That's why airlines like to get pilots with military experience. They are exposed to more crazy scenarios in training and work and generally keep a cool head better under stress.

Hmmm - but: military pilots are also known (especially in some cultures) for an over-strong respect for hierarchy, resulting in a willingness to go along with dangerous instructions. Also, at least some military pilots are trained to have a higher risk acceptance than civilian pilots.

Personally, I'd be very happy having an ex-military pilot flying me around; I think the pros definitely outweigh the cons. But do be aware that the cons exist.

Actually Korean pilots (civilian) are also known to have too strong a respect for hierarchy. I remember seeing an episode of air crash investigating where that was officially reported as a factor, so it isn't even just the military where that can be a risk.

This is the most famous incident, and the one that lead to the development of Crew Resource Management, a process to make sure decisions are taken by consensus, not by deferring to authority. The crew in question, by the way, was dutch.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster

> Hmmm - but: military pilots are also known (especially in some cultures) for an over-strong respect for hierarchy, resulting in a willingness to go along with dangerous instructions. Also, at least some military pilots are trained to have a higher risk acceptance than civilian pilots.

Can you elaborate more on what how dangerous instructions would work in a civilian scenario? Where does a hierarchy come into the picture?

Person A, in authority but missing a critical piece of information (e.g. senior pilot who mistakenly believes airspeed is high when the plane is nearly stalling) gives disastrous instruction (pull up) to person B (co-pilot) who has the crucial information, but obeys rather than contradicting A, due to hierarchy.

ATC operators must be the most underrated people in our transportation system.

Underrated by who? Society? What's the most highly rated profession in transportation?

Maybe unappreciated is a better choice of words. Overrated would be taxi drivers and municipal taxi regulators.

Agreed. It was like it didn't even phase the controller. Wow.