Human Factors in Aviation: A Rookie's Eye-Opening First Shift
It was the year 2020. I had made it through my first week of orientation at the National Aviation Academy in West Concord, Massachusetts, and now we were finally getting into the curriculum.
“Human Factors,” Mr. Rivera, my first-term instructor, bellowed with his presentation sprawled across the whiteboard through the projector. Everyone’s eyes were curiously fixated on the whiteboard in silence. It was almost as if we were all thinking the same thing: “What is this?” Something so self-explanatory yet dynamically complex.

Fast forward three years later, it is the year 2023. I am a rookie mechanic on my first overnight shift, paired up with a much more experienced mechanic who’s been with the company for thirty-plus years. I was barely two years in, when he got hired.
I was assigned the walk-around, and in my head, I thought I did a pretty prompt yet thorough job despite my body fighting against nature and my circadian rhythm being all the way off. My attention was drawn to the intermittent flickering of his headlamp. It was obvious he was trying to draw my attention to a potential teaching lesson; I could tell by the way he was stopped over the left main landing gear.
I walked over to him.

“Did you see this?” he asked, indicating some bare threads on the tire with the bright intensity of his torch.
I nervously shook my head, my eyelids fighting to stay open at this point.
“This is equivalent to a flat. We have to change this tire.”
Let’s just say it was an extremely long shift for my first overnight.
Human Factors, as the name implies, is pretty much our contribution to the safety and airworthiness of any aircraft in our care. Emphasis on the word care. It’s very easy to overlook something that we’ve done multiple times solely because we feel we’ve become “experts” in a way. This is also known as complacency. It's one of the “Dirty Dozen” common human errors in aviation.
Other factors that make up the Dirty Dozen include:
- Lack of communication
- Stress
- Lack of knowledge
- Distraction
- Lack of teamwork
- Lack of resources
- Lack of assertiveness
- Pressure
- Norms
- Lack of awareness
- Fatigue
In this case, it’s pretty evident that I was demonstrating a mixture of the latter two: lack of awareness and fatigue. Both of which, fortunately, have a remedy. My lack of awareness was corrected by communication, in part, from the senior mechanic. As for the fatigue, let's just say I remedied that by preparing better for my next overnight shift, going to bed on time, and getting quality sleep.
What I would love to commend the senior mechanic for, which also served as a learning lesson for me, was his inability to let complacency get the best of him. Mind you, he’s been in this field for over thirty years.
In summary, Human Factors, just as the name implies, is the human side of aviation. No matter how dynamic the world of aviation is, despite its rapid trajectory of growth in the direction of artificial intelligence, computer programming, electronics, robotics, and the like, humans will always have a role to play in the continued airworthiness and safety of all aircraft placed in our care.
Emphasis on care... 😊
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