[VintageKrug]

With fewer and fewer exRAF-trained pilots, I suppose it’s going to be rarer to find such exceptional abilities flying commercially in future.

However, I have the utmost confidence in BA pilots, this cannot always be said to be the case with some other airlines.

[MartynSinclair]

VK, I think you are being a little unkind about the flying skills of non RAF trained commercial pilots. The UK has some of the very best flight schools, with instructors who are not aspiring pilots just out of nappies, but several thousand hour experienced former airline pilots.

UK trained commercial pilots have excpetional abilities flying commercially.

Please also remember that flying military jet requires a totally different set of skills to flying a passenger jet.

[lloydah]

A longer version of this footage with interviews has been on You Tube for about a year now. About 9 minutes of it.

[IanFromHKG]

Indeed, Martyn. I am not a pilot, but I do recall reading that many military jets are designed to be inherently unstable in flight in order to maximise manoeuvreability. I very much hope the opposite is true of passenger jets!!

[MartynSinclair]

This is also why commercial cargo pilots and commercial passenger pilots generally dont switch … different sets of flying skills …

[canucklad]

VK…..I am not in agreement with the US policy, actually quite the opposite…..

I agree with Martyn about skill set…..in actual fact it goes further than that..

It is generally recognised that ex-military pilots are not physcmetricly suitable for cockpit management….having said that it’s a generalization and there are many examples of ex-military captains rescuing situations…

On the other hand there are many more examples of ex-military captains tendancies to adopt “agressive behavioral traits” rather than “assertive traits” that lead to one dimensional decision making etc…

Giving a pilot a gun, increases testostorone levels within an already very pressurised working enviroment!! But then from a country that is thinking about arming teachers anything is possible!!

[NameRemoved-18/12/14]

Well done that man… an unmistakable Northern Irish accent.

[Henkel.Trocken]

I agree with all the recent posts about different skill sets of pilots operating in different areas.

I have a feeling this is a thread that gets bumped when one poster wants to control what we see in the top ten.

[SergeantMajor]

The Report into this incident has now been obtained from the House of Lords library:

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/180157/response/446314/attach/2/FOI1114.pdf

Interesting reading, especially for MartynSinclair as it informs the reasoning behind use of crew rest seats on the Upper Deck.

[FormerlyDoS]

Not interesting, 13 years old, the flight deck has been sterile, between engine start and shutdown for 12 years, this type of incident won’t happen again.

Time to move on, nothing to see here.

[esselle]

Agree with FDOS , but on reading the report it does hint that the lack of joined up dots, not least within the various BA teams from LYS onwards, may have had a bit of a part to play in allowing the guy onto the LGW departure in the first place.

[FormerlyDoS]

It was a different world then, Esselle.

Unlikely to happen today, with the security trainingthat airline and airport staff undertake, he’d be pulled as a potential threat behaving like that.

But yes, I agree with you about the unjoined dots and the very short conversation between captain and sccm.

[esselle]

Anorak fact of the day; Brian Ferry was a passenger on that flight………..

[JohnHarper]

I just see it as another bumped thread, it’s happening quite a lot at the moment.

New handle, same old game playing.

Will it be dealt with?

[SergeantMajor]

There were in fact quite a few famous people on that particular flight.

I understand the pilot was looked after rather well for his quick-thinking and heroic actions.

[Author]

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