As with many such events there are various things one could focus on, however I'm interested in two things:
(1) ".... while the airplane was climbing through 700 ft and noted an issue with the left engine, so he [the captain] decided to immediately return to the airport. The captain reported that the company chief pilot criticized him for returning to the airport without performing the relevant abnormal checklist."
While I get that checklists are there for a reason I posit that blind adherence to said list(s) may sometimes get in the way of flying the 'plane and optimal crew/passenger safety? It would seem to me that, notwithstanding the flawed identification of the failed engine, had an immediate return to land occurred it's likely there would have been a better outcome, and that the CP's admonishment of the captain has some bearing on this outcome.
For the avoidance of doubt, this is not a criticism! I'm rather more interested in people's views re the rigid adherence to checklists following EFATO close to the originating aerodrome and when immediate return is possible.
(2) In the same vein, there are many instances of miss-identification of failed engines, Kegworth being one of the more obvious ones. When I did my training for multi-engine multi-crew operation we spent a lot of time on this very issue because of the lessons taught to us by such past events. However the issue, clearly, continues to raise its head.
To that end I posit whether it is better to shut down a supposedly failed engine, or in fact to immediately advance all throttles (if needed to keep flying) and continue to fly the aircraft to touchdown?
Obviously this is germane to partial or even complete loss of power on one engine only, and I recognise that there is risk to this strategy along with the obvious benefits of correct identification, however with particular regard again to EFATO close to the originating aerodrome, and the time taken up + risk of things going wrong during the identification process etc, I question whether there might be a better/simpler way to address such events?
FP.