Aircraft Maintenance Technology - 63

PROFESSIONALISM

Owning Your Impact
The call for leadership in business and general aviation has never been stronger.
Good leadership in crisis or at pivotal moments is important. Great leadership
engenders a culture of individual ownership and accountability and makes a
world of difference.

By Lisa Archambeau

Lisa Archambeau,
Vice President,
Facilitator & Strategist,
ServiceElements
International, Inc.

Never
underestimate
the power
of leaders to
transform
culture and
direct results.

On December 6, 1978 United Airlines Flight 173
- a DC8 inbound from Denver, CO to Portland, OR
- crashed in a suburban Portland neighborhood,
approximately seven miles southeast of Portland
International Airport. The Captain was one of the
airline's most senior pilots with over 27,000 hours,
including 5,500 in the DC-8. The First Officer and
the Flight Engineer had been with United for over a
decade and - between them - had over 2,500 hours
of experience in the DC-8.
The crew had felt abnormal vibrations and yawing when extending the landing gear upon approach
into Portland. Additionally, the landing gear indicator,
erroneously, indicated that the gear had not extended
completely. They advised Portland and flew in a holding pattern for approximately an hour trying to diagnose the gear problem. Recordings indicate that the
FO and Engineer at separate times raised concerns
of remaining fuel, yet the Captain remained fixated
on the landing gear issue and insisted they continue
the applicable checks.
When they lost the number one and two engines,
they declared an emergency, but lost the flight to fuel
starvation, resulting in the crash which claimed 10
lives, one of whom was the Flight Engineer.
On June 6, 1944 (D-day), Allied forces took five
beach landing areas of Normandy, France in Operation
Overlord during World War II. Utah Beach (the westernmost) was one of two American landing zones and
was taken with relatively few casualties - especially
significant given that the other American landing at
Omaha Beach was the bloodiest of all five.
In large part, the unanticipated ease of taking Utah
Beach was due to the absence of leadership on the
part of the German military. The Germans did not
counterattack the seaborne assault, nor did they put
up a strong inland defense at any of the beach's four
causeways.
While the German Forces in Normandy had spent
years building coastal barriers, employing such
devices as the asparagus - long, speared logs buried at angles - and other weapons along the coast to

destroy incoming vessels, these were not fortified at
Utah Beach, whose primary defense was natural: the
ability to flood surrounding lowlands with the control
of a lock at the mouth of the nearby Douve River. The
Germans opened the lock at high tide to flood the area
and then closed it to keep the water in. The German
defense at Utah was to be ground troops - namely,
the 709th Infantry Division.

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However on June 5th, the Division's leader, General
Karl-Wilhelm von Schlieben, was away from his troops
and returning when his vehicle broke down, prior to
the first paratrooper landings shortly after midnight,
June 6th. The German army was so hierarchical that
the troops were "lost" and chaotic, unable to selforganize without him. Additionally, the 709th was
comprised largely of multi-national units of Soviet
prisoners-of-war and conscripts from Poland and
other occupied countries who had chosen to fight
in the German Army rather than become prisoners.
Having no leader and motivations of self-survival versus advancing Germany's cause, they were no match
for the courageous and resolute Americans who met
their primary objective of securing the beachhead.
Leaders, own your impact and guide your team
members to do the same. Never underestimate the
power of leaders to transform culture and direct results
- either intentionally or unintentionally.

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Aircraft Maintenance Technology

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