Have pilots be able to seek help and not affect their ability to fly after recovery. Have planes equipped with remote control that can override pilots in extreme situations. Have cameras inside the cockpit and cabin stream live alongside all the data otherwise recorded in black box using the LEO. The latter is being already discussed anyway.

A lot of recent developments made things possible that were previously outrageous. Pilots will be reduced to mere backup, and eventually completely replaced by autonomous systems, just like the train engineers do nowadays, with the only pilots working remotely in command centers ready to take over if needed.

If we can do remote surgeries using robots, there’s no reason this couldn’t be a thing.

> Have planes equipped with remote control that can override pilots in extreme situations.

TBH that would cause way many problems than it potentially could solve, not even mentioning the technical difficulties to implement.

Though I agree with the rest, there should be a solution.

Have you used airplane internet? It’s awful. Only the military has the capability to remotely control a plane right now.

Not to directly speak on the feasibility of that plan, but the plane Internet will get a lot better if you kick off everyone else and otherwise put it into emergency mode.

Have you used LEO Internet, the one I specifically mentioned? It’s great.

That's the real issue then. Nothing would stimulate automation faster than suicidal pilots.

> If we can do remote surgeries using robots, there’s no reason this couldn’t be a thing.

Such operations are gimmicks; the reality is that there has to be a surgeon present who is capable of doing the operation themselves.

Not to draw seriously messed up parallels:

I frequently get in arguments with my extended family because I believe pedophiles and criminals have rights. I talk about the documented history of innocent people being convicted of a crimes, but there are many guilty offenders. I want prison conditions to be better, and I use it as an example of "if you care about human rights, you care about them for everyone. Even convicted rapists and murderers." Sometimes I go off on another tangent because we should care about rights for immigrants as well. :) Then I lead into a 2nd bit where I say, "There are many pedophiles out there. People who have the tendencies, and people who have acted. We know that women who are pedophiles go under or un-reported." To treat some of this, we need mental health facilities available even for people who find disgusting and monstrous. We need a safe environment where they can go in anonymously and seek help. It may prevent someone who is just thinking about children from touching a child. Most people would rather just execute a SUSPECTED pedophile. That's how you get someone to hate themselves and the world and children and act on their impulses. Make the stigma and the reality for them worse. We love doing it in prisons. We love making prisoners suffer as a society.

So to draw the awful parallel: We need mental health facilities available for pilots with no ability to report-out on how many are effected. We need to ensure anonymity, and provide resources with no idea of how well they may be helping someone on the edge. Maybe loose/aggregate data points can be reported, but my strongest emphasis would be on providing anonymous support that is always and frequently available.

Easy - make mental health non-reportable to the aviation authorities. Instead, the shrink can report if they think there is an issue to public safety, as they would currently do for patients at risk of harming the public.

The problem is people think that any 'solution' to this problem needs to be perfect. "What if we never find out this guy was a problem" comes up. No. You just need to make the next system net _better_. Don't delay forward progress because the next step isn't "perfect".

Would that really solve much? If the concern is pilots are not being honest to save their jobs - it seems like they would still not be honest to a therapist if they were considering self harm. I'm sure it would just take one story of a therapist being overly cautious and reporting someone having benign issues for it to convince pilots not to talk to therapists.

It would solve the problem of "pilot needs someone to talk to about their issues with their wife", which is nice. But don't know if it solves the larger issue being discussed.

The famous Germanwings murder-suicide had some of this in play -- the pilot's doctor had given him a letter excusing him from work, due to a probable psychotic episode, but the pilot chose not to share the letter with the airline and the doctor was forbidden by law from sharing it.

> make mental health non-reportable to the aviation authorities. Instead, the shrink can report if they think there is an issue to public safety, as they would currently do for patients at risk of harming the public.

Put yourself in a pilot's shoes. Would you attend sessions if there was ANY chance of you not being able to fly? Would others? It's optional and your entire career hinges on not being grounded once. That's you, your family, and anyone else who depends on your income.

The perception of this solution is still the same as the current one - I can be grounded.

Initially it might work, but once that first guy gets grounded via the program (or maybe a few), word gets out that's what this system ends up doing - you're right back here wondering what the solution was that was so easy.

I have a solution: pass a law that if any pilot gets grounded for mental health issues, then the airline industry (as a whole, in case his airline goes belly-up) has to continue to pay that pilot's salary until he retires.

This protects the pilot pretty well, but this leaves the airline open to some pretty crazy fraud, no?

Isn't this how it's handled in other countries when someone can't work due to medical issues? Surely they have some way of discouraging fraud, probably by making the doctor responsible or perhaps requiring multiple doctors to cross-check.

It happens in the US for worker's comp, but that's if you lose an arm. Pretty hard to fake that.

Mental health, "relatively easy" to fake esp if there's a lot of money waiting for you on the other-side if you get it right.

The solution is to support these people if they are unable to work so that they don’t have to fear for their livelihood if they come down sick.

If the expectation is for people who are sick to further worsen their condition by becoming unemployed and discard themselves then the system is broken - simple as.

The pilots union (and by extension airlines) need to establish a pension/insurance category for this eventuality imo.

We need pilots with mental health issues to seek treatment for the safety of themselves and more importantly passengers. The mental health issue may be resistant to treatment or otherwise disqualify them from flying in the near or long term. When that happens, they lose their career.

A robust system for handling this eventuality, much like getting injured on the job, needs to be put in place.