I am stunned, however, this is not the first time, but hopefully it will be the last.
A long time back, I joined an airline to be part of their Standards program. 7 days after arriving in country, I passengered on one of the airlines narrow body jets early in the morning, to do a validation examination at the nations capital. On the departure from the main city's international airport, I watched a tail strike develop, and felt that though my seat in first class. The other expat pilot beside em slept through the tailstrike... Anyway. Was curious whether the crew would do the NNCL procedure which is pretty much the same, irrespective of the aircraft brand, and is summed up as don't pressurise, land. So we flew at FL280 for 40 minutes and landed at the nations capital. On arrival, the flight crew deplaned promptly and ran to the back of the aircraft, returning with long faces.
3 months later, having completed the company line training as Captain, and also as trainer/instructor, and about to enter standards, I passengered back to this wonderland in one of my type aircraft. When about to close doors, a passenger sitting immediately behind me stood up, picked up a bag form the overhead and walked off the plane. The Cabin crew closed the doors. Curious, I went forward to chat to the senior cabin attendant, who said on quesioning that the passenger was a "No Show". I was missing something in the translation. After confirming that the cabin crew were quite prepared to dispatch the aircraft, I picked up the company FOM on my ipad, and read out the relevant part of security, and also noted that FYI, there are 2 countries in the world that what this crew were about to do was a criminal offense. Eventually, we got the Captain to chat with me, and lo and behold he is a good friend of mine. asking the Captain what he had been told by the system about the pax situation indicated that he had ben told that the pax had never turned up at check in. 2 hours later, and with an airport manager who was wondering about lying to the captain, we departed.
Arrived at the airlines home plate some time later, and at breakfast this story came up. One of the other crew commented that we didnt have much luck with the locals. I asked why, and the other pilot related the back story of the tailstrike.
pilot had a friend on the flight...
pilot invited friend to cockpit (offense)
Captain asked FO to vacate seat for passenger
Pasenger sat in FO seat for flight departure
Captain gave takeoff to Passenger... (pull back, houses get smaller)
OK... breakfast is not looking so good.
m'K, so was the passenger a NAA FOI? Nope
was the passenger an airline pilot on another type? Nope
was the passenger a military pilot, An F-5 Major perhaps??? Nope
was the passenger anything to do with flying???? Nope.
Had the passenger ever had a flying lesson?????? Nope.
m'K, you got me. So, was the Captain handed over to the police for the criminal actions?
Nope.
What happened to the Captain? He got 2 weeks paid vacation.
60 minutes after this conversation, I had visited the Head of Safety, a nice but troubled man, who was dealing with serious events on a weekly basis, and by serious I mean eye watering, not the stuff you want on your headlines sort of things... off runway with 5kts XW, 7kt xwind pod strike on left AND right engines on the one landing. circling in the wrong direction into mountains, circling in wrong direction into mountains, again, and... again. basically your hand over your AOC and go home sort of stuff. So, head of safety confirms the event, and more importantly the insipid, spineless company response.
5 minutes later, I have met the DFO, and handed my Company ID back to him, saying it was fun, but you really have issues that we are not going to sort out if the company gives holiday packages to criminal behaviour. The DFO is/was a nice guy, trying to change the program, but apparently there are different standards to an operation.
6 hours later, I depart the country in question. Didn't fly on the same airline, and won't.
So then, fast forward, and we have the same sort of nonsense occurring again. Is there some sort of problem we have in front of the flight deck door? Do rules of purely rational behaviour, compliance with criminal provisions of the law. These cowboys jeopardise the passenger, bystanders, the cabin crew, themselves, the airline, and even the countries accreditation on the world stage, and the management gives 2 weeks holiday as a penalty. Once I considered the industry was professional, I think the beancounters and HR have led the industry to the precipice.
But then maybe beauty is only in the eye of the beholder.
If the crew put a non pilot or non authorised pilot into an operating seat, and then took off in the middle of severe weather, then I cannot imagine any non punitive response is appropriate. I hope the story is completely wrong, as I assure you, if you find out that some goat played poker with your life and 167 others to get an ego trip, then it is hard to find forgiveness for the perpetrator or the system that condoned that behaviour.
Happy flying folks. You get the system that you are prepared to pay for.
recall Aeroflot Flight 593?
Last edited by fdr; 19th Sep 2018 at 05:32.