Dancing On Air

Growing up as children of an Airline employee indeed had its advantages. My brother and I were able to travel, with our parents of course, to places all over the world. I can even recall our trip to Mozambique in 1976, less than a year after the country gained its independence from Portugal. That trip was like an episode of the Amazing Race. We flew on United from San Francisco to Seattle, then Pan Am from Seattle to London Heathrow for a two day layover. Back at again, flying to Nairobi then picking up East African Airways for our flight to Maputo which stopped, it seemed, at every major city along the way. All in all, we were on the plane for over twenty-four hours getting to our destination. Looking back, what strikes me is the one common factor on each flight taken during that trip and every other flight I have been on; the Safety Demonstration.

As an “Employee Dependent” and later an Airline Employee, we are “encouraged” to remain attentive during the Safety Demonstration even going so far as taking out the safety pamphlet and reading along (maybe in hopes of inspiring others to do likewise). Now, after 46 years of flying commercially (I was six months of age my first flight), paying close attention to the pre-flight safety briefing and reading the pamphlet is second nature to me. I could very easily recite the briefing purely from memory but, I am still conditioned to listening and reading like it was my very first flight. Granted, some of the methods used by airlines to capture the attention of passengers are less than perfect but it’s the message that is of the utmost importance.

On any given commercial flight there are but a fraction of flight staff, Flight Attendants & Pilots, in comparison to the number of passengers. This means, in the absolute worse cases, the crew will not be able to personally rescue you. This is probably the main reason why airlines are required to give the safety demonstrations. To give the passengers the information they may need to save themselves and others.

Fatalities from catastrophic airline accidents range from the force of initial impact, blunt force trauma, and loss of blood all the way up to smoke inhalation. Surviving the initial impact does not mean you are out of danger. Getting out and clear of the aircraft is what saves you. Too many post crash investigations have revealed passengers surviving the initial crash only to perish soon after due to other un-natural causes. The deaths caused by the Ethiopian Airlines crash in the Indian Ocean (hijacked flight-pilot forced to ditch due to lack of fuel) were not all due to impact. Many passengers drowned trying to unbuckle their seat belts while others were unable exit the plane because they had inflated their life vest even before the aircraft hit the water (you’re not suppose to inflate the vest until you are out of the aircraft). Without going too much into gory details, my point is this… Some accidents are survivable IF you have and are able to retain the information provided in the safety demonstration and have read the safety pamphlet PRIOR to take-off. So it is extremely important that every passenger pays close attention during the safety demonstration and doubly important for those passengers seated in “Exit Rows”.

An Airline in the Philippines called Cebu Pacific Airways, a low-cost carrier that successfully branched into the South East Asian Market (and beyond), has come under scrutiny lately for its “creative” method of delivering their flight safety demonstrations (click for video here). I am told this “creative” method is in addition to the normal boring safety routine but, be that as it may, it has definitely raised some eyebrows here and around the world! To put it simply, the flight attendants have choreographed a dance routine with music to highlight the many safety features of the given aircraft. It’s really entertaining but, more importantly, the flight attendants have the full and undivided attention of the passengers. I’ve studied the video several times and can’t find one passenger with his or her head down. Everyone is looking up at the attendants doing the Safety Dance (Yeah, I’m old enough to remember when that song came out. I bet you’re humming that song right now in your head too). That attention may help in saving lives during an emergency and that is what counts! Don’t worry about how the message was delivered, but moreover, how much of the message is RETAINED.

I’m actually hoping more airlines will adopt this method, so long as it is in addition to the normal briefing. My vote would be for Singapore Airlines or even Thai. Sorry United. Employee seniority notwithstanding, aging flight attendants dancing through the isles is not the way I want to begin my trans-oceanic flight, thank you very much.

In all seriousness though, I must give High-Fives to Cebu Pacific and their imaginative Flight Attendants for taking something most passengers ignore and turning it into a site they can’t take their eyes off of. Retaining the information provided during the safety demonstration WILL save your life! Any method used to gain and hold the attention of the flying public during this briefing is well worth the effort. High-Fives to Cebu Pacific!

Jetlag807

Missing The Train

This may come as some surprise to many of you but it’s the honest truth… I was not going to write anything remotely connected to the Manila Bus Hostage crisis and the subsequent fiasco also known as the Hostage Rescue. Watching the Incident Investigation and Review Committee (IIRC) hearings a few weeks ago literally wore me out. I actually thought, after viewing the tragic events unfold live on TV during the crisis, that it couldn’t be any worse. I was wrong. The IIRC hearings uncovered a complete lack of operational understanding, crisis management, tactics, basic police work and common sense. From the very start, when the Vice President of the tour company called the Philippine National Police to report the hostage situation, the dominoes, representing one bad decision after another, began to fall. I could spend pages of this blog just reviewing how the decisions of those involved started an unavoidable chain reaction leading to the deaths of seven hostages but let’s leave that for another post.

What I would like to discuss is training and team work. High School football (American Football not Soccer) teams practice five to six times per week. In fact, prior to the start of the school year, there’s even Spring Training which is the lead up to regular football practice. During Spring Training (held Monday through Friday from morning to evening) the players run as a team, lift weights as a team, go through the “plays” as a team, run some more as a team work on techniques as a team and run some more as a team. All of this works to condition their bodies in preparation for the football season and, of course, it builds Team Work. Once the school year begins, they practice Monday through Friday after school and “double-sessions” on Saturdays. Practice, practice, practice! Train, train train!

Recently, the Philippine National Police National Capital Regions SWAT Teams took part in skills & fitness tests (article in the PhilippineStar). Since the tragic end to the bus hostage crisis, every police department inside Metro Manila, excluding the Western Police District, showcased their perspective SWAT Teams in an effort to prove incompetence is not all encompassing so… One would think the results of the test would show the same level of skill and performance as seen during any of these SWAT Demonstrations. Here are the actual results…

Out of the 418 active SWAT members in Metro Manila, 42 (FORTY-TWO) passed the Skills and Physical Fitness Tests of the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO). That’s just Metro Manila where they have five Police Districts (Quezon City, Northern, Eastern, Western and Northern) and in each district are Police Stations and Sub-Stations. So, to make sure we all understand the situation, Metro Manila now has 42 (FORTY-TWO) active SWAT members. It gets worse…

Out of the 418 so-called SWAT members, a mere 56 (FIFTY-SIX) actually took the physical fitness test. 362 so-called SWAT members were unable to or were excused from taking this portion of the testing due to, get this, “medical problems and old age”. Now, common sense dictates that if you are too old, too sick, too fat or all of the above, your status as a SWAT Operator should come under some sort of scrutiny.

Oh but it gets worse… “At least 324 or 77.5 percent of those tested lacked fundamental SWAT skills while 93 others failed to complete and pass the individual skills tests” according to Metro Manila Police Chief Leocadio Santiago. This is simply and completely unacceptable by all logical reason.

However, there are certain personalities in Law Enforcement (in the Philippines) and Government who have quickly pointed out the failures are not theirs but that of the foreign agencies who have trained the members of SWAT in the past. These officials, so quick to point the finger elsewhere, contend that since Philippine SWAT Team Members (some of them) received training from LAPD SWAT, FBI, DEA etc, then said training should have shown through during the botched hostage rescue attempt ergo, SWAT performance was (is) below standards because the training they received from “the foreigners” was below standard. Makes perfect sense until you realize that foreign training of this kind takes place every few years at best. You know what? I’ll come back to this in a moment. Bear with me…

As I pointed out earlier, Football (as with any team sport) takes practice and team work. No one player on the field can do it alone. In my high school days we had a running back named Steve. This guy was awesome! Natural speed and ability that got him all the way into the Pros! But here’s the thing. Steve, with all his talent and skill, could not win any game by himself. It takes an entire team that has practiced together for months on end, day in and day out, to bring home the win. Now, Steve may have attended Football Camp during the summer months and benefited from professional players and coaches to increase his skill but, that being said, it is certain that those skills would be passed on to his team mates back at school.

So, here we are… The fact is members of the Philippine SWAT Teams may go abroad (or even here) to receive training from any number of Law Enforcement Agencies who specialize in Weapons & Tactics each year. If they don’t bring that home and practice those skills every day, the skills are lost. A perfect example is the testimony of three SWAT operators who took part in the bus hostage rescue. Other than the day of the event when, that afternoon, they performed “dry-runs” on a bus, the last time any of them had trained (either as a team or simply at the firing range) was one year ago! Even if the entire Manila Police District SWAT Team attended a four week training course from the US Federal Bureau of Investigations Hostage Rescue Team earlier in the year, the skill is lost without RECURRENT training. They might as well sit back and prey for a peaceful outcome because to send them into the game would be a huge mistake, which it was.

Now we find out the awful truth that Metro Manila only has 42 qualified members of their Special Weapons and Tactics Teams to cover 17 (SEVENTEEN) separate cities therein due to old age, poor health, poor physical shape and, yes, lack of training.

Part Two of this piece coming soon… Stay tuned.

The Bottom Up

28 AUG 2010

The Bottom Up

Here we are a mere four days after the fiasco that was the Manila Bus Hostage Siege and still, the tragic comedy continues. Police and public officials from the bottom up have been scrambling like mice to get “their versions” of the story out to the press but, as expected, the lies show through as clear as black ink on a white linen sheet. It’s really no different, in their eyes, from any other foul up. They know the population as a whole will believe these absurdities and go on happily with their lives. However, what makes this situation far different from those of the past, and there are many, is the fact that China (especially Hong Kong) is watching this show very closely; and what a show it has been.

From the time Mendoza’s brother was allowed to participate in the negotiations until this very second, 28 AUG 2010 at 09:40HRS, each and every person, police and public official involved has made and continues to make serious lapses in judgment which only serve to make the situation much worse. The latest being the planning session going on right now to explain how anyone in government could even consider placing the Philippine Flag on the coffin of Rolando Mendoza. Thankfully, the Chinese government aware of the latest “SNAFU” complained saying (in so many words);

“Draping his coffin with the Philippine flag is a smear on the dignity of the flag”

Doesn’t it bother anyone (in the Philippines) that, until the Chinese complaint, nobody thought twice about it? Much like the uproar in response to President Aquino’s apparent “smiling” during the tour of the crime scene and subsequent press conference, Chinese officials are not at all pleased with the way things are turning out. Considering the amount of tourist arrivals, trade and labor migration that exists between Manila and Hong Kong, the Philippines should think twice (even three or four times) before they say or do anything related to the Hostage Crisis from this point onward. Sadly, those of us familiar with Philippine Damage Control know the level of stupidity is in its infancy and, given time, must mature into full-grown insanity.

Webster’s Dictionary defines INSANITY as (among other things) “something utterly foolish or unreasonable”. That would be my take on Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim’s statement, “I ordered them to handcuff him, but there was no order to make an arrest.”

Until that insane statement, given the obvious implications which kick-started the mayhem, I had placed Vice President (then Makati mayor) Binay at the top of the all time list of stupid comments made by public officials when he said…

“I didn’t lie… I just kept the truth to myself.”

Mayor Lim, not taking into account the massive LIVE TV coverage of the event and the events occurring in and around the Headquarters of the Manila Police District, ordered the apprehension (arrest) of Gregorio Mendoza, the gunman’s brother (the same brother who was allowed to assist in negotiations earlier in the day) causing said gunman to respond violently. Of course, no one would have been made aware of this had it not been for the grilling questions asked of police officials during the Senate Hearings on the subject. Lim, now backed into a corner, had two choices; accept and admit to his mistake or think up something “really stupid” to explain what he really meant. Well, we all know which route he took.

From the bottom to the very top, all persons involved in this circus, except for the gunman himself, continue to fail miserably. I give exception to the gunman simply because, out of this whole affair, he is the one person who succeeded in his goals.

1. He brought international attention to his grievance
2. He held the Police at bay for an extended period
3. Once his demands weren’t met, he carried out his threats unobstructed

On the other side of the fence, however, the score card is completely different.

1. The OICs refusal to use the Special Action Force Team – FAILURE
2. The SWAT Team – FAILURE
3. PNP Crowd Control – FAILURE
4. Mayor Lim (and Office of) – FAILURE
5. Tourism Secretary’s comments saying “crisis won’t effect tourism” – FAILURE
6. President Aquino smiling at the crime scene & press conference – FAILURE
7. President Aquino’s explanation for smiling – FAILURE
8. Police posing for souvenir pictures in front of the bus - FAILURE
9. Decision to drape Philippine Flag on gunman’s coffin – FAILURE

The list of FAILURES will, no doubt, continue to grow in size, magnitude and stupidity…

JETLAG807

24 AUG 2010
Bang to Breach

I have a few things to say and will try my best to keep my anger & disgust to a minimum. The hostage situation, in and of itself, was unfortunate to say the least. A disgruntled employee lashing out using means of terror and violence to bring the point home is not something limited only to the Philippines. In the US, we have a term called “going postal” which originated after several US Postal workers (some still employed, some discharged) went on murderous rampages of revenge against their co-workers and the public at large. So, this part of the situation is NOT limited to the Philippines at all. There is no difference between the hostage taker last night and anybody “going postal” anywhere in the world. It happens. The differences exist within the procedures of the law enforcement agencies tasked to bring and end to the situation.

Not having the proper equipment, not being trained enough, not being smart enough or not being brave enough is NO EXCUSE! Forty-five minuets from “Bang to Breach” is inexcusable! The spokesman from the NCRPO said the police officers had to consider “the safety of the hostages” when asked why the breach took so long. That BS!!! Once the shots are fired by the hostage taker, IT’S ON (The guy is SHOOTING! What do you think he is SHOOTING at?)! You breach and pray you can take out the bad guy BEFORE he kills (more) hostages! You DON’T wait outside the bus for forty-five minuets while shots inside the bus are continuing! You crack a window, or find one with a big enough hole, toss in a few flash-bangs and MOVE IN! Hostage Rescue 101 people! Instead, the police of the MPD made themselves look like absolute fools to the Philippines and the rest of the world while they struggled to get inside the bus…

It would be funny if it weren’t for the tragic loss of life. They tried entering from the front passenger door with no success. Why? Because they didn’t know what they were doing! They tried smashing the front window to gain entry. Why? Actually, that part boggles my mind. That is the one area of the bus that the gunman has complete field of vision and line of fire. Why would anyone in their right mind even think of attempting a breach there? Then they tried the back window. Another tragic comedy caught on live TV for future episodes of World Stupidest Police Moments. How long did it take them to realize that there was an EMERGENCY EXIT door towards the rear of the bus? This wasn’t a “crack team” of hardened professionals. This was a bunch of clowns stumbling through a situation that was NEVER in their control from start to finish! No wonder the Chinese Government issued the Travel Warning so quickly!

And don’t start all that mess about; “well maybe we should ban all OFWs from Hong Kong”! The Chinese Government, families of the victims and the entire world watched as the situation spiraled out of control due to the stupidity of the MPD! Did the PNP pause and think that maybe the gunman was watching the news on the bus and would possibly become agitated at the sight of his brother being hauled off? Truth be told, that’s probably what turned the whole affair from manageable to a complete mess!

In the “real world” after a circus such as this, the Officer in Charge would (be forced to) resign. The OICs boss would (be forced to) resign. The police district in question would be investigated by the Feds and, most likely, be taken under government receivership. Here in the Philippines things go “a little” different. The OIC will make stupid excuses. The OICs boss will make stupid excuses. The police district in question will make stupid excuses. The people of the Philippines will accept these stupid excuses and wonder why the rest of the world making such a fuss.

Oh yes; One more thing. The footage of President Aquino smiling like a kid seeing his first peep-show as he was escorted through the scene of the crime last night was appalling! But I’m sure there will be plenty of excuses posted about that!

JETLAG807