YOU SAID IT

KG Rajesh, MCAA-II

Working Hard?  Or Hardly Working...?

There’s one important factor that is often overlooked in any discussion on Flight Safety, and that’s the state of mind of the man behind the machine. In other words, the psychological factor behind Flight Safety is often ignored.

Analysis of accident records carried out by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company show that 66% of the accidents were due to poor job performance, i.e., failure to recognise potential hazards, faulty judgement, slowed reaction time and lack of attention. These shortcomings can often be attributed to fatigue and stress. Likewise, the excitement and irritation connected with the effort to maintain speed in spite of fatigue may be a significant factor. Proportionately more accidents are found in long working days than in short. In a 12-hour day, ammunition workers had almost three times as many accidents as in a 10-hour day, although the total time was only 20% longer. In the same sampling, accidents in the last hour were five times as numerous as in the first hour in a 12-hour day; the ratio was 3:1 in a 10-hour day. Thus, accidents give us another objective means of checking on the effects of fatigue.

What is fatigue?

A human being recognises fatigue as a feeling of tiredness or pain; he regards it as intrinsically unpleasant, and so is interested in its decrease or elimination. And since a decline in the curve of production is attributed to the worker’s fatigue, the employer would like to eliminate fatigue too.

Whatever fatigue is, it is safe to say that any muscular work, even that involved while sitting in a chair, will result in fatigue, provided the work of the muscles and the resulting expenditure of energy are at a faster rate than its recovery. Many other factors result in fatigue – length of work period, speed of work, extent of musculature involved, and the tensions accompanying the task are a few factors. Depending on the strength, stamina and preparation of the individual, fatigue is manifested at different rates in different people.

The factor that we need to discuss in detail, which probably is the most common factor resulting in fatigue or stress in our working environment of Naval Aviation, is the length of working hours.

Hours of Work and Production.

The relationship between an employee’s hours of work and his production had been a point of discussion since time immemorial. There is widespread misunderstanding and confusion about this relationship. It is generally believed that the way to increase production is to increase the number of working hours.

A look at a sample case however reveals some interesting results. During the First World War, some British ammunition workers were on a schedule of 68 hours a week. Even with the extreme motivation of the enemy across just across the channel, production was very low. It was assumed that a 20% increase in hours would yield a 20% increase in production. This was far from the case. Production decreased through the week. A committee of scientists studied the matter and decided to cut the hours experimentally to 60. As a result, the total daily output increased about 8%. In other words, more work was done in 60 hours than in the previous 68. This obviously was due to the reduction of accumulated fatigue, which previously had been carried over from one day to the next.

Many other studies in war industries yielded similar results. It was the same story in the Second World War. In the desperate production effort in ammunition and airplane industries, any increase in weekly hours above 60 caused a drop in both hourly and weekly output, as well as increased loss of time – the brief initial spurt due to the emergency soon wore off as fatigue began to get in its way. Studies and surveys conducted thereafter concluded that the 40-hour week and the 8-hour day yield the highest output per hour worked. More than 40 or 48 hours a week resulted in additional output, but with constantly decreasing efficiency and with increasing absenteeism.

The length of the working day has an emotional impact too. It is seen as an obvious practice that unproductive working time increases as the working day becomes lengthy. So by the end of the day, the net output achieved remains the same. For instance, if a task is to be completed on a particular day as per the PERT chart and if it’s a full working day due to the modified routine, the likely thought process of the individual involved in the task goes ‘OK, it’s a full day anyway, I can do it in the afternoon’. So even if the task could be completed in the forenoon session itself, it has been procrastinated to the afternoon session, and unproductive working hours has been added to the nominal working hours thereby reducing the actual working hours in the morning session.

And in the afternoon his efficiency is psychologically down thinking, “Why the h**l am I working alone?” or “why is only my section working?”. Obviously because there is no motivation factor—intrinsic or extrinsic—whatsoever, which could actually motivate the technicians, since in most cases the reward for good work is more work. The only motivation factor which remains for these hard-working technicians is the time they could have spent with their family. If due to the hard routine they are unable to find time for their dear ones, the problem faced at home might come to the forefront as a snag in maintenance practices, not consciously, but due to the emotional carry-overs due to trouble at home or due to the unknown fatigue which drives down the efficiency of the person. It is worrying that we tend to ignore fatigue (which starts psychologically) till it is seen physically affecting our body.

Case in Point

Take for example the case of TU maintenance, of which I have experienced over the years.  Maintenance time schedules for the aircraft were laid down in the early 1990s, when the aircraft was still new and the manpower availability was more than ample. Fast forward to the present day, when TUs land with defects that take even the OEM by surprise. The technical team analysing the problem and suggesting solutions is practically half the earlier strength.  In the race against time—following the schedules laid down more than a decade ago—the solutions are often temporary in nature, and the problem resurfaces a sortie or two later, leading to a vicious cycle of greater workload and still faster solutions. 

We need to give serious thought to the series of accidents and incidents happening on the aircraft. Are they due to the fatigue? When have most of the most of the accidents/incidents occurred – during working hours or off working hours? What was the fatigue level of the technicians working on the aircraft when the accident/incident happened? What was their state of mind? All this needs to be analysed for the final conclusion.

To Sum Up...

A solution to the problem could be as simple as an amendment to the time allocated for various servicing and maintenance practices. Ageing of aircraft and reduction of manpower is to be taken into consideration to promulgate extended time for various servicing without putting the tradesmen and the supervisors under stress. We need to give time for analysis and finding permanent solutions. We need to give our people time to refer the books.

Though these changes would obviously take time to come to light, let us in the meantime maintain the peace of mind of people who maintain the aircraft, and develop an atmosphere more conducive to accident/ incident free flying.