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Engineering Commons

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Aviation Safety and Security

Series

2005

Aircraft accidents

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Human Error And General Aviation Accidents: A Comprehensive, Fine-Grained Analysis Using Hfacs, Douglas Wiegmann, Troy Faaborg, Albert Boquet, Cristy Detwiler, Kali Holcomb, Scott Shappell Dec 2005

Human Error And General Aviation Accidents: A Comprehensive, Fine-Grained Analysis Using Hfacs, Douglas Wiegmann, Troy Faaborg, Albert Boquet, Cristy Detwiler, Kali Holcomb, Scott Shappell

Publications

The Human Factors Analysis and Classification System (HFACS) is a theoretically based tool for investigating and analyzing human error associated with accidents and incidents. Previous research performed at both the University of Illinois and the Civil Aerospace Medical Institute has successfully shown that HFACS can be reliably used to analyze the underlying human causes of both commercial and general aviation (GA) accidents. These analyses have helped identify general trends in the types of human factors issues and aircrew errors that have contributed to civil aviation accidents. The next step was to identify the exact nature of the human errors identified. …


The Influence Of Visibility, Cloud Ceiling, Financial Incentive, And Personality Factors On General Aviation Pilots' Willingness To Take Off Into Marginal Weather, Part I: The Data And Preliminary Conclusions, William Knecht, Howard Harris, Scott Shappell Apr 2005

The Influence Of Visibility, Cloud Ceiling, Financial Incentive, And Personality Factors On General Aviation Pilots' Willingness To Take Off Into Marginal Weather, Part I: The Data And Preliminary Conclusions, William Knecht, Howard Harris, Scott Shappell

Publications

Adverse weather is the leading cause of fatalities in general aviation (GA). In this research, influences of ground visibility, cloud ceiling height, financial incentive, and personality were tested on 60 GA pilots' willingness to take off into simulated adverse weather. Results suggested that pilots do not see "weather" as a monolithic cognitive construct but, rather, as an interaction between its separate factors. This is supported by the finding that the multiplicative statistical effect of visibility and ceiling could better predict takeoff than could the linear effect of either variable considered separately. Also found was a statistical trend toward financial incentive …