Comments on: Has Airline Safety Peaked?

By: Congress now backing away from aviation safety enhancements | Project 7 Alpha TEST

Sun, 18 Oct 2009 00:21:32 +0000

[...] They must push these simulators to the limit and beyond; over and over again until recovering is instinctual. The entire world’s training programs need to be over hauled. They were designed in the 1930s, when all aircraft were piston powered and had straight wings. It is time to bring training up to date. No more Buffalos. [...]

By: chip

chip — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 14:15:07 +0000

Pete;
You have to look a little closer. The Turkish Air flight had a “Cadet Pilot” onboard. Although, I have not read who was at the controls. In the BUF crash the Captain had just over 100 hours (a month and a half) in type. The First Officer had around 2,000 total hours, a comuter pilot can easily get 900-1000 a year. So if you subtract just minimums for a Commercial license, she had less than two years experience at the airline.

I do agree that it is the type/quality of training that counts. And that is ultimately my point. Thousands of hours watching an autopilot fly straight and level dosn’t give a pilot much experience, let alone a couple of hundred. IMO this is exactly what the MPL program is all about; system management. Some times the automation fails, and then you have to fly it.

Both the above aircraft were stalled, the most basic pilot skill is to maitain flying speed. These basic aviation skills is what, IMO, the MPL program treats as a side issue.

Aviate, Navigate, Communicate.

By: pete

pete — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 18:30:12 +0000

just to the point… http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/learmount/2009/03/pilots-who-needs-them.html
I understand what some says about experience, but as I said it’s not only about flight and managing systems, but it’s abount overseeing complex digital systems that are flying the plane with some type of high level decision making authority that was not possible before… not surprisingly all problems we had in the recent past are not on badly maintained planes / old planes / poorly trained crew / small regional airlines / but on the latest equipment with top experienced pilots etc etc…

By: Chip

Chip — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 17:30:40 +0000

Rick;
There are normally many causal factors in an accident. I think that in this accident the use of auto pilot will be one of them. Along with crew fatigue and experience. By using the auto pilot up to the FAF the crew would not have felt the control anomalies. As they re-configured the wing the aero dynamic phenomina I posted about today would have occured.

There is an old saying in aviation: If you move something and it dosn’t do what it should, move it back.

They tried; but the control loading being extremly heavy in one direction and light in the other IMO lead to PIO. With the nose pitching up it spiked the angle of attack on the iced up wing causing it to stall. A characteristic of which is wing rock. The wing rock would account for the rolling moment. They were in a dire situation and just didn’t have enough altitude to regain control.

No flap landings are considered an emergency in a high performance (airliner) aircraft. To get fast cruise speeds they make the wing as small as possible. To land safely they put the flaps slats etc, that actually re-shape it changing the camber and flow. The change lowers the approach speed dramatically. I think once the crew re-cognized the problem they were going to go around and probably divert to a field out of the icing. It just didn’t work out.

By: Rick

Rick — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 13:54:51 +0000

Chip,
OK I understand re dropping gears at the FAF. Do you have a thought on comment #10 re no-flaps landing? Thanks,
Rick

By: Chip

Chip — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 06:57:34 +0000

Rick;
FAA (if memory serves) requires gear down at final approach fix, every company I have worked for has it in their procedures. Even on visual I usually drop the gear at FAF out of habit. They were on the ILS for 23 so they were folowing normal procedure.

By: Rick

Rick — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 23:07:01 +0000

One more thing…I am puzzled by why they would have had gear down 6 miles out. They hadn’t yet turned base to final. I know they were over the marker, but still…dropping gear before you drop flaps? If you have any thoughts on that I’d love to hear them.

By: Rick

Rick — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 22:57:29 +0000

Chip,
I have read several pilot comments about the tail stall now. There is a good article in the NY Times today that quoted an aernautical engineer as saying that once icing is a problem, there are certain airplanes that introduction of flaps renders the airplane out of control. Apparently they will affect the wing, but can also affect the tail. There was almost an instantaneous connection between lowering flaps to 15 degrees and loss of control. I think one lesson to be drawn from this is that if a pilot of this particular aircraft can not control icing, I think he really needs to consider a no-flaps landing. I might be wrong, but I think one would have to reach this conclusion. Your thoughts? Rick

By: Chip

Chip — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 21:31:26 +0000

Rick;
It now appears very likely that the tail accumulated ice, stalled and caused the aircraft to pitch nose down. I came accross a NASA video that describes exactly what seems to have happened. I will write a new article and get it posted. EVERY pilot should see this.

By: Chip

Chip — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 21:27:27 +0000

Pete;
On your second point I agree that the industry as a whole got very used to having a great safety record. I think that they didn’t get why. It was the experience of the crews not just in total time but in specific aircraft. There has been little movement. so most pilots have stagnated and been in the same seat/aircraft for years. Personally; I’ve been in the right seat of the MD-80 for all of my 10 years except 8 glorious months in the 767/757.

I hope to keep sharing my passion. My second novel is with the publisher (Pen and Sword) and I’m trying to wrap up my third. I also recently bought a share in a Beech Musketeer. Three of my four kids want to learn to fly (my second son is in a part 141 school now).