TyroPicard.
The only explanation, from every airline I know and every DGCA -or equivalent- is that he was undergoing some line training in order to obtain right and left -hand seat approval to become a TRI. There is no other explanation.
There is - one which appeared right at the start of the thread, where somebody (Dani??) said that TAM Captains flew together as normal line crews, swopping seats to fly as PF in LHS.
Thanks, I found it : post #469 by Rippa who's no longer with us but seemed to have the most accurate info on TAM. But still,
That's against quite a few rostering rules elsewhere...
Rob21 writes :
They also inquired the pilot who performed the previous landing at Congonhas before handing over the plane to the last crew. When asked why he chose to bring just one TL to reverse, leaving the other at idle, he said that given the slippery condition of the runway, by doing so he would not have the extra forward thrust caused by selecting the "locked" engine TL to reverse.
Doesn't look very good about TAM SOPs, does it, if everybody could use his own personal procedures ? This lack of trust of one's hierarchy should be a concern in Brazil.
I know of someone else on another airline who lost his bars for six months for doing just that. He too had a seemingly valid reason.
Contrarily to the public perception, Flight Safety is not only about acting on an accident report, it mainly deals with what PBL calls *Prophylaxy*, i.e working ahead of trends, insuring strict crew adherence to SOPs, monitoring good standards of training...etc...
In the pilot community, the FCOM is called *The Bible* for no other reasons. Once good flight practices and discipline are allowed to slip, there's an incident waiting to happen.
Among other things, but related to you question, this Inquiry (CPI - Comissão Parlamentar de Inquérito) verified TAM's dispatch records and confirmed Capt. Lima was the PF.
That cannot be correct : the dispatch records would
only show who the Flight Commander was.