Commercial Fixed Wing
Flight Crew Multiengine; Flight Crew Instrument; Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Situational Awareness; Communication Breakdown; Confusion
Deviation - Track / Heading All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Clearance; Inflight Event / Encounter Unstabilized Approach
Flight Crew Became Reoriented
Human Factors; Airport; Airspace Structure; Procedure
I was Pilot Flying for flight into PWM. Approaching the airport; we were assigned the Harbor Visual to Runway 29. We crossed the coast eastbound at approximately 3;000 feet and made a left; north-bound turn towards the islands. We had previously briefed the approach before we were cleared the visual. The Captain and I were trying to identify the lighthouses and islands that we were supposed to turn between.I called out two islands that I believed to be the two to turn between. The Captain concurred. I selected pattern altitude of 1;500 feet and begun a manual descent with the Flight Director ON. Slowing the aircraft early to prevent coming in too fast on this visual; we were flying approximately 180 knots in the descent.We overflew an island; and the Captain announced; 'You need to turn hard; now.' Apparently; the islands that I had identified were not the same that he understood.I began a gradual left turn to join the harbor. In this confusion; I did a poor job monitoring my altitude. Both of us forgot to continue configuring the aircraft. At 1;000 feet AGL; we received a chime to denote that the gear is not down. The Captain instructed 'Level off.' While still in the left turn; I pitched the nose up and added a slight power increase. We configured the aircraft in the next few seconds and continued our descent at REF+5. The aircraft landed successfully.The poor communication between the Captain and myself led to this event. We had experienced similar poor communication this pairing. It is my belief that the Captain knew when to turn; but failed to correct my island identification; due to his comment of flying this certain approach 'many times.' The lack of ability to confirm the turn inbound led to a distraction; which led to an unstable approach.The approach should have ended as soon as we realized that we were off course and behind the aircraft. A go-around should have been executed and the procedure re-attempted. My hesitation with calling the go-around comes from being a low-time First Officer flying this approach for the first time and having an extremely experienced Captain in the left seat. His reassurance that these deviations were OK to land led me to not go-around.
Air carrier pilot reported an unstable approach due to poor CRM on the flight deck.