[wiedehopf]

Is it really unexpected failures or do they discuss scenario / do you expect one of a few typical scenarios?

Really throwing failures at pilots without them knowing what's going on seems to mean too many fail or rather there is not enough time to train pre-discussed scenarios and do scenarios that aren't announced.

I'm not sure it's really what you'd want.

[Pasorrijer]

It's truly unexpected failures,in the context of flying the plane. Basically every failure state in flying has a procedure, and as a pilot you're expected to memorize some, and know how to find and follow the checklist or red page for all emergency situations. Beyond that, you have to know how to assess and evaluate any emergency because that's your job.

[t0mas88]

It's not that unexpected, because you do recurrent training in the simulator every 6 months. And there is a set of emergencies that is done every time, for example engine failure / fire during takeoff must be done.

All pilots are trained to know the immediate actions required for a whole set of scenarios (we call these memory items) the point of the sim check is not to learn them but to check that you know all of them and to keep some recent experience. Because these things happen so rarely in real flights.

I've had for example only once had an engine failure after takeoff and it was a partial failure without fire. In the simulator I think I've done it at least 100 times and most times they put it on fire for good measure so you're in a hurry to get on the ground. The real world one was very uneventful, return to the airport, taxi back, do a lot of paperwork.

[andruby]

My father is a retired airline pilot and instructor. Everything that can fail in the simulator is fair game. Pilots have recurrent trainings all the time during their career. They get tested every X months. They have medical exams.

And that is how it should be. Pilots must be able to handle every possible failure. They don’t need to know every single procedure by heart, they’ve got the manuals in the cockpit for non-urgent procedures.

My father loves _flying_. He’s from a generation that trained on airplanes with little automation. He often talked about younger pilots relying too much on instruments. He would get annoyed with pilots that didn’t appreciate manually flying a plane.

[hungryforcodes]

It's exactly what you want, because it simulates reality. Unexpected failures are by definition unexpected.

[wiedehopf]

Yeah i know it is what you want.

I'm just asking if it's really a reality as i previously got the impression airline training wasn't quite at that level. As in mostly you get an engine out because that needs training every time. And if the unexpected scenario is an engine out most of the time ... it's not really unexpected.

I wonder how often stuff like static port blockages and even maybe the flight director being wrong during takeoff are trained in an unexpected fashion. I'd expect quite rarely if at all. That's ok i suppose as it's rare failures, but the descriptions here kinda suggested a level of random scenarios being thrown at pilots ... which isn't quite realistic i think due to limited simulator time alone.

[hungryforcodes]

I just fly small planes, so I don't know much about commercial airline sims except from what I've read -- but I think if you have just a limited time in the simulator then for sure you'd want to be hitting up flight failures more frequently to test yourself. These things are complex, so I'd imagine there would be discussions after of how it could have gone better etc, rather than just a pass /fail.