The Trap of Plan Continuation Bias

You’re on final approach after a long shift – fatigued but feeling relieved to be almost home 🏡 However, the weather is significantly worse than forecast, which is starting to worry your co-pilot. Still, you’re so close to the finish line.

You’ve briefed the landing, your passengers expect to arrive on time, and ATC is expecting you to continue, right? ✅

A missed approach would mean extra fuel burn, paperwork, and delays. So, you press on – just like many others before you.

This is plan continuation bias in action.

It’s the reason experienced pilots have landed with the gear-up, flown into deteriorating weather, or ignored subtle signs of mechanical failure.

The problem? 🚨

By the time the threats become obvious, it’s often too late.

Today, we’ll break down how plan continuation bias sneaks into our decision-making and why even the best pilots fall for it.

But more importantly, we’ll look at how you can guard against it when it matters most!

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What is Plan Continuation Bias?

Plan continuation bias is the unconscious cognitive bias to continue with the original plan in spite of changing conditions.

Or in plain english: you still stick to the plan when you shouldn’t anymore!

Professor Charles West talks about it in this interesting research piece called “The Barn Door Effect”.

He describes:

“When enroute and at altitude, commercial aircraft pilots will deviate around convective weather more than five nautical miles for severe weather and lightning avoidance. These same pilots, given a situation where a similar storm is on final approach to their destination airport, will usually fly underneath a heavy to extreme convective cell with tops in excess of 50,000 ft.”

Of course, this is just one example of plan continuation bias. There are so many ways that we can be affected:

It all comes down to how aware we are of the threats that are present, how flexible we are as pilots, and how good we are at saying no, as we discussed here:

The Crucial Skill of Saying No as a Pilot

What Causes Plan Continuation Bias?

Plan Continuation Bias can have many causes. These can differ depending on the type of operation, where you are in the world, and what crew you are flying with. Let’s go over the 10 main causes 💡

Tunnel Vision

If all you can see is where you’re trying to end up, it can be harder to be aware of the threats around you. Tunnel vision is common during the landing phase, especially if you’re running out of fuel, weather, and Flight Time Limitations (FTLs)!

Emotional Investment

If you’re emotionally tied to the outcome of a flight, being objective becomes 10 times harder. There are all sorts of reasons; such as not willing to admit you’re wrong about something, or simply trying to avoid losses (loss aversion).

It then becomes more ‘desirable’ to overlook negatives and make positives bigger. A slippery slope…

Social and Operational Pressure

We’ve talked about this one in a previous article:

Let’s Talk About Commercial Pressure in Aviation

Operational (or commercial) pressure can have a massive impact on pilots pushing through when they shouldn’t. The type of company you’re flying for has a lot of influence on this.

Sunk Cost Fallacy

The sunk cost fallacy happens when we continue to invest into something purely based on the amount of resources we’ve already put into it, instead of on proper analysis.

Let’s say you’ve made a few decisions in line with your plan A. If all of those decisions make plan B less convenient (if you were to change to it), you will feel more ‘invested’ in plan A instead, and might stick to it when you shouldn’t.

Status Quo Bias

When it comes to assessing risk, known variables are easier to process than unknowns. This can create a bias where we take the route of knowns, no matter how bad they might be. The danger here is that we can discount very viable alternatives for the sake of dealing with less unknowns.

Time Pressure

Time pressure is something every pilot will have to deal with at some point. Emergencies, schedules, take-off slots, shift times, and FTL’s, we can’t escape any of these.

When there’s less time available to assess options and think carefully, we can become overly attached to “just sticking to the plan” ➡️ plan continuation bias.

Confirmation Bias

Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favour and recall information in a way that confirms or supports our prior beliefs or values. The relationship between plan continuation bias and confirmation bias is a feedback loop.

If we have a tendency to discount data that suggests we should change our plan, we then have an even stronger reason to stick to the plan.

If we have decided that plan A is in fact what we’re going with, confirmation bias can then become even stronger as well…

Overconfidence & Complacency

We’ve covered complacency vs vigilance in a previous article here:

Defensive Flying 101: Are you Vigilant or Complacent?

The thing is, overconfidence can lead to complacency, which can lead to plan continuation bias. If we’re so confident we can deal with that incoming weather front, we might not be seeing the overall picture clearly and not deviate when we should.

Authority Gradient

Authority gradient is defined as:

“The established, and/or perceived, command and decision-making power hierarchy in a team, crew or group situation, and also how balanced the distribution of this power is experienced within the team, crew or group.”

The danger here is an authority gradient that’s way too steep. If I as a captain do not take the opinion of my first officer seriously, then no matter how shit my plan A might be, I’ll have a tendency to stick to it despite him pointing out its flaws.

This is a huge problem in many different parts of the world, including the west. A future article on this is coming ✅

Proximity to Destination

Remember the Barn Door effect we mentioned in the intro? We’re often much less risk averse when we are closer to our destination. It’s not just because of the sunk cost fallacy we’ve mentioned earlier. A huge reason why proximity to our destination matters is goal fixation.

Goal fixation is the tendency to become overly focussed on achieving a specific objective. As we get closer and closer to achieving it, it becomes harder and harder to see the big picture and make rational decisions, as demonstrated by the source in the intro.

How to Avoid Plan Continuation Bias

Right, so what can we actually do to keep our brains from continuing with plan A when the world around us screams we should go to plan B?

Let’s take a look 👀

Define Decision Points

Switching to plan B becomes much easier if you’ve put pre-defined conditions in place that when hit, trigger a review of what the hell you’re doing.

So for instance in HEMS, when we cross a valley in poor weather, we might say:

If we’re not visual with this mast on the map by point X, we turn around.

If upon reaching point X, we are not visual, we can look at eachother and we know plan A has just become plan B.

Without defining this, it might be tempting once you’ve reached point X to inch a little further to see if plan A is still feasible. A very effective way to cause an accident…

Ask the What-If’s

What if’s are an excellent way to prepare for the unexpected.

Examples?

🔸If the weather isn’t quite as expected, what are our options?

🔸 If the passengers or medical crew are late, how can we deal with it?

🔸 If this airport closes unexpectedly, what are our divert options?

🔸 If the cloud-base beyond the valley is worse, how can we turn back?

🔸 If we enter IMC inadvertently, what are our actions?

Actively thinking about questions by yourself or as a crew can help you stay calm and act rationally when things go south.

Challenge and Verify Assumptions

Assumptions are a slippery slope in aviation. Just because something happened 99 times in the exact same way, does not mean it will happen the 100th time as well.

Thinking that it will be the same again can set you up for failure and difficult situations. Any time an assumption is made, make a conscious effort to verify how likely it is that it’s actually true. If you can’t verify it but you know it is likely, make sure you still have an option if it doesn’t turn out that way!

Encourage Open Communication

Actively seeking feedback and input from your crew members is a pretty straightforward antidote to plan continuation bias. Unless other crew members are suffering from the exact same mindset, they can help you snap out of clinging to plan A when you shouldn’t.

Ask questions such as: “Does anyone see a reason why continuing might not be the best decision?” or “What are the threats I have missed here?” Any answer to these questions will help you stay on the right track when things get tough.

Commit to the Process, not the Outcome

Getting too committed to the outcome of a flight is a bad idea in general.

Try to shift your focus from getting to the destination, to making the safest decisions at each stage of the flight.

The latter will probably get you to your destination the majority of the time, but the times that you shouldn’t it will make all the difference.

Conclusion

Plan continuation bias is one of the most dangerous traps in aviation decision-making – precisely because it can feel so natural. The closer we get to the goal, the harder it becomes to step back and reassess.

Fatigue, pressure, and overconfidence all push us toward sticking with a plan, even when the safest choice is to change it.

The best way to counteract this bias? Recognise when it’s happening!

Build decision points into your flight. Ask the tough “what-if” questions. Encourage open discussions with your crew. Most importantly: commit to making the safest decision in the moment, not just the one that gets you to the destination.

The best pilots aren’t the ones who always stick to plan A, it’s the ones who know exactly when to switch to plan B.