I spy with my little eye: Analysis of airline pilots' gaze patterns in a manual instrument flight scenario.

The aim of this study was to analyze pilots' visual scanning in a manual approach and landing scenario. Manual flying skills suffer from increasing use of automation. In addition, predominantly long-haul pilots with only a few opportunities to practice these skills experience this decline. Airline pilots representing different levels of practice (short-haul vs. long-haul) had to perform a manual raw data precision approach while their visual scanning was recorded by an eye-tracking device. The analysis of gaze patterns, which are based on predominant saccades, revealed one main group of saccades among long-haul pilots. In contrast, short-haul pilots showed more balanced scanning using two different groups of saccades. Short-haul pilots generally demonstrated better manual flight performance and within this group, one type of scan pattern was found to facilitate the manual landing task more. Long-haul pilots tend to utilize visual scanning behaviors that are inappropriate for the manual ILS landing task. This lack of skills needs to be addressed by providing specific training and more practice.

Flying the Needles: Flight Deck Automation Erodes Fine-Motor Flying Skills Among Airline Pilots.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of practice and training on fine-motor flying skills during a manual instrument landing system (ILS) approach. BACKGROUND: There is an ongoing debate that manual flying skills of long-haul crews suffer from a lack of flight practice due to conducting only a few flights per month and the intensive use of automation. However, objective evidence is rare. METHOD: One hundred twenty-six randomly selected airline pilots had to perform a manual flight scenario with a raw data precision approach. Pilots were assigned to four equal groups according to their level of practice and training by fleet (short-haul, long-haul) and rank (first officer, captain). RESULTS: Average ILS deviation scores differed significantly in relation to the group assignments. The strongest predictor variable was fleet, indicating degraded performance among long-haul pilots. CONCLUSION: Manual flying skills are subject to erosion due to a lack of practice on long-haul fleets: All results support the conclusion that recent flight practice is a significantly stronger predictor for fine-motor flying performance than the time period since flight school or even the total or type-specific flight experience. APPLICATION: Long-haul crews have to be supported in a timely manner by adequate training tailored to address manual skills or by operational provisions like mixed-fleet flying or more frequent transitions between short-haul and long-haul operation.

Manual flying skills under the influence of performance shaping factors.

This paper describes an experimental study investigating pilots' manual flying skills. In today's line oriented flight training, basic flying skills are neglected frequently. So, the study examines the manual flying skills of commercial airline pilots under the influence of several performance shaping factors like training, practice or fatigue in a landing scenario. The landing phase shows a disproportionate high percentage of aircraft accidents and it is typically flown by hand. The study is to be undertaken with randomly selected pilots in a full motion flight simulator to ensure a high validity of the results.