NYT: Pilot was locked out

[Dauphin]

The "truly miniscule" number is the reduction in life expectancy of a random passenger taking a flight. The reduction in life expectancy on the fateful flight is stark.

[Dauphin]

Now that I think about it actually, you are correct. I am undervaluing human life by saying that the argument works when applied to the cost of the airplane but not human lives. Sorry.

However, the argument is still wrong, because it isn't worth the money even if it is to save money on the cost of losing an airplane. Going back to life expectancy, you see, you aren't losing 40 years. You're losing much less.

Let's say the new rule costs a penny per flight. This is a per-flight expense. Without the rule, every bajillion flights some co-pilot crashes a plane into a mountain, taking 150 people and a $70 million airplane with him. The cost here is: 1) the cost of losing the airplane multiplied by the probability of losing the airplane in such an incident over its lifetime, and 2), the total increase in mortality associated with these incidents amortized over the total number of flights.

What I suspect and what I am arguing is that the cost in mortality and the cost of the risk to the airplane, amortized per flight, is less than a penny. Or whatever the cost of implementing this regulation is. Furthermore, (2) is quite a bit less than 40 years, or whatever number.

36 million flights a year. At a penny a flight it's less than a million dollars.

[Hauldren Collider]

The "truly miniscule" number is the reduction in life expectancy of a random passenger taking a flight.

Correct, which is the appropriate way to look at something when attempting to minimize risk across a population.

The reduction in life expectancy on the fateful flight is stark.

No, because that violates the definition of "expected". Let's say I have an extremely rare fatal disease that kills about 25 people per year. Yes, having the disease reduces your lifespan by a lot, but it doesn't reduce our population life expectancy by much because the risk of getting it is very small. Which means for example it isn't really worthy of research funding because its costs are so low, particularly when compared to other more common diseases that result in more deaths. This is no different from our situation with the airplane, where the mortality and risk is tiny.

[DinoDoc]

HC seem to be the living reminder of the need for the phrase: check your privilege.

I don't even get the argument that it costs money. Does he think the company is going to hire someone just to sit in the cockpit for the entire flight?

[Hauldren Collider]

36 million flights a year. At a penny a flight it's less than a million dollars.

OK, so continuing with my baseless estimate of 1 penny per flight: To break even on the cost of a $70 million airplane (ignoring mortality costs) this would have to happen approximately once in every 7 billion flights. (this is actually somewhat highball because the actual cost is for the remaining lifespan of the plane but whatever) If there are 36 million flights a year it has to happen at least once every ~194 years if my arithmetic is correct. So if these back of the envelope numbers are right then yes it is worthwhile.

That being said I think it probably costs more than a penny, and this is still a pretty trivial thing to fret over given how safe airline travel is. I certainly would question the sanity of anyone seriously worried about this happening on their airline flight. But from our armchair assumptions, the math does work out in my disfavor, so I concede the argument.

[Dauphin]

If quantifying the absolute worth, it's the man-years you want. 1000 people 10 years each or 10,000 at 1 year each etc. The shift in life expectancy is rather irrelevant.

[Proteus_MST]

An aeroplane of the type downed costs around a minimum of $70m. If one were downed like this every 50 years, that is well over $1m dollars a year. How much do you think this regulation will cost in comparison?

And actually this isn´t even the full amount of money that the accident surely has cost Lufthansa/Germanwings.
In addition there is the money that they will pay to the relatives of the victims ... also the cost of money because many of the employees of Lufthansa/Germanwings are kept from doing their usual work (because they have to do press conferences, or do work related to the accident).
Not to forget the potential costs in reputation for Lufthansa/Germanwings, which may result in people canceling flights. (Well, the costs in reputation may not be high, as Lufthansa has reacted in a good manner, in their treatment of the accident and the victims ... but the accident may still wake fears of flying in people and result in them canceling not necessary flights and prefer other means of transportation if possible)

[kentonio]

EDIT: I realize you all have some good fun painting me as some Uncle Scrooge who only cares about his bottom line--nevermind that I don't even have a bottom line, I am a college student who will in a few months be a junior employee at a medium-size bank (despite "senior" being in my title) and nowhere near the top tax bracket. But I actually have the opinions I do out of a sincere belief that they are ultimately what is best for people who are disadvantaged. I can see that it is fun to assert that my relatively privileged background disqualifies me from honestly arguing conservative positions but I am finding that attitude somewhat tiresome.

Dude, just because you don't recognize how much your privileged upbringing has sheltered you from the realities of life, doesn't make it any less true. I've lost count of the number of times you've just been completely unable to understand how things that seem tiny or irrelevant to you can have massive effects on the lives of those less fortunate.

You make comments like this one in the water thread..

The average household pays $15 to $45 a month for water!



Yeah, that's basically 0. Particularly when you consider how many people have lawn sprinklers. I know our water bill. It's similar to that. Like 95% of it is the sprinkler.

Without any sense of quite how out of touch that really makes you sound. You're a decent guy usually, which is what makes this sadder. You just need to actually experience how the other 75% of the population actually live at some point.

[rah]

Without the rule, every bajillion flights some co-pilot crashes a plane into a mountain, taking 150 people and a $70 million airplane with him.

We must also add in the other rare occurrences where a medical issue incapacitates a pilot left alone in the cockpit. Which in my opinion is more likely to happen.

[Proteus_MST]

We must also add in the other rare occurrences where a medical issue incapacitates a pilot left alone in the cockpit. Which in my opinion is more likely to happen.

This, on the other hand, is already covered by the ability to enter a door open code (which every pilot and flight crew member has memorized) in order to open the door from outside.
Considering that pilots AFAIK only are allowed to leave the cockpit when crusing flight level has been reached (i.e. not during start/ascent or descent/landing) where the plane is under control of the auto pilot, I guess that should leave crew members with enough time to get into the cockpit if a single pilot in the cockpit is incapacitated.

The code probably also was entered in case of the Germanwings flight .... but unfortunately if the code is entered, the pilot / person in the cockpit gets informed about this and has half a minute time to press an override switch in order to prevent the outside crew members from opening the door via the code (after which the door is locked for 5 minutes without anyone from outside being able to use the code in order to open the cockpit door).
Not surprisingly (sconsidering his intentions) the Copilot most likely used this override switch

[Ming]

If one were downed like this every 50 years, that is well over $1m dollars a year. How much do you think this regulation will cost in comparison?

Just to point out... this isn't as rare as once in every 50 years... From the NY Times

2 years ago

November 2013
Mozambique Airlines

Herminio dos Santos Fernandes, the pilot of Mozambique Airlines Flight TM470 bound for Luanda, Angola, intentionally crashed the plane in a national park in Namibia on Nov. 29, 2013, according to investigators. All 33 people on board were killed. When the flight’s co-pilot left to use the lavatory, the captain locked him out of the cockpit and manually steered the plane downward. Listening to recovered flight recordings, investigators were able to hear alarms and banging on the cockpit door.

Back in 1999

October 1999
EgyptAir

EgyptAir Flight 990 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean off Nantucket, Mass., on Oct. 31, 1999, killing all 217 people on board. Investigators concluded that the most likely explanation was that the co-pilot, Gameel al-Batouti, deliberately brought down the plane, although they sidestepped the question of motive and Egyptian officials have disputed that conclusion.

The flight data recorder showed that he waited for the captain to leave the cockpit and then disengaged the autopilot. As the plane descended, he could be heard saying in Arabic, “I rely on God,” over and over.

In both of these cases, the second pilot had left to go to the bathroom.

So three cases in less than 16 years.
In addition, there have been other cases in the last 25 years were a commercial airline pilot has intentionally crashed his airplane.

While it is indeed rare, it's not as rare as some may think.

[Uncle Sparky]

Has anyone suggested commode chairs for the cabin crew, with optional privacy curtains? More expensive than having an air steward provide relief in the cockpit, but at least the air waitresses would be free to give out those little bags of nuts, uninterrupted.

[Donegeal]

Ming, those 400 lives are worthless, at least according to our resident inhuman assbag; but maybe you have something about the dollar value of those planes.

[Bereta_Eder]

There's a french specialist investigator who contradicts everything the french attorney says and accuses him of doing a favor to the company in order to lower the compensation to the victims.
Arnau I think he's called.
One of the things is that it's impossible for a breath to be heard while in the cockpit because the surrounding sound is very strong. It seems a lot of pilots support him on that.

[Proteus_MST]

There's a french specialist investigator who contradicts everything the french attorney says and accuses him of doing a favor to the company in order to lower the compensation to the victims.
Arnau I think he's called.
One of the things is that it's impossible for a breath to be heard while in the cockpit because the surrounding sound is very strong. It seems a lot of pilots support him on that.

There is no limit to the compensation anymore.
The blackbox has been found and it shows that the copilot intentionally accelerated the plane during the descent.
This removes any possible limits on the compensation that Germanwings/Lufthansa may have to pay to the relatives of the victims ...
IIRC because it proves beyond doubt the intention of the copilot to kill the passengers (instead of being just a pilots error)