Software Development and General Aviation
Software development and general aviation seem like completely different worlds. One is about writing logic, the other about defying gravity. But when you break them down they both involve managing complexity, reducing risk and following structured processes to prevent failure.
The Swiss Cheese Model
In aviation failures rarely happen because of a single mistake. Instead, they’re the result of multiple small errors lining up. This is the Swiss Cheese Model—each layer of defense (training, checklists, maintenance, ATC) has weaknesses. When those weaknesses align, accidents happen.
Software failures work the same way. A major outage isn’t usually caused by one bad deployment. It’s a series of small oversights:
- A missing unit test.
- A misconfigured environment.
- An ignored error log.
- A rushed code review.
To avoid this, aviation and software both rely on multiple layers of protection: testing, peer reviews, monitoring, and structured deployment processes. When done right, these layers catch failures before they escalate.
Built to Fail Safely
Aircrafts are built with redundancy in mind. If something fails, there’s almost always a backup. Critical systems—engines, electrical systems, flight controls—don’t just assume failure won’t happen. They assume it will and are designed to keep working anyway.
Take the Boeing 777. It has triple-redundant flight control computers. If one fails, another takes over. If two fail, the third is still operational. Even if all three fail, pilots can still manually control the aircraft. With each failure(losing cvorum, etc) the system degrades but it doesn’t collapse.
Software should work the same way:
- Database replication: If the primary fails, a secondary takes over.
- Load balancing: If one server crashes, traffic shifts to another.
- Circuit breakers: If an external service is slow or failing, the system should degrade gracefully instead of going down entirely.
- Fail-safe mechanisms: If something critical breaks, the system should have a fallback instead of blindly retrying until it crashes.
Yet in practice, software often lacks these redundancies. A single-point failure in a database, a hard dependency on an external API or an unhandled error can take down entire systems. Aviation reminds us that failure is inevitable, but catastrophic failure is preventable.
Checklists
Pilots don’t rely on memory. Every phase of flight—preflight, takeoff, landing—has a checklist. The goal isn’t to compensate for a lack of skill but to prevent avoidable mistakes.
Software development should be no different:
- Code review checklists to ensure consistency and catch potential issues.
- Deployment checklists to avoid skipping critical steps.
- Incident response checklists to ensure quick, structured action during outages.
The best developers don’t just “know” what to do. They follow repeatable processes to get things right every time.
Situational Awareness
In aviation, situational awareness means knowing where you are, anticipating problems, and reacting before they become critical. Losing awareness leads to things like controlled flight into terrain—where a pilot doesn’t realize they’re heading straight into the ground until it’s too late, which, according to IATA is the second highest cause of fatal accidents.
The same thing happens in software:
- Deploying a big change without considering its downstream effects.
- Working in isolation without understanding how your code interacts with other systems.
- Ignoring monitoring dashboards until users start reporting issues.
A good pilot is constantly scanning instruments and surroundings. A good developer keeps an eye on tests, logs, metrics, and dependencies.
The 5P Model: Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance
Pilots use the 5P model—Plan, Plane, Pilot, Passengers, Programming—to evaluate everything before a flight. It’s a structured way to reduce the chance of surprises.
Developers should take the same approach:
- Plan: Define clear requirements before writing code.
- Codebase (Plane): Ensure the system is in a good state to handle the change.
- Developer (Pilot): Are you focused and prepared?
- Users (Passengers): How will this change impact them?
- Tools & Automation (Programming): Are monitoring, logging, and deployment processes ready?
Skipping steps in aviation leads to accidents. In software, it leads to tech debt, outages, and messy rollbacks.
Final Thoughts
Flying and software development both require structured thinking, risk management, and the ability to anticipate failure. The difference is that in aviation, mistakes can cost lives so the processes are taken seriously. In software, failures are often treated as “just part of the job.”
But the same principles apply: build in redundancy, follow checklists, stay aware of the bigger picture, and plan properly. Failures will happen, but they don’t have to take everything down with them.
