As a professional in a non-aviation high-risk business, actually the highest-risk business of all because people die regularly in it, it seems strange to me that the UK CAA seem to disregard the well-known fact that systemic risk prevention always beats individual risk prevention by a large margin in achieving a total risk reduction
Blimey, sounds as if Germany medicine must be streets ahead of medicine within the UK. Whilst reading this thread I have often found myself pondering whether, given the well publicised treatment of Dr Bawa Garba and many similar cases, the trend towards criminalising error is a national phenomenon rather than something specific to aviation.
And as an aside it has often seemed to me ironic that aviation seemed to have a much better handle on ‘human factors’ than medicine. Maybe I was wrong about that.
kwlf wrote:
Blimey, sounds as if Germany medicine must be streets ahead of medicine within the UK. Whilst reading this thread I have often found myself pondering whether, given the well publicised treatment of Dr Bawa Garba and many similar cases, the trend towards criminalising error is a national phenomenon rather than something specific to aviation.And as an aside it has often seemed to me ironic that aviation seemed to have a much better handle on ‘human factors’ than medicine. Maybe I was wrong about that.
I doubt that we are “streets ahead” in medicine in Germany when it comes to human factors. The last couple of years have definitely brought a culture shift when it comes to risk management though. No longer is “naming and shaming” seen as an adequate way to deal with errors in medical treatment. Not all specialities are equal, however. Anaesthesia, my own speciality, is about 15 years ahead of all others and in many institutions about to reach the same level of “enlightenment” regarding human factors and risk management that aviation had about 1980 to 1990. CIRS is en vogue, and grave errors are often followed by an analysis of the systemic factors at work.
The surgical specialities are the next best, though it often depends on the individual department heads how they deal with this topic. Many older (and old-fashioned) departments heads still think that the best way to deal with errors is to heap all the blame on the lowest-ranking surgeon involved at the time the error occurred and shame him in front of all others…
The conservative specialities, Internal Medicine etc., only seem to get around to the fact that human factors and risk management exist just these last few years…
All in all signs are looking good for a movement in the right direction. Patient safety has become a primary concern and risk management is seen as the best way to ensure it, both by healthcare professionals and regulators/politicians. Increasingly, we even have a Just Culture where mistakes are not primarily attributed to an individual but seen as opportunities to avoid future mistakes through thorough analysis.
This was somewhat off-topic, not fully though because how we see and tackle risk is the essential underlying question in all high-risk endeavours, and here in how we deal with airspace infringements.
Maybe a separate topic in how different high-risk professions deal with human factors, risk management and Just Culture might be interesting?
As a professional in a non-aviation high-risk business, actually the highest-risk business of all because people die regularly in it, it seems strange to me that the UK CAA seem to disregard the well-known fact that systemic risk prevention always beats individual risk prevention by a large margin in achieving a total risk reduction.
Medewok – you are spot on.
EuroGA forum traffic is well spread around Europe, with quite a bit from the US. The biggest audiences are Germany, UK and France. UK participation (posting) is relatively low as a % of the visitors – mostly I believe because UK pilots get excommunicated from the UK sites if they post on EuroGA 
I can offer a few random comments on why I think this has become a mostly UK thread:
)Maybe a separate topic in how different high-risk professions deal with human factors, risk management and Just Culture might be interesting?
Hangar Talk is just fine for that
Peter wrote:
busting (non military!) CAS in France is actually really hard
I take that you never flew VFR into Paris 
To make it no a 1 liner, airspace sometimes drop from 3500 to 1500 (with ground at 700ft). In one of my last departures I was informed about a VFR traffic that was inside the airspace (he passed not far from me, at a higher altitude (and I was already in the class A)
Thanks for the comprehensive and insightful answer, Peter! I wish the UK aviation scene all the best in finding workable solutions to these problems. Many suggestions are on the table, the problems have been thoroughly analyzed in this thread. Now it is up to the people in charge to overcome underlying “political problems”.
Given that the airspace design and FIS/radar funding issues especially are longstanding problems, I am afraid there won’t be a comprehensive solution anytime soon. Instead, the burden will fall on the weakest link, the UK GA pilots…
Yes; I am told that Paris and Lyon are places where it is tight, but the rest of France is a very big place.
On another topic, is the composition (names of the members) of the CAA IWG (the committee which decides on cases above a certain level) public knowledge?
A free t-shirt is going to the pilot who makes post #1000
“there is an unfortunate lack of non UK ATC input posted;’
I got a personal response, and asked about reposting an anonymous version, but my contact did not approve.
Size M please (might have needed to add relevant post)
Peter delete (moderate :) ) the above post, size M pls ;)
OK Noe yes I dropped the ball there… PM me your name and address
