Asian culture DID, however, play a significant role in the Korean plane hitting the seawall at SFO - the lower-ranking co-pilot apparently saw the problem but “it was not his place to criticize”.
And I’d guess the House of Saud isn’t thrilled about being corrected by infidel peasants.
Tha SFO flight had a check ride pilot. It was his express job to tell the Captain the approach was FUBAR’d.
It’s not that “Asian pilots” can’t fly but there is a serious disconnect in a number of Asian cultures that interferes with Crew Resource Management. This was an almost universal problem in many airlines until the Tenerife disaster where one 747 crashed into another. All because an FO didn’t exert his opinion that they did NOT have clearance. He could have keyed his mic and verified the instructions. That’s all it would have taken to stop 583 deaths. The SFO crash was a simple go-around.
Planes have become very complex and at the same time much simpler to fly. Almost an entire flight is done through automation and the pilot is inputing changes to various systems which then control the plane. this makes the job of pilot one of emergency administrator in case those systems fail. The purpose of 2 pilots is both redundancy and also a checks and balance that things are done correctly. If culture doesn’t allow for this then it becomes a real problem in an emergency.
To be fair, the kamikaze pilots weren’t terribly well-trained. All they got was a crash course.
More on topic, the recent crashes were due to weather in one case and a catastrophic ill-timed engine failure in another and the third is still unknown and perhaps unknowable. To put this in racist terms is quite stupid.
I’ve already covered the issues with Korean culture, but I’m pleading ignorance on the rest. Which other Asian cultures have similar issues?
Well that’s an interesting question. Some Asian Airlines use Western pilots. It’s kind of an interesting thing to observe because there’s a disconnect between the pilots and how the rest of the airline is run.
And they certainly excel at off airport landings.
With six you get barrel roll.
Reminds me of this story from a few years ago: