Chipzilla - the flight would have operated with 2 pilot's only as there is no requirment to carry Cabin Crew on a aircraft fitted with less than 20 seats (air navigation order, annex1, article20 - composition of crew of the aircraft)
- For Public Transport flight's, cabin attendent's separate from the members of flight crew must be carried for safety duties when : - 1) Carrying 20 passengers or more. 2) carrying at least 1 passenger if the C of A permits the carriage of more 35 passangers.
The company would have required there passngers to watch a safty demonstration or a safty video prior to boarding the flight.
Of the two aircraft mentioned earlier, EC-ITP is clearly marked with a blue tail (as in the Cork photo) but a recent photo of EC-GPS shows it in white markings ...
My understanding of instrument approaches, at least those I do, is that you can make as many attempts as you feel safe to do so, taking account of fuel remaining, visibility, aiport status (ie open) and any ATC instructions. I was once on a Virgin 747 that took 6 attempts to get into San Francisco. So no reason why this Metroliner crew couldn't make 3 attempts (other than the reported viz and cloudbase seem incredibly poor).
And to the news hacks logged in, runways 17 and 35 are in opposing directions (170 and 350 deg)
How common an occurrence is it to miss an approach, then come back and make an attempt in the opposite direction?
Due to the nature of fog, you might find that as the fog sets in at one end of an airfield, the other side can be slightly better and after a go-around, after a discussion with your colleague on the flight deck and ATC, the information presented may well suggest an attempt on the opposite end would be your best chance of landing successfully before diverting elsewhere.
Must admit I've never seen it written down, but I once did 2 unsuccessful NPA's, then they opened the ILS, but wouldn't permit me to do a third approach! (Maybe it was a local rule) Was also told of the max 2 approach rule, but dunno where it comes from.
It looks like all the survivors where at the back of the a/c, I doubt anyone forward of the wings got out. So we won't be receiving any pilot reports by the looks of it.
Our company SOP's state that in order to make a third approach the weather would have to improve by by double, ie the visibility would have to double in order to make a third approach.
The number of approach attempts you are allowed will be defined in that Company's Operations Manual (which is approved by the authority).
With the airlines I have operated for you are only allowed a third attempt if there has been a significant improvement in the weather (this also is usually defined). There are also sometimes stipulations that the previous 2 attempts must be on autopilot. (Once again though this would depend on that Company's OM).
So this decision rests with the aircraft Commander (he obviously should be obeying the rules!).
Only exception would be if you have to declare an emergency for some reason.
Another reason for doing approaches onto a different runway is that this might save time and therefore fuel but usually it's because of better RVR etc.
Medic at Cork University Hospital tells national radio RTÉ two patients were received there with soft tissue injuries, four with more serious but non-life threatening injuries.
decoding the weather from an earlier post (below) gives: 09.30 status, runway viz 300metres but 375m to the north on 17, 350m to the north on 35 At 10.00, they had 400m viz with 600m to the north on 17, 450m to the north on 35 Cloudbase 100ft but viz marginally improving but still pretty poor
The condition of the u/c indicates the wheels made no contact with the ground, so it seems the a/c contacted in present and final attitude. Therefore this was more than a hard landing from a botched approach, or so it would appear.
Were the A/C and crew certfied for Cat 2? If not it seems that the W/X was marginal at best. Some companies SOP's and some countries enforce an approach ban - did this apply?
Flew into Kerry this morning and that was nice and clear, but flying in there you could see lot of fog in the valleys and also over large parts of Ireland. Including Cork, which we overflew coming in from the East, but that was before the time of the crash in Cork.
@ FourTrails: actual current readings in wind or vis can be different then on a METAR or ATIS. And even with vis lower than minimum required passing 1000ft you can continue, because once you pass the OM and the vis then drops below minima you are allowed to continue to your mimimum alt for your approach. So please be a bit careful in what you say and have some respect as you dont know the exact details and the guys are not around anymore to defend themselves.
Last edited by Horsepowerrr; 11th Feb 2011 at 19:34.
) appear to have all the photos anyone could need:
