Hassles in the air: Stress on the flight deck, Part 1
In my previous post, I introduced the topic of 'hassles in the air' -- the kinds of stressful events that can happen to people who work in the civilian air transport industry on any trip. I'm talking about events of relatively brief duration here, not chronic stressors. (We'll get to those later!)
Let's have a look at what kinds of 'hassles in the air' affect civilian pilots. As I explained earlier in this tale, I first interviewed working crew members, asking them what kinds of things happened to them on trips that were stressful. From those interviews I created a list of events, which survey participants then rated for stressfulness.
I found that what pilots labeled as stressful events fell into several categories. I'll call them flying events, other operational events, and interpersonal events. Flying events are just that -- events that have to do with flying the aircraft. Other operational events are things that happen on a trip that are not directly related to actually flying the ship. Interpersonal events are events involving other people.
The most stressful flying events for the pilots who took the survey have to do with actual emergencies. In fact, the one event that was rated consistently as the most stressful by all kinds of professional pilots in the sample was having to abort a takeoff at high speed. Airline, freight, charter and corporate pilots all rated that item as the most stressful on the list of 25 events. Period. The only variation was that pilots over age 50, as a group, gave the aborted takeoff a slightly lower stressfulness score than everyone else -- but it was still at the top of their list.
Now, imagine that we array all 25 events that the pilots rated in order, from the most stressful down to the least stressful. Since it's at the top of the list, let's say that having to abort takeoff at high speed is a '10.' That's the 'anchor score' for our stressfulness array. All of the other events were rated as less stressful than that, so we'll assign each a number that corresponds to how stressful they were rated to be, relative to the aborted takeoff item.
Here are the other items, and their stressfulness ratings. Remember, the ratings reflect how stressful they are relative to the aborted takeoff item. These are composite ratings for all 411 pilots who took the survey. Later on I'll mention a few variations that emerged.
Events having to do with flying the aircraft:
- 9.5 -- Having to make an emergency landing
- 7.6 -- Encountering thunderstorms en route
- 5.9 -- Having to return to the airport soon after takeoff due to a mechanical
- 4.9 -- Performing a go-around due to unstable approach
- 4.4 -- Making a hard landing
- 4.1 -- Flying into/out of a destination/departure city for the first time
- 3.5 -- Turbulence at all levels; can't find smooth air
- 3.2 -- Getting a complex re-routing/flight plan change en route
- 2.2 -- Flying a holding pattern at the destination
- 8.8 -- Security emergency during the flight
- 7.6 -- Passenger requires emergency medical care during the flight
- 7.2 -- FAA line check
- 6.8 -- Member of the crew becomes ill or is injured
- 5.7 -- Having to file a NASA incident report
- 5.7 -- Having to wait for a room at your layover hotel
- 5.2 -- Flight is diverted to alternate airport due to bad weather
- 5.0 -- Mechanical problem identified shortly before departure
- 4.5 -- Departure delay at the gate after everyone has boarded
- 4.1 -- Long wait for a gate or parking space on arrival
- 2.5 -- F/A informs you of a shortage in the cabin (meals, amenities, etc.)
- 1.4 -- Having to take a random drug test on arrival
- 7.7 -- You don't like or get along well with the other pilot
- 7.3 -- You have an unpleasant exchange with another member of your crew
- 7.3 -- You have an unpleasant exchange with a member of the ground crew
