National Aviation Day
August 19th is National Aviation Day because it is Orville Wright’s birthday, the first person to ever fly a plane. The flight lasted about twelve seconds, a far cry from the longest commercial flight you can take today at nearly nineteen hours. Orville was still alive when FDR established National Aviation Day as a day to celebrate the importance of aviation, and U.S. Presidents ever since have recognized the holiday.
Aviation and Root Cause Analysis have had a long standing relationship based around the need for quick decision making and impromptu excellence. Mistakes and risks are a given in an environment largely at the mercy of the natural world, so preemptive RCA is necessary to protect aviators from these resulting in disaster. But how can we protect people from bad decision making?
Aviation and RCA
When operating an aircraft, danger abounds. Operating systems are highly technical and there are many opportunities for mistakes to occur. So how do aviators develop the skills necessary for a high reliability organization?
TapRooT® RCA has helped companies from Alaska Airlines to Air Canada access the expertise necessary to streamline and find success in a dangerous field. The TapRooT® System focuses on finding the truth behind the disaster and keeping blame out of the equation. In the air, mistakes risk lives, and operators must be trained with extra precision to prepare for the consequences of every action.
At this year’s Global TapRooT® Summit, two excellent aviators and authors will be speaking on their experiences in this industry. Here’s what you can expect from their sessions:
Kim “K.C.” Campbell
Kim “K.C.” Campbell is one of our 2025 keynote speakers. A female fighter pilot, she was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for Heroism after successfully manually flying and landing a battle damaged airplane after a mission over Iraq. After this experience, she wrote the bestselling leadership book Flying in the Face of Fear: A Fighter Pilot’s Lessons on Leading with Courage about the importance of keeping your cool in the midst of disaster to persevere towards safety.
Her speech will focus on the importance of being decisive, adaptable, and calm in the face of pressure, as well as creating a “wingman culture” of trust within the workplace. During a difficult situation, bravery is important, but it isn’t the only thing necessary for success. Campbell will also essential nature of good teamwork, communication skills, and humility to creating a high reliability workplace.
Erika Armstrong
Erika Armstrong will be leading a session called “Training Beyond the Mistake.” She is the author of A Chick in the Cockpit: My Life Up in the Air, and an aviation professor at MSU Denver. She has flown twenty eight different types of aircraft and has been an international corporate, airline, Red Cross, and 24-hour air ambulance pilot/captain. She also owns an aviation consulting business and is an expert witness for high profile aviation cases.
Her session will focus on the inevitability of the unexpected when working in dangerous fields, and what training can do to make a difference when the unexpected happens. While employees are trained to do things right the first time, they may not know what to do when something goes wrong. Training employees to react to mistakes well and recover with excellence can make a significant difference in the amount of incidents a workplace experiences.
Summit
Both Erika Armstrong and KC Campbell will be present at this year’s Summit, Armstrong for her session on Training Beyond the Mistake and Campbell as one of our keynote speakers. To hear them speak on their inspiring experiences and the impact of RCA on aviation, learn more about our 2025 Global TapRooT® Summit here.
