Risk Management for the Remote Pilot

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Risk Management for the Remote Pilot

Remote pilot lesson: ADM, CRM, and PAVE. What I want to cover with you is this information from Chapter 10 of the Remote Pilot Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems FAA study guide.

That's where this information is coming from - Aeronautical Decision Making and Judgment. I've been flying for 20 years, since 1997, private pilot, commercial pilot, certified flight instructor, now as a remote pilot as well.

I can tell you, you may think this seems like there's a lot to it for a remote pilot, but I can tell you this is a big, huge subject. What they're covering with you here and what they want you to know is the meat, but it goes a lot further when you get into the other parts of the piloting, as far as private pilot, commercial pilot, and to certified flight instructor, especially in the commercial environment.

I flew helicopter EMS for five years. You could go to a whole week on Aeronautical Decision Making, ADM; CRM, Crew Resource Management. Even though this may seem like it's a lot of info and you think, "Wow, I've got to know all this as a remote pilot?" Yes, these are the things that the FAA has laid out for you that they want you to know to take the written test. These things are going to show up on the written test.

Risk Management for the Remote Pilot

You want to get your pilot rating, and you want to be better than the average guy. Don't just be the person, "Oh, just hurry up and give me the test questions so I can take the test and go get my pilot's license." You have to be ready to prepare for these flights, take in your personal factors, the different things that you need to be thinking about as far as your stress and your own physical activity and wellbeing. This stuff is important, even though it may seem a little bit boring. It can get a little bit boring, but these are things that you have to know.

So let's go ahead and start getting to some of it. Aeronautical Decision Making, ADM, is decision making in a unique environment, which in our case is aviation. It's a systematic approach to the mental process used by pilots to consistently determine the best course of action in response to a given set of circumstances. It is what a pilot intends to do based on the latest information he or she has. ADM, Aeronautical Decision Making, is a systematic approach to risk assessment and stress management. To understand ADM is to also understand how personal attitudes can influence decision making and how these attitudes can be modified to enhance safety in the operation of a small, unmanned aircraft.

1. It is important to understand the factors that cause humans to make decisions and how the decision-making process not only works, but can be improved. Steps for a good decision: Identifying personal attitudes hazardous to safe flight. 

2.Learning behavior modification techniques.

3. Learning how to recognize and cope with stress.

4. Developing risk assessment skills.

5. Using all resources. I want to jump in on this one.

I've been training pilots for almost 20 years now, and I've used the same examiner for many of the tests. He always says, "A good pilot uses his resources." You can't be expected to know everything. There's a lot of things you have to know to get the remote pilot certificate. You're going to have to go back every two years and retest to keep your remote pilot certificate. Some things, over time, you're going to forget. You need to know where to find the information, so always using your resources when you're planning your flight, using your different weather resources that we've talked about in this course, going out and checking the hazards in the area where you're going to be flying your small unmanned aircraft. There's a lot of things to be considering when you're preparing for these flights.

6. Evaluating the effectiveness of one's ADM skills.

Your ADM skills are going to improve with time, with training, getting out there and getting the experience that you need. Experience builds confidence. Experience builds good decision making through trial and error. You always want to make the best decisions you can, but we're human beings and we know that sometimes we make mistakes. Hopefully, you're not going to do anything that's going to cause anybody any harm or any real problem. But making good decisions is key, and through training and through experience, you're going to get better at that and you're going to get better at the Aeronautical Decision Making.

Risk Management for the Remote Pilot

Risk Management: As an EMS pilot, we talked about risk management all the time. Every morning, we had a big long list of things we had to do going onto every shift. What the FAA wants you to know is not nearly as detailed as what we had to go through. This is kind of the bare basics of things that you need to really think about, and understand, and know. The goal of risk management is to proactively identify safety-related hazards and mitigate the associated risks. Risk management is an important component of ADM, of the Aeronautical Decision Making, so risk management is just one component of a series of topics that we're going to talk about.

When a pilot follows good decision-making practices, the inherent risk in a flight is reduced or even eliminated. The ability to make good decisions is based upon direct or indirect experience and education, which is a little bit about what I mentioned a little bit ago, studying, being on top of the books, get the experience, learn from your experience, learn from your mistakes. The formal risk management decision-making process involves six steps. 1. Identify hazards 2. Assess risks 3. Analyze controls 4. Make control decisions 5. Use controls 6. Monitor results.

There are four fundamental principles of Aeronautical Decision Making: 1. Accept no unnecessary risk. Flying is not possible without risk, but unnecessary risk comes without a corresponding return. 2. Make risk decisions at the appropriate level. Risk decisions should be made by the person who can develop and implement risk controls. 3. Accept risk when benefits outweigh the dangers. 4. Integrate risk management into planning at all levels.

Because risk is an unavoidable part of every flight, safety requires the use of appropriate and effective risk management not just in the preflight planning stage, but in all stages of the flight. So you need to remember: you're the remote pilot. You are in charge. You are in charge of that entire flight. If anything happens, the FAA is going to come back on you. You need to make sure that you have all your ducks in a row; you've been through the proper training; you have the knowledge. That's the best way to keep you safe and everybody else around you safe as you're operating your small, unmanned aircraft.

Risk Management for the Remote Pilot

As this world changes and small, unmanned aircraft get used more and more every day, there's going to be more incidents and there's going to be more things happening. I'm sure you're going to see kneejerk reactions from the FAA. You definitely don't want to be on the receiving end of a violation because you went out and you did something silly. What if you did endanger someone in an aircraft, a helicopter, an airplane, or a jet? Or someone, an innocent bystander in some area that maybe you shouldn't have been flying over, and you have some kind of an inflight emergency and someone gets hurt? Being informed, sticking to the rules, sticking to the basics is how you're going to keep yourself out of trouble and be a safe remote pilot.

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