Originally Posted by
MD83FO
Hello colleagues,
how would you handle the cockpit workload in an immediate return to a runway?
V1 Eng Fire, ECAM Actions complete, fire persists. Checklists, NITES brief, approach brief, flight plan sequence,
Thanks.
Hi,
unfortunately it is impossible to come up with a clear cut answer because everything will depend on how the event unfolds.
The most important aspect to consider is, first of all, the surprise & startle effect. Consider that the exposure we do get to this massively important element is quite limited as 1) airplanes nowadays generally suffer only minor failures, if any and 2) training surprise & startle in the SIM is virtually impossibile as any time you head to the SIM you know there will be lots of action, which basically degrades the surprise element. So as pilots we need first of all to cope with emotions only partly experienced in SIM sessions and this will have a certain impact on how we do things in real life, when there is no ready made solution available. A great example of that is the Sully event.
The second aspect to consider is that your proposed scenario can have tons of variables.
Are we talking about a takeoff on a cavok/wind calm day out of a sea level airport with 2 x 4000m runways? Is it a max crosswind takeoff out of a Greek short field Island above MLW with chances of wind shear? Is it a LVTO with real CAT III ops out of an area where the takeoff alternate is 30 min away? Also, do we have a ready-made solution? For example, we all have spent the last 20-30 years or so doing V1 cuts with and without fire. If You get an "LPC like" engine failure in real life you have a ready made solution, i.e. do what you did to get your license signed. If we do get something different though, a severe birdstrike followed by and engine failure and fire just by the time we start the clean up, with the PM talking on the radio asking to avoid WX, then we need to create a solution that is not out of the shelf anymore. All of those aspects are nowadays deeply addressed in competencies based training, as we do appreciate the fact that we know how to deal with V1 cuts and that real life ops evidence shows that V1 cuts are very unlikely. Basically we are very well trained to do something that is very unlikely to happen as it happens during the LPC but we do lack more training on what is more likely to happen according to the statistics.
Also, coming back to your question, your operator should have established procedures for unforeseen emergencies in terms of cabin crew training and calls from cockpit to cabin and vice-versa. It's basically a call You make over the PA which advises the cabin that there will be a return to field very shortly leading to an evacuation and you don't have time to do more talking.
Hope this helps for some brainstorming
