1. Choose one of the disasters and describe the cultural aspects that contributed and/or
exacerbated the environment that allowed for the disaster. What could have been changed
from a design perspective to prevent the active failure, mitigate the effect of the active
failure, or allow the system to return to normal.
Contributing to the Aloha Airlines disaster was the pressure placed on the maintenance
and inspection personnel to ensure that each airplane was fully operational for the next day’s
flying schedule. Being able to “island hop” was a significant aspect of the airline’s culture and
relied on quick turnover rates to make a profit. Normalization of Deviance was present in the
maintenance personnel and the pilots when they cleared the fleet for operation despite obvious
damage on the airframes. Providing the maintenance and inspection personnel with the best
techniques for detecting material fatigue and damage could have prevented the lap-joint failure
in the fuselage.
2. Describe Regression as it pertains to air or ground crews. How might this contribute to
cultural environment?
In stressful environments, human tendencies cause us to fall back to earlier states of
being. In the case of air crews, the stressful environment could regress them back to earlier
points in their training, as we saw in the KLM pilot in the Tenerife disaster. Affecting the cultural
environment of an airline, regression can lead to group thinking, where the crew defers to a
figure of perceived authority despite reservations they might have about a situation (resulting in
a lack of assertiveness).
exacerbated the environment that allowed for the disaster. What could have been changed
from a design perspective to prevent the active failure, mitigate the effect of the active
failure, or allow the system to return to normal.
Contributing to the Aloha Airlines disaster was the pressure placed on the maintenance
and inspection personnel to ensure that each airplane was fully operational for the next day’s
flying schedule. Being able to “island hop” was a significant aspect of the airline’s culture and
relied on quick turnover rates to make a profit. Normalization of Deviance was present in the
maintenance personnel and the pilots when they cleared the fleet for operation despite obvious
damage on the airframes. Providing the maintenance and inspection personnel with the best
techniques for detecting material fatigue and damage could have prevented the lap-joint failure
in the fuselage.
2. Describe Regression as it pertains to air or ground crews. How might this contribute to
cultural environment?
In stressful environments, human tendencies cause us to fall back to earlier states of
being. In the case of air crews, the stressful environment could regress them back to earlier
points in their training, as we saw in the KLM pilot in the Tenerife disaster. Affecting the cultural
environment of an airline, regression can lead to group thinking, where the crew defers to a
figure of perceived authority despite reservations they might have about a situation (resulting in
a lack of assertiveness).
