Too Much Information?

(No, I don't mean the kind you don't want to hear about, i.e., your parents sex life.)

Instead I'd like to talk about situations such as the Air France jet that crashed into the Atlantic Ocean in 2009.  Recently the "black box" recorder was recovered from the bottom of the sea.

It paints an interesting picture of what happened.

But before getting into the accident lets talk a little bit about what the cockpit is like on a modern jet.

Like modern cars jets are full of high-tech devices to prevent "mistakes".  For example, setting the flaps to the "wrong" position in many situations is "locked out" by safety devices that tell the pilot that doing so would cause a crash or a problem.  There are warnings associated with this as well - audible sounds that indicate various problems.

Most large modern jets fly across the ocean on their own under the control of the "autopilot".  Stories abound about crews falling asleep (see this as an example) in the cockpit while the plane happily flies on itself.  Autopilots can do a lot including some of the landing tasks these days - however for a variety of reasons pilots are still required.

Most of the safety systems I mentioned above have been developed as a result of reviewing crash data.

The same is true for automobiles.  This is why your doors lock automatically when you start to move the car - apparently someone fell out (or more likely their child fell out) long ago and so automakers decided to automatically lock the doors for you.   ABS brakes, traction control, lights on with wipers, headlights on all the time, automatic headlights off, etc. all fall into this category.

In reading about the Air France crash (see this WSJ article) we see something interesting.

What apparently happened is special "pilot tubes" which measure the velocity of the air moving past the plane to provide the pilots with air speed information filled with ice.  When this happens the "air speed indicator" (basically the same as a "speedometer" in your car) began to fluctuate wildly.

This caused the planes "autopilot" to disengage.  (Just like tapping your brakes causes the "Cruise Control" to disengage in your car.)

What happened next is the interesting part.  The pilots, who had extensive procedures for dealing with frozen "pilot tubes" and the resulting problems got, well, confused.  They did a number of things that were inconsistent with what should have been done including stalling the plane and turning the engines back to idle.

Now don't misunderstand - these guys were heroes to the very end - desperately trying to fix the situation until the very last second.  I believe they did their absolute best.

Instead what I think the real problem was was the "safety systems" (warnings, sounds, lights, etc.) set the pilots into a state of confusion.  In their confused state they basically went off into the weeds in terms of procedures trying to fix what was not wrong and not seeing clearly what actual was.

This harks back to the "Through the Keyhole" post I wrote a while back.  But beyond not seeing the bigger picture there is also the notion of "too much help" from the airplane itself.

What do I mean by that.

Let's take "ABS brakes" as an example.  I don't like them and I don't like what they do.

I grew up in southern Wisconsin - we had a lot of snow and cold (including at least 30 days below zero (not 32F) the year we got married.  In those days you learned how to drive in the snow and ice or you didn't drive.  Cars had no ABS brakes or other safety nonsense. 

It was up to you to learn how to drive - which meant driving on icy roads (there were too many to salt) and dealing with skids and other problems.

ABS brakes prevent the driver from "locking up the brakes" by sensing when one wheel is turning slower than the others during breaking.  The ABS then reduces the braking of the slower turning wheel so that all the wheels continue to turn at roughly the same speed.  The idea is to give you more "control" when slamming on the brakes so that the wheels don't "lock up".

In the olden days locking the brakes (on show, for example) would stop them from turning completely.  An inexperienced driver would then try to steer out of whatever skid they were in by turning the wheel.  However, since the wheels were not turning all they did was set the wheels pointing in a different direction than the skid - but the car continued to skid in the initial directly.

The wheels would then suddenly grab again (either because the brakes were released or the car moved onto another surface).  However, since they were now pointed in some random direction (because people tended to turn the steering wheel all the way left or right) the car would flip or go out of control.

When I learned to drive you learned how to manually perform the same function as the ABS brakes by "pumping the brakes" in a skid - so instead of slamming them on and holding them there you pumped them on and off for the same effect.

Now you might think that the technology solved all the skid problems in world - but sadly this is not true.

And this is my point.  Modern drivers who have grown up with ABS brakes rely on them to do all their specialty braking functions.  They cannot do them themselves because they were not taught to (in fact, pumping brakes usually causes the ABS to get confused, so now I have to account for that as well should I skid).  The ABS brakes also make a loud, funny noise - one that's confusing to the driver because the car never makes that noise unless the ABS brakes kick in.

Unfortunately ABS brakes don't always help.  A lot of times they do - but not always.  And when they don't you can be in a lot of danger if you don't know how to control a skid.

Similarly with the Air France crash.  I believe that there is too much being done for the pilots by the airplane these days - so much that they can fall asleep.  And when the "autopilot off" alarm sounds, waking them from their slumber or coffee or whatever, they have a very poor picture of how things got into the state they are in (with something out of wack). 

And that's critical.

Kind of like waking up to a loud noise, screaming, banging, etc.  At first you are confused - what's that sound - is it a bugler, etc.  After a few minutes you realize its the garbage men or a dog stuck in closet or something like that and you relax.

But as an airline pilot you have much more (like everyone's life) to be concerned about.  You are supposed to know "what to do".  But the warning systems and the fact that the "autopilot" and safety systems have removed your perspective creates a problem.

You suddenly become involved in a problem from "scratch" and have to piece together what's going on amidst alarms, faulty input, etc.  In a wooden biplane you would never be so far removed from what your plane is doing.  However, today you are in a plane supposedly flying itself - until it doesn't.

And that's a serious problem.

Too much help and "autopilots" and safety systems makes the pilots complacent and adds to the time it takes the pilot (or driver, etc.) to figure out what's wrong and do the right thing.

If I control the bakes at all times and I go into a skid there is total continuity between all the events and I can react precisely.

On the other hand, if some safety system starts up on my behalf and confuses me (either with noise or alarms or by taking control from me) I am now at a disadvantage mentally.   I am not directly connected to my situation and I have to peer back through the keyhole to figure out what's gone wrong and to figure what to do about it.

From what I see this is what caused the plane to crash in this case.  The pilots were unable to get enough information back out through the keyhole to rationally address what was wrong.  Instead they went off into the weeds desperately trying to fix perceived problems (caused by a lack of information) by stalling the plane and putting the engines on idol among other things.

This is a great danger in our society as lawyers and manufactures constantly push to make our world safer.

Unfortunately I think that we are crossing the tipping point and that we must stop and examine what the "larger picture" is - whether for flight systems or drugs or ABS brakes.

Are we really fixing a problem?  Are we really safer?  Are we really helping a pilot make the best decisions by removing him from the loop right up until a problem occurs?  Or are we adding technology or false claims of "unsafe products" to situations that would benefit from the users being more directly responsible for their own fates?

Are the safety systems providing too much information in terms of alarms and warnings?

Or are we better off remaining in charge of our own fates...