydraulic fluid in order to operate properly. For instance, aviation gasoline or avgas, contains a high amount of lead. This leaded fuel contains Tetra-ethyl-lead (TEL), which is an additive used to prevent engine damage at higher power settings (FAA). TEL, is known to cause nervous system damage in humans, along with a a laundry list of other ailments. If is able to do this to a human, what do you think it can do to the environment? When I was first taking flight lessons, my instructor showed me how to sump check the wing tanks to make sure there was no water in the fuel, and his wa...

       Humanity first took powered flight in 1903 and ever since that achievement, the world as we knew got smaller. We found a new realm to explore and much like exploring the west in the 1800’s, it was wild. Aviation was a newfound form of transportation, and over time airplanes became reliable enough to start ferrying passengers and cargo. Fast forward to 1938 and then President Roosevelt signed The Civil Aeronautics Act, which extended the reach of the federal regulation and transferred responsibility to an independent Civil Aeronautics Authority (CAA) and a 3-member Air Safety Board (1). The CAA was now had oversight in determining if private air mail and commercial companies were charging a fair price, participation on international discussions of regulations and most importantly, safety.      In the years after the creation of the CAA, aviation safety improved dramatically. The agency implemented changes to the certification process of airman an...

 Human Factors 5.3  September 5th 2022     Human factors as defined by the FAA is a " multidisciplinary effort to generate and compile information about human capabilities and limitations and apply that information to equipment, systems, facilities, procedures, jobs, environments, training, staffing, and personnel management for safe, comfortable, and effective human performance” (FAA Order 9550.8A). This means making sure all human based systems are performing at a high level with little or no error. Humans are  inherently  wrong, we are not all perfect, and  that's  why we have a system of checks and balances within aviation. The FAA has listed out 12 human factors that are attributed to maintenance related incidents/accidents.      I have been in aviation maintenance for 10 years now and have seen my fair share of screw ups in the work place. A few human factors that I see more often that gets people in trouble and or cause a ma...