Whip Leadership In Plane Crash

Plane crash, a simple phrase that invokes fear in the thoughts and hearts of many, including me. Before I start my analysis, I want to say that this movie was very hard for me to get through, as I was on an airplane when an engine exploded mid flight. While my experience wasn’t as lethal (luckily no one died) as the one in flight, I have PTSD from my experience, and watching this movie brought a lot back to me. I have a hard time flying now because of that incident, but at the same time I think my experience will help make a much better analysis of this movie. I think ethics in this movie are tough to define though, because of my personal experience. I can see both sides of the story, and will address my feelings on this later on. Whip Leadership
In what ways does Whip demonstrate leadership? This is our first question we have been asked to answer. Even though Whip was “under the influence”, during the accident he was whole heartedly a leader. He took his role very serious when danger started being a possibility, and knew exactly what to do, in order to land that plane the way he did. He shows different roles of leadership throughout the movie including when he was trying to get rid of all the alcohol. I had a strong alcohol addict in my family (luckily he is clean now), but from my past experiences with him, I know alcohol is not just something you “give up”. Addiction is a very real disease and we see Whip struggle with trying to overcome it, even though he doesn’t exactly succeed. Finally, Whip shows immense leadership when it comes to the NSTB hearing. He ends up taking responsibility for the empty vodka bottles on the plane, and not blaming Katerina (the flight attendant) who died on the accident, and couldn’t defend herself. Whip knew that if he did this and admitted to drinking while flying, that he would go to prison and would probably never fly again, yet he was honest and up front at the hearing. All of these show Whip portraying leadership. Addiction Impact How does Whip’s addiction impact his ability to make ethical decisions? His addiction is constantly impacting his ability to make ethical decisions, but it doesn’t impact his ability to make the biggest decision that matters in this movie. His addiction is always thirsting for alcohol, and that enables him to want to (need to) drink while flying the plane. We see throughout the movie, where Whip tries to stop drinking. Once he gets out of the hospital he tosses all his alcohol out, dumps it down the drain, and trashes it. He knows that he needs to stop, but his addiction to drugs and drinking is too strong. His addiction causes him to always need to drink or get “high”, because his body requires it. This enables him to drink and use drugs the night before (and possibly morning of) the hearing, in fact he is “plastered” during the hearing, as he quotes to the committee, “I’m drunk right now, because I’m an alcoholic”. I think it is also his addiction which ended the relationship with his ex-wife and son originally, as well as the relationship with Nicole. His ethical decisions are always being called into question, whether it be relationships, or just basic decisions. He drinks either before or during all the important meetings with Hugh the lawyer, and his friend Charlie Anderson, regarding his future and the investigation. It also doesn’t help that his friend (I think his name is Harling?) is always supplying him with drugs and alcoholic beverages. Ethical Handling
Do the attorney and union representative display ethical behavior in their handling of the situation? Ok, this where things start to get hazy for me personally. I’m going to sort of re-enact my situation. Let’s say that on my flight our pilot was drinking (this was not the case, as our pilot was on top of the situation, before it got bad). Personally I would be very upset if an attorney for him “killed” the toxicology report. This was not an ethically wise decision at all, even though I know he wanted to protect him, this was not right. I know in this movie (much like our accident), the problem was not “pilot error”, but even if that was true I personally would still want the toxicology report to be valid. I also believe that blaming the accident as an “act of God” is very irresponsible of both the NTSB and the lawyer. The thing that bothers me about this, is that in the end it was someone’s fault (the airline company for not doing the inspection). The thing I have learned about plane accidents is that the NTSB would rather not blame the airlines if possible. The airline company is this movie clearly was the reason for the failure of the elevator in the plane, not an “act of God”. I am saying this and it has nothing to do with my religious views, it has to do with the fact that my experience also had a missed inspection and that upsets me that airlines skip their inspections. I whole heartedly believe the reason we were saved that day was the “act of God”, not the accident, and I’m sure the people who experienced this in the movie (as characters, not as actual actors) thought that it was God that saved them, and gave them the pilot that knew how to deal with said accident. Both the NTSB and the lawyer in this movie both don’t have the best ethical decisions.
Ethical Dilemmas
What ethical dilemmas/decisions is Whip faced with making?
Whip faces a plethora of ethical decisions to make. Drinking is a decision and a dilemma that Whip faces throughout the movie, and constantly has to make an ethical decision whether to drink or not. At the start of his recovery from the crash, we see him dump out and trash all his alcohol at his farm house he is staying at (I’m guessing to be away from the news and paparazzi). He does really well until he starts meeting with attorney and Charlie Anderson and the investigation starts going. As the investigation gets tougher for Whip we see him start to drink more and more, leading to the blackout from the minibar and drugs, at the hotel. We also see Whip make an unethical decision when he goes to visit his ex-wife and son. He does not handle himself well and says hurtful things to them, and accuses his son of just wanting money from him. Personally I think every time he feels the need to contact his druggie friend (Harling?) is an unethical decision, because he just makes the addiction worst. I feel like most of his unethical decisions though come from the drinking and the drugs in fact in the movie Whip states, “I choose to drink! And I blame myself! I am happy to! And you know why? Because I choose to drink! I got an ex-wife and a son I never talk to! And you know why? Because I choose to drink”. This just shows that Whip knows his problem is his drinking. We also see Whip buy alcohol both at a bar and a store, he
just can’t stop it. Whip makes good ethical decisions though as well. From the get-go with the attorney (for the most part) he is up front about drinking, he is honest about it when they were inspecting the plane in the hangar (saying there should be 3 vodka bottles, not two), and most importantly, completely honest when it comes to the end of movie, when he is in the hearing and takes responsibility for drinking on the plane, and not blaming it on Katerina. In the end he makes an ethical decision to be honest in the end, even though it costs him his career and his freedom.
Good Decisions? Does Whip make good decisions regarding the ethical challenges that he is faced with?
Let’s start at he beginning when the plane starts to go down, as this is where I think “good decision” is tough to say. At the start of my paper I said that ethics are hard to define, when it comes to this. Whip was not impaired by the alcohol or drugs while making that landing at all. His head was in the right place, and knew all the technicalities and what to do in that emergency situation. He remained calm and collected and didn’t panic, and looked and acted if he had the whole thing under control. Yes, he did drink but we know from the quote from Hugh Lang, “The FAA and the NTSB took 10 pilots, placed them in simulators, recreated the events that led to this plane falling out of the sky. Do you know how many of them were able to safely land the planes? Not one. Every pilot crashed the aircraft, killed everybody on board. You were the only one who could do it!” Personally, I would much rather have Whip (who did consume drinks and drugs), then have one of those 10 pilots who killed everyone in the simulator, who were not under the influence. I think in an emergency situation like that, ethics are still important, but should not be overshadowed by the fact that he turned an emergency into a miracle for the most part. On the other side though, I can see where it is ethically wrong to drink and fly, much like drunk driving. I just think personally for me, I would have just been grateful to
be on the ground (and hopefully be) alive, I wouldn’t call ethics into question, just like I didn’t with my situation. Whip was truly the only one that could fly that plane. Whip has another good and strong decision he makes, and that is as stated above, at the end of the movie. Whip knew from the internal and mechanical investigation (and from the start), that the problem was the broken plane, and not the intoxication. I still don’t think what his team did was right, and should have left the toxicology report alone and valid, but that wasn’t the cause of the accident. The flight crew (that survived) after the accident knew about the intoxication and being high, as Margaret said she wouldn’t lie for him, and Evans even says that he smelled like drugs and alcohol, but it seems in the end they backed him up. Whip at the Hearing is listening to the NTSB’s report about the incident and the mechanical failure of the elevator, and then they start talking about the empty vodka bottles. Ellen Block ends up blaming the bottles on Trina, which upsets Whip that his girlfriend (I could use another set of words, but I’m not) who died during the crash. This is where he takes a stand, and admits to drinking while flying. This is a huge ethical decision Whip makes and is honest to not only the committee, but himself. At the very end of the movie we see Whip in prison, and we learned that he isn’t going to be able to fly anymore. There is a quote that nicely ties the end movie together, “I could not tell one more lie. And maybe I'm a sucker. Because if had just told one more lie? I could have walked away from that whole mess and kept my wings and my false sense of pride and most importantly I would have avoided being locked up here with all of you nice folks for the last 13 months”. At the end we learn that Whip is starting to understand what was really going on with his life as he even tells the men in prison with him, that he “betrayed the public trust”. I think in the end Whip did learn that ethical decisions can be hard to make, but it’s always wise to be honest and up-front. This movie made me appreciate life a lot more, and when I was doing some digging on the background of this movie, I found out that this was loosely based on a real airline accident, in which the plane had the same mechanical failure. The pilot of that airline did the same thing Whip did by turning the plane upside down, but in the case of that accident no one survived. After reading this I am glad that this movie was assigned to us, because it reminded me just how precious life is, and how quickly it can be taken away.