Why are pilots so hesitant to declare an emergency?

kicktireslightfires

kicktireslightfires

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kicktireslightfires
See the attached video of an American Airlines flight. I'm curious: Why are some pilots so hesitant to officially declare an emergency when there’s a problem? Is there a lot of paperwork once you declare an emergency or something? In this video, the pilot states over and over again that they do not want to declare an emergency even though to me it sounds like they have quite the emergency (ALL NINE of their flight attendants suddenly went ill).

 
Because there’s a ton of paperwork involved. :rolleyes:
 
kicktireslightfires said:
Is there a lot of paperwork once you declare an emergency or something?
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Not at all - just one report which would have needed to be made anyway because of the nature of their problem.
 
There may be a request for paperwork in the event of an emergency, but that may still happen whether you "declare" it to be one or not. As an airport firefighter, I don't get the hesitancy either. We are here to help, let us help you!
 
The only time I had an emergency (engine ate a valve and produced essentially zero power while still running) , I did not declare even when asked by ATC if I wanted to. Upon reflection, that was stupid. If there’s a next time, I will.

Cheers
 
Because they FAA will investigate and find out you’re on an expired medical. :D
 
Because "communicate" is third after "aviate"and "navigate"?
 
I second that, it's because of FAA involvement. I got into a weather situation as a student pilot. The tower asked me if I wanted to declare an emergency. I did not but was in way over my head and should have. It turned out ok, I lived. But emergency spells FAA.
 
Velocity173 said:
Because there’s a ton of paperwork involved. :rolleyes:
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There is not a ton of paperwork involved. In my case, fire trucks rolled and class D airport cleared me for any and all runways for my 10 minute period trying to limp back in. FAA asked for an email picture of a logbook entry showing a mechanic looked at the plane and declared it airworthy again, that is all. Did not investigate if I was current or if the plane was in annual.
 
New question, who here has declared an emergency? If you have not, how would you know if there is any paperwork or investigations involved after declaring?
 
I’ll declare an emergency if I think there’s any way anybody outside the airplane can make things better.

Didn’t watch the video, but I’m guessing they couldn’t get outside medical help into the airplane until they were on the ground.

Matthew Rogers said:
New question, who here has declared an emergency? If you have not, how would you know if there is any paperwork or investigations involved after declaring?
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I have.

Had an engine come apart in flight. Airport fireman asked if everybody was ok.

Had a bird go through an engine on takeoff…insurance company wanted a copy of the last page in my logbook. It had two entries, neither of which was the airplane type involved, and no times carried forward.

The rest of them I didn’t declare, although in two cases, declaring would have meant figuring out who to call after I was on the ground to let them know there had been an emergency. :rolleyes:
 
Joe_B1 said:
I second that, it's because of FAA involvement. I got into a weather situation as a student pilot. The tower asked me if I wanted to declare an emergency. I did not but was in way over my head and should have. It turned out ok, I lived. But emergency spells FAA.
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Yes, fear of bureaucratic scrutiny. Plus it’s human nature: it’s difficult to accept that you might be facing actual imminent death. We live most of our lives within a false illusion of security. The human mind actually needs this illusion, there’s no way we could relax and function, much less be happy, if we allowed ourselves conscious awareness of how close we come to possible death on a near constant basis, how many threats are all around us from within our bodies to society, to cosmic. So when one of those threats actually becomes reality, it takes a while for the mind to shed the illusion of security and accept it.
 
Rushie said:
Yes, fear of bureaucratic scrutiny. Plus it’s human nature: it’s difficult to accept that you might be facing actual imminent death. We live most of our lives within a false illusion of security. The human mind actually needs this illusion, there’s no way we could relax and function, much less be happy, if we allowed ourselves conscious awareness of how close we come to possible death on a near constant basis, how many threats are all around us from within our bodies to society, to cosmic. So when one of those threats actually becomes reality, it takes a while for the mind to shed the illusion of security and accept it.
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I haven’t done an analysis, but I suspect imminent death was not a player in the overwhelming majority of emergencies, declared or otherwise.
 
Around row 22...so a passenger needed a shower?
 
Lost a hydraulic system that caused us to drop the gear manually and therefore we lost nose wheel steering. We were going to block the runway so declared an emergency. No big deal. Filled out one simple form online through the company and never heard another word.
 
nah, more like the jr CA didn't want to miss his commute home. :D
 
Because they are afraid it might draw unnecessary attention towards them, and possibly expose some deficiency or wrong action on the part of the pilot.
 
MauleSkinner said:
I haven’t done an analysis, but I suspect imminent death was not a player in the overwhelming majority of emergencies, declared or otherwise.
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My emergencies occurred in situations where imminent death was unlikely, as long as I didn't screw up.

One way to screw up would have been to get delayed because of not letting people on frequency know that I had an emergency.
 
I'm amazed how many people say they won't declare because they don't want an FAA investigation.

1. That probably won't happen
2. What are you trying to hide?
 
hindsight2020 said:
nah, more like the jr CA didn't want to miss his commute home. :D
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You see, that's a perfect reason *to* declare the emergency. Go direct to the runway, haul ass to the gate, set the brake and be the first one off the airplane. :p


Tarheelpilot said:
They were trying to decide if the flight attendants were full of **** or legit
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This might actually be close to the truth. I don't have any inside info on this situation, but I can't think of a reason why they wouldn't declare. The company certainly would prefer it - they actively encourage us to declare for just about anything unusual, and the only form required is quick and easy via the iPad. As I mentioned before, sick FAs are gonna require the form to be submitted anyway.

Or maybe the CA was like a dude I used to fly with at my last company - he got into an argument with our lead FA during cruise and ended the 'call' with, "Let's get something straight Kathy, the difference between you guys and us is that all four of you could DROP DEAD and we'd still get to the gate on time!" :eek:
 
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Pilots are a proud bunch. Declaring an emergency is a psychological admission of failure for many

There is a "big bad mean paperwork" stigma as well

Or it could be as simple as basic denial that their situation really *is* an emergency
 
In this particular case it didn't seem like much of an emergency to me. Aircraft is fine, pilots are fine and ATC got them right back with minimal effort. Maybe time for a new FA contract?
 
Or different pilots have different definitions of emergency. For some pilots their autopilot going inop on a VFR clear and a million day is an emergency. I'm more at the other end of the spectrum and unless the plane is on fire, or I'm not going to make it to the runway due to an engine about to come from together, or I'm picking up ice and they won't give me a new altitude, that's about the point I will declare an emergency. Most pilots are probably somewhere in between.
 
What am I missing? Sure, the crew turned back and said we’re not declaring, then declares. It’s not unfathomable the situation evolved from “we have an odor” to “the FAs” all feel ill.

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Kind of feels like Monday morning quarterbacking.
 
Wouldn’t this situation be more of a “pan pan”type of a thing?
 
Bill said:
Wouldn’t this situation be more of a “pan pan”type of a thing?
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Could be, although according to the Pilot/Controller Glossary, pan pan is still an emergency.

"EMERGENCY- A distress or an urgency condition."

"PAN-PAN- The international radio-telephony urgency
signal. When repeated three times, indicates
uncertainty or alert followed by the nature of the
urgency."​
 
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I've never declared but was with a friend that did when the gear wouldn't come down. Finally did get it down with emergency procedures but wasn't certain it was locked. Called an emergency and the trucks were waiting as we came in on a very soft landing and the gear held. Not much paperwork that I recall ...
 
Matthew Rogers said:
New question, who here has declared an emergency? If you have not, how would you know if there is any paperwork or investigations involved after declaring?
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I declared an emergency with Savannah approach when one of my landing gear legs got stuck up on the Velocity. After some hard porpoising, I was able to get it down and locked and landed without incident. No priority given so not an o ounce of paperwork. FSDO safety guy from Cocoa Beach Florida called me the following day and had a pleasant chat. Said he even wasn’t going to file it as an incident on it. End of story.
 
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I think there is a valid fear that the FAA will change the significance of having an emergency in the past, and make future renewals problematic.

They did that with the medicals, as has been discussed on this web site in detail.
 
Tantalum said:
Pilots are a proud bunch. Declaring an emergency is a psychological admission of failure for many

There is a "big bad mean paperwork" stigma as well

Or it could be as simple as basic denial that their situation really *is* an emergency
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The paperwork never bothered me. The psychology of it I think is more like it’s hard to admit we need help. We are supposed to be the problem solvers. That’s how I taught my upgrade candidates… sometimes declaring an emergency is what leaders need to do…
I would reference the broken arrow scene in the “we were solders” movie. Asking for help is a sign of strength and resolve to accomplish the mission.
 
I shut down an engine due to loss of oil pressure and returned to the departure airport. ATC had to give delay vectors to a couple heavy irons. I sure as heck declared. After landing I went to introduce myself and thank the guys on the fire truck. The fire chief had a few questions, and I never heard from the FAA.

I had to declare a number of times in Alaska and usually the FAA just wanted a copy of my ATP certificate and medical. I have never had to write a report. A couple times I did have to answer a couple questions, usually about maintenance but it wasn't until later after myself and the plane had returned to flying.
 
geezer said:
I think there is a valid fear that the FAA will change the significance of having an emergency in the past, and make future renewals problematic.

They did that with the medicals, as has been discussed on this web site in detail.
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Are you kidding me? You would rather take your chances with the reaper over the hypothetical chance that the FAA is going to come back at everyone that has ever said MAYDAY and deny them their pilot certificate? I guess the sky really is falling all around your part of the world. They would be grounding nearly every pilot with more than a few thousand hours, practically every ATP, CFI, DPE, etc.
 
For me, it’s this

Dana said:
Because "communicate" is third after "aviate"and "navigate"?
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I’m not going to spend any time trying to decide, if I don’t think someone is going to be able to help (and yeah, getting others out of my way is help) then I’m going to spend my brain cycles working the problem rather than talking to someone that can’t help. The whole.”how many souls on board, how many hours of fuel conversation is not helpful for single pilot situations IMO.
 
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