Move on up

Work here has always been an uphill struggle. Most of the mechanics are either clueless, lazy, demotivated or not at work at all. Which means the hard working few get lumbered with most of the jobs most of the time. Which makes me appreciate them all the more. Working on without protest knowing that their colleges will be sitting on their arses all day but still getting the same pay as them, yet they soldier on.

Add to that the distinct lack of certifying engineers. A measly 3 compared to other places where 8 is not uncommon and 20 not unheard of. Then to top off the cake, comes the icing... The management. Which will be today's bone of contention.

Narcissistic, dangerous and clueless. Lets tackle narcissistic first. Totally in love with themselves, they only listen or acknowledge others who love them as much as they love themselves. As far as they are concerned how could anyone not love em, they are sooooo great. They view anyone who ever tells em how reality is, as a heretic. Very swift with the "orf wiv iz ead" they are. As such whenever the truth needs telling, either a sacrificial lamb is chosen to report the news or they are simply told "yes no problem, will do" but instead, just do whatever. Unsurprisingly, those willing to work OT sucking those dicks and licking those cracks find themselves on the fast track.

And if there is 1 way to make yourself faster while on that fast track to the top, is being dangerous while you are at it. Like for example ignoring findings such as structural damage on areas the aircraft makers deem as a no damage zone. Or ignoring multiple structural failures of parts of the aircraft so the part is pretty much held on by the last threads. Just ignore it, concoct some BS to make it sound less serious then throw in a random maintenance manual quote to round off the report. Any quote will do, it doesn't need to be related, just needs to sound technical enough. With that done send the plane out to fly with paying customers.

Lastly cluelessness. Summed up well by decisions like the following genius call. If working on something like an air-conditioning unit takes 50 man hours then if we allocate 25 men to work on it, it will take 2hours...orrrrr if we double the manpower to 50 men it will take just 1 hour!!! Yes lets do that, never mind the access panel to work thru is just 2m squared, I'm sure we can get 50 pairs of hands in there. Below is an artist serialisation of a possible office encounter with the above manager types.


So what happens when several people with all those traits come together in 1 aerospace company? Things happen... things like the casual over looking of around 40 or so manufacturer and government issued tasks to be carried out on a single aircraft. Those manufacturer and government body issued tasks are more often than not all safety related. Good job on the quality dept for picking up on it and grounding the plane before anything horrifically (emphasis on the horror) embarrassing occurs. But it must make you wonder how so many important tasks get over looked. I don't know how it happened but I'll warrant specimens like the aforementioned persons certainly didn't help things.