Thousands of airline pilots flying every day with suicidal thoughts

[Blobfish]

Does the thought that the plane you are boarding , may be flown by a Pilot with a death wish put you off Airline travel ?

Another good reason to stay home for Christmas.

Where MMO-c member Celeste..she is our Resident Psychologist

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016...ughts-harvard/

More than 4,000 commercial flights on any given day are being flown by pilots who have experienced suicidal thoughts, a landmark study on the airline industry suggests.

An international survey of pilots by Harvard University found 4.1 per cent had contemplated killing themselves at least once in the previous fortnight, and 12.6 per cent met the criteria for depression.

Pilots diagnosed with acute depression are automatically deemed unfit to fly, but experts have warned many cover up their symptoms for fear of losing their careers.

The study was conducted in the wake of the 2015 Germanwings tragedy, when a pilot suspected of being mentally ill deliberately crashed his airliner into the French Alps, killing 150 people.

Its authors said there is a “veil of secrecy” surrounding mental health problems in the cockpit

How should the Airlines handle this.?
I do not want to die because some Pilot dude broke up with his Girlfriend / Boyfriend

[Garnier Fructis]

I do not want to die because some Pilot dude broke up with his Girlfriend / Boyfriend

A far, far more likely reason would be that a lot of airline pilots are basically overworked and underpaid. Irregular schedules. Having to balance safety concerns against time pressure from the airline.

[Dextroden]

Interesting. Now, how you ever considered how many people driving around you could be suicidal, homicidal or just plain stupid? That's terrifying.

[Deleted]

I always thought being a pilot was great.

[Garnier Fructis]

Interesting. Now, how you ever considered how many people driving around you could be suicidal, homicidal or just plain stupid? That's terrifying.

A good majority, I'd figure. People who don't understand how zippers work and subsequently cause traffic at merges. Anyone driving a lifted pickup truck that obstructs everyone else' view of the road and forces people to leave larger than usual following distances. People who decide to suddenly change lanes without looking (some idiot tried to suddenly fuse the back end of her car with the front end of mine at 65 miles an hour, and if it had been another mile down the road somebody would have died because I wouldn't have had a breakdown lane to dodge into). People driving erratically at 80 mph on their phones. People doing makeup at 70 mph.

Maybe it's just California, but it sure seems like everyone here is either trying to kill you, or kill themselves and take you along for the ride.

[Deleted]

Luckily, pilot-less flying will eventually take over.

[Ghâzh]

Luckily, pilot-less flying will eventually take over.

Then we'll be fine for a while until the robots develop far enough to have suicidal thoughts of their own.

[Garnier Fructis]

Luckily, pilot-less flying will eventually take over.

I'm inclined to think this is more curse than blessing. Computers work great until some mechanical shit goes wrong, at which point computers essentially stop knowing what the fuck to do. There have been crashes where the computer failed, and then the pilots flew like idiots because they sort of expected to plane to fly itself. And that sort of shit we've successfully addressed with training regulations and standards. You can't regulate away computer malfunctions.

It's just trading one set of problems for another, and the problem we're trading away is the one that's easier to identify and fix.

[Ghâzh]

I'm inclined to think this is more curse than blessing. Computers work great until some mechanical shit goes wrong, at which point computers essentially stop knowing what the fuck to do. There have been crashes where the computer failed, and then the pilots flew like idiots because they sort of expected to plane to fly itself. And that sort of shit we've successfully addressed with training regulations and standards. You can't regulate away computer malfunctions.

It's just trading one set of problems for another, and the problem we're trading away is the one that's easier to identify and fix.

You can't completely regulate away human error either and I'm inclined to believe that a well designed machine is way more reliable than a human pilot.

[Deleted]

I'm inclined to think this is more curse than blessing. Computers work great until some mechanical shit goes wrong, at which point computers essentially stop knowing what the fuck to do. There have been crashes where the computer failed, and then the pilots flew like idiots because they sort of expected to plane to fly itself. And that sort of shit we've successfully addressed with training regulations and standards. You can't regulate away computer malfunctions.

It's just trading one set of problems for another, and the problem we're trading away is the one that's easier to identify and fix.

But would a mechanical computer not have less failures than a biological computer (a human)?
Even though made by humans, a computer can react waaaay faster to any problem.

I would feel safer with a computer calculating risks than any human flying a plane myself

[Independent voter]

There's not a lot to do for a pilot these days, the plane practically fly themselves. That leaves a lot of time for contemplation.

Just don't take everyone on the plane with you!

There's been at least two incidents were pilots have crashed their planes on purpose. That german guy and I think a Saudi.

[Garnier Fructis]

You can't completely regulate away human error either and I'm inclined to believe that a well designed machine is way more reliable than a human pilot.

For normal operation, yes. But when shit goes south, you'll want an experienced human in there because a computer can only do what it knows how to do. And the very nature of mechanical failures and design flaws makes it pretty impossible to program in what to do, because that would require some awareness of a potential problem.

[Sliske]

Name a person who hasn't had a suicidal thought.

This article isn't "suicidal pilots flying every day"

the article is "pilots that have experienced suicidal thoughts are flying planes"

Again, name someone who hasn't had a suicidal thought. You can't. Thats like naming someone who hasn't had an intrusive thought.

Just another clickbait BS article.

[Garnier Fructis]

But would a mechanical computer not have less failures than a biological computer (a human)?
Even though made by humans, a computer can react waaaay faster to any problem.

I would feel safer with a computer calculating risks than any human flying a plane myself

A computer can react faster if it knows how to react. How does a computer react when it's being fed false data because a sensor froze over, or even worse, what happens when an error is made in fueling and the plane runs out of fuel mid flight? Since the engines power the electrical components in the plane, you're basically in a situation where nothing is flying the plane.

Modern flying is already highly automated. It's basically 2+ dudes that sit there and watch the instruments watch them for the majority of the flight. They're there to take off, land, and fly the plane when the plane can't fly itself.

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

But would a mechanical computer not have less failures than a biological computer (a human)?
Even though made by humans, a computer can react waaaay faster to any problem.

I would feel safer with a computer calculating risks than any human flying a plane myself

Computers can only do what they're programmed to do. Human pilots are more able to adapt.

[HumbleDuck]

Still better than taking the road.
http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/sites/ri...02_01.html_mfd

[Blobfish]

Just another clickbait BS article.

Well its a Harvard University researched Clickbait BS article.

I do think Harvard do not put out BS articles..

They are in the top 3 Universities globally

[Sliske]

Well its a Harvard University researched Clickbait BS article.

I do think Harvard do not put out BS articles..

They are in the top 3 Universities globally

and they have Gender Studies as a degree. Whats your point?

[Slant]

and they have Gender Studies as a degree. Whats your point?

So they have one joke course. How does it make them a worse uni? They still have everything else that gives them a good rep. It's not like they abandon their business degrees for gender studies. :P

[Deleted]

Well its a Harvard University researched Clickbait BS article.

I do think Harvard do not put out BS articles..

They are in the top 3 Universities globally

depends, a lot of psychology surveys like this are just done by grad students or postdoc students who need to have x articles published to graduate. so it's not necessarily high quality science but often just an interpretation of whatever results they got from their survey, and likely will never be reproduced by someone else. you know like book reports in school, most people just put in enough effort to get em out of the way.

Then comes a long a journalist who translates "some pilots have issues of any kind" into "thousands of flights are flown by suicideal pilots " to "thousands of pilots are suicidal"