NTSB Most Wanted

There comes a time, when repeated problems with similar themes are no longer tolerated as acceptable risk and action needs to be taken. For any correction to occur, there needs to be someone (organization, individual, etc.) to take action against the matter. In this discussion, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is the "someone" who is actively taking action on the problem. The two problems that will be discussed are General Aviation's ineffective use of identifying and communicating hazardous weather, and the issues faced with helicopter operations, both of which fall under the NTSB's most wanted list.

The issue revolved around helicopter operations is that regardless of weather, time of day, or stressful environments, helicopter operators are of high demand. High demand requires more operations in not ideal conditions, thus increasing the margin for error. For example, if a helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) pilot is responding to a medical emergency, weather becomes a lesser factor in the "go no-go" decision process, because other outside factors are now involved. Such as, severity of emergency and available supplemental aid for the victim. These types of flights are recipes for disaster, because the combination factors like stressful flights environment, poor weather, and time management all contribute to operational failure.

I believe that with the increasing utilization of helicopters over the past few decades, this problem is very significant and important to discuss, as we can simply see by the NTSB placing it as number one on it's Most Wanted List for 2013. We have seen through the ages that the helicopter was a daring device used relatively little compared to the airplane, but has grown to be a very productive system in the aviation community. With it's increasing use and high demand, the NTSB is doing the right thing to formulate a solution to the growing problem, because if helicopter operations continue to increase but there is nothing done about the underlying issues, we may face greater casualty rates that otherwise could have been prevented.

Both of these topics create foreseeable job opportunities. In regards to the general aviation issue, the efforts that are being put forth by the NTSB discussed in the "What Can be Done" section will require a lot of man-power from the management side of the house. Potential jobs that can be created are management and pilot positions that deal with pilot training, more so for "pilots to be" (student pilots in training), since a lot of this occurs in general aviation where proficiency training is not continuously conducted. A few examples of the jobs being created are people who will update the required knowledge in weather briefing expected from upcoming pilots. Additional flight instructor's will need training on how to train their students to meet these expectations, so those individuals who are training the instructors (typically chief instructors) will see an increase in job opportunities.

The helicopter safety issue will create job opportunities for pilots, manufacturers, and management. The NTSB's plan is to incorporate key stake holders of these departments into formulating a more safe operating environment. Jobs in the manufactures field will be focused around the development of new safety management functions onboard the aircraft. Management will focus heavily on developing/improving new safety risk management procedures and operations. With each of these changes comes with repetition to instill good habits for when the situation arises. This brings us to the increase in pilot demand, because an increase in flight hours typically requires more pilots; test pilots, instructor pilots, and simply just pilots, so that pilots are not pushing either their limits or the minimum limits set forth in the FARs. Correcting both of these safety issues will be a positive experience for both the job economy and the safety and welfare of the aviation community and its occupants.