Mental Health in Aviation: A Turbulent Ride

The conversation none of us want to have, but it’s worth having.

In recent years, the discourse around mental health has gained significant traction around the world. As a society we are rapidly arriving at a place where it is “normal” to acknowledge mental health issues, and in doing so, we are creating an environment where people feel empowered to seek treatment. In fact, the percentage of adults who have sought mental health counseling has doubled in the past 20 years.

To most, this statistic will not be surprising. Many of us know someone who actively attends therapy or who has been prescribed some form of treatment for their mental health needs (and sometimes that someone is ourselves). Regardless of what the case may be, mental health challenges are hardly unusual, nor is deciding to do something about it.

However, something that is unusual is a profession where simply acknowledging a mental health struggle could be the first step toward being out of a job.

For most of us civilians, this is a preposterous idea. The Americans with Disabilities Act specifically protects individuals who have been diagnosed with anxiety, depression, or a litany of other mental health conditions. If an individual’s disability does not present itself as an impairment to his/her job-related work, then legally it’s not a problem.

However, for professional pilots, the possibility that their mental health condition might be a problem is enough to ensure that it is one.

The explanation for this situation can be somewhat crudely summarized with a single question: Would you feel comfortable being a passenger flying on a commercial flight piloted by someone who was diagnosed with depression and who had experienced suicidal thoughts?

If you are like me, you might have a difficult time answering with a firm “yes” or “no.”

If the pilot had expressed suicidal thoughts within the prior twenty-four hours, I will be the first to admit that I would feel extremely uncomfortable. That would hold true if it had been a week, and probably even a month or two.

The reason for this concern is that, despite the countless innovations that have drastically improved the safety of air travel, there are few safety provisions that could override a pilot who has intentions of using an aircraft to end his own life (and the lives of those onboard). The main line of defense in such a scenario is the co-pilot; if the co-pilot is unable to overcome the other pilot’s disastrous efforts, things would quickly become dire. 

But what if it had been six months since the pilot experienced a particularly bad bout of depression? A year? What if those suicidal thoughts were directly associated with a medication that the pilot had started but was no longer taking? Or what if he/she had been grieving from the loss of a loved one?

Pilots are human too, and sometimes it’s easy to forget that. They go through ups and downs, and they are not immune from some of the more tumultuous feelings and thoughts that all of us may be exposed to from time to time. Expecting them not to experience such things is simply unrealistic. Asking them to keep those feelings to themselves and not seek help is detrimental to all involved.

But pilots have a very important role in the aviation world. The men and women up front are placed in charge of safely transporting up to hundreds of people from place to place in a demanding environment. When they’re up in the air, much of the passengers’ safety relies on the pilots’ ability to get the job done mentally and physically. It’s not unreasonable for the FAA, the airline operators, and the passengers to want the individuals placed in that position to be in a reasonably solid state to complete the task.

Between the internal complexities of the human mind and the countless external pressures on the aviation industry, this is an issue heavily clouded by variables worthy of consideration. The FAA and NTSB have been placed under the spotlight in recent months to try to take a better swipe at handling the situation. In subsequent posts, we’ll take a deeper look at both sides of the issue, and attempt to come to a considerate recommendation for current policy revisions by the conclusion of this series.

May 2024 © Facer Insurance Agency, Inc. Requests to reproduce or redistribute our material may be sent to facerinsurance@gmail.com and may be approved only upon condition of credit to us.