Originally Posted by
RAT 5
The last attempted brakes on push back worldwide was......?
I can surely tell you from personal experience it was at least last week.
I reckon the combination of park brake light + standard (ICAO) RT would cut down a lot of those incidents.
For the poster who thought it would be a "potential disaster" if the light became standard and then it would be inop for some reason, the A320 MEL states that for this light to be inop, efficient communication with the ground crew should be used. Just the standard RT would go great lengths in adding to safety in those scenarios.
For the moment, I'd reckon that if the crew is always to check the status of the brakes, it would be quite helpful, particularly at the "before pushback" stage since it seems the main difference in SOPs, based on what others have said here, is the initial brake release before push. I.e.: "cockpit to ground, cleared to push, may I release the brakes?" This way it's always the pilot who is getting confirmation of what to do, sort of "leading" the manoeuvre, and avoiding confusion to the ground crew who may otherwise forget or mix up different SOPs (in the case of a handling agent)