Warning: Threadjack underway
I've always wondered about that because that's happened off SOCAL more than once. I actually talked to a professor at Monterey who deals with decision-making under stress and turns out there is a linkage to folks under stress seeing (or not seeing) what they want to see or fear to see when stress is applied to a situation such as:
USAF F-15 pilots intercept helos in ONW and with fangs out, fail to ID them after visual pass as 2 USA MH-60 and shoot them down thinking they are Iraqi Hinds. They didn't see what was really there and saw what their brains initially lead to believe they would find: threat helos
CIC personnel aboard USS Stark watch an Iraqi Mirage F1 fly right at them on an attack profile an dnever go to GQ or realize what is occuring believing they are safe, but not seeing the clear indicators (Mirage F1 nightly Exocet attack against Iranians...ie if nose is pointed at you and closing, you are a target!). Stark takes 2 missiles without taking any defensive measures.
VF-74 F-14 pilot shoots down USAF RF-4 after hearing exercise raido call of "Warning Red, Weapons Free". This was after intercepting RF-4 on USAF tanker leaving no doubt it was a friendly aircraft. In a classic CRM scenario, he asked the RIO if he was supposed to shoot and the RIo responded "Yeah, go ahead and shoot em". In this case, the pilot wasn't seeing what the real situation was and the RIO wasn't seeing what the pilot was intending to do. Big surprise for the RIO when a Sidewinder went snaking off the aircraft and bigger surprise for RF-4 aircrew when they got smacked (they didn't know why their aircraft went out of control until debriefed on the Sara after being fished out of the water).
CIC on USS Vincennes tracks Iranian airliner on departure (climbing) at constant speed during surface engagement and concludes it is an Iranian fighter heading at them accelerating and descending on an attack profile. Vicennes takes out airliner after seeing something other than what is really happening.
USS Saratoga fires a Seasparrow into bridge of Turkish destroyer operating with CVBG. Much like the Tomcat intercept of the RF-4, everyone but the guy (PO) releasing the weapon knew it was an exercise. The PO misinterpreted the GQ drill as the real thing not seeing events as they really were while CIC did not realize or see that he was repsonding as if he thought the carrier was under attack.
Then there are the electronic versions of this same phenomena when Patriot missile batteries take out a F/A-18 and Tornado due to firing mode selected and humans being absent from console not seeing what their HAL coputer is about to do.
In all of above, there was stress present that influenced the actions of those involved. The folks at Post Graduate (PG) School have developed some exercises in which they apply stress and information to show that decisions can be made that aren't correct based on the stress and preconditioning. Landing on the wrong carrier while ignoring seemingly obvious clues falls in same category as the incidents above.
Hmmmm CVN-71, large, not smoking, Midway, lots of angle, smoke trail. Lucky for him he boltered IIRC it DID come up at focsle follies though
I've always wondered about that because that's happened off SOCAL more than once. I actually talked to a professor at Monterey who deals with decision-making under stress and turns out there is a linkage to folks under stress seeing (or not seeing) what they want to see or fear to see when stress is applied to a situation such as:
USAF F-15 pilots intercept helos in ONW and with fangs out, fail to ID them after visual pass as 2 USA MH-60 and shoot them down thinking they are Iraqi Hinds. They didn't see what was really there and saw what their brains initially lead to believe they would find: threat helos
CIC personnel aboard USS Stark watch an Iraqi Mirage F1 fly right at them on an attack profile an dnever go to GQ or realize what is occuring believing they are safe, but not seeing the clear indicators (Mirage F1 nightly Exocet attack against Iranians...ie if nose is pointed at you and closing, you are a target!). Stark takes 2 missiles without taking any defensive measures.
VF-74 F-14 pilot shoots down USAF RF-4 after hearing exercise raido call of "Warning Red, Weapons Free". This was after intercepting RF-4 on USAF tanker leaving no doubt it was a friendly aircraft. In a classic CRM scenario, he asked the RIO if he was supposed to shoot and the RIo responded "Yeah, go ahead and shoot em". In this case, the pilot wasn't seeing what the real situation was and the RIO wasn't seeing what the pilot was intending to do. Big surprise for the RIO when a Sidewinder went snaking off the aircraft and bigger surprise for RF-4 aircrew when they got smacked (they didn't know why their aircraft went out of control until debriefed on the Sara after being fished out of the water).
CIC on USS Vincennes tracks Iranian airliner on departure (climbing) at constant speed during surface engagement and concludes it is an Iranian fighter heading at them accelerating and descending on an attack profile. Vicennes takes out airliner after seeing something other than what is really happening.
USS Saratoga fires a Seasparrow into bridge of Turkish destroyer operating with CVBG. Much like the Tomcat intercept of the RF-4, everyone but the guy (PO) releasing the weapon knew it was an exercise. The PO misinterpreted the GQ drill as the real thing not seeing events as they really were while CIC did not realize or see that he was repsonding as if he thought the carrier was under attack.
Then there are the electronic versions of this same phenomena when Patriot missile batteries take out a F/A-18 and Tornado due to firing mode selected and humans being absent from console not seeing what their HAL coputer is about to do.
In all of above, there was stress present that influenced the actions of those involved. The folks at Post Graduate (PG) School have developed some exercises in which they apply stress and information to show that decisions can be made that aren't correct based on the stress and preconditioning. Landing on the wrong carrier while ignoring seemingly obvious clues falls in same category as the incidents above.
... plus, it works mo' bettah in the Tropics ... :icon_wink
