Tailstrike Woe
As I suggested earlier on this topic, electronic and automatic generated data is great, but surely this still requires a final manual check. On the SQ at AKL, it appears all three of the guys on the flight deck did not appreciate or `twig on`, that the figures and V speeds they were about to use were incorrect. I would strongly assert that, had a manual check been completed someone would have noticed the mistake. On my last aircraft the F/O normally calculated the T/O data and speeds etc directly from the tables, the card was then passed to the F/E who ran a complete recalculation on the F/Os figures. Only after it was agreed that both sets of figures matched totally, were these used for the take off. When the take off was very limiting indeed and quite often as a matter of course, the Captain also ran a manual check.This sounds a bit drawn out I know, but in fact on the DC10 the whole two calculations normally took no more than about six minutes. I would say this was time very well spent indeed. Electronic and automatic data for performance calculations must be checked manually, otherwise how do know what you are seeing on the card is correct.