Originally Posted by
Landflap
Jack ; See ? I was, rather, hoping to avoid this - done to death -discussion. "Nearest suitable" does NOT mean suitable in terms of time -"nothing else". As you say . Oh dear. Land at the nearest suitable means (1) NEAREST in terms of distance . Note any dictionary , (2) SUITABLE refers to things like performance criterior ( Not suitable if the runway is grass-eh ? Maybe concrete but is it long enough ? Is the field, actually, open ? ) etc, etc, etc .
Here's the thing and something for you to ponder. In my last Company's Command Selection Board of which I was a member, we posed the question ; Twin engine, en route to dest, bang, lost a donk OVERHEAD a company regular field. Down the road is another company regular field (Suitable) and with a strong tailwind forecast, you will reach it quicker than descending in the hold for the overhead (nearest, ole mate ,) field. When you inform Company that you are descending in the hold, engine out, mayday procedure for that lovely long, SUITABLE and very familiar airfiled right under your backside, they ask you to go to the en-route because they have a spare engine there & you will be back aloft for destination within six hours. Worse, where you are intending to go is suffering a employment dispute and there is no engine spare holding . What do you do ?
Those bowing to commercial pressure, failing to understand simple terminology like (nearest), failing to have fully grasped the meaning of "suitable" were shown the door. Nearest suitable door, actually.
Boeing elaborates on the "Nearest suitable airport" in detail in both the Boeing 777 FCTM (Non-normal ops 8.3) and in the QRH checklist instructions, none of your assertions have any support there.
These documents provided by the manufacturer are much better than a dictionary from the stationery in the case of an emergency.
Adequate and Suitable aerodromes are not the same.
The crew seem to have solved the emergency in a way that was perfectly safe, legal and at the same time saving millions of dollars when avoiding aircraft and runway damage, blocking a busy runway in a very busy peak hour. Everyone happy except for the mighty PPRUNE investigation board.