Discussion: Maintaining Situational Awareness

Topic 1: A loss of situational awareness being loss or degrading is called a “red flag.” Discuss strategies and methods that crews may use to maintain situational awareness and some ways that loss of SA can be mitigated. 

Crew Resource Management and
Situational Awareness

ASCI 516

Module 5 Presentation

Overview of Situational Awareness (SA)

Definitions

Components of SA

CRM skills that aid in situational awareness

Threats to SA

Prevention methods to enhance SA

Theory of the Situation

A set of beliefs about what is happening and what action an individual should take.

Based on the interpretation of available information.

Based on individual’s perception of reality

Reality of the Situation

What is actual reality, without human perception

Theory of Practice

An individual’s concepts and skills developed over time, used to build and respond to Theories of the Situation

The sum of experience

Theory of the Situation

You are MOST likely to change your theory of the situation when:

Operating under low stress

Have access to and accept feedback

Develop inquiry skills into your Theory of Practice. Guard against interpreting information to support your Theory of the Situation

Theory of the Situation

You are LEAST likely to change your theory of the situation when:

Your Theory of Practice is over-learned

You have a complacent attitude

It is a crisis situation

The theory of the situation is central to your self-esteem/ego.

Got SA???

Situation Awareness is an accurate perception of the factors and conditions currently affecting the safe operation of the aircraft and crew.

(ICAO & Industry CFIT Task Force).

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Defining SA
Situational assessment is defined as the process of achieving situation awareness. It is the process of information acquisition and interpretation that leads to the product defined as situation awareness
Adams, Tenney and Pew, 1995

Awareness Is the Result of
Multiple Situational Assessment
Observation of Situation
Comparing observation with:
Other Observations
Expectations
Plans
Seeking More Information

Situational Assessment on Three Levels
Perception: Failure to correctly perceive the situation
Integration of Information:
Failure to integrate or comprehend the information
Projection: Failure to project situation into the future

Pilot Elements of Situational Awareness
Experience and Training
Physical Flying Skills
CRM Skills (Teamwork)
Spatial Orientation
Health and Attitude

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Operational Clues to Loss of Situational Awareness
Terrible Eleven
Incomplete Communications
Ambiguity
Unresolved Discrepancies
Use of Undocumented Procedures

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Operational Clues to Loss of Situational Awareness
Terrible Eleven
Preoccupation or Fixation
No One Flying
No One Looking
Confusion

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Operational Clues to Loss of Situational Awareness
Terrible Eleven
Deviations from SOP’s
Violations of Limits and Regulations
Failure to Meet Targets

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Confused?
Maintain Control – Fly the aircraft.
Create Time & Space – minimize the impact of any errors or threats by avoiding critical flight segments until ready.

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REVERT TO BASICS:
Maintain Control – Fly the Aircraft. Or delegate someone to with specific actions.
Minimise any errors by a safe, conservative approach: Create Time and Space – Climb! Put distance between yourself and the ground or a possible accident window . Put the aircraft at a safe altitude. Enter the hold. Get back to SOPs
Assess the Problem in the Time Available. Re-evaluate use the CLEAR model to:
Gather Information from all sources.
Assess All the Options & Choose the Best.
Monitor the Results – Alter Plan as Required.

CRM Skills That Increase Situation Awareness
Leadership
Communications
Preparations and Planning
Adaptability

Leadership
Ability to create a team climate:
Introductions
Inputs
Suggestions
Assigning Tasks
Re-assigning Tasks
Workload Management

Communications
Perception
Consciousness – a result of perceiving
Observation – a mental image

What Do You See?
Chances are you’ve seen this example before, but it clearly shows that things can be perceived differently in a given situation.
Having a shared mental model and getting everyone’s input when time permits makes for improved SA and better decision making

Communications
Not the amount but quality
Verbalizing information to other crewmembers on the team about actions being taken, actions planning to take, and giving information they need you do two things.
Other crewmembers are aware of what is going on from your perceptive.
If your actions are indicators that you are not “up” on the situation, gives crewmembers an opportunity to help correct an ill-advised action.

Communications
Good communications for situation awareness includes confessing to a loss of awareness.

Preparation and Planning
Know taxi routes
Know about other crewmembers
Knowledge about items in cockpit
Knowledge departure plan
Level of automation
Frequencies
Who will handle emergencies
Handout preflight planning

Adaptability
Open to information that suggests plans need to be changed
Need to recognize when plan is not working
Recognizing that they need to alter their own tasks to assist a crewmember who may be having a problem

Situational Awareness
Skill and experience
are no guarantee of protection!

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Threats to
Situational Awareness
Distractions/Preoccupation
High workload
Poor information processing
Non-Standard situations
Unplanned situations
Untested assumptions
Automation

USAF Causes – Threats to
Situation Awareness
Task saturation
Distraction
Channelized Attention
Inattention (Attention Treats)
Automation
Habituation
Negative Transfer
Inappropriate Motivation
Pressing
Misdirected Peer Pressure
Supervisor Pressure

Real Time Situational Awareness
Flying tasks require a mixture of:
Habit patterns
Conscious processing
Actions in accordance with habit patterns vulnerable to negative habit transfer

General Conclusions
(SOLO)
Two tasks requiring a high degree of conscious processing cannot be performed concurrently
Two tasks that are largely automated may be performed together
Two tasks requiring a mixture of conscious and automatic processing is difficult

Research Findings
Activities found to distract or preoccupy pilots include:
Communication
Searching for VMC traffic
Responding to abnormal situations
Head-down work

Statistics
88% of all U.S. air carrier accidents are caused by a break down in situational awareness
50% of all international air carrier accidents are caused by a break down in situational awareness

Controls
Preflight briefings
Automating systems and warning alerts
SOP’s and checklists

Wording in a Typical Flight Ops Manual
“Crewmembers must be alert to the indicators of lost or degraded situational awareness and must announce the presence of those indicators when detected”

Team or Crew
Situational Awareness
Team situational awareness involves two critical but poorly understood abstractions: individual situational awareness and team processes in a highly interactive relationship
Salas, Price, Baker and Shrestha, 1995

SA & The Shared Mental Model
“Curvaceous, seductive, compelling, lofty, cool, and waiting to be conquered”
After reading this statement, visualize an image in your mind…

Was this the image you had in your mind?

Shared Mental Model and Situational Awareness

Situational Awareness
An accurate perception of:
What has happened
What is going on now
What might happen

Situational Awareness is the realistic understanding of all factors which affect the safety and effectiveness of the aircraft.
Where you were!
Where you are!
Where you are going!

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5

What is SA… let audience respond. With regard to what?
Time Space Fuel Switches
Wx Obstacles Terrain Geographics (destin.)
Crew Day etc. etc. etc.
…All factors.

Key Elements of Situational Awareness

Spatial orientation/attitude
Orientation of proximate traffic
Orientation with respect to time
Geographic orientation – with respect to terrain, lateral and vertical navigation.
Threat status
Aircraft maintenance status
Flight concept
Aircraft status

CRM Principle – S.A.
What do you do when you suspect you have lost S.A.?
React
Regain
Reconstruct

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9

EAL401 EVERGLADES classic case study of loss of SA.

Situational Awareness
Maintaining Situational Awareness
Aviate, Navigate, Communicate: Prioritize
Maintain Overall mission focus – avoid or limit distractions, don’t fixate
Recognize clues to the loss of Situational Awareness and take immediate action to restore a high level of Situational Awareness

Practicing Good SA
Maintain ongoing awareness of mission status
Alert other crew members to operational and environmental conditions
Maintain focus on central problems despite distractions
Alert other crew members to conditions ahead of aircraft
Select instrument and FMC displays for information relevant to the phase of flight

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Flags of Lost Situational Awareness
NASA and the FAA studied 30 major airline accidents and the average number of flags in each mishap was seven, the least being four and the most being nine.
No one is communicating
No one is flying the plane
Deviating from standards
Violating minimums
Confusion
Ambiguity
Failure to meet targets
Not addressing discrepancies
Preoccupation

Loss of SA “Red Flags”
Listed in Your CRM Textbook
Not communicating
No one flying the A/C
Change of habit/patterns
Violating policy/procedure minimum
Stress (fatigue, down shifting, tunnel vision)
Ambiguity
Not maintaining Shared Mental Model
Not addressing discrepancies
Preoccupation
Complacency – High cockpit automation

ATTENTION & SITUATIONAL AWARENESS
Processing Modes

CONTROLLED — Processing is under conscious control; responses
are executed while pondering the situation and required actions.

RULE-BASED — Processing happens when familiar problems are
encountered for which specific procedures are memorized.

AUTOMATIC — Processing occurs with little conscious awareness
and uses pre-programmed response sequences.
AUTOMATICITY OF COMPLEX SKILLS, LIKE FLYING, INCREASES
WITH EXPERIENCE ON SPECIFIC TASK(S).

ATTENTION & SITUATIONAL AWARENESS
Attention Failures
INATTENTION — Not paying attention to relevant tasks
HABITUATION — Automatically performing wrong action
CHANNELIZATION — Task fixation, ignoring pertinent data
DISTRACTION — Momentary diversion of attention from task
TASK OVERLOAD — Saturation, demand exceed capabilities

ATTENTION & SITUATIONAL AWARENESS
Control Action Errors
OMISSION – Forget to operate/set a control
SUBSTITUTION – Confusing controls devices
ADJUSTMENT – Over/Under controlling function
REVERSAL – Confusing control settings
MISACTIVATION – Unintentional control operation
OUTSIDE REACH – Awkward control operation

Examples:
Types:

ATTENTION & SITUATIONAL AWARENESS
Situation Awareness
Some attentional factors which could lead to a loss of SA:
Not monitoring the situation
Inattention
Habituation
Monitoring the wrong information
Channelization
Distraction
Not correctly interpreting the situation
Visual Illusions
Spatial Disorientation

Ways To Improve Situation Awareness
ATTENTION & SITUATIONAL AWARENESS
[ ] Proficiency training, instrument scan, cross-checks, flight planning,
and crew resource management.
[ ] Improve critical indicators (gauges, advisory, and warning displays).
[ ] Reduce cockpit distractions (e.g., during critical mission phases).
[ ] Rehearse cockpit “switchology”, conduct “blind-cockpit” drills,
and confirm switch settings.
[ ] Follow established task sequences/procedures, and use required
checklists.
[ ] Be alert to aircraft cockpit differences (e.g., type/model/series)
[ ] Maintain “emotional control” by managing stress, fatigue, and
workload.

Tips for Good Situational Awareness
Plan for contingencies
Create visual & aural reminders
Be alert for clues to loss of SA
Speak up!

Tips for Good Situational Awareness
Determine and assign crew roles
Develop a plan
Solicit Input from others
Rotate your attention
Monitor and update your plan

Indicator Symptom Example
Ambiguity Sources of info disagree Air Florida 737
Preoccupation Fixating on one task EAL L-1011@MIA
Not communicating Not asking for or offering input, not talking/listening WAL DC-10 @MXO
Confusion Doubt about the situation, thinking “this is stupid” NW DC-9@DTW
Violating Policy/Procedure minimums Exceeding established limits FAA N-62
Failure to meet or set targets Lack of planning, scheduling and prioritizing UAL DC-8@PDX
Not addressing problems Unresolved confusion, doubts, concerns and unmet targets Avianca 707@JFK

Trap
 

Example

Focus on the right information at the right time.

Avoid tuning radios, completing paperwork, or performing other cockpit tasks while moving on the surface.
 

If something doesn’t look or feel right, it probably isn’t.

Don’t ignore feelings of uneasiness; there’s probably a reason for them.
 

Watch out when you’re busy or bored.

Be more vigilant during high (approach and landing) or low (cruise) workloads.
 

Habits are hard to break.

Be cautious during abnormal situations requiring abnormal habit patterns.
 

Expectation can reduce awareness.

Expectation may bias pilot’s hearing/sight; ensure clearances are really as expected.

Things that take longer are less likely to get done right.

Longer tasks more subject to interruption; forgetting to stop fuel cross-feeding.
 

Reliable systems aren’t always reliable.

Human nature to reduce reliable system monitoring; FMS & glass cockpit failures can occur.
 

It’s hard to detect something that isn’t there.

Absence difficult to detect, such as lack of confirmation that a task was completed.
 

Automation keeps secrets.

Difficult to detect erroneous FMS entries.
 

Distractions come in many forms.

Paperwork, flight attendants, company radio, ATC communications, etc…