Definition
The total amount of mental and physical work a pilot is handling at a given moment in the cockpit, including flying the aircraft, navigating, communicating with ATC, monitoring systems, managing checklists, and making decisions. Workload rises and falls during a flight, and certain phases — such as takeoff, approach, and a missed approach — produce especially high workload because many tasks must be performed simultaneously and accurately.
Plain English
How much the pilot has on their plate right now. When a lot is happening at once — flying, talking, thinking, deciding — the workload is high.
Context Anchor
Seen in instrument flying, especially during missed approaches, when several tasks may need to happen close together while the aircraft is still being flown precisely.
Derivation
“Flight deck” originally referred to the deck of a ship used for aircraft operations, then came to mean the area where an aircraft is controlled. “Workload” means the amount of work being carried. Together, the phrase points to the amount of work being carried by the pilot or crew in the aircraft control area.
Why Pilots Care
High workload raises the chance of errors during critical phases like missed approaches, directly affecting safety.
Intuition Check
Do not think of flight deck workload as just “being busy.” In aviation, it means the total demand on the pilot’s attention, decisions, communication, and aircraft control at that moment.
Example Sentence 1
Briefing the missed approach procedure before beginning the approach reduces flight deck workload if a go-around becomes necessary.
Example Sentence 2
The crew divided tasks to keep flight deck workload manageable while executing the published missed approach.