UPS cargo crash near Birmingham AL

[Huck]

Aircraft down, fire department is responding to fire at scene.

Birmingham Fire (http://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/13108/?rl=rr)

[weatherdude]

source: https://twitter.com/myfoxal/status/367598464957308928

[1stspotter]

Plane is a UPS Airbus A300 freighter performing flight 1354 from Louisville to Birmingham (AL). Aircraft is supposedly burning and there have been at least 3 explosions so far.
2 crew on board.
Map showing crash site here.
https://plus.google.com/u/0/108868884822043573742/posts/M5razqJrVo7

[Bralo20]

An Airbus A300F4-622R probably: ASN Aircraft accident Airbus A300F4-622R ? N155UP ? Birmingham Airport, AL (BHM) (http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=20130814-0)

[weatherdude]

2013-08-14 06:06 METAR KBHM 141106Z 00000KT 9SM FEW005 OVC070 23/22 A2999 RMK AO2 FEW005 FU =
2013-08-14 05:53 METAR KBHM 141053Z 01003KT 10SM OVC070 23/22 A2999 RMK AO2 SLP146 T02330222 =
2013-08-14 04:53 METAR KBHM 140953Z 34004KT 10SM FEW011 BKN035 OVC075 23/22 A2997 RMK AO2 SLP141
T02330222 =
2013-08-14 04:04 METAR KBHM 140904Z 00000KT 10SM SCT010 BKN075 23/22 A2996 RMK AO2 =
2013-08-14 03:53 METAR KBHM 140853Z 00000KT 10SM BKN010 OVC075 23/22 A2997 RMK AO2 CIG 006V013
SLP138 T02330217 52000 =

An overcast, muggy southern night. Last metar from 6.06 am with reduced visibility to 9 SM from the crash smoke (FU at the end of the Metar)

[mikeramrod]

Live audio feed from Birmingham Fire Dept on scene

Birmingham Fire Live Audio Feed (http://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/13108/web)

[mikeramrod]

Short Instagram video of fire seen from tarmac

Instagram (http://instagram.com/p/c_VHjPR3Jq/)

[Eboy]

A short report from NBC:

UPS cargo plane crashes, explodes at Alabama airport - U.S. News (http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/08/14/20020990-ups-cargo-plane-crashes-explodes-at-alabama-airport?lite)

[aa73]

Photo:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BRoBIDLCMAA9jmE.jpg:large

2 fatalities reported.

[Mudman]

A video clip of fire dept on scence here...

Smart Player (http://video-embed.al.com/services/player/bcpid1949044313001?bctid=2604832832001&bckey=AQ~~,AAAAPLMIMAE~,kKetLjW2WxUgiRmvwWvrX1zHOEtf9iIT)

[Check Airman]

Crash: UPS A306 at Birmingham on Aug 14th 2013, touched down outside airport (http://avherald.com/h?article=466d969f&opt=0)

[Check Airman]

Looks like they were approaching RW 18. Wonder why they went for that one,as they park at the SW corner of the field.

[gleaf]

UPS spokesman quoted on Louisville news A300. Crew of 2. Birmingham Mayor stating in a field not on airport proper. Area commented as industrial.

[Mark in CA]

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — A large UPS cargo plane crashed early Wednesday near an airport in Birmingham, Ala.

Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen told The Associated Press the A300 plane crashed on approach to the airport before dawn.

The plane was en route from Louisville, Ky., to Birmingham as UPS Flight 1354, Bergen said.

Toni Bast, a spokeswoman for Birmingham's airport authority, said the cargo plane crashed near Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport. Bast said the crash site is outside the airport's perimeter fence and has not affected airport operations.

Neither Bergen nor Bast had any information on injuries.
A photo from the news site al.com showed a plume of smoke rising from the site in an open field. Several fire trucks and other emergency vehicles were lined up on a narrow road nearby.

Representatives for Atlanta-based UPS could not immediately be reached Wednesday morning.

[aa73]

LOC/DME is Notam'd OTS on the ILS 18...

Edited: looks like it was just notamed after the crash. My apologies.

[Blind Squirrel]

Birmingham resident Eddie Smith, who lives on 90th Place North near the airport, said he heard a loud boom about 5 a.m.

"It shook my house so hard, I jumped up," Smith said.

A few minutes later, he said he heard another loud boom. Then it got quiet. He went outside to walk his dog and could see the smoke rising over the trees and hills. Smith said he was stopped by a Birmingham police officer who drew his weapon and ordered him to return to his home and said that there had been a plane crash.Front section of aircraft separated from the rest of the aircraft, and is lying about 50 yards away. Five explosions were heard from the part on fire.




http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/lt/lt_cache/thumbnail/610/img/photos/2013/08/14/36/21/ups_post_crash_photo.jpg

[aa73]

http://cmsimg.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcsi.dll/bilde?Site=B2&Date=20130814&Category=NEWS01&ArtNo=308140065&Ref=AR&MaxW=640&Border=0&UPS-A300-cargo-plane-crashed-half-mile-short-runway-FAA-says

[aterpster]

Lousy LOC or LNAV approach.

[Mark in CA]

Smith said he was stopped by a Birmingham police officer who drew his weapon and ordered him to return to his home...
Typical yahoo police behavior in that part of the world.

[tubby linton]

Were the papis working as neither approach procedure for RW18 is authorised at night if they are not?

[flarepilot]

yes, its a guess, say again GUESS:

non precision approach, night or semi night conditions , wondering if they had the runway in sight and lost it in low scud, or somehow decieved by low hanging cloud or a sudden spurt of rain/drizzle without wipers on, a bit of a duck under mda and contact with terrain.

[WHBM]

Typical yahoo police behavior in that part of the world.
At least they appear not to have driven over and kill any survivors, as happened in the Asiana accident at SFO.

[flarepilot]

IF memory serves, birmingham is a special airport (among 16 others) in the US that have special concerns mainly due to terrain.

invite others to double check...don't have my jepps with me

special airports require certain additional study/mainly due to terrain features like TVL etc.

[barit1]

Twelve years ago, I lost a good friend in a terrain-related approach accident a few miles from KBHM. Good briefings are a must! :uhoh:

[Stefan Wolf]

http://i.imgur.com/FWMvddz.jpg

[roving]

The plane left Louisville, an air hub for UPS, at 5:04 a.m. New York time and was northeast of the Birmingham airport at 5:47 a.m. when industry data tracker FlightAware.com received its last report on the jet. At that point, it was descending from about 850 feet above the ground, FlightAware data show.

Planes at Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport were under instrument flight rules at the time of the crash, according to FlightAware. That means pilots would use cockpit instruments, not visual observations, in takeoffs and landings. FlightAware said visibility was about 6 miles amid mist and a layer of broken clouds at 700 feet above the ground.

“We will immediately engage with the National Transportation Safety Board’s investigation, and we will work exhaustively on response efforts,” UPS Airlines President Mitch Nichols said in a statement. Atlanta-based UPS is the world’s largest package-delivery company.

Airbus said it was assessing the situation, and Pratt & Whitney, the United Technologies Corp. unit that made the engines on the jet, said it would work with accident investigators.

UPS Cargo-Jet Crash Kills Two Near Airport in Alabama - Bloomberg (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-14/ups-jet-freighter-crashes-near-airport-in-birmingham-alabama.html)

[completely deck]

http://i.imgur.com/d2h3xRwl.jpg (http://imgur.com/d2h3xRw)

http://i.imgur.com/mkTgcXx.jpg (http://imgur.com/mkTgcXx)

[flyboyike]

IF memory serves, birmingham is a special airport (among 16 others) in the US that have special concerns mainly due to terrain.

invite others to double check...don't have my jepps with me

special airports require certain additional study/mainly due to terrain features like TVL etc.


Yes, it's a special airport, but no more special than any number of others. Not sure where you get the 16 figure from, but....

[787FOCAL]

He clipped the trees it looks like.

[Navialden]

From Flightaware it seems it descended between 4000/5500 ft/min on the last part of the leg, is it normal due to the terrain?
http://it.flightaware.com/live/flight/UPS1354/history/20130814/0849Z/KSDF/KBHM/tracklog

Thanks

[aterpster]

flyboyike:

Yes, it's a special airport, but no more special than any number of others. Not sure where you get the 16 figure from, but....

The only Birmingham airport that is a special quals airport is the one in New York state.

[Sleeping Freight Dog]

Latest news report from CBS, interviewing the Mayor of Birmingham, is that there is debris on a couple of houses along the flight path. Judging from photos and location of the wreckage, that would seem to indicate to me that debris was pre-crash, rather than a result of the post crash break up.

[West Coast]

ATERPSTER

KBHM in my companies Jepp package is a special airport.

[skidbuggy]

Fatigue?

Time will tell....

Many airlines in the US run their crews into the ground, dirtbag carriers such as Colgan and Jetblue come to mind. Hopefully UPS has something better.




Slag away.....

[Sorry Dog]

I used to work in the neighborhood right where the crash is (definitely weird for me). It is the more open and less populated side of the airport. Most trees are cleared out, but it is not flat by any means.
At night that area could look like the best place to ditch from far away (few lights and trees), but then not look so good once you get a closer view because of a few rolling hills.

[WhatsaLizad?]

yes, its a guess, say again GUESS:

non precision approach, night or semi night conditions , wondering if they had the runway in sight and lost it in low scud, or somehow decieved by low hanging cloud or a sudden spurt of rain/drizzle without wipers on, a bit of a duck under mda and contact with terrain.


Let's try this one again, ( ok MOD?)

It is just a guess and out of line. The bodies aren't even room temperature and we have to put up with the start of endless guesses from the PPrune crowd, many who aren't aircrew and should confine themselves to the spectators or enthusiast forum for their comments and questions.

[visibility3miles]

Latest news report from CBS, interviewing the Mayor of Birmingham, is that there is debris on a couple of houses along the flight path. Judging from photos and location of the wreckage, that would seem to indicate to me that debris was pre-crash, rather than a result of the post crash break up.
Does that imply a package blew up on descent and a mid-air breakup?

They reported a couple of loud booms, but that could be the plane "landing"

[captjns]

Many airlines in the US run their crews into the ground, dirtbag carriers such as Colgan and Jetblue come to mind. Hopefully UPS has something better.

Slag away.....

Nothing to slag about, just comment on. When in doubt or a bit on the weary side, one should avail themselves of every asset the airport has to offer to make operations safer and easier. That said we can all agree that an ILS approach requires far less work than a NPA.

[joee]

Jet Blue a dirtbag carrier? I wasn't aware they had that rep, but I was a freight dog all my 121 life.

[Sorry Dog]

Local news says witnesses said engines sounded like they were sputtering or cutting out.
The low approach comment seems off base right now... also I live about 2 miles south of the airport. There was rain earlier in the night, but it was gone by early morning.

[AKAAB]

From some of the photos that have come out, it looks like they impacted the front side of a hill, impacted the next hill, and ended up on the other side. The impacts could account for some of the reports from neighbors.

Looking for a silver lining, I hope this brings to light how the DOT allowed cargo airline managements to get a carve-out/exemption from the new FAR 117 rest and duty rules coming in January. Pilots are pilots and we all need to be rested to do out jobs safely.

[ECAM_Actions]

Local news says witnesses said engines sounded like they were sputtering or cutting out.
I didn't know the A300 had piston engines. :E

If the reports are accurate, maybe it was the ignitors firing after a bird strike?

* waits for the official report *

[Speed of Sound]

It is just a guess and out of line.

Why is it out of line?

Until the final report is out we are all guessing as to the cause, and flarepilot's 'guess' is no better or no worse than anyone else's I've seen so far.

[Sorry Dog]

I didn't know the A300 had piston engines.

;) Not my choice of words, but I can see how surges can be described as such.

[VinRouge]

Is this a FATAC or did the crew get away with it (or are the details still being withheld?)

Hoping for the best, looks as if it was survivable, keeping fingers crossed that it was.

[NG ExPat]

Keep in mind that this model Airbus has had several inflight rudder problems. ie AA crash after takeoff from JFK. If I remember correctly, there was also a Canadian Charter operator that lost a good portion of the tail while out on the AR's. The talk about a debris field prior to the impact site might be explained with this in mind.

As with everyone else.....waiting to see what the NTSB has to say.

[FIRESYSOK]

It could also mean they impacted trees, engines surged as they failed, dropping internal/external parts along the remainder of the flight path.

Anything is possible, but there is a photo floating around that shows the left-main gear strut intact, approximately perpendicular to the fuselage with the wheel bogies inboard. IOW, the gear *may* have been in the retract position.

This could indicate a go-around was being attempted but not possible with compromised engines. It could also mean it simply came to rest that way as those struts are well built.

Purely an observation based on the photo.

[Cows getting bigger]

They could have done an Asiana.

Perhaps we should all stop for a breath or two? :bored:

[MPN11]

So the data you have is … … …. landed waaaay short of the RW and both crew are dead.

Has nobody considered cargo shift, terrorism, double engine failure, enthnic minority pilots or any other random suggestions? :eek:

I know it's a "Rumour Network", but apart from a few posts that contribute something there's nothing to see here. Just 2 people who were doing their job, and who are now dead.

How about waiting until there's anything to discuss? Like some facts?

[Uncle Fred]

Being en vile by chance at the moment I would second the question of landing south. I am not questioning the crews decision at this time as something else must have factored in as the taxi to the cargo ramp would be just as long had they just landed on the long runway to the northeast-east.

Perhaps the long runway was closed at that time. That is why we stand at parade rest and wait for trained and competent investigators to do their work.

There were thunderstorms last evening but no squall lines or lasting foulness. Rain on and off since then.

I had reason to be on the north side of the aerodrome this morning and it was populated by the usual bevy of news trucks. I had no desire to see the site. We lost fellow aviators this morning and apart from some road closures, gawking would be inappropriate.

Compared to some of the world's airports BHM is certainly not high terrain, but it is hilly just north of the airport and terrain is terrain if it were in the dark and on a NPA. It is most definitely, as had been stated, not a flat terrain approach whilst landing to the south.

[DaveReidUK]

How about waiting until there's anything to discuss? Like some facts?NTSB on-scene press briefing today 4pm CDT.

[AKAAB]

I read elsewhere that 24 was NOTAM'd out of service until 0500. Looking at current NOTAMS, it appears there is construction ongoing on 24, with ALS, PAPI, and ILS inop until October.

[Blind Squirrel]

Moments before Flight 1354 crashed into a hillside less than a quarter mile away, it clipped two trees in Cornelius and Barbara Benson's yard. Splinters of pine tree tops and scraps of aluminum scattered across the yard.

The Benson's home at the intersection of Tarrant Huffman Road and Treadwell Road is the last house a plane passes over before it reaches the airport....

On Wednesday morning, a piece of the UPS cargo plane about the size of a dinner plate sat leaning against a patio chair on the back porch.

Barbara Benson said the sound of the crash woke her from a dead sleep. She saw a bright red flash through the windows

"I thought at first it was the End Time," she said.

About 50 feet past the Bensons' home, the Airbus 300 struck power lines on Treadwell Road and knocked out power for several blocks....

Judging from the broken treetops in the Bensons' yard, the plane had flown 20 feet or less above their home, which sits across the street from where the airport's property starts.


If Google Maps is correct, that puts the point of first impact just a smidge more than a mile from the RWY 18 threshold, right on the extended centre-line.

[Sorry Dog]

I actually just went and looked at the accident...or at least as close as you can get without interfering.

They did clipped the tops out of several trees on the approach, and then flew over a house missing it by 40 feet or so.

The hill you see is another 100 yards beyond the house, but it rises up 50 feet up from the road and the house.

It looks like he was 20 feet low to clear the hill. You can see black impact area in the hill and most of the back half of the plane is either gone or rolled over to the over side. I suspect it was nose high, so the front broke off to where you see it now.

[Speed of Sound]

I read elsewhere that 24 was NOTAM'd out of service until 0500. Looking at current NOTAMS, it appears there is construction ongoing on 24, with ALS, PAPI, and ILS inop until October.

The CNN interview with the woman who said it sounded 'lower than usual at that time of day' suggests that this flight has been using RWY 18 for a while.

Does anyone know how long RWY 24 has been OTS?

[AKAAB]

NOTAMS as of 1900z today. Looks like Rwy24 was under construction.

!BHM 08/035 (KBHM A0367/13) BHM RWY 18/36 CLSD

!BHM 08/025 (KBHM A0349/13) BHM RWY 6 DISTANCE REMAINING SIGNS MISSING

!BHM 08/023 (KBHM A0347/13) BHM RWY 24 TORA 10060/LDA 10060/TODA 10060 WEF 1308050129

!BHM 08/022 (KBHM A0345/13) BHM RWY 6/24 NOW 10060X150

!BHM 08/021 (KBHM A0344/13) BHM RWY 6/24 NONSTD MARKING

!BHM 08/019 (KBHM A0342/13) BHM RWY 24 TOUCHDOWN MARKINGS MISSING

!BHM 08/018 (KBHM A0341/13) BHM RWY 6/24 WORKING PROGRESS TRENCHING 1290 NORTHEAST OF THR DSPLCD

!BHM 08/016 (KBHM A0337/13) BHM RWY 24 THR DSPLCD 1938

!BHM 08/008 (KBHM A0326/13) BHM NAV ILS RWY 24 DME OTS WEF 1308031700

!BHM 08/004 BHM OBST TOWER 877 (270 AGL) 12.1 SE LGTS OTS (ASR 1217702) WEF 1308011004-1308161004

!BHM 07/054 (KBHM A0316/13) BHM RWY 24 PAPI OTS WEF 1308022100-1310042100

!BHM 07/053 (KBHM A0315/13) BHM NAV ILS RWY 24 GP OTS WEF 1308022100-1310042100

!BHM 07/052 (KBHM A0314/13) BHM RWY 24 ALS OTS WEF 1308022100-1310042100

[West Coast]

Did those NOTAMS happen because of the crash or were the posted prior?

[Kengineer-130]

Sky news report has a witness saying it was on fire before impact? li battery's again??....

[flarepilot]

an earlier post of mine offered a GUESS as to what happened. it has been called inane among other things.

a cloud deck at 700' agl on a localizer dme approach that gets you to 600' is a bit suspicious

I've had a sudden spurt of rain/drizzle ruin my forward visibility and I always have my copilot standing by to turn on wipers.

any quick check shows the vasi /papi lights are set at 3.2 degrees making a slightly steeper approach....why? terrain.

a night non precision approach with low clouds makes one prone to visual miscues. hitting trees means the plane was low.

I do offer a question of barometric altimeter setting and its possible leading to a low actual altitude.


I would like to think we are all pilots here and that these are reasonable views ,possibilities if you will, about a tragic crash.

anyone recall the american airlines md80 that hit trees making an approach to windsor locks? (hartford ct). altimetry was a problem there.

I ,for one, welcome the ideas postulated here and now...a year from now when the ntsb report comes out, we will have forgotten this one.

wondering what the altitmeter setting was , what was given from approach control/atis, what we will find on the altimeters in the cockpit and how much off they might, SAY AGAIN MIGHT, have been.

now, it might not be altimetry, it might be something else...but shall we open our eyes and not just drop our heads?

[tubby linton]

The flight data from the Flight Aware website shows the aircraft a few minutes before the crash below platform height( 1500 ft )and fast .The speeds listed are groud speeds and at 191kt ground speed you would be aiming to be in config 15/20( limit speed is 205kt), probably with the gear down. There may have been a tailwind on the approach based on the surface conditions.
The data before this shows a very high rate of descent and speed which to me suggests that the crew were trying to get the height off to go straight-in on 18., To achieve 5000ft/min + at around 250kt indicated requires the use of full speedbrake in the A306..Perhaps they had planned for 24 and had forgotten that it was notamed closed until handover to Birmingham approach
The workload would have been high with the reduction of track miles and the requirement to retune the aids and rebrief for a steep NPA onto a shorter runway and fly an approach that did not fit the mental model they had created when the flight comenced. The LOC/DME does not indicate Zero at the threshold but it is displays 1.3nm according to the chart.
The Jepp chart for the Loc18 approach does not have a cross reference to DME/ALT box as a LOC/DME approach would have. The A306 will not display the LOC DME on the PFD unless the approach is in the database and has been selected.
There are no approach lights on 18 and the runway lights are listed as medium intensity. Did the road north of the airfield look like the runway?
Others have already mentioned on here that this is classified as a special airfield for their operations.
We do not know how many days or sectors they had flown recently but the pressure to land after another long night, plus having to fly at the lowest point of their circadian rhythm must surely have played a part.

[aterpster]

West Coast:

ATERPSTER

KBHM in my companies Jepp package is a special airport.

Must be something special for your company. Here is the usual list:

8900.206 - Special Pilot-In-Command Qualification Airport List: Addition of Airports - Document Information (http://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/orders_notices/index.cfm/go/document.information/documentID/1020675)

[olasek]

Sky news report has a witness saying it was on fire before impact?
Unfortunately such witnesses are notoriously unreliable...

[flarepilot]

just read the altimeter setting and it was not too far off standard, so I am thinking it wasn't altimetry...29.97 is close enough to 29.92 that it shouldn't have caused the crash...

[PEI_3721]

Question on RNAV RWY 18 as depicted at Crash: UPS A306 at Birmingham on Aug 14th 2013, touched down outside airport (http://avherald.com/h?article=466d969f&opt=0)
The point ‘BIDPE’ is additional to those shown on the LOC procedure. What is the purpose of this point other than for terrain clearance at that range?
Is does not appear to be part of the 3.25 deg GS path, and could be misinterpreted as a check altitude (2600ft) – 2000ft AAL, but at 8.7 nm this would be well below the anticipated approach path.
The procedure altitude check appears to be at the FAF ‘BASKN’; there is no altitude-range table to help monitor the approach. Without additional safety aids would the crew rely totally on the RNAV glidepath, and thus depend on the correct interpretation / programming of the procedure – including altimeter pressure setting?
Procedure NA without VGSI ? (PAPI OTS, #60)

[olasek]

BASKN is the FAF - this is where 3 deg slope counts and points before are not subject to the "slope" rule. Also 2600 ft is the minimum allowed altitude at BIDPE, so yes, this is your altitude check, but better be not lower than 2600. Yes, this is your typical non-precision approach so there is no glideslope/glidepath. If you flew this approach in some lowly Cessna you would have no information about your vertical performance except the altimeter.

[MarkerInbound]

IF memory serves, birmingham is a special airport (among 16 others) in the US that have special concerns mainly due to terrain.

invite others to double check...don't have my jepps with me

special airports require certain additional study/mainly due to terrain features like TVL etc.


Birmingham used to be on the 121.445 list but dropped off sometime in the early 2000s. The "additional study" tends to be look at a couple pictures of the airport taken on final and read a paragraph about what makes the airport special. Takes about 30 seconds. And it isn't required if the weather is good.

[Sorry Dog]

a night non precision approach with low clouds makes one prone to visual miscues. hitting trees means the plane was low.

For at least the last 1000 feet, the flight didn't appear to be descending much, but was way low.

The pic below is from google maps and I put an arrow across where the plane took out the tops of a few trees. The impact point is about 500 feet or so after the arrow or from the house in the pic. (The street pics on google are a little old since some of the trees on the left are not there anymore).

http://i39.tinypic.com/2a5ye61.jpg

If you go to maps on google (here's the location (https://maps.google.com/maps?q=1795+Tarrant+Huffman+Road&hl=en&ll=33.588365,-86.748047&spn=0.009134,0.021136&sll=33.5882,-86.748352&sspn=0.000407,0.00066&t=h&gl=us&hnear=1795+Tarrant+Huffman+Rd,+Birmingham,+Jefferson,+Alabam a+35217&z=16&layer=c&cbll=33.588252,-86.748259&panoid=3xFdqHFU1IZbhA76LwNtWA&cbp=12,140.85,,0,13.07) )

and zoom to street level, where you can see the berm that the front is resting on, you can see how low they where

[PEI_3721]

Thanks olasek (#72 / 73). However, the significant point is that the ‘altitude’ is not on the required glide path, which in an RNAV procedure might be confusing.
This is not ‘typical’ of what is required of a commercial RNAV NPA, and does little to help the industry-wide initiative to improve NPAs, particularly with the use of RNAV.

[AKAAB]

Let's be careful about building fanciful theories or extrapolating the flight data based on FlightAware info. I've looked at several of my approaches that were normal and stable, but Flightaware showed a spike in the data that wasn't factual.

The finite data will be in the boxes. It won't take long before they release some preliminary data from the recorders just to appease the media. Once we get some of that, then we can build our scenarios on facts and not wild speculation.

[AKAAB]

Did those NOTAMS happen because of the crash or were the posted prior?

Prior. The last three went into effect last week.

!BHM 07/054 (KBHM A0316/13) BHM RWY 24 PAPI OTS WEF 1308022100-1310042100

!BHM 07/053 (KBHM A0315/13) BHM NAV ILS RWY 24 GP OTS WEF 1308022100-1310042100

!BHM 07/052 (KBHM A0314/13) BHM RWY 24 ALS OTS WEF 1308022100-1310042100

[WillowRun 6-3]

There's a fascinating - and IMO highly important dynamic in this thread: the notion of the "what ifs" staying within the context in which they were offered, versus the "waiters" who scorn or reject or look askance at speculation on an Internet message board - one with certain membership parameters to be sure and thus far from the free-for-all left to the hoi polloi, but a mere techno-water-cooler sans geography through which the talk is plentiful and cheap, or cheap and plentiful, depending on your point of view. Regarding those who speculate, maybe it is worth recalling that OF COURSE they know to wait for NTSB's Probable Cause findings analysis & recommendations - they're readin' & postin' here, so this is a given, already. By like measure regarding those who would prefer nothing be said here about possible causality factors, it is worth recalling that OF COURSE this Community wants to share information, in a form and format inconceivable not so long ago, and something good comes of it, even if it just teaches a lawyer or barrister that approach flying is highly complex and causality analysis depends on many many factors and there's isn't a Big Teacher with an answer key to check the NTSB's work. IOW, even if the guesses are uncivilized backside (wild-arse in non-legalese), isn't the quest to lessen and reduce the holes in the Swiss cheese aided by having as many smart and informed fliers in the conversation as possible? That'll be two cents, Canadian of course, svp.

[Speed of Sound]

Yellow arrow shows where aircraft hit the pine trees.

http://i1280.photobucket.com/albums/a481/SoS57/bh_zps94666a0a.jpg (http://s1280.photobucket.com/user/SoS57/media/bh_zps94666a0a.jpg.html)

[captjns]

I do offer a question of barometric altimeter setting and its possible leading to a low actual altitude.

We were discussing the same thing in our office. QNE in SDF was about 3009 and about 2996 in BHM at the time of the accident. Could lead to lower than indicated, and possible instrument error too.

Just theory if the altimeters were not reset to local station pressure during descent.

[A4]

Apologies for asking what may be an obvious question to some. What does OTS actually stand for? I can understand OOS, U/S etc but OTS I'm not familiar with. I was going to ask in the Asian/SFO thread.

[Murexway]

There's a fascinating - and IMO highly important dynamic in this thread: the notion of the "what ifs" staying within the context in which they were offered, versus the "waiters" who scorn or reject or look askance at speculation on an Internet message board - one with certain membership parameters to be sure and thus far from the free-for-all left to the hoi polloi, but a mere techno-water-cooler sans geography through which the talk is plentiful and cheap, or cheap and plentiful, depending on your point of view. Regarding those who speculate, maybe it is worth recalling that OF COURSE they know to wait for NTSB's Probable Cause findings analysis & recommendations - they're readin' & postin' here, so this is a given, already. By like measure regarding those who would prefer nothing be said here about possible causality factors, it is worth recalling that OF COURSE this Community wants to share information, in a form and format inconceivable not so long ago, and something good comes of it, even if it just teaches a lawyer or barrister that approach flying is highly complex and causality analysis depends on many many factors and there's isn't a Big Teacher with an answer key to check the NTSB's work. IOW, even if the guesses are uncivilized backside (wild-arse in non-legalese), isn't the quest to lessen and reduce the holes in the Swiss cheese aided by having as many smart and informed fliers in the conversation as possible? That'll be two cents, Canadian of course, svp. Information is good. Idle, uninformed speculation just takes up space. I don't post here to educate lawyers.

Let's be careful about building fanciful theories or extrapolating the flight data based on FlightAware info. I've looked at several of my approaches that were normal and stable, but Flightaware showed a spike in the data that wasn't factual.

The finite data will be in the boxes. It won't take long before they release some preliminary data from the recorders just to appease the media. Once we get some of that, then we can build our scenarios on facts and not wild speculation. +1

[Lonewolf_50]

Isn't it a habit to get the altimeter from ATIS at your destination before you begin the approach? :confused: Regardless of the runway and approach active, the altimeter setting applies to the whole airport.

[Airbubba]

We were discussing the same thing in our office. QNE in SDF was about 3009 and about 2996 in BHM at the time of the accident. Could lead to lower than indicated, and possible instrument error too

I think you mean QNH, not QNE in SDF and BHM.

If it was never reset to QNE (STD in the 'bus) after takeoff in SDF, they would inevitably get a call from ATC when leveling off in RVSM airspace enroute.

But, as you conjecture, if it was switched back out of standard and then never reset from the SDF QNH, the path guidance on an RNAV (GPS) approach would indeed lead to a point short of the runway.

[lomapaseo]

Previous CFIT accidents have involved severe engine damage both while shredding through trees as well as a bounced impact with the ground where the engines take multiple impact damage before being tossed ahead of the aircraft.

This might be present where one engine is severely damaged while another engine shows little signs of rotating in the fan.

best not to jump to conclusions upon viewing the first couple of days photos.

[Loose rivets]

This seems surprisingly low.




The plane was built in 2003 and had logged about 11,000 hours over 6,800 flights, Airbus said in a statement.

[Orestes]

This screengrab is from the following web site:

2 killed in explosive UPS cargo plane crash in Birmingham, Alabama - NY Daily News (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/ups-cargo-plane-crashes-explodes-birminghma-article-1.1426318)

It looks like the fan was turning very slowly if turning at all on impact.....

http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1426785.1376505937!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_635/ups.jpg

[flarepilot]

dear A4

OTS means OUT of Service.

[tubby linton]

OK 465 I think that the UPS aircraft have the latest version of FMS fitted which will allow the flying of a Vnav path. The FCOM references .
The airbus mod required is 12454 ,12455 or later to be able to do this.

[tubby linton]

According to the FCTM if the mod is fitted then it will fly a path. The sub -mode is known as Final Approach Function. FCTM ref is 2.32.72 p8. I think it was somebody at Honeywell who told me that UPS had it fitted.

[ImbracableCrunk]

rumour US, rumor [ˈruːmə]n1.a. information, often a mixture of truth and untruth, passed around verbally
If you don't wan to read rumors, rumours, etc, then maybe you should go to a website that doesn't have RUMOUR in the name. Or simply wait for the NTSB's sunshine report.

Pilots (and people in general) cope with accidents by talking it out.

If you want a more facts-based website, go to AvHerald. Just don't read the Reader Comments.

[PJ2]

tubby linton, perhaps slightly OT, but have you ever heard of the "Universal" FMS and if so have you heard of any problems with it? (I'm not saying that the UPS aircraft had this equipment on board, but the discussion points raising LNAV - VNAV caught my eye).

[skyken]

A2997 Altimeter from Metars at the time.

[Murexway]

If you don't wan to read rumors, rumours, etc, then maybe you should go to a website that doesn't have RUMOUR in the name. Or simply wait for the NTSB's sunshine report.

Pilots (and people in general) cope with accidents by talking it out.

If you want a more facts-based website, go to AvHerald. Just don't read the Reader Comments. The experienced-based comments, observations, suggestions, etc. on this website from actual, transport-category rated, commercial pilots are most informative and interesting, despite the "Rumor" name. But the number of posts from non-pilot aviation "entuhsiasts" make it much less interesting and more tedious to read. Perhaps you're right.... at least the AvHerald seems to have facts.

Thanks......

[tdracer]

This seems surprisingly low.



Quote:
The plane was built in 2003 and had logged about 11,000 hours over 6,800 flights, Airbus said in a statement.



I've noticed this with UPS 757 and 767 Freighters - hour/cycle count is roughly half what is normal for passenger operations (there are some late 1980/early 1990 built passenger 767s that have 100,000+ hours :eek:). They typically fly two flights per day - one to the UPS hub, one back to a destination airport (generally not the airport they came from).

BTW, regarding the witness report of engines "sputtering" - I've often heard surging engines described as "banging" or "backfiring", but never "sputtering". Reasonably sure the UPS A300-600 have PW4000/94" engines - pretty much the same as used on the 767, 747-400, and MD-11. Impressive reliability record (well below 1 shutdown per 100,000 hours), so independent engine failure is highly unlikely. It was still dark at the time, so a large bird strike is also unlikely (plus bird strike caused shutdowns are super rare on the PW4000 - fan damage and maybe a surge - but they usually recover and operate more or less normally for the remainder of the flight).

OTOH, not too many engines out there would deal well with a tree ingestion event :rolleyes:

[physicus]

The apparent absence of rotational kinetic impact damage on the fan blades points at little to no power developed at impact. A late change of plans from 24 to a straight in 18 would have left them hot and high: close throttles, barndoors out, nose down, and by the time low energy became apparent, it was either too late due to preoccupation with some other issue, or a compressor surge (for whatever reason) prevented spooling up in time leading to the result at hand. Judging by the fire, fuel starvation appears unlikely.

[lomapaseo]

The apparent absence of rotational kinetic impact damage on the fan blades points at little to no power developed at impact. A late change of plans from 24 to a straight in 18 would have left them hot and high: close throttles, barndoors out, nose down, and by the time low energy became apparent, it was either too late due to preoccupation with some other issue, or a compressor surge (for whatever reason) prevented spooling up in time leading to the result at hand. Judging by the fire, fuel starvation appears unlikely

not so fast :)

The engine could have creamed the rear-end (not the fan) when it hit the hill, tail first. All the picture shows so far is after the engine dislodged from the wing and flew a bit farther.

The folks on scene already know this answer even without the DFDR so I'm intent on listening for a clue in the next NTSB summary.

[olasek]

the significant point is that the ‘altitude’ is not on the required glide path, which in an RNAV procedure might be confusing
There should be nothing confusing about this particular chart for someone who is a reasonable skilled IFR rated pilot, and even less so for an ATP with thousands of hours behind his belt.

[ImbracableCrunk]

The experienced-based comments, observations, suggestions, etc. on this website from actual, transport-category rated, commercial pilots are most informative and interesting, despite the "Rumor" name. But the number of posts from non-pilot aviation "entuhsiasts" make it much less interesting and more tedious to read. Perhaps you're right.... at least the AvHerald seems to have facts.

Thanks......

Quite true. The double-edged sword of free speech. AvHerald for facts, PPrune for discussion.

[Capn Bloggs]

The Jepp chart for the Loc18 approach does not have a cross reference to DME/ALT box as a LOC/DME approach would have.

Why on earth, in this day and age, don't the Americans have a distance/altitude scale on their NPA charts? It then doesn't matter what the steps are or what the FMS is doing, just get on, and stay on, the distance/altitude scale and you'll be safe.

The procedure altitude check appears to be at the FAF ‘BASKN’
Although I don't use FAA charts, it doesn't look to me like the Procedure Altitude is published here; the 2300 is merely a "not below" altitude. It would be interesting to see the Jepp chart for this approach, as it publishes the Procedure Altitude on the chart.

BASKN is the FAF - this is where 3 deg slope counts and points before are not subject to the "slope" rule. Also 2600 ft is the minimum allowed altitude at BIDPE, so yes, this is your altitude check, but better be not lower than 2600.
Say what? 2600 an altitude "check"? "Better be not lower than 2600"?? It's a mandatory "not below" altitude and by my calculations happens to be fully 900ft below the "normal" profile for the RNAV approach.

There should be nothing confusing about this particular chart for someone who is a reasonable skilled IFR rated pilot, and even less so for an ATP with thousands of hours behind his belt.
So what profile would you use down final, or would you just "dive and drive"?

[olasek]

not below" altitude and by my calculations happens to be fully 900ft below the "normal" profile for the RNAV approach.There is no profile at BIDPE yet, as there is no profile at COLIG, profile doesn't start before FAF. You look at a straight line and the picture confuses you because this is just a drawing, it is out of scale and it is meant to be a shortcut. Also if you don't like "altitude check" (I didn't invent this term) you may call it step-down fix. Everybody familiar with IFR operations should know what step-down fix is.

So what profile would you use down final, or would you just "dive and drive"? Dive& drive is a perfectly valid choice, it all depends on aircraft equipment.

[BuzzBox]

Dive& drive is a perfectly valid choice, it all depends on aircraft equipment.

Oh boy, here we go again... :ugh:

[Airbubba]

Dive& drive is a perfectly valid choice, it all depends on aircraft equipment.

That may be how they did it back in the old days with piston twin equipment but it is defintely not currently taught in widebody FMS aircraft from what I've seen.

Why not is explained in this FAA circular:

http://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Advisory_Circular/AC%20120-108.pdf

The whole idea of the RNAV (GPS) approach is not to dive and drive.

[Capn Bloggs]

There is no profile at BIDPE yet, as there is no profile at COLIG, profile doesn't start before FAF.
Well it should (and be published). You guys need to be dragged into the real world.

[Airbubba]

Well it should (and be published). You guys need to be dragged into the real world.

Huh?

Step down fixes are not on the final profile path on many approaches. And even if they are, non-standard temperature can cause them to be above the extended profile. The feds have been harping on this in recent years, here is a discussion for ILS approaches, it is a similar situation for non-precision approaches with vertical path guidance:

FAA Releases Updated Guidance on Instrument Landing System Intercepts | NBAA - National Business Aviation Association (http://www.nbaa.org/ops/airspace/20110408-instrument-landing-system-intercepts.php)

And here is the circular:
http://www.faa.gov/other_visit/aviation_industry/airline_operators/airline_safety/info/all_infos/media/2011/InFO11009.pdf

[olasek]

The whole idea of the RNAV (GPS) approach is not to dive and drive. Wrong, RNAV with VNAV, there is no VNAV in this approach. If aircraft has no equipment to help him with the vertical part then dive & drive is perfectly fine. Obviously this Airbus was supposed to fly it per airline's SOP but there may be a lowly GA aircraft flying behind it that will in fact do dive & drive - it still happens every day. I stick what I said - depending on the equipment and pilot's training, I refuse to view aviation through the prism of "big iron" only. If my G1000 box in my SR22 doesn't turn this particular approach into LNAV+V and provide me with "advisory" glide path then I am no better off then some steam gauges Cessna circa 1965 flying the same approach.

You guys need to be dragged into the real world. Say what? What guys? Talk to the people who design approaches or kindly read some IFR textbook.:ugh:

[Airbubba]

Wrong, RNAV with VNAV.

Uh, don't know if you know someone who has Jepps but chart 12-2 dated 2 MAR 12 is the RNAV (GPS) RWY 18 at BHM, presumably this is the chart the UPS crew was using. I doubt they would be using the LOC RWY 18 but I will concede that it is possible and legal. And, if they did do the LOC approach, they would normally have vertical path guidance from the FMS.

I refuse to view aviation through the prism of "big iron" only.

I'm not trying to be pedantic, I realize you perhaps don't fly large aircraft for a living.

The only aircraft smaller than the A300 that UPS operates is the B-757 so I guess in that sense you could call it a light twin. But somehow I don't think they would be doing a dive and drive in a widebody in 2013.

[olasek]

But somehow I don't think they would be doing a dive and drive in a widebody in 2013. I can agree with this.

My only point was that there is nothing on this particular RNAV approach chart that gives you a glide slope, this is not LNAV/VNAV nor is it LPV both of which would give you a slope.

[ironbutt57]

Many approaches that don't have VNAV/LNAV minimums published, are still encoded in the database....however in FBW bus...(dont know about the A300) it is prohibited to fly these in Final Approach mode...looking at the approach chart posted on Avherald, it sure is a less than optimally designed approach especially if flying the transition from TDG VOR

[Airbubba]

My point was that there is nothing on this particular RNAV approach chart that gives you a glide slope, this is not LNAV/VNAV nor is it LPV both of which would give you a slope.

So, are you claiming there is no vertical path guidance on an RNAV (GPS) approach? In my experience, you do have vertical path guidance on an RNAV (GPS) approach in an FMS widebody like the UPS A300. The gotcha is that the aircraft knows where it is horizontally but depends on altimetry to generate the vertical path since the GPS doesn't do vertical position well without something like WAAS correction as in the LPV approach which you mention. Hence the RNAV (GPS) is still a non-precision approach.

Do you see that [3.24°] notation on the planview chart? Are you familiar with a D-DA?

[olasek]

Again, you keep referring to "FMS widebody" and I am talking about this approach in general with no particular equipment in mind, clearly there are differences between just LNAV like this one and full LNAV/VNAV, too bad this runway doesn't have it yet. Yeah, I know many FMSs can handle constant angle descents but unfortunately my SR22 can't do it but instead can do LPV which most "widebodies" can't :}. But my G1000 can turn a given LNAV into LNAV+V and give me this desirable glide slope but it ain't guaranteed.

[slowto280]

Quote: The plane was built in 2003 and had logged about 11,000 hours over 6,800 flights, Airbus said in a statement.

Overnight Cargo - 52 weeks x 5 days x 2 legs a night x 10 years = 5,200
With the short legs these airplanes fly, just about right.

Short leg passenger operation - completely different story.

So sad for these guys and families of - just another day at work - enjoying (even loving...) what you do and getting a darn good paycheck for doing it - then in an instant - finished. Crap! :ugh:

[SMT Member]

This seems surprisingly low.

Not for a freighter, particularly not one bought brand new by an integrator. Keep in mind the nature of their business, which is limited to operating as little as 2 sectors a day. It is ops normal for integrators to have their aircraft standing around all day, and only operate for a handful of hours during the night.

[Tscottme]

Kengineer wrote

Sky news report has a witness saying it was on fire before impact? li battery's again??....

Remember the Avianca 707 that ate it near NYC some years ago. The crew ran it out of fuel. There was no post-impact fire. The media and witnesses still reported witnesses as seeing fire before impact.

[fatbus]

Was there any distress call prior to? What kind of approach were they doing?Wx seemed ok. Wait to hear the initial findings before coming up with ANY theory . We were not there!

[ironbutt57]

witnesses ALWAYS see a fire before impact...might have been on fire before it hit the hill, as it did impact trees and power lines prior to hitting a hill...LiOn battery fire would have probably generated a Mayday call....who's to know, anyway be sure the FDR and CVR will bear witness to what happened...

[Loose rivets]

SMT: . . . which is limited to operating as little as 2 sectors a day. It is ops normal for integrators to have their aircraft standing around all day, and only operate for a handful of hours during the night.


Incredible how it can be made to pay. In the early days of Britannia's 737 operation, a Texas Boeing salesman told me they had the highest utilization in the world - some 19.something per 24. I found that incredible in the opposite direction.

Low utilization seems to imply there might be a lot of pressure to get those packages accepted and on their way. Why am I getting a bad feeling about this? Not the tragic loss of this one, but for a basic principals. Sitting on the flight-deck watching the night activities in freight hubs is a real eye-opener.

[DaveReidUK]

Staggeringly unhelpful graphic published by FlightAware (who really should know better) purporting to show the final radar plot of the aircraft's position amid the KC-135 tankers on the 106th ARW's ramp, just to the NW of runway 06/24 :ugh:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BRn-43rCYAAr1ig.jpg:large

[Capn Bloggs]

Step down fixes are not on the final profile path on many approaches. And even if they are, non-standard temperature can cause them to be above the extended profile. The feds have been harping on this in recent years, here is a discussion for ILS approaches, it is a similar situation for non-precision approaches with vertical path guidance:

I really don't think this is the issue, in relation to the publication of a distance/altitude scale for an NPA. From my reading of the links you posted, any step-down fix is related to altitudes, so the temperature would be irrelevant, as all aircraft that were affected by the fix (those on hte approahc and those crossing under or over) would all be affected identically. The issue in the articles was the physical location of the glidepath verses the changing altitude of that glidepath due to temperature. That is irrelevant to an NPA.

I can see no technical reason why a distance/altitude profile could not be published for this and other NPAs, as they are in other parts of the world:

http://www.airservicesaustralia.com/aip/current/dap/BASVO01-135.pdf

Yeah, I know many FMSs can handle constant angle descents but unfortunately my SR22 can't do it but instead can do LPV which most "widebodies" can't . But my G1000 can turn a given LNAV into LNAV+V and give me this desirable glide slope but it ain't guaranteed.
Yes this is not an LPV, so mention of it is irrelevant, and you are correct, real FMS can do VNAV on an NPA. But for those who don't/can't, a distance/altitude scale is the next best thing; I'm talking about "big iron" here. You are free to do what you like in your bugsmasher. Dive and drive to your heart's content; you're going slow enough not to hurt anyone (if you do it'll probably only be you and your few pax) and you don't have any stabilised approach pressures of sink rate and slope.

[bugg smasher]

You are free to do what you like in your bugsmasher

I beg your pardon? You are starting to sound like my wife...

[FIRESYSOK]

I would think most airlines are using constant-rate descents on non-precision approaches. Most charts in the US have a ROD table based on ground speed whereby you figure an initial descent rate and modify it if g/s changes or a restriction will not be met, using the VNAV information for advisory. (Don't get me wrong, this can be tricky)

Adding 50' to the MDA, you would miss the approach if you were either not in a position to land stably, or you simply did not see the requisite lights or runway environ. Some airlines call it "CANPA". Constant-Angle NPA.

It works rather well in practice. I can't see doing a dive and drive method in this day and age, but I do not know what UPS does or did.

[Capn Bloggs]

I beg your pardon? You are starting to sound like my wife...
Sorry Bugg, you're probably on Prune to keep away from her!

Most charts in the US have a ROD table based on ground speed whereby you figure an initial descent rate and modify it if g/s changes or a restriction will not be met, using the VNAV information for advisory. (Don't get me wrong, this can be tricky)

Correct. It's difficult to judge what's going to happen in a couple of miles if the ROD is not quite right. Sure, you can "bounce" off the steps but equally, if you get high, you're just as likely to not get to the MDA before the 3° cutoff. That's the beauty of an altitude distance scale: get on it, stay on it and provided you don't bust the minima, you'll never kill yourself or your pax and give yourself the best chance of getting in (50ft problem not withstanding).

[737er]

Yes sir. In the US dive and drive is all but extinct for 121 carriers. Typical is to add 50' to the MDA and treat that new altitude as a DA. Calculate a vertical speed to use from the FAF and make small adjustments to V/S as necessary for the proper path and step downs if applicable. Much much better. Works great.

[FR8R H8R]

In the US, dive and drive was the preferred method of NPA. That said, I have no idea how UPS operates their NPA and will not try to speculate.

There is no proper VNAV on the A306 and the profile mode is generally not reliable enough to use for more than the initial stepdown in an arrival. Any changes and it goes tango uniform. It is certainly not a FBW modern airbus.

Has anyone ever seen an aircraft crash that didn't include Cletus and Maude talking about "backfiring engines", abnormal configurations and "explosions and fire" prior to impact? How many times has a witness actually said "it all looked normal"? And how many people were up before dawn watching UPS land? :ugh:

[JimField]

Like their Asiana 214 analysis, Sooeet did a new analysis for UPS 1354, including nice plots of position and airspeed. It's darned good, check it out:

What Happened to UPS Flight 1354 - Analysis by Sooeet.com (http://www.sooeet.com/aerospace/what-happened-to-ups-flight-1354-p01.php)

[Speed of Sound]

So far there have been no reports of anyone hearing engines spooling up.

If they were doing 190KTS less than 1 nm out, the fact that no go around was attempted (or was successful) suggests that they were dealing with problems other than simply a 'messed up' approach.

[VinRouge]

why not wait till the preliminary comes out? the engines could just as likely have been at idle.

pointless speculating either way, the NTSB will get the report out as soon as they can.

best we can hope for that the FAA will get a move on in changing their rediculous FTL's in the USA.

[J.O.]

Many approaches that don't have VNAV/LNAV minimums published, are still encoded in the database....however in FBW bus...(dont know about the A300) it is prohibited to fly these in Final Approach mode

That may be the rule in your neck of the woods but it isn't universally so. With certain restrictions, many jurisdictions permit the use of the fully managed NPA without having an LNAV/VNAV minima published.

[DaveReidUK]

If they were doing 190KTS less than 1 nm outIf they were doing 190kt at that point.

But that calculation is presumably based on the same dodgy FlightAware data that puts the final position of the aircraft within the airport boundary. :ugh:

However if we assume that the two previous position plots are valid (granted, an equally precarious assumption) then they put the aircraft at 5.46nm from the threshold and then a minute later at 2.83nm.

That's an average GS of 158kt - a lot different from 190kt.

[FIRESYSOK]

Referencing the 'Sooeet' vertical path someone posted above:

This was not an ILS. It is NOT a good analysis. In fact, it is almost completely irrelevant and actually looks quite reasonable for a non precision profile until the very last, if it is to be believed at all.

[Lonewolf_50]

EDIT:
NVM, just realized there were two pages.

Analysis of interest, but taken with a grain of salt for reasons noted above.

[Capn Bloggs]

Like their Asiana 214 analysis, Sooeet did a new analysis for UPS 1354, including nice plots of position and airspeed. It's darned good,
I tend to agree with firesysok: that article is dodgy.

If Soooeeet's plot is to be believed, it's plainly obvious the crew couldn't see the runway because the track deviates well left from a long way out. It's claim that weather was not a factor appears itself to be a furphy. The crew either couldn't see the runway or were majorly distracted by something in/with the aircraft.

Additionally, UPS1354 flew well above the PAPI glide-slope for runway 18 until about 15 nautical miles out, at which time UPS1354 began a very rapid descent while maintaining 300 knots, likely using a combination of engine power to maintain speed, and spoilers to increase descent rate. UPS1354 attempted to intercept the PAPI glide-slope from above by means of this rapid descent between 15 and 10 nautical miles from the runway touch down zone.
What is this rubbish? Intercepting the PAPI glideslope at 10-15nm? If they are like ours, you can't even see them that far out; at night they are just a white/pink/red blur. And let's not forget that it was Scattered at 1100 and Broken at 3500ft. PAPI would not have been visible.

"Engine power to maintain speed and spoilers to increase descent rate"? And these guys are casting judgement on a dead crew??

[WillowRun 6-3]

To add to the sub-thread here on the matter of whether any and all rumor and conjecture posted here - sometimes by members who do not possess PIC hours or even any license to operate any aircraft, and also sometimes by full-authority Four-Stripers - even amongst the posts of the cognoscenti there can be, and are, disagreements over the meaning of observations. There is something to be said, despite apparent derision or condescension offered previously, for non-pilot "enthusiasts" who ALSO are seeking to participate in or contribute to the business at hand: improved safety, or more sensible R/T protocol and compliance therewith (the R/T Standard thread on another part of the board), and perhaps even in the looming if not imminent governmental and regulatory challenge of assuring that manufacturers' automated avionics suites in new types (and retro-fits and/or upgrades) work in concert with, not in opposition to, the vast complexity of approach flying in civilian-controlled U.S. (and presumably most ICAO national jurisdictions) airspace. Was not one main impetus emerging from the SFO Asiana mishap the need to assure something like "coordination" of avionics, ATC, automation protocols, and CRM (send me back to Primary if I have omitted something critically important from said list). Stated in a little bit different terms, would not every full-authority Driver want the General Counsel of Boeing (just for example) to be pretty conversant, and to have a decent cognitive -- though OBVIOUSLY not experiential- comprehension of LNAV VNAV Wx and all the rest of the pilot talk posted here? So, what that leaves us with is, one, don't eject the enthusiasts who have something to contribute or are striving to learn so that they may do so in some other professional careerist role, and two, in a day when the masses shoot 140-keystroke messages in sheer mass numbers and widespread the world over, the pace of information-sharing is so fast, which is a good thing - and if it turns out there is a little bit of noise amidst that torrentious signal, deal with it, move on (though be glad for the incredibly fast dissemination of information).

[Speed of Sound]

And these guys are casting judgement on a dead crew??

Can you actually show me where judgement is being cast on the crew?

[Capn Bloggs]

We analyzed the range data (distance from the airport), and altitude data published by FlightAware.com. Our analysis suggests that UPS Flight 1354 (UPS1354) made a non-stabilized approach to runway 18.

Heavy transport aircraft such as the Airbus A300-600F, should routinely perform stabilized approaches

It clearly shows that UPS1354 flew the majority of the approach well above the PAPI glide-slope. "High energy" approaches, like this approach flown by UPS1354, are inherently risky for heavy transport aircraft such as the Airbus A300-600F.

However, at 1 nautical mile UPS1354 was still flying at 190 knots, much too fast for the final approach. It should have been flying at about 135 knots during this portion of the approach.

In fact, the more I read it, the more the whole article stinks.

[PEI_3721]

olasek, Capn Bloggs, Airbubber, et al,
Whilst the gist of my original question was to stimulate discussion as above, one aspect remains unanswered. Why have ‘BIDPE’ on the RNAV chart but not for LOC.
If ‘BIDPE’ pre-empts a VNAV path approach, then by not being on the desired path, albeit before the FAF (FAF is a more a check and not necessarily a start point?), it adds confusion and may encourage a step down procedure.
Alternatively if ‘BIDPE’ is just for info, ‘not below’ point, then it provides opportunity for an erroneous early descent – “Calculate a vertical speed to use from the FAF and make small adjustments to V/S as necessary for the proper path and step downs if applicable”, where flying the calculated descent path from ‘BIDPE’ - mistaken for FAF, would result in a 900ft error.

Re ‘lateral’ deviation. What is the primary navigation source on this aircraft how is it updated? Is this subject to ‘map slip? If so, then it might contribute to longitudinal / lateral path errors; the data link information discussed elsewhere might not represent ‘real world’.
Furthermore, we have yet to hear about EGPWS, which should have provided an alert, but if ‘the map’ - the assumed position from ‘NAV’ was closer to the airfield than reality, then EGPWS might not have alerted the crew (a good reason to have GPS embedded in EGPWS).
Also, if the crew focused on the computed RNAV solution then they similarly might not have been concerned until the ‘visual’ stage of the approach (=<MDA).

[Speed of Sound]

In fact, the more I read it, the more the whole article stinks.

I'll take that as a no then?

[Flying Guy]

"just read the altimeter setting and it was not too far off standard, so I am thinking it wasn't altimetry...29.97 is close enough to 29.92 that it shouldn't have caused the crash... "

AHHH, I guess we should always keep our altimeters at standard - avoid many accidents.

[Speed of Sound]

Like their Asiana 214 analysis, Sooeet did a new analysis for UPS 1354, including nice plots of position and airspeed. It's darned good, check it out:

What Happened to UPS Flight 1354 - Analysis by Sooeet.com (http://www.sooeet.com/aerospace/what-happened-to-ups-flight-1354-p01.php)

Not entirely sure why they have included a profile of an approach to RWY 24 on their graph. :confused:

[Airbubba]

Additionally, UPS1354 flew well above the PAPI glide-slope for runway 18 until about 15 nautical miles out, at which time UPS1354 began a very rapid descent while maintaining 300 knots, likely using a combination of engine power to maintain speed, and spoilers to increase descent rate. UPS1354 attempted to intercept the PAPI glide-slope from above by means of this rapid descent between 15 and 10 nautical miles from the runway touch down zone.

However, at 1 nautical mile UPS1354 was still flying at 190 knots, much too fast for the final approach. It should have been flying at about 135 knots during this portion of the approach.

In fact, the more I read it, the more the whole article stinks.

I agree, the idea of a 300 knot descent 15 miles out in the U.S. somehow doesn't seem right. It is definitely 250 kts. below 10,000 ft. and they don't give you 'high speed' in the U.S. even at night in Alabama. And if they were really doing 190 kts. one mile out they couldn't get land flaps out at that speed, right? Below 1000 agl and not stable and not configured they would go around, long before a one mile final I would think.

Furthermore, we have yet to hear about EGPWS, which should have provided an alert, but if ‘the map’ - the assumed position from ‘NAV’ was closer to the airfield than reality, then EGPWS might not have alerted the crew (a good reason to have GPS embedded in EGPWS).

The EGPWS I am familiar with has its own GPS and functions whether the LNAV in the aircraft has GPS or not. And, yes, I believe the EGPWS will give terrain warnings for descent toward terrain that is not the runway in the landing configuration. Seems like you would get a false alert at KUL (Sepang, not Subang) years ago due to a hill that had been removed to lower landing minima but was not yet updated in the EGPWS terrain database.

[ohnutsiforgot]

"It sounded like an airplane had given out of fuel. We thought it was trying to make it to the airport. But a few minutes later we heard a loud `boom,'" she said.


A few minutes later ?

Lacking a complete language, we Americans frequently measure intervals using the folllowing precision estimator:
'Then it went" = immediate
'Few minutes later" = greater than 'then it went'
'While later" = greater than a few minutes
'A while later" = greater then while later
'Sometime later' = 1 day to 6 weeks, used only by journalists

[Mudman]

Aerial photos of UPS crash site.

http://imgick.al.com/home/bama-media/pgmain/img/birmingham-news/photo/2013/08/-b6d10abfa6f64281.JPG

http://imgick.al.com/home/bama-media/pgmain/img/birmingham-news/photo/2013/08/-f56fe3821bd43da5.JPG
more here.. Aerial Photos of UPS Crash Site (http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2013/08/ups_plane_crash_aerial_photos.html#incart_maj-story-1)

[PJ2]

"In fact, the more I read it, the more the whole article stinks. " - Capn Bloggs

Agree completely, including your quoted passages. It's terrible work, dressed up pretty.

Those who know accident investigation and flight data work routinely ignore such contributions as the data source used is not an investigative tool but a polished internet toy that gives the appearance of careful work that in truth just fuels uninformed internet speculation in advance of the facts.

There's no point in such work (other than for ego) because it can't possibly describe what occurred without the flight data from the recorders. Anything else is just a cartoon.

PJ2

[WillowRun 6-3]

@ ohnutsiforgot:
Imagine how much fun it is to take the deposition testimony of such folks - or to take their statements for NTSB field investigation purposes. I recall seeing in the NTSB interview record of some of the people who were in the JAL 787 at BOS when smoke first was observed certain references to their estimations or expressions of perceived lapse of time...and thinking 'hmmm, a tad imprecise, is it not?' Not suggesting the wiggle in those facts impacted anything material in that causality analysis, but it might matter quite a lot in some other case.

[areobat]

There has been discussion about Harold and Maude seeing the plane on fire or hearing sputtering, and I agree, you almost always get "witnesses" that say that. In this case, I think there may be some truth to the matter. As mentioned previously, the plane clipped the power lines (and trees) before impacting the hill. This could have ruptured a fuel tank and the impacted electrical lines could have ignited it. From the insulators I can see in the photos, it looks like that there is 12KV service in that area, so the arcing could have been significant.

I also think that the "sputtering engines" may have been the sound of high voltage arcing, spring fuses melting, or the utility recloser in operation. The recloser is a type of automated circuit breaker that attempts to "re close" the circuit several times (usually three) after a fault, the theory being that most faults are temporary, so why keep the juice off. When this operation occurs into a hard fault like downed lines, it does indeed sound like very loud "sputtering".

[aguadalte]

"Additionally, UPS1354 flew well above the PAPI glide-slope for runway 18 until about 15 nautical miles out, at which time UPS1354 began a very rapid descent while maintaining 300 knots, likely using a combination of engine power to maintain speed, and spoilers to increase descent rate. UPS1354 attempted to intercept the PAPI glide-slope from above by means of this rapid descent between 15 and 10 nautical miles from the runway touch down zone"

..."likely using a combination of engine power to maintain speed, and spoilers to increase descent rate."


That sentence could not have been written by a credible author...

[Speed of Sound]

because it can't possibly describe what occurred without the flight data from the recorders. Anything else is just a cartoon.

Not strictly true!

A number of people carried out 'reconstructions' after the Asiana 214 crash using published radar data for altitude and ground speed which turned out to be surprisingly accurate once the DFDR information was released. ;)

[PJ2]

Speed of Sound;
Not strictly true!

A number of people carried out 'reconstructions' after the Asiana 214 crash using published radar data for altitude and ground speed which turned out to be surprisingly accurate once the DFDR information was released. http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/src:www.pprune.org/get/images/smilies/wink2.gif
Thanks for your response.

To my knowledge no one here has the DFDR data so we can't really say that. The comparison is with statements made about the data, not the data itself.

I realize I'm being fussy, but that's what this work is all about - second-hand information isn't good enough even from reliable sources.

For a number of reasons, the caution regarding the use of such unproven data is warranted and necessary. The risk is, as I'm sure you're aware, that people actually believe plots and animations made on such thin data and begin drawing conclusions, just like a lot of other behaviours based upon "internet knowledge".

I fully understand the capabilities of radar data plots (which are even used in formal reports at times), but the sample rate is too low to support assumptions of accuracy without confirmation with the aircraft recorders.

[A Squared]

"just read the altimeter setting and it was not too far off standard, so I am thinking it wasn't altimetry...29.97 is close enough to 29.92 that it shouldn't have caused the crash... "

AHHH, I guess we should always keep our altimeters at standard - avoid many accidents.

Not sure where you come up with this inane comment. Nobody suggested anything of the sort. The point was pretty obvious and it's amazing that you need it explained, but as you obviously missed it, here's what was meant: For the actual conditions existing at the time of *this* particular incident, forgetting to reset altimeters to QNH thru transition would have resulted in an altimeter error of approximately 50 feet, which obviously far too small to have resulted in *this* accident. The suggestion that resetting altimeters to QNH on descent be done away with exists solely within your imagination.

[DaveReidUK]

Not sure where you come up with this inane comment.

That'll teach Flying Guy not to use irony in his posts, lest they be taken literally. :O

[A Squared]

That'll teach Flying Guy not to use irony in his posts, lest they be taken literally.

I understood completely his irony. That's kind of the point, he was sarcastically and ironically responding to a something which hadn't been hinted at. Not even a little bit.

[DaveReidUK]

Second media briefing on the investigation to be held 4pm CDT today.

[PEI_3721]

OK465. Thanks for the chart explanation (#132 / 135), although I am surprised by the accuracy difference between LOC (an angular system) and GPS RNAV (linear, RNP 0.3); I also note that BIDPE is a waypoint in the GPS procedure.
However, it still appears illogical for the RNAV approach to allow a descent to 2600ft (well below a constant-angle path), when such a relatively new procedure could have been constructed to help improve safety.

As Airbubber notes, most modern installations use the GPS receiver built into EGPWS; however this is not used for navigation. Other EGPWS configurations still depend on an external nav input, which even with GPS (used for nav) is only assumed to correctly represent the aircraft’s position, i.e. GPS drop out / error, the nav position could ‘slip’.
Depending on the aircraft’s nav installation, some of the early EGPWS installations could suffer map slip, which could falsely position the aircraft in the EGPWS safe area before the runway, and the in-parallel standard GPWS function would not warn of low terrain due to the landing configuration – gear and flap.
Thus what was the EGPWS nav configuration in this aircraft?

[PilotsResearch]

The FlightAware track shows, about 20 nm north, a jog to the right, presumably to get lined up for final. However, the new track didn't quite line up with RWY 18. Rather, it would have led them slightly east, crossing RWY 24 near its touchdown zone.

Any ideas on why this error? Is this measurement error in FlightAware data? (It does appear, however, to show the crash site accurately.)

[olasek]

approach to allow a descent to 2600ft (well below a constant-angle path)Again, you keep repeating this "well below descent path" like a broken record, it is your poor understanding of the approaches. Take any other say ILS approach and any point before the FAF will be for sure "below descent path" by obvious geometry, it is simply false to consider points before FAF as having anything to do with the descent profile. This is how great majority of the approaches in the US are constructed, it has nothing to do with safety. Grab some Canadian charts, you will also find similar examples there. Yes, it is absolutely OK to descend to 2600 at BIDPE and stay at 2600 until you reach the FAF, such interception of glide slope from "below" is perfectly routine.

[Lonewolf_50]

I fully understand the capabilities of radar data plots (which are even used in formal reports at times), but the sample rate is too low to support assumptions of accuracy without confirmation with the aircraft recorders.
Restated for emphasis.

I have now had a chance to review the approach plate.

IAF at COLIG is 14.1 DME, which is 12.8 nm from MAP. Min Alt 3500 ft.
FAF is BASKN, 6 DME, 4.7 nm from MAP. The 3.28 degree glide slope depicted (suggested) is IIRC based on the idealized slope from FAF to touchdown, however, I'd need to look that up to refresh my memory.

In the lower left hand corner, FAF to MAP times are 1:53 at 150 kts GS, and 1:34 at 180 kts GS. This would tell me, as a pilot, that if I were flying a CAT C or D aircraft on this approach, I should be configured, and on approach speed well before the FAF, and have my estimated ROD figured out before I hit the FAF. If I had a tool in the cockpit that allowed me to create a 3.28 glide slope that keeps me above min altitudes before FAF, all the better.

It looks as though the approach need ~700 fpm ROD if GS is 180, ~580-600 FPM ROD if GS is 150.

It will be interesting to learn the actual speed they were flying once that data becomes available from the NTSB.

[DaveReidUK]

Is this measurement error in FlightAware data? (It does appear, however, to show the crash site accurately.)You are kidding, aren't you?

Flight Track Log ? UPS1354 ? 14-Aug-2013 ? KSDF - KBHM ? FlightAware (http://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/UPS1354/history/20130814/0849Z/KSDF/KBHM/tracklog)

Have you tried putting FlightAware's supposed final position plot (33.5681 -86.7539) into Google Earth ?

[Sorry Dog]

There has been discussion about Harold and Maude seeing the plane on fire or hearing sputtering, and I agree, you almost always get "witnesses" that say that. In this case, I think there may be some truth to the matter. As mentioned previously, the plane clipped the power lines (and trees) before impacting the hill. This could have ruptured a fuel tank and the impacted electrical lines could have ignited it. From the insulators I can see in the photos, it looks like that there is 12KV service in that area, so the arcing could have been significant.

I also think that the "sputtering engines" may have been the sound of high voltage arcing, spring fuses melting, or the utility recloser in operation....

Maybe...but I don't think the power line part is likely.

I drove by the accident 3 times and didn't see any power line that were hit directly by the plane. I think the power lines were damaged by tree brush being knocked down. The trees there are close to 70-80 feet in height. Also, one other thing I saw that seemed to stand out. From a saving it (or at least improving your crash circumstances) point of view, only the last tree looked large enough to cause significant structural damage, which would have only affected one side or one engine. I would think they would have gone to TOGA at least when they started to hit the smaller trees which were at a similar altitude to the impact at on the hill and about 1000 to 1200 feet before. That's only about 6 to 8 seconds. Also, in the overhead pictures it's hard to see how steep the hill is, but the impact angle was probably at least 20 degrees due to the slope of the hill. If they had 20 more feet of altitude, they would have had a much better chance of surviving.

I also think the comparisons to Asiana don't have much value at this point, since the conditions seem quite different.

[Speed of Sound]

It will be interesting to learn the actual speed they were flying once that data becomes available from the NTSB.

Shouldn't be too long.

http://i1280.photobucket.com/albums/a481/SoS57/bb_zps4daa9162.jpg (http://s1280.photobucket.com/user/SoS57/media/bb_zps4daa9162.jpg.html)

[Airbubba]

The 3.28 degree glide slope depicted (suggested) is IIRC based on the idealized slope from FAF to touchdown, however, I'd need to look that up to refresh my memory.

It looks as though the approach need ~700 fpm ROD if GS is 180, ~580-600 FPM ROD if GS is 150.

I'm just a driver, not a rocket scientist but you might want to re-check those numbers for a 3.28 degree glide path. :confused:

[RCav8or]

Just a question from the peanut gallery.
Wouldn't, or shouldn't TCAS have given the crew ample warning of their situation?
Pete

[Coagie]

I read through the thread. Maybe I overlooked it, but did the pilots let the tower know they were in trouble, or were they unaware of trouble or too busy keeping the plane aloft to radio? Thanks.

[Huck]

From the Sooeet thingy....

The ground speeds shown on Figure 2 should be at most 4 knots above the indicated airspeeds that the crew of the accident aircraft would have seen on their cockpit instruments. This is due to the fact that the prevailing low level wind (a tailwind), was at most 4 knots.

Not unless you ignore the 2% per thousand difference in indicated versus true airspeed.

Which you can't.

[Coagie]

I read through the thread. Maybe I overlooked it, but did the pilots let the tower know they were in trouble, or were they unaware of trouble or too busy keeping the plane aloft to radio? Thanks. Answer to my own question. Found an article that said preliminary reports said there was no distress call. It was in an article pointing out that, maybe, the standard for pilot fatigue should be the same with freight and passenger carriers. I wonder if the pilot flying dozed off, after he lined up for the approach, and the other pilot was already taking a nap? Ex-NTSB chief: FAA should rethink pilot fatigue rules after Ala. crash | Al Jazeera America (http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/america-tonight/america-tonight-blog/2013/8/14/ex-ntsb-chief-faashouldrethinkpilotfatiguerulesafteralacrash.html)

[Huck]

I would think it would be impossible to nod off while approaching a 7000' runway at night in a widebody, no ILS, hilly terrain, etc....

[olasek]

The RNAV 18 approach loads from BIDPE at 2600A, COLIG is not loaded as part of the RNAV 18 approach procedure and it does not have to be flown from COLIG. COLIG is loaded as a transition if desired. There are 2 others.
It all depends how pilot chooses the approach to be loaded, if he loads it as "vector for final" then yes COLIG won't be there, but any other selection will load COLIG as all transitions pass through that point.

[TangoBar]

Not to suggest it's a factor here or not, Huck, but I would say, as a longtime freightdog, that it's always possible if you're fatigued or dealing with a schedule flop.

If you're tired enough, you'll nod off on an ILS to minimums. At some point, fear and adrenaline aren't enough to stave off microsleep or full-on unconsciousness.

Again, not suggesting anything- we'll have to wait for the NTSB to pull the data off the boxes and present it.

[Jet Jockey A4]

TCAS as nothing to do in avoiding a crash. It is merely a traffic avoidance system and not a ground or terrain avoidance system.

You probably meant to ask about the EGWPS and yes perhaps that will come out in the report that the system did indeed warn the pilots but we will have to wait for the NTSB report.

[PJ2]

Lonewolf_50

Yes, it will be interesting, for sure.

Although it is still done, dive-level-off-dive is a proven higher risk than continuous descent for flying non-precision approaches. So anything that reasonably reduces the need for the technique enhances flight safety. The method described for finding the timing to the MAP and the necessary rate of descent from the Outer Marker, (now the FAF) was one we used on the DC9 almost fourty years ago now but we used the front of the Jepp CR2 computer to do it, with essentially the same results. It's not as good as using FPA and FMCs capable of generating and flying pseudo (electronic) glide paths but better than dive & drive.

I haven't examined the approach plate carefully yet.

I understand that in Canada where a GNSS approach is executed that the highest non-precision minima is employed. This is unconfirmed and may be company-specific - don't know. It certainly wouldn't be CAT I limits though.

For the person who asked why "the TCAS" didn't warn them of an impending collision with the ground, first of all TCAS warns of mid-air collision threats; it's EGPWS that warns of ground proximity. Second, the following generic (not representing any specific system), chart regarding the particular EGPWS mode referenced shows why a terrain warning might not have been issued from the system. Whether it was or not and what responses occurred remains to be determined from the now-recovered recorders.

(re EGPWS, thanks Jet Jockey...posted without refreshing)

http://batcave1.smugmug.com/photos/i-CsxCjRx/0/L/i-CsxCjRx-L.jpg


PJ2

[Coagie]

I would think it would be impossible to nod off while approaching a 7000' runway at night in a widebody, no ILS, hilly terrain, etc.... Dozed off doesn't sound good, but it happens, all the time, to responsible drivers on the road, so it could happen to a responsible pilot in the air. Of course, he may not have dozed off. The pilot flying might just started to wake his colleague as he lined up the plane, but had a heart attack, stroke, seizure, or some other incapacitating health issue.

[tubby linton]

It is very difficult to tell from the few photographs available and the remaining surfaces have been damaged and displaced but the config looks like 15/20 to me. Normal config for landing is 30/40. There is little left of the surfaces to base this on but the lever position in the cockpit and the info from the data recorders will give the exact positions.
Positions are slat/flap positions but do not reflect the exact rigging angles.

[mixduptransistor]

Hey guys, not a pilot, but I'm a resident of Birmingham and thought I'd throw in some details. The NTSB news conference was just on and they said that the engines had evidence of ingesting trees and dirt and there was no evidence of a pre-impact fire in the engines.

Also, if you watch the video on this CNN article, they show a piece of wreckage in the yard of the house at the end of the field where they clipped the trees. It's a pretty substantial piece of aluminum, so it looks like they were pretty deep in the trees when they clipped them. UPS plane crash: Data recorders recovered - CNN.com (http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/15/us/alabama-ups-plane-crash/index.html?hpt=hp_t2)

Anyway, I'm not nearly close enough to qualified to opine on what happened, but I find this discussion immensely interesting and as someone who has flown in and out of Birmingham a lot (always been RWY 24, I've never had a flight land on 18) I'm really interested in knowing if airport factors were involved here.

[Murexway]

I would think it would be impossible to nod off while approaching a 7000' runway at night in a widebody, no ILS, hilly terrain, etc.... I agree. Although we've yet to hear of their duty day, at most their reaction time might have been affected.

Flying all-nighters into MEX (arrive 0000L, sit for 4 hours - depart 0400L four nights in a row) by the end of the month I felt like I had toothpicks holding my eyes open. But to actually fall asleep on the approach? - Hardly.

[Murexway]

Dozed off doesn't sound good, but it happens, all the time, to responsible drivers on the road, so it could happen to a responsible pilot in the air. Of course, he may not have dozed off. The pilot flying might just started to wake his colleague as he lined up the plane, but had a heart attack, stroke, seizure, or some other incapacitating health issue. You been watching a lot of movies or something?

[Passenger 389]

Coagie, from your posts on this thread, I gather that you aren't a professional pilot. Though fatigue can be an issue, I seriously doubt the pilots were both sleeping on final approach -- or that either pilot was -- and it is an insult to their families and to real pilots to suggest they were (while citing zero evidence to support your wild speculation).

If I'm wrong, I will be the first to admit it -- but I don't expect that will be the case.

[bugg smasher]

Sorry Bugg, you're probably on Prune to keep away from her!

Crikey!! You probably are my wife! Honey, I told you not to post here, you're embarrassing me...

I'm going to guess that exhaustion and fatigue, combined with a likely complacency that comes with operating into very familiar airports, will be designated as contributory, although I as well, await the results of the investigation to confirm that.

As a long time freight animal on the MD-11 conducting difficult approaches in bad weather after long and lonely stretches in the dark over the Pacific, I can only quote Huck, I think it was, who some time ago posted this on the FedEx Narita disaster, he was speaking of the long duty days on the extreme backside of the body clock, eloquently put;

"You're just hanging in the straps, waiting for the pain to stop..."

[Desert185]

Five Hour Energy is the perfect antidote to "hanging in the straps" when there is no other viable solution.

[JimNtexas]

U.S. TV news shows NTSB investigators recovering the CVR and FDR from the burned out tail section. The devices look seriously fire damaged, I hope they can recover useful data.

[DWS]

NTSB: No engine failure in fatal UPS plane crash - Houston Chronicle (http://www.chron.com/default/article/NTSB-No-engine-failure-in-fatal-UPS-plane-crash-4734032.php)

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — Federal officials have found no evidence of a pre-crash fire or engine failure aboard a UPS plane that went down in Alabama, killing two pilots.
National Transportation Safety Board (http://www.chron.com/?controllerName=search&action=search&channel=news%2Fus&search=1&inlineLink=1&query=%22National+Transportation+Safety+Board%22) member Robert Sumwalt (http://www.chron.com/?controllerName=search&action=search&channel=news%2Fus&search=1&inlineLink=1&query=%22Robert+Sumwalt%22) says the plane was trying to land on the Birmingham airport's shorter runway early Wednesday because the longer one was closed for maintenance.
Sumwalt also said at a news conference Thursday that investigators expect to be able to recover good data from two flight recorders taken from the wreckage earlier in the day.
The plane slammed into a hillside just short of the runway.

[aterpster]

The plane slammed into a hillside just short of the runway.

The media are at it again. That is so misleading.

It crashed into slightly rising terrain well below MDA and about .8 miles prior to the threshold.

[Speed of Sound]

and as someone who has flown in and out of Birmingham a lot (always been RWY 24, I've never had a flight land on 18)

This, plus the fact that quite a few people have said that they struggled to find any Flightaware data for approach and landings to RWY 18 suggests that this is a rarely used runway at this airport.

[PJ2]

This, plus the fact that quite a few people have said that they struggled to find any Flightaware data for approach and landings to RWY 18 suggests that this is a rarely used runway at this airport. 15th Aug 2013 16:23
Well, the real data is right on the runway...compare the rubber deposits for both runways...

[gleaf]

I want to thank everyone for upgrading the double name world of the southern US to Harold and Maude single name status. Honest the witnesses were Billie Jo or Billie Bob and Charlene Marie who's native language is Appalachian American.. Measurements are in Stones Throw and Fer Piece. As in a Whoop an a Holler and a Good Stones Throw or other variations.
We of Appalachian American areas apologize for our unwritten language and its effects on understanding.
Yet we do know the difference between Yall and All Yall.

Believe the Black Boxes. They are the right color this time.

I had to listen to Louisville news saying the Airbus was one of 53 made in the US....
for a whole day. Sadly what ever it is that is wrong has spread to information everywhere.:ugh: continue your struggles to understand this one in peace and safety.

[Util BUS]

I have never operated into BHM or on an A300-600, but in my mind the following might be a possible explanation for what happened.

The crew elects to do a GPS approach onto RW18. It is a long evening and both crew members are tired, so instead of using the GPS approach charts take out the LOC charts for RW18 by mistake.

As can be seen on the AVhelard website:
Crash: UPS A306 at Birmingham on Aug 14th 2013, contacted trees and touched down outside airport (http://avherald.com/h?article=466d969f&opt=0)

There is a 1.3nm offset between the distance to the threshold depending which chart you are using. If the VNAV equivalent on the A300-600 is as poor as some older aircraft I have flown, then they elect to fly the vertical profile in the equivalent of V/S. During the whole approach they are low by the equivalent of 1.3nm. The crew think they are doing fine when they break cloud and they can see the runway lights ahead as well as a few sporadic lights around. The only thing that does not look right are the four reds on the PAPI's. However their calculations show them to be right on profile and the black hole effect makes them feel like they are on profile. They continue the approach in spite of the uneasy feelings they have about the PAPI's. While they discuss what is wrong with the airport systems they are unable to see the dangers that lurk around them. Before they can do anything else they have hit some trees/powerlines and it's game over.

[737er]

gleaf,

Very well, however I happen to know that all 50 or so Airbus models made in the US were all manufactured in the same factory that produced the world's first french fry.

Trying to get y'all up to speed so you become enlightened like our media.

[Coagie]

When was the last time the Birmingham tower heard from them? Trying to figure out why they wouldn't radio the tower, problem or not. Could there have been an electrical failure? The plane was going fast, the flaps weren't lowered for landing. It's like it started the approach in control, but control was lost, and it was already aimed at the airport.

[Turbine D]

Original quote by Coagie: the flaps weren't lowered for landing.
And how do we know this???

[Murexway]

This, plus the fact that quite a few people have said that they struggled to find any Flightaware data for approach and landings to RWY 18 suggests that this is a rarely used runway at this airport. I've landed there a lot, mostly on 06, sometimes on 24, and in light jets on 18. Probably most airline pilots are more familiar with 06/24, but presuming you're legal for it, an assignment to runway 18 shouldn't be a problem.

[Murexway]

The crew elects to do a GPS approach onto RW18. It is a long evening and both crew members are tired, so instead of using the GPS approach charts take out the LOC charts for RW18 by mistake. I would imagine that if the LOC/DME was in service they would have been shooting that approach (we'll know soon enough what approach they were cleared for). As is depicted on the chart, at runway threshold the DME reads 1.3 (to the far end, like SFO 28L). If they thought they were farther from the field than they were, they would have been high, not low.

[Sorry Dog]

18 tends to be used by the GA traffic.

As for the name references... Jimmy John would normally be the witness, but on that side of town it was definitely somebody named something like D'Marquis, Mo'Nique, or Sha Nay Nay ... or my favorite.... Barakisha.



As for the visuals on the approach... There would be almost no lights for 3/4 miles before the runway lights, so that should have not matched the mental picture....unless they usually didn't land on 18....

[Util BUS]

If they were planning on doing a GPS approach then they might not have even tuned up the LOC with associated DME. The only distance reading would have been to the threshold from the FMC. This would have left them low instead of high.

I know it's a bit far fetched but..... stranger things have happened.

[Coagie]

And how do we know this???Turbine D, We don't know it, but there was some educated speculation, earlier in the thread, that they were flying at 190 knots per hour just 1 nm from the airport, so might not have had the flaps down.

[grounded27]

The only thing that does not look right are the four reds on the PAPI's. However their calculations show them to be right on profile and the black hole effect makes them feel like they are on profile. They continue the approach in spite of the uneasy feelings they have about the PAPI's. While they discuss what is wrong with the airport systems they are unable to see the dangers that lurk around them. Before they can do anything else they have hit some trees/powerlines and it's game over.
http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/src:www.pprune.org/get/images/statusicon/user_offline.gif

Completely feasable but if true there is no logic, no conversation other than G/A once visual 4 red is seen @ said altitude. Other than cloud cover leaving them below DH or a critical altitude.

[Airbubba]

Here's an assessment from 'consultant' and 'aviation expert' Kit Darby:

Kit Darby is an aviation expert with more than 30 years of experience.

"When they got down closer to the airport they found themselves too high and too fast and they really made a very steep descent," said Darby.


Pilots identified in Birmingham UPS cargo plane crash - CBS Atlanta 46 (http://www.cbsatlanta.com/story/23133265/pilot-copilot-dead-in-birmingham-ups-cargo-plane-crash)

http://www.kitdarby.com/

He may be right but I'd be a little cautious on that call given what little we now know.

[Capn Bloggs]

they were flying at 190 knots per hour
Interesting concept...

[-JC-]

Using the elevation feature on Google Earth (appears to be accurate) you can trace out the terrain on the approach path to runway 18.

Some observations.

The house pictured with debris in the yard and tree damage is located 1.0nm from the threshold at an elevation of 766 feet, 122 feet above the elevation at the threshold (644 feet).

The aircraft appears to have impacted the trees at a height of around 50-70 feet agl, or 172-192 feet above the threshold, or 816-836 feet asl.

At 1.0nm (6076 feet) from the threshold the altitude corresponding to a 3.24 degree glidepath (GPS approach) would be 1036 feet asl. (tan(3.24) X 6076 + 644 + 48)).

At 0.61nm (3706 feet) from the threshold and on the centerline (+/- 200 feet) the terrain rises to 835 feet, 191 feet above the elevation at the thresold.

If they hit the trees at the lower of the estimated altitude of 50 feet (816 feel asl) at 1.0nm final it seems possible that the threshold and PAPI's might have been obscured by the sloping hill (835 feet located 0.61nm from the threshold).

At 0.61nm (3706 feet) from the threshold the altitude corresponding to a 3.24 degree glidepath would be 902 feet asl. (tan(3.24) X 3706 + 644 + 48)). This is 67 feet above the 835 foot terrain (hill).

Some questions.

Is my math correct ?

Is the elevation feature on Google Earth that accurate ? Appears so when checked against known elevation points on the airport.

A 67 foot clearance over terrain just over half a mile from a runway threshold is interesting. What are the glidepath terrain clearance parameters used for certification of non-precision instrument approaches ?

Given the terrian clearance would you get a warning using a TAWS or EGPWS system flying this approach at the correct 3.24 degree glidepath ?

JC

[8driver]

Murexway- I've gone into microsleeps on a number of occasions, one that I remember was on final approach to PHL back in 1993 at a regional. An extenuating circumstance was that I was just beginning to feel the first symtoms of what would become a really nasty flu. (I went home). More recently I experienced a microsleep just after top of decsent into ANC, flying for a carrier with better than FAA FTLs but after a long sector. I just started this trip with a guy who told me he had a microsleep much later on an approach into ANC due to constant swapping from back to front of clock. I'm sure your MEX turns are tough, but flying your body's day versus night in the same trip even a long rest period is hard.

I also flew for a freight carrier with a hub sort in the midwest in the late 90s. I was lucky in that I slept pretty well on the daytime layovers. But the outbound flights (similar to UPS sort) were always hard even though I always napped in the hub during the sort. The human body just wants to sleep at certain times and it will do so.

Murexway, you're pretty hard on somebody suggesting a catastrophic incapacitation. We lost a Captain who had a heart attack rolling out in a DC-8 in Indy on 32 roughly 13 years ago. He started to drift off centerline and the F/O took control but couldn't stop it before they ran into the mud off the end. The engineer had to pry the guys hand off the thrust reversers. No movie, it can happen and it takes awhile to recognize incapacitation. Does your airline train for it? Mine does, although truth be told we always know its coming in training. It can be very ugly (ala JetBlue), it may come on slowly, or it may be very fast.

The reason your post got my attention is not that I think you had two people asleep at the controls or one incapacitated. You just don't seem to treat these things as a serious consideration because they haven't happened to you. By downplaying them you do the public readers and your fellow aviators a disservice in not letting people know how serious fatigue in particular can be. But somebody might have not been feeling well, or had microsleep, or just been really tired coming out of the hub sort and it might have effected descision making and reaction times. Its the biggest problem the industry faces. Its why you have people in the other forums and threads saying they wouldn't shoot a visual in SFO after a transpac flight. Microsleeps happen a lot, at just about every airline, and no phase of flight is immune. The body doesn't care. I would not be surprised to find fatigue listed a related factor here, on the other hand nobody will really know how they both slept the day before.

Passenger 389- Nobody is being insulting saying fatigue might be a factor. It isn't like the guy said they planned to have a sleep and wake up on short final. Unless you've been there, done it, and got the T-shirt with back of the clock flying you don't know what it feels like.

[ojessen]

well, it is a valid expression for acceleration (but mighty tiny value - 0.02 m/s^2)

[JimField]

The analysis put out by Sooeet on the 14th was updated today with a new page adding more information. It explains really well the FlightAware data, but I'm still puzzled as to what exactly caused UPS 1354 to crash. I'm leaning to PE based on the flight profile which to me looks gungho and devil may care.

Check it out -

UPS flight 1354 analysis by sooeet.com (http://www.sooeet.com/aerospace/what-happened-to-ups-flight-1354-p01.php)

[Speed of Sound]

The only thing that does not look right are the four reds on the PAPI's. However their calculations show them to be right on profile and the black hole effect makes them feel like they are on profile.

I don't buy this.

You are not flying into a black hole if visibility is 10nm, you are below the scattered cloud and you can see eight bright red lights in front of you.

PAPIs either work or they don't. They are either on or off and they don't change angle once they are installed and certified. Even if I was Albert Einstein I would trust eight red lights over my calculations.

There is a very good reason why 'too low' is red and 'too high' is white.

[Capn Bloggs]

Soooeeet have obviously been reading Prune because they've corrected a couple of blunders-obviously-written-by-amateurs in this second rendition of their missive. They should also run the spell-checker through the text they post.

Credibility still zero. http://www.smilies.our-local.co.uk/index_files/thumbsdown.gif

[HDRW]

@Speed of Sound, While I agree with your point, there seems to be only one set of PAPIs on 18 - I checked on Google Maps and can only find one set, just North of the runway intersection, so it'll be four reds rather than eight. Still should have told them what the problem was, obviously!

[CPTG747]

Birmingham was one of my stops for years, years ago.....The north south runway does have small hills on it.....Sad to say, at this point looks like night, 7,000 ft runway, crew just wanted to hit the numbers, but got the trees.....To early to say really....UPS have great crews, good training....Know few of their pilots there.....Scattered overcast, but ceiling was not that low really...light showers they reported also....NTSB says engines were ok, no other news as of yet....(according to boxes)
Since no radio statements to tower, or approach, leads one to think, just early morning TO LOW, hard to believe, hope am wrong! Either or anyway, we lost two pilots (RIP)

[CPTG747]

lat long for gps is 086-45-08.3000W/33-33-50.0000N
-86.752306/33.563889
4 light system, that is correct........think the other 11,000 ft runway was closed my friend to me also...

[CPTG747]

Just another airport in USA, nothing special really.....Been to Aspen, Telluride, etc and many abroad that would constitute a wording of SPECIAL I suppose....Keep in mind also the A300 has very good short take off and landing numbers, compared to others in same weight class....Not like mine, I need all the room I can get.....lol.....

[Speed of Sound]

The analysis put out by Sooeet on the 14th was updated today with a new page adding more information. It explains really well the FlightAware data, but I'm still puzzled as to what exactly caused UPS 1354 to crash. I'm leaning to PE based on the flight profile which to me looks gungho and devil may care.

Check it out -

Rather than just posting a link to the updated page, maybe you could engage with some of the posters on here who have made valid criticisms of the blog.

I for one, would like to know why you included the approach profile for RWY24 on Figure 1. You call it a 'reference' but a reference for what, given it is from another direction and over completely different terrain to RWY18?

And on the presumption of innocent until proven guilty, maybe phrases like 'gunho' and 'devil may care' could be left until the report is out? :rolleyes:

[Lonewolf_50]

Airbubba: The approach plate I am looking at is dated 25 July 2012, from SE-4, AL-50(FAA). Glide slope noted as 3.28 degrees. The math went like this. (It may or may not reflect said glide slope. I don't have my old GS table at hand ...)

Hmm, you have a point, my calc was to MAP, not touchdown.

I'll try a different method.

If I start at the IAF at 3500 feet (as shown) and arrive at threshold (644 feet), I lose 2856 feet over a distance of 12.8 nautical miles.
150 kts GS gives me 2.5 nm per minute (5.12 minutes) 558 FPM.
180 kts GS gives me 3 nm per minute (4.27 minutes) =670 FPM. (Not far from ~700 fpm)

Granted, one should cross the threshold higher than 0 feet AGL. Call the total delta in alt -2800 feet and decrease ROD slightly to hit the box.

[Mudman]

I imagine that the reason for this crash, like most, will be a serious of incremental events that on their own would be benign but in combination prove fatal, "Swiss cheese" etc. I wonder if some kind of visual illusion might be one of those small events.
Visual Illusion Awareness (http://www.pprune.org/www.airbus.com/fileadmin/media_gallery/files/safety_library_items/AirbusSafetyLib_-FLT_OPS-HUM_PER-SEQ11.pdf#4)

“Black hole” along the final approach flight path:

In case of approach over water or with an unlighted area on the approach path, the absence of visible ground features reduces the crew ability to perceive the aircraft lateral and vertical position relative to the intended flight path.

Uphill or downhill terrain before the runway threshold:

An uphill slope in the approach zone or a drop-off of terrain at the approach end of the runway creates an illusion of being too high (i.e., impression of a steep glide path, as shown on Figure 1), thus:
Possibly inducing a correction (increasing the rate of descent) that places the aircraft below the intended glide path; or,
Preventing the flight crew from detecting a too shallow flight path.

[Ian W]

As people are talking of fatigue affecting performance and the associated regulations both in the US and EU, I thought I would refer to research that has been done using driving simulators. There is a lot of this research so just one link for now, it really merits its own thread perhaps in Tech Log.

from How do prolonged wakefulness and alcohol com... [Accid Anal Prev. 2001] - PubMed - NCBI (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11235795)


How do prolonged wakefulness and alcohol compare in the decrements they produce on a simulated driving task?
" Alcohol consumption produced changes in speed deviation and off-road occurrences of greater magnitude than the corresponding levels of prolonged wakefulness. While limited to situations in which there is no other traffic present, the findings suggest that impairments in simulated driving are evident even at relatively modest blood alcohol levels, and that wakefulness prolonged by as little as 3 h can produce decrements in the ability to maintain speed and road position as serious as those found at the legal limits of alcohol consumption."

[aterpster]

Speed of sound:

I don't buy this.

You are not flying into a black hole if visibility is 10nm, you are below the scattered cloud and you can see eight bright red lights in front of you.

PAPIs either work or they don't. They are either on or off and they don't change angle once they are installed and certified. Even if I was Albert Einstein I would trust eight red lights over my calculations.

There is a very good reason why 'too low' is red and 'too high' is white.

PAPIs and VASIs have been found on occasion to be badly misaligned. In fact, for purposes of the visual segment (as defined in TERPs, Chapter 2) the FAA presumes such lights are unreliable for purposes of the visual segment of a NPA. (That presumption can be overcome on a case by case basis.) At an airport such as BHM I presume the FAA had verified these PAPIs as being correctly aligned. Otherwise, the two approaches would have categorically been NA at night because the visual segment is encumbered by penetrations of a 34:1 slope in the visual segment and, perhaps even a 20:1 slope (higher terrain a bit left of centerline with lots of trees and homes.

But, for all we know at this point the flight may have been cleared for a visual.

[Capn Bloggs]

18 LOC approach according to Bloggs:

350ft per nm/3.28°.

21 7580
20 7230
19 6880
18 6530
17 6180
16 5830
15 5480
14 5130
13 4780
12 4430
11 4080
10 3730
9 3380
8 3030
7 2680
6 2330 (limit 2300)
5 1980
4 1630
3.3 1385 (MDA)
3 1280
2 930
1 580

Get on it, stay on it. End of story. Too hard to work out? Get the FAA to put it on your charts.

[tubby linton]

Lonewolf the Jepp chart gives a descent rate of 813ft/min at 140kt ground speed. The FAF is at BASKN 6D, but only 4.7nm from threshold at 2300ft. The next check height is IMTOY 3.3D, 2nm from threshold at 1380ft.The Jepp shows the 3.28 descent angle starting at BASKN so you wouldn't need all the previous checkheights.
The runway threshold is at 1.3D IBXO, why didn't the installer get it to read zero at te threshold?
Jepp also shows a spot height just after IMTOY of 910ft amsl.
Jepp also has the following note:
Only authorized operators may use
VNAV DA(H) in lieu of MDA(H).

Were UPS approved for this?

[ironbutt57]

possible as well their FPA calcs were wrong, sighting 4 reds and not wanting to "de-stabilize" (by climbing back up to the PAPI) they levelled off to re-establish the PAPI and encountered the trees and other in the process of doing this...the boxes looked pretty well cooked....hope they still have retrievable data...

[Murexway]

If they were planning on doing a GPS approach then they might not have even tuned up the LOC with associated DME. The only distance reading would have been to the threshold from the FMC. This would have left them low instead of high.

I know it's a bit far fetched but..... stranger things have happened.Well, this early in something seemingly inexplicable, almost nothing can be considered far-fetched - including sudden crew incapacitation. However, usual practice is (or should be) to use all available navaids. That would include, if possible, using VOR radials to cross check the IAF at COLIG, as well as a time hack at BASKN to time the segment from the FAF to the MAP. But I'm not sure why having an exact readout of the distance to the threshhold (LOC DME minus 1.3) would necessarily result in flying lower-than-published approach altitudes - for any of the RNY 18 approaches.

[Capn Bloggs]

Only authorized operators may use VNAV DA(H) in lieu of MDA(H).

Tubby, can you post the Jepp chart?

It's odd that the FAA GPS chart makes no mention of an LNAV/VNAV minima ie a DA when Jeppesen does.

The FAF is at BASKN 6D, but only 4.7nm from threshold at 2300ft. The next check height is IMTOY 3.3D, 2nm from threshold at 1380ft.
Please clarify for me that those underlined altitudes are "not belows" as opposed to profile target/check altitudes?

[Murexway]

8driver: Not disputing anything you say. The human factor, including the tendency to be able to "hack it" and be slow to realize the need for a missed approach, is very big in most incidents/accidents, especially on the back side of the clock.

[Murexway]

Sorry, I admit I'm old school.... all this stuff about black holes and no lights until the REIL's seems irrelevant. I'm presuming that they were cleared for some sort of instrument approach. Black holes and lack of adequate visual references are why we have instrument approaches in the first place. Even if they were cleared for a visual, especially at night it would be unthinkable that they wouldn't have had some sort of instrument approach briefed and set up. Those are hard altitudes at specific DME's for a reason, and the PAPI's are there for the same reason: obstacles between you and the end of the runway - including terrain.

[-JC-]

Just another airport in USA, nothing special really.....Been to Aspen, Telluride, etc and many abroad that would constitute a wording of SPECIAL

While Aspen and Telluride have obvious terrain challenges, the last 1.0nm of the published approaches into these airports is over flat terrain, actually in both the terrain is lower than the threshold. The last mile on the runway 18 approach into BHM seems unique in that the terrain rises to almost 200 feet above threshold elevation just over 1/2 mile from the end of the runway, directly on the runway centerline. The fact that it isn't a big jagged rock but an innocuous looking shallow upsloping hill makes it seem all that more insidious.

Show me a published IFR approach to a major airport that has terrain impacting the glidepath like that over the last mile to the runway ?

[tubby linton]

The published altitudes are not below figures for their relavent dme positions. The gps rnav chart also has the same note about approved operators using vnav minima

[Coagie]

Murexway, you're pretty hard on somebody suggesting a catastrophic incapacitation. We lost a Captain who had a heart attack rolling out in a DC-8 in Indy on 32 roughly 13 years ago. He started to drift off centerline and the F/O took control but couldn't stop it before they ran into the mud off the end. The engineer had to pry the guys hand off the thrust reversers. No movie, it can happen and it takes awhile to recognize incapacitation. Does your airline train for it? Mine does, although truth be told we always know its coming in training. It can be very ugly (ala JetBlue), it may come on slowly, or it may be very fastPassenger 389- Nobody is being insulting saying fatigue might be a factor. It isn't like the guy said they planned to have a sleep and wake up on short final. Unless you've been there, done it, and got the T-shirt with back of the clock flying you don't know what it feels like.Thanks 8driver for pointing the not so far fetched issue of sudden incapacitation and the important issue of fatigue. Having dealt with all sorts of rotating shifts, alerts, etc, I know how tough it is to switch from day to night and night to day, and still know up from down, left from right, not to mention just staying awake and concentrating during critical times. I'm guilty of getting Murexway and Passenger 389 to think, and it ended up hurting their feelings, and they responded impulsively, or they momentarily forget, that pilots have the same physiology as mortals, and are subject to falling asleep, or being incapacitated by illness, through no intent or fault of their own. I'm not used to taking people's feelings into account, when I'm trying to solve a problem, that is not of the heart. I apologize to him and her, for hurting their feelings. It was not my intent.

[JimField]

There's no point in such work (other than for ego) because it can't possibly describe what occurred without the flight data from the recorders. Anything else is just a cartoon.

Sooeet nailed the Asiana 214 final approach profile days before the NTSB released several data points of FDR data for the last 3 nm of the approach. What makes you think that a similar analysis for UPS 1354 is any less accurate? Aren't you jumping to conclusions before looking at the data?

What Happened to Asiana Airlines Flight 214 - Analysis by Sooeet.com (http://www.sooeet.com/aerospace/what-happened-to-asiana-airlines-flight-214-p04.php)

[Murexway]

Nope, not offended or "hurt" at all. Since I've flown many all-night trip pairings, I'm not discounting physiology and didn't mean to sound immune to it. :)

[Airbubba]

In the lower left hand corner, FAF to MAP times are 1:53 at 150 kts GS, and 1:34 at 180 kts GS. This would tell me, as a pilot, that if I were flying a CAT C or D aircraft on this approach, I should be configured, and on approach speed well before the FAF, and have my estimated ROD figured out before I hit the FAF. If I had a tool in the cockpit that allowed me to create a 3.28 glide slope that keeps me above min altitudes before FAF, all the better.

It looks as though the approach need ~700 fpm ROD if GS is 180, ~580-600 FPM ROD if GS is 150.


I'm just a driver, not a rocket scientist but you might want to re-check those numbers for a 3.28 degree glide path.

Airbubba: The approach plate I am looking at is dated 25 July 2012, from SE-4, AL-50(FAA). Glide slope noted as 3.28 degrees. The math went like this. (It may or may not reflect said glide slope. I don't have my old GS table at hand ...)

Hmm, you have a point, my calc was to MAP, not touchdown.

I'll try a different method.

If I start at the IAF at 3500 feet (as shown) and arrive at threshold (644 feet), I lose 2856 feet over a distance of 12.8 nautical miles.
150 kts GS gives me 2.5 nm per minute (5.12 minutes) 558 FPM.
180 kts GS gives me 3 nm per minute (4.27 minutes) =670 FPM. (Not far from ~700 fpm)

Granted, one should cross the threshold higher than 0 feet AGL. Call the total delta in alt -2800 feet and decrease ROD slightly to hit the box.

From discussions on a PPRuNe sister forum, UPS pilots use Jepps.

I was thinking the crew would probably shoot the RNAV (GPS) RWY 18 approach but they certainly were legal to do the LOC Rwy 18 (don't know why it's RWY on one plate and Rwy on the other).

Anyway, take look at the LOC Rwy 18, chart 11-2 dated 17 AUG 12.

There is a small rate of descent table on the left side. For 140 knots groundspeed, the rate is 803 fpm, for 160 knots, 929 fpm. This seems about right from my experience, your ROD numbers appear to me to be too low for the groundspeed.

You are not flying into a black hole if visibility is 10nm, you are below the scattered cloud and you can see eight bright red lights in front of you.

PAPIs either work or they don't. They are either on or off and they don't change angle once they are installed and certified. Even if I was Albert Einstein I would trust eight red lights over my calculations.


The BHM 10-9A chart has the notation PAPI-L (angle 3.2°), as HDRW points out, there would only be four red lights in this case.

It has been claimed by ALPA in defense of the pilots in the 2002 FedEx TLH crash that moisture can affect the operation of PAPI's:

ALPA is disappointed that the Board did not fully explore the possibility that moisture condensation on the visual approach aid (Precision Approach Path Indicator, or PAPI) gave the crew a false indication. The FAA was aware of this problem as far back as 1983.

ALPA Reaction to NTSB Findings in FedEx Accident. - Free Online Library (http://www.thefreelibrary.com/ALPA+Reaction+to+NTSB+Findings+in+FedEx+Accident.-a0117879310)

[M609]

Show me a published IFR approach to a major airport that has terrain impacting the glidepath like that over the last mile to the runway ?


Vel, perhaps not major....but it does welcome A300 and larger aircraft on a regular basis.

Bardufoss/ENDU (https://www.ippc.no/norway_aip/current/AIP/AD/ENDU/EN_AD_2_ENDU_3-3_en.pdf)

[Murexway]

Not trying to hang the crew, but unlesss there's evidence of mechanical failure or crew fatigue/impairment, the possiblility does exist of an intentionally flatter than 3.28 degree final approach (with a lower than 48' TCH) in order to plant it on the numbers of a 7,000' runway.

[BOAC]

The last mile on the runway 18 approach into BHM seems unique in that the terrain rises to almost 200 feet above threshold elevation just over 1/2 mile from the end of the runway, - hmm. That would make a 3.28 slope VERY interesting. You sure about that?

[tubby linton]

On the 10-9 airport chart there is a symbol almost on the centreline forRW18 for a lit obstacle at 819 ft amsl, The obstacle is within 2000ft of the runway threshold and it would be 175 feet above it. Slightly to the left of the centreline some terrain is depicted at 757ft amsl.

[aterpster]

Pertinent Jepp Charts:

http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa214/aterpster/JeppsKBHM109A_zps7a07bbc4.jpg

http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa214/aterpster/JeppsKBHM112_zpsf078e0a4.jpg

http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa214/aterpster/JeppsKBHM122_zps1f34fd62.jpg

[A Squared]

At an airport such as BHM I presume the FAA had verified these PAPIs as being correctly aligned. Otherwise, the two approaches would have categorically been NA at night because the visual segment is encumbered by penetrations of a 34:1 slope in the visual segment and, perhaps even a 20:1 slope (higher terrain a bit left of centerline with lots of trees and homes.

The approach charts for both R18 approaches contain the note that the procedure is NA at night, which seems to support your presumption.

[aterpster]

A Squared:

The approach charts for both R18 approaches contain the note that the procedure is NA at night, which seems to support your presumption.

I can only speak to the LOC procedure because it is the only one I researched. Jeppesen was correct when Amendment 2 was effective. Amendment 2A removed the blanket restriction by authorizing at night provided the PAPI is operating. Jepp failed to correctly update the chart. They may have a Jeppesen chart notam on that, I don't know.

[aterpster]

Old topo and less old sat photo. Note the houses that were on the topo are gone in the sat photo:

http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa214/aterpster/KBHMtopo_zps07c2912d.jpg


http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa214/aterpster/KBHMsat_zpse2043d13.jpg

[aterpster]

In the U.S. an unrestricted VGSI must clear all obstacles 1 degree below the commissioned angle, out to 4 n.m, and with a 15 degree splay. Any restriction to the splay or distance must be published in the FAA's Airport and Facilities Directory.

This PAPI has no published restrictions.

[tubby linton]

Some local new sources have an article about the airport buying property near to the airport.

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama (http://al.com/birmingham) -- Drive the neighborhoods surrounding the Birmingham Shuttlesworth International Airport and on one stretch you might think you are in the countryside. Wild animals, trees and tall weeds have begun to reclaim city blocks where houses once stood. Streets and alleys have begun to crumble back into the earth. You'll see things out of place - such as a mailbox on a curb but no house.
But then turn a corner, and you are right back in the city, with single family homes and residents waiting for their turn to move.
Since 1986, the Birmingham Airport Authority has purchased thousands of houses in surrounding neighborhoods, where jet engines pollute the air and shake residents awake at night. But other households are left to deal with the noise and pollution - and also the unthinkable, a plane falling from the sky (http://topics.al.com/tag/UPS%20plane%20crash/posts.html#incart_maj-story-1) - and wonder why their houses have not been bought.
Barbara Benson, whose home off Treadwell Road was nearly struck by a falling plane on Wednesday (http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2013/08/ups_flight_1354_missed_birming.html), doesn't understand why homes around her have been acquired, but hers, which is the last house a plane flies over before landing, has never been bought.
"Why would they buy every house around us and leave us here?" Barbara Benson asked.




Barbara Benson Describes Hearing A UPS Plane Crash Near Her Birmingham Home (http://videos.al.com/birmingham-news/2013/08/barbara_benson_describes_heari.html) BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- Barbara Benson describes hearing a loud boom and red flash as she was awoke from a UPS cargo plane crashing through the trees by her Airports Hills home in Birmingham, Alabama Wednesday August 14, 2013.


The property purchases the airport authority have done are part of a program known as "Part 150," which refers to the section of federal regulations which govern them.The program allows airports to buy nearby properties which, through a study and map, have been determined to be affected by airplane noise.
The airport authority submitted its study in 2005 to the Federal Aviation Administration identifying more than 600 single-family residences, two multi-family residences, three churches and a school, according to airport authority information.
At that time, the study estimated the purchases would cost $80 million spread out over several fiscal years, with federal matches covering about 95 percent of the cost.
Information publicly available on the airport's website - which airport officials said is up-to-date - shows that in phases since 2009, the airport has purchased at least 570 properties. It is unclear how many more properties are left to be purchased.
The airport authority did not provide further comment on the program.
"We are reserving comment at this time to allow NTSB to complete their investigation of Flight 1354," spokeswoman Toni Herrera-Bast said in a statement.
But for airport neighborhood residents, how the airport authority defines an affected neighborhood and how they define "affected" differ.
Tyrone Reed, who lives about a block away from Benson, said that the airport has yet to make an offer on his house, too.
"She called me at work and after she told me what happened she said, 'Now are you ready to move?'" Reed said.
Reed said that in the last three weeks, he had seen more planes flying low into the north-south runway.
"On Saturday I was sitting on the porch, and I saw one fly right over Mrs. Benson's home so low, I didn't think it was going to make it," he said.
Reed had just started his shift at ACIPCO, when UPS Flight 1354 crashed Wednesday, but his wife, Letita Reed, was awake and at home when the plane crashed. She was close enough that she heard what sounded like engines sputtering before a series of explosions, he said.
"She called me at work and after she told me what happened she said, 'Now are you ready to move?'" Reed said.
Reed said that after Wednesday, he is ready.
Since 1989, Birmingham city council woman Kim Rafferty had owned a home on 90th Street until the Airport Authority bought it from her in June. For Rafferty, relocating was an end to a decades-long struggle with the airport, but when Flight 1354 went down on Wednesday she spent three hours responding to phone calls and texts from friends and former neighbors.
According to Rafferty, the airport's acquisition of property has lacked transparency, and many homeowners never know whether their houses are slated for buyouts until they receive a letter of intent in the mail.
"It says that someone is going to come by your house and you need to work with them," she says. "Then some guy comes by to do an appraisal and about five or six months later, they make you an offer."
The airport has not been using eminent domain in recent years, Rafferty said. But homeowners are left with only once choice - accept the offer the airport gives you or be left behind as the homes around you deteriorate and are eventually demolished.
Homeowners who aren't made offers by the airport can have even worse problems, she said. While she lived in the Roebuck neighborhood, her home was burglarized three times. Many homeowners move away and rent the homes they leave behind, creating a lack of cohesion and community there, she said.
The airport's strategy, according to Rafferty, has been to create a blight barrier between itself and the surrounding neighborhoods, rather than reintegrating itself into those communities.
"In their whole history they have not done one thing to meld with the community that is around them," she said. "All they have done has been (noise) mediation or their expansion programs."
Birmingham City Hall has little control over the airport authority, other than appointing board members, and there has not been a cooperative effort to address neighborhood issues, Rafferty said.
While Rafferty has ties to those neighborhoods, Councilwoman Maxine Parker represents that district. When UPS Flight 1354 clipped power lines and treetops on Treadwell Road, Parker's campaign signs were mixed among the debris.
Once the crash investigation concludes, Parker said, she would like to host community meetings along with the Birmingham Airport Authority to hear those residents' concerns and to learn what more needs to be done to help them.
According to Parker, the city and airport need to do more to help those residents with their concerns, especially how low planes are allowed to fly over those neighborhoods.
"I had no idea that planes were going as low as they are until I talked to residents out there today," she said. "The airport needs to do something about that."
AL.com reporter Mike Smith contributed reporting for this article.
This article was edited at 10:40 to correct the neighborhood where Kim Rafferty lived. Her house was in the Roebuck neighborhood, not Airport Hills.

[A Squared]

I wonder if runway 18 was in existence when Ms Benson bought her house.

I bet it was.

[Carbon Bootprint]

One doubts the neighbourhood would be named "Airport Hills" if there wasn't already an aerodrome somewhere nearby. :=

[Coagie]

I wonder if runway 18 has just recently been used for larger aircraft, as Tyrone Reed indicates in the article? Someone mentioned, earlier in the thread, that runway 18 was usually used for General Aviation. Maybe the airport felt like they've cleared out enough houses, where they don't need to worry so much about noise abatement, so they are using it to land bigger aircraft. Landing on runway 18, may be like landing at a different airport for even crews very experienced at landing in Birmingham, since they come in from a different direction, and Birmingham has varied terrain, having not only hills, with coal, lime, and Iron ore, for Iron and steel production, but navigable rivers for barges to transport it, that made it a steel boom town in the first place. The Magic City, as it popped out of nowhere, except a railway crossroads, when the Bessemer process of mass producing Iron was brought there . Even though it isn't perfect, it's sounds like the buyout of homes, to clear a path, is going comparatively well (compared to clearing for a roadway, for instance). I'm surprised that the funds to buy the houses, haven't been somehow diverted for the City of Birmingham's use. They've had some financial difficulties; ya know. Sorry, I digress.

[skysign]

Reply to JC

I do not know if your calculation are correct, but your observation is.
I had to do several years ago the same approach at night ( 6/24 close for repair at night ) flying an ATR for a freight company.
The last 1/2 to 1 mile you litteraly buze the hill all the ways down to the RWY. It is like doing a low flyby over a downhill slope to the rwy.
Landing on 18 , is like landing at the bottom of a bowl.

The glide path is already steeper than normal = landing long will be a given, shallowing the path and you get extremely close to the ground.
if you are high on approach you will absolutely land long on a down slope rwy ( not the best scenarion for an heavy).

[A Squared]

One doubts the neighbourhood would be named "Airport Hills" if there wasn't already an aerodrome somewhere nearby.

Seems improbable, doesn't it? Maybe the namers were psychic.

[olasek]

Reply to JC

I do not know if your calculation are correct, but your observation is.His calculations are wrong at least in one respect - he incorrectly assumes that glidepath is calculated to the runway threshold, but in fact it should be calculate to a touchdown zone - usually around 1000-1500 ft from runway threshold.

[-JC-]

M609,

perhaps not major....but it does welcome A300 and larger aircraft on a regular basis.

Interesting. Looking at ENDU on Google Earth it actually looks like they have cut a trail through the forest under the approach path ?

BOAC,

hmm. That would make a 3.28 slope VERY interesting. You sure about that?

That is according to the elevation function on Google Earth. Not sure how accurate it is ? When you cross check it with the known point of elevation for the airport is it bang on. (+/- 0 feet).

The highest point of terrain within 1 nm of the theshold appears to be at a distance of 3527 feet (0.58nm), 256 feet to the right of the extended centerline, at 844 feet asl. Exactly 200 feet above the runway threshold elevation of 644 feet.

I now see the PAPI's are set a 3.20 degrees. Using a TCH of 48 feet, a 3.20 degree glidepath would put you at 889 feet asl. when 3527 feet from the threshold. (tan(3.20) x 3527 + 644 + 48). So it would appear that on the PAPI's and just slightly right of the centerline would clear the hill by 55 feet (not counting how far your landing gear extends, or at exactly what angle (altitude) the PAPI's change from 2 white to one white).

Unless these elevation figures from Google Earth are wrong (?) I'm very surprised such an approach could be certified for night operations with a PAPI set a 3.20 degrees ?

This is all somewhat accademic to the accident because they flew into the trees 1.0nm from the threshold then impacted the ground at an elevation of around 750 feet agl at a point around 0.8nm from the threshold.

Still it would seem to make for an interesting approach. As anyone on the forum here actually flown this approach at night ?

[Coagie]

One doubts the neighbourhood would be named "Airport Hills" if there wasn't already an aerodrome somewhere nearby.Carbon Bootprint (Great name, BTW), Maybe they picked out the location of the airport, because they figured, it was a good omen, that there was a neighborhood called "Airport Hills" near by!:) Of course, the airport is probably there since the '20's or '30's, and might not have been such a noisy place for the surrounding neighborhoods, since it may not have extended out so much, or had noisy jets. Of course, in the olden days, living near a noisy airport was a comfort zone, compared to working in a steel mill for many the residents. Also, I couldn't imagine a developer calling a new sub-division "Airport Hills" nowadays, but back then, you were Thoroughly Modern Milly, if your neighborhood had the word "Airport" in it. You could remind the ladies, in the Junior League, that is where you lived, and they'd be pea green with envy!

[JimField]

I'd suggest reading the FedEx 1478 report, which appears to have involved very similar circumstances, instead of amateurish interpretations of flawed data points. A large newspaper blundered by publishing a similar "analysis" of the Asiana 214 flightpath, only for it to be shown to be complete fiction.

Some important points-

Sooeet's flight path analysis of Asiana 214 coincides perfectly with the FDR data released by the NTSB which makes me think that Sooeet's analysis of UPS 1354 is also correct.

The NTSB report on FedEx 1478 basically says that the TLH accident was caused by crew error attributed to all 3 crew, and that black hole conditions may have been a contributing factor, as were crew fatigue and physiological factors, but that PAPI was indicating plain bright and simple FOUR-RED, and that the reason PAPI exists is to prevent these types of accidents, but all 3 crew overlooked the PAPI cues. And a similar thing probably happened to both pilots of UPS 1354.

What's wrong with this picture? Poor crew training? Overworked crews? It looks like a systemic problem if the recent rash of large airplanes falling out of the sky is any indication. The public has a right to know.

Reading NTSB accident reports many months after the accident is fine well and good, but I want to know what happened to UPS 1354 now, to the extent possible. I see no good reason to ignore all sources of information, and I will also read the NTSB AAR on UPS 1354 when it comes out many months from now.

More information is a good thing. We are talking about very serious public safety issues here. Just ask the hundreds of people whose houses are directly under or near the approach path to runway 18 at BHM.

[A Squared]

His calculations are wrong at least in one respect - he incorrectly assumes that glidepath is calculated to the runway threshold, but in fact it should be calculate to a touchdown zone - usually around 1000-1500 ft from runway threshold.

His calculations look fine to me. He computes from the threshold, but he uses the published 48 ft threshold crossing height.

[aterpster]

JimField:

More information is a good thing. We are talking about very serious public safety issues here. Just ask the hundreds of people whose houses are directly under or near the approach path to runway 18 at BHM.
They owe their city a debt of gratitude for buying all the houses they did.

If the city had done nothing homes would have been hit as shown on my old topo map.

[olasek]

The highest point of terrain within 1 nm of the theshold appears to be at a distance of 3527 feet (0.58nm), 256 feet to the right of the extended centerline, at 844 feet asl. Exactly 200 feet above the runway threshold elevation of 644 feet.Nothing particular unusual about it, there are many airports with similar "hills" in immediate runway vicinity (for example RNO). The important point is that minimum vis for this approach is 1 mile so they would clearly see all the obstacles well in advance.

[A Squared]

Sooeet's flight path analysis of Asiana 214 coincides perfectly with the FDR data released by the NTSB which makes me think that Sooeet's analysis of UPS 1354 is also correct.


Just a suggestion. How about you stop referring to "Sooeet" in the third person like you're an unbiased third party defending them with no self interest? It is abundantly clear to everyone that you are in fact "Sooeet" and pretending otherwise makes you look immature and dishonest.

[skysign]

JC read 3 post above yours.

I have done that approach LOC 18 ( no vertical guidance, doing the down step fix ) couple years ago and probably my past employer flew that same ATR 2hrs prior UPS using LOC 18.


And yes it is an " interesting approach " day or night !!!!!

[-JC-]

His calculations are wrong at least in one respect - he incorrectly assumes that glidepath is calculated to the runway threshold, but in fact it should be calculate to a touchdown zone - usually around 1000-1500 ft from runway threshold.

I correctly assume the glidepath is calculated from the threshold, starting at the published Threshold Crossing Height (TCH) of 48 feet. This is included in the calculations.

correct alt (feet, asl) = tan(a) x distance (feet) + threshold elevation (feet) + TCH (feet), where a = glidepath angle

[A Squared]

What makes you think that a similar analysis for UPS 1354 is any less accurate?

Uhhh, you're basing it on a data set which places the final position of the aircraft a mile or so beyond where it came to rest. And your "fix" is to merely delete the obviously incorrect data and substitute a position from another source, without any consideration of the fact that the rest of the data you're accepting as true may also be flawed, but not as detectible.

[tubby linton]

For those of you more familiar with the airport and the UPS operation of the 306 what result do you come ou with for the flight using this risk assesment tool?
(The Flight Safety Foundation CFIT assessment tool)
http://flightsafety.org/files/cfit_check.pdf

[JimField]

@ A Squared:

immature and dishonest

Just a suggestion: Any chance we can discuss the substantive issues I raised, including systemic problems in the airline industry, such as poor crew training, overworked crews, etc., which are posing important public safety hazards, rather than engaging in personal attacks based on your feelings?

[A Squared]

Are you saying that it's not dishonest to pretend you're not Sooet? It may ruffle your feathers to be called on your pointless deception, but it is what it is. And yeah, dishonest and immature are reasonable descriptions of what you're doing.

[Murexway]

Reading NTSB accident reports many months after the accident is fine well and good, but I want to know what happened to UPS 1354 now, to the extent possible. I see no good reason to ignore all sources of information, and I will also read the NTSB AAR on UPS 1354 when it comes out many months from now.

More information is a good thing. We are talking about very serious public safety issues here. Just ask the hundreds of people whose houses are directly under or near the approach path to runway 18 at BHMEverybody is in a rush these days and expects everything instantly. Well, guess what? Accident investigations take time. I can tell you what likely happened right now. What good is it? Absolutely zero, because it's based on the what facts we have right now - which are exactly zero.

[Murexway]

Are you saying that it's not dishonest to pretend you're not Sooet???? I really don't care who he, she, or it is. Is this relavent to UPS 1354?

[A Squared]

I have a low tolerance for people who use sock puppets on internet forums.

[Coagie]

For those of you more familiar with the airport and the UPS operation of the 306 what result do you come ou with for the flight using this risk assesment tool?
(The Flight Safety Foundation CFIT assessment tool)
http://flightsafety.org/files/cfit_check.pdf Tubby Linton, Maybe this tool should be used, before a planned landing at an unfamiliar airport or runway. It seems very thorough. It may have prevented this crash, if it does turn out to be CFIT.

[Murexway]

I have a low tolerance for people who use sock puppets on internet forums.:ok: Love it!