Ethics in Aviation

  For this week’s blog, I’d like to discuss the turbofan engine that is popularly used in passenger aircrafts today. The turbofan was developed to combine the advantages of the turbojet and the turboprop into one do all engine. The turbojet produces thrust by ejecting a high energy gas stream from the engine exhaust nozzle which leads to accelerating a relatively small mass of air to a high speed. A turboprop adds a propeller through a reduction gear and is great at slower speeds. When you combine the two you get the turbofan, it creates additional thrust by diverting a secondary airflow around the combustion chamber. The turbofan bypass air generates increased thrust, cools the engine, and aids in exhaust noise suppression. This provides turbojet-type cruise speed and lower fuel consumption (FAA, 2003). As we can see, the engine is one of the most important parts of the aircraft. An example of a turbofan not functioning correctly was recently in the news, this is definitely some...

      The term ground effect might be new to you, but many pilots have encountered the term a few times. Ground effect is the positive influence on the lifting characteristics of the horizontal surfaces of an aircraft wing when it is close to the ground. What causes this you ask? It comes from a reduction in the amount of induced drag generated. The reduction in induced drag when in close proximity to the ground causes the pressure air that is supposed to be circular around the wing becomes elliptical as the airflow is pushed outwards. This causes the effective aspect ratio of the wing to become greater than the geometric aspect ratio which reduces the induced drag.      So you're saying to yourself why not just keep the aircraft away from the ground, hence we don't have to worry about the ground effect. Well we have to take off and land the flight, that is when ground effect can become a problem. On December 16th, 2004, a cargo carrier SD3-60 attempte...

       Ethics is doing what is right morally. Pilots have an moral obligation to take passengers from point A to B as safe as possible. We as passengers expect the pilots to act in an ethical manner, that they uphold their responsibilities in the highest regard. We expect that flight maintainers take care of the planes they work on because a mistake can lead to death. We as passengers expect that our air crew follows ethical principals to ensure mission safety.       In 2009, flight 3407 crashed in Buffalo, NY, taking 50 lives on board. As with any safety mishap in the flight industry we expect the crash to be investigated to find out the root cause of the accident. According to Hoppe (2019) found the probable cause of the accident was the captain's inappropriate response to the activation of the stick shaker [the stick shaker warns a pilot of an impending wing aerodynamic stall], which led to an aerodynamic stall from which the airplane did not r...