About the name...
The
name CulturAiles is
a French pun!
It has been created in 1995.
It is made with the combination of the two French
words:
- CULTURE (same
meaning in English), and
- AILES (meaning wings in
English).
Literally CulturAiles can
be translated in English as CulturWings.
Therefore, Cultur and Ailes together
in English have the meaning of (the) "CULTURE (of
the WINGS)"...
CULTURAILES Company
CulturAiles website is also one of the information tools of CULTURAILES company, registered in Hong Kong (SAR, China No. 37592903-000-01-07-7).
Why this web site?
CulturAiles provides information about human factors regarding safety in aeronautics.
I wish here to offer a kind of melting-pot dedicated to aviation safety, but centered on its most critical area: the human factors. I have made this maxim the key base of CulturAiles: The human operator is the least reliable element of an aerodyne, but the most essential. This shows the deep paradox regarding the need of the human being versus its weaknesses.
Most of the worldwide regulatory organisations have made the human factors knowledge a requirement to be able to join the industry. Usually, during a very short training course (sometimes on your own), one must learn a condensate resume about the most recent knowledge/results about human factors researches.
But the human factors are a huge science field (made of psychology, sociology, medicine, anatomy, neurology, physiology, anthropology, statistics, ergonomics, pharmacology, management, physics, etc.). As it takes years to train a pilot, a chief purser, an engineer, it takes years to be able to deal with human factors issues.
CulturAiles propose an approachable and modern point of view of the human behaviors in daily operations.
Thus, this web site concern mainly the people involved in the aviation industry (pilots, mechanics, engineers, cabin attendants, managers, etc.). But unfortunately, the human factors concepts are not so far limited to the aeronautic, since they concern all the type of operations, not only professional but personal.
Therefore, some other industries (transportation, energy, etc.) should be interested by the CulturAiles content.
The web site history
I started thinking about a web site in 2004. But for different reasons, I started the design only in February 2005. After some trials with a free provider, I put the first version of CulturAiles on line in April 2005. But i t took me about six months to build the main sections, everything on
my own, even though I got many advices and information from many sources (I am not a IT specialist). In May 2006, I change the old design for the present one.
A such web site is never achieved. There are always corrections to bring and materials to add.
I try to spend as much time as I can changing and adding, sometimes endlessly.
|
CulturAiles is free... because safety should be free.
The content of CulturAiles is free, even though there are some requirements regarding its use. Therefore, every piece of material provided here can be used and shared.
Free is not a widespread concept in aviation, since everything is usually pretty expensive (often unsuitably). Safety should be free, even though I know it is probably a dream. I do not pretend to offer everything, but at least some ideas that can help to analyse Safety/Human Factors issues.
The second reason CulturAiles is free, is because sharing information is a key factor regarding safety. Recent studies shows the type of safety issues today, are not really different compared to 10 or 20 years ago. The difference is that it is happening to the... new operators. So, everybody has to learn from everybody. The new (operator) from the old, but the opposite is also true...
The third reason is the consequence of the second. Sharing the safety issues must be done in a total transparency. Maybe some people would use the data improperly, but it is probably a (high?) price to pay. I am thinking here about media. If I praise the freedom of information, I also worry how some may use the information in order to build the big scoop. I was amazed and sad hearing the interview of André Turcat, the first Concorde test pilot after the Concorde crash in July 2000. The way the questions were raised could only lead this very clever man to say something he did not really want to say, moreover that was not really correct. You could feel his embarassment, and you could hear him expressed that was not the correct way to approch this event. But the journalist always came back again and again with his previous irrelevant question(s). The point here is media are never specialised in a specific area, except journalism... and regarding aviation, their approach is rarely appropriate and often one sided.
The best example regards the car accidents in France. During the late 90s, we had yearly 9000 dead by car accidents (only the dead not the injured) information that never reach the first page of any newspaper.
A simple conversion would make an equivalent of 18 B747 crash yearly, meaning 3 crash every 2 months... that will definitely make the first page of any newspaper.
Surely it is difficult to admit a mistake has been done. But externalizing the (difficult) operating experiences demonstrates a certain sense of awareness.
And when some awareness is expressed, you usually are on a track to provide solution(s). It is a dream to believe, as I could heard many times organisation pretending not having safety matter(s).
In any way, a complex system does not have any safety issues... Even today, a zero risk system does not exist..., and an error free system does not exist either!
Therefore, it is important to share freely everything regarding safety.
|
