How is anticipation, as part of system resilience, operationalised on the flight deck, and to what extent does the regulation facilitate it?

Abstract: Resilience is a contemporary ‘hot topic’ in aviation - as well as in many other safety critical industries. The need for understanding resilience has been recognised since it has been noted that serious incidents and accidents are often related to very complex and unexpected situations and failures that cannot be managed with compliance, or which are not covered by existing procedures or checklists. In aviation, resilience has largely been defined as the capability of the crew to ‘bounce back’, meaning their ability to function in an unexpected and unplanned situation, where procedures do not suffice or exist, and which has not been covered by training. However, scientific literature sees many other shades of resilience. There are many interpretations of resilience not as an ‘ability’ that someone possesses, but instead a process that incorporates continuous potentials such as learning and anticipating, or ‘looking ahead’. Science also talks about resilience much more as a system function, instead of an ability at the sharp end. This qualitative study has its starting point in an interest on how the concept of resilience is implemented in aviation. The study has a special focus on ‘anticipation’, which seems to be recognised in science as a resilience potential but does not seem to receive corresponding recognition in the airline industry. This research deals with the definition and training of resilience and especially anticipation in the airline industry. The purpose is to view how the European regulator (EASA) defines resilience and what role it grants anticipation in resilience development. The research enters the airline organization from the perspective of flight crew training and explores how crews, instructors and examiners view the regulation, and how it further spreads via CRM and simulator training into line operation. This research also observes and compares how airline crews anticipate, and how they foresee the potential of risks and threats that affect normal operation by using skills and experience most effectively.