Stephanie Cosme, 32, was killed last year when she inadvertently walked into the rotating propeller of an aircraft in California

US air force civilian contractor had become disoriented recording data at an airport in California last year when she walked into a jet’s rotating propeller and was killed, officials said on Friday.

In a statement outlining the findings of a report into the contractor’s death, the air force materiel command said that 32-year-old Stephanie Cosme was mortally injured on 7 September when she inadvertently walked into the rotating propeller of an MQ-9A that was parked at Gray Butte airfield.

  • EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    12
    arrow-down
    42
    ·
    7 months ago

    Why was a civilian allowed to record around active jets and expected to safely lead themselves? Pokémon go had to warn people not to walk off cliffs and into traffic, but the Air Force is accessory to this without having someone to watch her movements and nothing?

    • bhmnscmm@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      42
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      7 months ago

      Her job was to be on active tarmac near running aircraft. She isn’t some random person that shouldn’t have been there.

      It appears she wasn’t paying attention and people tried to stop her from walking into the propeller.

      “Others began shouting and waving to get [Cosme’s] attention as well,” the report said. It added: “Without looking up to determine her position relative to the aircraft, [Cosme] proceeded to walk directly into the propeller … sustaining fatal injuries.”

      • John_McMurray@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        6
        ·
        7 months ago

        Probably an accident due to familiarity. Some guy off the street is gonna pay attention around a running airplane, someone been working around them for years might just get distracted.

        • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          7 months ago

          Over-familiarity and comfort is a major cause of accidents.

          I do a lot of woodworking, and the most dangerous things are repetitive tasks. Make the same simple cut 200 times in a row on a table saw, and it gets more dangerous as you get in the groove, not less.

      • eardon@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        7 months ago

        “We’ve investigated ourselves and found no wrongdoing.”

        I guess because it’s not cops and because the snowball effect has taken hold, this rhetoric suddenly doesn’t apply.

        • leftzero@lemmynsfw.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          6
          ·
          edit-2
          7 months ago

          They did find wrongdoing on their part: they didn’t train or instruct her adequately. It’s just that her becoming disorientated was also a contributing factor.

          Cops would have just called her an immigrant terrorist or something, and planted drugs on her remains.

    • tal@lemmy.today
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      22
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      7 months ago

      Why was a civilian allowed to record around active jets and expected to safely lead themselves?

      I mean, I walk on a sidewalk right next to traffic. I’ve worked with power tools. People work around heavy machinery.

      We come in close proximity to things that have enough energy to kill us on a not-irregular basis.

      • TyrionsNose@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        24
        ·
        7 months ago

        I think people underestimate how many civilians work alongside our men and women in uniform. Walk out to any hangar on a base in the US and it will be close to half and half. If it’s test facility it may be more civilians.

      • EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        arrow-down
        5
        ·
        7 months ago

        Cars are machinery the public is integrated with and understands the dangers of - she can’t be expected to navigate distracted as though she’s trained to be around active jets. It is not the same thing at all as being near the street.

        • catloaf@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          9
          ·
          7 months ago

          That’s her job, so yes, she is expected to work around active jets.

          But it sounds like this was at least partially due to a failure in training.

          • EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            7 months ago

            That’s why I said expected to navigate as though she’s trained, because you certainly don’t walk around without looking around just because you’re holding a camera if you’re trained to be around a giant suction blender.

    • Fal@yiffit.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      19
      arrow-down
      5
      ·
      7 months ago

      There are all kinds of civilians working for the military. This isn’t some active war zone where she stepped on a land mine. Every civilian doing work on an airport tar mac doesn’t require a military member holding their hand to tell them not to walk into spinning proppellers. Blaming this on the military vs just an unfortunate accident is just ridiculous

        • Fal@yiffit.net
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          3
          ·
          7 months ago

          That doesn’t make you right. That’s very different from expecting a military member to follow her around to keep her safe. The training likely would have come from the contracting company she was working for, not the military

          • Empricorn@feddit.nl
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            7 months ago

            My comment/edit was really more of an update on the incident than a vindication of my initial reaction, though there’s some of that too.

            You wrote:

            Blaming this on the military vs just an unfortunate accident is just ridiculous

            That’s false. Even the military themself admitted as much. Facts matter…

      • Empricorn@feddit.nl
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        7
        arrow-down
        12
        ·
        edit-2
        7 months ago

        EDIT: I was right:

        https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/05/us-air-force-contractor-death-stephanie-cosme

        I don’t think anyone’s claiming it was during the chaos of wartime, but it was an active airfield. So yes, it’s their responsibility to limit access, keep track of everyone, and keep both pedestrians and vehicles/aircraft safe.

        the air force materiel command accident investigation board said it found two causes for the incident.

        “First,” the board said, “the test engineer was incorrectly instructed or trained on how to take telemetry readings when approaching the MQ-9A while the engine was running. Second, she lost situational awareness while walking around the mishap aircraft taking telemetry readings with a hand-held measurement device.”

        • Cyyris@infosec.pub
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          15
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          7 months ago

          I guarantee she had access lol. Getting access to a flight line is not as difficult as you’re making it out to be.

          If her job duties included…you know, being on the flight line (as it sounds like her contract absolutely was,) all she had to do was get the SMO to verify her clearance, verify her job duties, assign her a RAB, and she’s good to go. Guaranteed she had all of the correct clearances and authorizations.

          If you’ve got access to the area, nobody is going to follow you around and “keep track of everyone.”

          I know this because I had all of this access as a civilian contractor when working on a military installation.

            • Cyyris@infosec.pub
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              4
              ·
              edit-2
              7 months ago

              Now that does not shock me in the least. The contract I worked for the USAF was to provide IT services.

              You know how many usable SOPs or process guides they had available to train us with? None. Not a single one. We recreated each and every process after having to fumble through it ourselves.

              There’s so much transition in the USAF that unless you have a civilian or contractor working alongside the uniformed workers, it only takes like one or two PCS cycles until there’s not a single person left that remembers the processes unless they’re written down in a detailed SOP (that is updated regularly.)

              • Empricorn@feddit.nl
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                edit-2
                7 months ago

                That’s interesting. I also have to poke fun at the use of 5 acronyms used. Military + IT = Acronym Endgame Boss.

                So how did you get access to military contacts anyway? Do I need to find a company that will get me those clearances?

                • Cyyris@infosec.pub
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  3
                  ·
                  7 months ago

                  Ah…yeah, whoops 😅. IT & Military definitely love their acronyms!

                  But you’ve got it pretty much spot on! Just keep an eye out for the various companies that are winning defense contracts; I usually keep an eye out on this site to see what’s going on out there: https://news.clearancejobs.com/category/defense-contracts/

                  Once you find one you’re interested in, the job listing will usually tell you it requires a certain level of clearance. Depending on the job, some will expect you to already have said clearance, but most will not. The company will apply for your clearance on your behalf, referencing the contract that you’ve been hired for. Then you get to go through the extremely fun process of a 30+ page background check, where you get to go through the last ten years of your life. Where you lived, who knew you at those addresses, where you’ve been out of the country, jobs you’ve held, etc. The very first one I did was in my early 20’s, so going back 10 years I was filling in my parents address when I was still in high school! It’s really not that bad, but they definitely ask a lot of off-the-wall stuff.

                  You’ll usually get an “interim” clearance a few months after you apply, which will allow you to do your work, but you’ll get your final clearance after about a year or so (assuming everything checks out.) Once you’ve got it, you keep it for 5 years, and it’ll automatically be renewed as long as your job requires it, and it can be transferred between companies if they require you to have a clearance.

    • eardon@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      7 months ago

      You are correct, but the snowball effect has taken hold so it’s up to people smarter than the average lemmy/redditor to do things right.