Aeronautical Emergency and Abnormal Checklists: Expectations and Realities

Abstract

Developers of emergency, abnormal, and non-normal checklists hold a number of beliefs about how, when, and under what types of conditions flight crews will access and use these checklists. These beliefs or expectations strongly influence the decisions developers make about checklist content, design, and presentation. Interviews with pilots involved in incidents and accidents, simulator observations, and analyses of paper and electronic checklists, reveal that many of the expectations developers hold, which are implicit in checklist designs, do not match the realities of emergency and abnormal situations and flight crew checklist use. Several of these expectations are presented along with contrasting realities and some suggested design solutions.