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Author Topic: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit  (Read 9208 times)

NFMike

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Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« on: September 20, 2012, 09:14:40 pm »

Anybody else watch this? I was utterly gobsmacked.

Tug-Kenny RIP

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #1 on: September 20, 2012, 09:16:02 pm »


Can you enlarge on the details please. Sounds awful.

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Tug-Kenny RIP

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #3 on: September 20, 2012, 10:18:19 pm »


Thank you.  I had no idea.


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NFMike

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #4 on: September 20, 2012, 10:39:11 pm »

It's the one that crashed in the middle of the south Atlantic - out of radar coverage - in 2009. Took two years to find the flight recorders and really pin down what happened and this programme was in essence (if you skip the ads and 'human interest' stuff) a reconstruction of what happened in the cockpit with comments by some aviation talking heads.

I'm still shaking my head in disbelief.

F4TCT

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #6 on: September 21, 2012, 08:27:45 am »

Although im just a private pilot, it really is incomprehensible that trained guys like that kept on stalling the aircraft.

The issue is, they might be on the ball when they first start flying for the airline because they have just done their commercial license and ME/IR ratings and MCC. Aswell as that, they may instruct for a thousand or two thousand hours then be accepted for the airline.

The pilots nowadays never fly the thing for long and they lose the basic skills thought to them in flight school.

I've always wanted to be strapped into a 737 sim and these errors presented to me, to see if i can actually save the thing.

it has been noted in previous incidents, the fact that the airbus series have joy sticks, the pilots cannot see what each other are actually doing with them and so incidents like this occur.

Terrible shame which will be learnt from.   :((
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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #7 on: September 21, 2012, 09:43:32 am »

I watched it, and although I'm not a pilot, it seemed to me to be a catalogue of errors just waiting for a disaster. The captain didn't seem to know what his co-pilot was doing, and vice versa...one was pulling the stick back and the other was pushing the stick forward, thus fighting each other. Factor in faulty instrumentation, and there's no hope.

Is it possible nowadays for a pilot to switch off all the computerised controls and fly the plane as it should be flown...ie, by direct manual input to the operating surfaces? I guess from a pilot's point of view it must be nice to be able to board the aircraft, get comfy in your seat, and let the plane fly itself from point A to point B...but there must come a time in a flight when actual flying from a human being is needed?

As I said, I know sweet naff all about flying anything with wings, so bear that in mind when posting an answer! I don't even like flying, I have flown a few times, but I didn't enjoy it at all...


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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #8 on: September 21, 2012, 10:29:11 am »

Good ole 737, Starfighter of the commercial airlines. Airbus may have wobbly sticks, but it's still fly by wire. Come back Rapide, all is forgiven. :-))

  Regards Ian
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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #9 on: September 21, 2012, 10:53:19 am »

I watched it, and although I'm not a pilot, it seemed to me to be a catalogue of errors just waiting for a disaster. The captain didn't seem to know what his co-pilot was doing, and vice versa...one was pulling the stick back and the other was pushing the stick forward, thus fighting each other. Factor in faulty instrumentation, and there's no hope.

Is it possible nowadays for a pilot to switch off all the computerised controls and fly the plane as it should be flown...ie, by direct manual input to the operating surfaces? I guess from a pilot's point of view it must be nice to be able to board the aircraft, get comfy in your seat, and let the plane fly itself from point A to point B...but there must come a time in a flight when actual flying from a human being is needed?

As I said, I know sweet naff all about flying anything with wings, so bear that in mind when posting an answer! I don't even like flying, I have flown a few times, but I didn't enjoy it at all...


Rich

Usual times of the pilots flying is instrument departures and even en it can be done on auto pilot and usually the last 500ft of the approach is hand flew. Again with autoland and stuff, the do nothing other that cover the controls in case something goes wrong.

There's times I've been at the local airport with my scanner and the KLM Fokker 70 has requested a VFR approach into the airport which is nice. I think if the majority of the time is spent on auto pilot chatting up the hostesses.. Then at least have several sim sessions a year where the pilot can throw the ting about the sky and manually fly approaches etc...
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furball

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #10 on: September 21, 2012, 11:14:15 am »

Quote
Is it possible nowadays for a pilot to switch off all the computerised controls and fly the plane as it should be flown...ie, by direct manual input to the operating surfaces?

No, it's not. I think all the latest airliners are fly-by-wire. All the control surfaces are operated by hydraulics controlled by computer.

It was interesting to see that the Airbus didn't stall in the normal sense - the computers prevented that - it just didn't have any forward airspeed and fell out of the sky in a level attitude.

Lance
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roycv

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #11 on: September 21, 2012, 11:15:21 am »

Hi, I am a great fan of Aircrash confidential and Aircrash Investigations on the cable channels.  Well they come on late and I am finished modelling for the day!
You get this tremendous spread of competence from Sullenberger to other lesser souls, for me I like a woman in the pilots' seat she has had to work harder to get there!

The biggest loss of life of all on the ground was at Tenneriffe and that was attributed to a pilot who had a big ego and ignored the control tower instructions, took off down the runway and hit another jumbo.

Not many people are aware that when the Concorde crashed it missed the then French President, who was waiting in a jumbo, by 20 feet!
If you have followed the Concorde investigations you will also know that the piece of metal on the runway,  jealously guarded by the French had little to do with the crash.  
Allegedly the most dangerous airline is Chinese where some of the repair work done is almost on a blacksmith level.

I believe that British Airway always had in flight data sent to a central control and now others do it to a larger or lesser extent, this could lead to making the so called "Black boxes", which are orange, obsolete.  But with the necessity of keeping aircraft in the air who is going to test everything.

There was a case of a conscience pilot who part way through the take off checklist had a fault light and decided to go back to have it repaired.  The fault was isolated and I think it was decided it was not urgent and they taxied back and carried on the pre flight check list where they had left off and forgot that they had put the flaps back to off position for the taxi / repair and went down the runway without the flaps in operation.  It was an MD11 and needs all the lift it can get to take off, so it crashed.

It is interesting to note that the VC10 was up against the Boeing 707 and lost out. Less than a thousand VC 10's sold.  The British airline said it wanted a short take off aircraft so the VC 10 was designed that way.  The 707 has to have flaps etc to do normal take off, if the 2 aircraft were side by side and took off together the VC 10 would be at 1000 feet before the 707 left the ground.
But it meant that the 707 was more economical to run so that is where the airlines went.
All the above says that the aircrash investigations are one of the best factual progs on the box!
regards Roy


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U-33

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #12 on: September 21, 2012, 11:49:44 am »

Gawden Bennett...I'm trying to pluck up the courage to fly to Vancouver to fetch 'er who's over there back home. Do they still do an ocean crossing..... ;D
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Rich

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #13 on: September 21, 2012, 01:04:16 pm »

 
"The biggest loss of life of all on the ground was at Tenneriffe and that was attributed to a pilot who had a big ego and ignored the control tower instructions, took off down the runway and hit another jumbo."

Captain Veldhuyzen van Zanten was certainly egotistical but there many other contributory factors.........

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster
 
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furball

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #14 on: September 21, 2012, 01:11:35 pm »

Quote
I believe that British Airway always had in flight data sent to a central control and now others do it to a larger or lesser extent, this could lead to making the so called "Black boxes", which are orange, obsolete.

Not quite.

As far as I know, they just have their own recorders which at the end of very flight get uploaded to a central repository, which is then analysed to provide things like aircraft and crew performance. It's proactive, in that problems can possibly be discovered before anything major happens, whereas the normal flight recorders are obvious reactive. They only get looked at after the event.

I doubt whether real-time telemetry will ever be used with commercial aircraft, because a) there would be just too much of it, and b) there are places (over the middle of the oceans for example) that radio contact is non-existent.

Quote
Gawden Bennett...I'm trying to pluck up the courage to fly to Vancouver to fetch 'er who's over there back home. Do they still do an ocean crossing.....

I think that statistically, flying is still one of the safest methods of transport - far better than driving, it's that when accidents occur, it happens to multiple victims all in one go, which tends to make the news.

Lance
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roycv

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #15 on: September 21, 2012, 01:26:47 pm »

Hi, I did not name names on purpose.  There was some poor visibility, the man in question was also the picture on all the advertisements for the airline, after this, comments about his ego were not favourable towards him.  They were getting close to not taking off due to insufficient flying hours for the journey, but if I remember correctly the cockpit voice recorder plainly has him over riding the ATC.
There was no ground radar installed, it was there but still in crates.
He had been told to hold his position as well.

As in most accidents there are several contributing factors of which one or more could have prevented the situation.
Impatience is probably responsible for more unwanted events than anything else.
This kind of accident galvanises action to make sure safety is key.  (thats for you U33!)

At one of the American airports there had been a series of over runs on the airstrip. i.e. aircraft runs out of runway.
There was a nice but untried idea of having a fixed but relatively soft system at the end of the runway to slow an aircraft with the drag effect of breaking up material like polystyrene.  This was installed and goes in like tiles so easy to reinstate.  Within days a cargo plane plowed into it and was saved with no damage.
The safety officer who had it installed was a lady.


On a completely different tack, I was at a lake and handed my yacht over to my"daughter in law" to sail.  There was a comment behind me saying I would not let a woman run my boats!  I said her usual boat was a 21 foot racing catamaran so I thought it would be safe with her.
Hats off to the ladies I say.

regards Roy

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #16 on: September 21, 2012, 04:25:56 pm »

For U33, since an Air Transat (Canadian) flight ran out of fuel because of an error in refuelling & had to glide to a safe landing on the Canary Islands on its way from Canada to the U/K, I believe all flights to & from U/K must at all times not be more than 2 hours flying time from land, I may have this wrong & I am sure someone on here will correct me if I am. The last time I flew to and from the U/K we were flying over the tip of Greenland for quite awhile. Our present Government has changed the law on maintenance checks to a voluntary system & the opinion of the pilots is that this has created a situation of an accident waiting to happen. In investigations it is easy to blame the pilots when they are dead & cannot defend them selves. In the case of 737's they had lots of problems with the rudder for a long time and knew it but did not have a fix & had at least 3 major crashes where all aboard were killed & still they allowed them to carry on flying, a case of greed & profit over safety and governments not doing their job looking after their people. In the case of the Airbus I think you will find there is no direct link from the cockpit to the control surfaces, it is all done by computers but has as many as 5 separate systems on each control surface, if I am wrong please correct me but that is my understanding of it. Mick B. 
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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #17 on: September 21, 2012, 04:33:06 pm »

You're not cheering me up at all, young sir...running out of fuel? That's a nice thought at five miles up(or however far up they fly)...that's an awful lot of nothing underneath my posterior!

I'm thinking of just sending Madam a ticket and meeting her at Airwick  Gatport...   ;D
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Rich

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #18 on: September 21, 2012, 04:49:03 pm »

Gawden Bennett...I'm trying to pluck up the courage to fly to Vancouver to fetch 'er who's over there back home. Do they still do an ocean crossing..... ;D

Try an Italian Transatlantic Line  %% %%

Ned
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U-33

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #19 on: September 21, 2012, 04:51:02 pm »

I'd rather try to get a ride on an RN sub....if they go that way.  ;D
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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #20 on: September 21, 2012, 04:53:06 pm »

I'd rather try to get a ride on an RN sub....if they go that way.  ;D

Probably run aground around Newfy Country {-) {-)

Ned
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U-33

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #21 on: September 21, 2012, 04:55:04 pm »

Probably run aground around Newfy Country {-) {-)

Ned

That's it...I'm staying here, she can come to me.  %)
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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #22 on: September 21, 2012, 05:00:43 pm »

As the song goes,
'If you want me come and get me  ;D

Ned
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U-33

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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #23 on: September 21, 2012, 05:10:47 pm »

You got it!   :-))
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Re: Fatal Flight 447: Chaos in the Cockpit
« Reply #24 on: September 21, 2012, 05:38:54 pm »

Hi U33, if you have not been to Vancouver believe me it is well worth the trip. It is a beautiful city, very British & Grandville Island is a place not to be missed you can spend a whole day there & the food is to die for. The harbour is full of all sorts of boats & even float planes,all to be seen at least once in a lifetime. You can also take a ferry ride across to Vancouver Island & have tea in the very British Empress hotel while watching the ships & boats sail in & out of the harbour. Don't miss it is the chance of a lifetime. Mick B.
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