Live data from Hacker News

Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

cnn.com

151–160 of 358 posts

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#151

Older article, but apparently Pakistan carts its nuclear weapons around in regular delivery vans: https://www.wired.com/2011/11/pakistan-nukes-delivery-vans/ I personally think this is a bad idea.

Didn't want to add politics to this, but i hope they get more funding for safety. Sadly, most of the funding they get from US and other Western countries is gobbled up by the Army which is the most powerful institution in the country. Their economic situation is a little worse now and it is likely they will become a vassal state of China in the future as well. China will take the role of USA in the country if it goes…

The foreign aid is being used to purchase political support (largely in the army), as is typical. The issue is political economy, not shortage of money.

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#152
A better question to ask is how many of those pilots have progressed in their careers and moved on flying as captains for other world airlines. Having based their privileges on fake foundations.

This problem is ripe in aviation and it’s all over the world except mostly for western countries even though some Eastern Europeans countries have some variation of this.

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#153
post #84

I heard this anecdote in India, and I'm not sure if it is apocryphal. There was a small airline flying turboprops to service a Himalayan region. Someone asked whether it was safe to fly these planes and the response was as hilarious as it was scary: "Yes, sir. It is very safe. They used to have 11 planes, 10 of them crashed and now they are really really careful with the one left" :)

Heh, this reminds me of a flight my friend took from a small island country. The side of the plane proudly displayed in big letters "Fly is Safe". I don't think he was reassured... edit: whoops, can't spell "plane" this morning

If it was the plain it was ok

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#154

I don't think most people appreciate the level of regulation that ensures safety and quality of life in Western countries. Go to many countries outside of that spectrum and you may still see beautiful architecture and more. Now did the team that worked on that project have the necessary experience to drive a safe and long lasting solution? Does the concrete and steel used follow good standards? This means that it may…

I believe regulation is an essential tool for society, but it is not the whole story- morality plays as large a part. Once the regulation is set, it can easily be undermined. BPA was banned by regulation, so industry developed analogue chemicals with the same properties and began using them. Certain aspects of concrete & steel are regulated, so unethical effort goes into subverting the idea of the law while following…

In capitalist societies any morality driven endeavor will very quickly be driven to the ground by its amoral competitor. And in public organizations the moral are quickly driven out because they threaten the amoral.

Also, of course, there are cases where regulation fails, and it’s never 100% successful. But the situations you mention are where people refused to adjust regulations as needed.

I’m curious to see examples where morality has prevented undesirable behavior on a large scale.

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#155
post #124

I don't think most people appreciate the level of regulation that ensures safety and quality of life in Western countries. Go to many countries outside of that spectrum and you may still see beautiful architecture and more. Now did the team that worked on that project have the necessary experience to drive a safe and long lasting solution? Does the concrete and steel used follow good standards? This means that it may…

I'm assuming it's regulation, cause I'm super happy the utility poles around me don't look like this [0]. There's even comments about how people die because nothing is grounded there. [0]: https://old.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/gn16k8/cable_managemen...

I'm not an expert, but those look to my eyes like data (cable/phone) wires, not power distribution. A crazy rats' nest, but probably not dangerous?

I'm curious to know how it got to that point. Do they have 3 or 4 competing cable tv services in the neighborhood, all with their own infrastructure?

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#156

I heard this anecdote in India, and I'm not sure if it is apocryphal. There was a small airline flying turboprops to service a Himalayan region. Someone asked whether it was safe to fly these planes and the response was as hilarious as it was scary: "Yes, sir. It is very safe. They used to have 11 planes, 10 of them crashed and now they are really really careful with the one left" :)

Reminds me of a story I was told while learning how to design experiments and a/b tests.

In World War 2, some company was experimenting with the kind of material to use for combat aircraft wings. When they did their initial trials, they saw that the planes coated with the new material came back with more bullet holes. Off hand, that would seem like a reason to dismiss the new material. But, digging into the data, they realized that planes with the old material were actually crashing when they got their first bullet hole and the planes that were making it back, even with bullet holes, all were coated with the new material.

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#157

I don't think most people appreciate the level of regulation that ensures safety and quality of life in Western countries. Go to many countries outside of that spectrum and you may still see beautiful architecture and more. Now did the team that worked on that project have the necessary experience to drive a safe and long lasting solution? Does the concrete and steel used follow good standards? This means that it may…

>Go to many countries outside of that spectrum and you may still see beautiful architecture and more. Now did the team that worked on that project have the necessary experience to drive a safe and long lasting solution? Does the concrete and steel used follow good standards? This means that it may not have critical structural problems today, but in 5 to 10 years, you may have to reconsider your infrastructure. By doi…

Except for all the people that die when it falls down...

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#158
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh, this reminds me of a flight my friend took from a small island country. The side of the plane proudly displayed in big letters "Fly is Safe". I don't think he was reassured... edit: whoops, can't spell "plane" this morning

If it was the plain it was ok

The plane in Spain falls mainly in the rain.

Re: Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says

#160

I heard this anecdote in India, and I'm not sure if it is apocryphal. There was a small airline flying turboprops to service a Himalayan region. Someone asked whether it was safe to fly these planes and the response was as hilarious as it was scary: "Yes, sir. It is very safe. They used to have 11 planes, 10 of them crashed and now they are really really careful with the one left" :)

Reminds me of a story I was told while learning how to design experiments and a/b tests. In World War 2, some company was experimenting with the kind of material to use for combat aircraft wings. When they did their initial trials, they saw that the planes coated with the new material came back with more bullet holes. Off hand, that would seem like a reason to dismiss the new material. But, digging into the data, the…

I think that account gets it a bit wrong. Here's what Wikipedia has:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias#In_the_milit...

> During World War II, the statistician Abraham Wald took survivorship bias into his calculations when considering how to minimize bomber losses to enemy fire.[10] The Statistical Research Group (SRG) at Columbia University, which Wald was a part of, examined the damage done to aircraft that had returned from missions and recommended adding armor to the areas that showed the least damage, based on his reasoning. This contradicted the US military’s conclusions that the most-hit areas of the plane needed additional armor.[11][12][13] Wald noted that the military only considered the aircraft that had survived their missions; any bombers which had been shot down or otherwise lost had logically also been rendered unavailable for assessment. The holes in the returning aircraft, then, represented areas where a bomber could take damage and still return home safely. Thus, Wald proposed that the Navy reinforce areas where the returning aircraft were unscathed[10]:88, since those were the areas that, if hit, would cause the plane to be lost. His work is considered seminal in the then-nascent discipline of operational research.[14]

Post reply on HN