Originally Posted by
Centaurus
It always amused me to watch some captains during the takeoff roll, put their hands over the top of the thrust levers in an unnatural claw-like grip as if to emphasis how ready they were to rip the thrust levers back to idle up to V1. There is no need for that nonsense. For example, a tyre burst 10-15 knots below V1 on a limiting length runway would run the chance of an over-run due to lack of maximum braking availability. V1 is not the sacred cow of all possible takeoff go/stop situations.
You're quite right, a V1 cut is not the sacred cow of all situations, and there are many other malfunctions or situations that could cause a rejected takeoff or issue on the climb out. That's why our emergency briefing is pretty basic for the reject side of things, starting off with "In the event of a rejected takeoff, I will..." The parameters for what we will reject for are not discussed in the brief, but covered in length in our FOM. However, what we will do for an engine failure after V1 is briefed as it could require different FMA modes, a simple-special or complex-special engine out procedure, different checklists for the different malfunctions, different aircraft configurations and, in the case of the LEAP-1 engine Load Reduction Device (LRD), the possibility of toxic amounts of smoke entering the flight deck within seconds necessitating an immediate response versus one happening above the 4th segment climb. I've not given much thought to why we harp on about engine failures over other malfunctions in an emergency brief, just whether a briefing is a good thing or bad thing. I'd imagine that it's likely a carry-over from when aircraft malfunctions beat the pilots to an accident over their own mistakes. Any briefing puts us in the frame of mind to be ready to respond to whatever comes our way, and in an aircraft that cannot climb away after an engine failure or other malfunction, having a briefed plan in place before takeoff is better than not.