Pace your right on track...Look ..here is what I see that is going on..
First of all we are asking opinions of guys that were hired to read a checklist and follow the SOPS that someone else gave them...we might as well debate this with thier chief pilots because these guys will spew the same blather over and over to keep thier jobs.. These guys weren't hired for thier experience, but to what the company wanted and to be trained the way they wanted. If you want thier opinion, they go to the SOPS manual...
Secondly..your right the videos were all minimun runway deals..so yeah, in a 747, on a 5000 ft field, with a lake of burning lava at the end..Boeing wants us to go...and I think they make it pretty clear the real problem with this whole scenario is the pilots, thier reaction times, ect...pilots making bad decisions...so if they can just have an easy thing...V1, go or not go...easy...just like EGWS...pull up, pull up...TCAS...traffic traffic..climb climb..they are trying to 'pilot proof' all these aircraft...
So if you tell 10000 pilots to go after V1, then when that Concorde can't climb or the tire blows out in Goma and the plane doesn't accelerate, ect ect...that's acceptable...because if you gave all these guys too much lattitude, they would probably crash more often..and they are probably right...especialy from what I am hearing on these threads.. I don't want these guys to think, just do...while I go find a pilot that can...
So it's make it simple for these guys... don't let them make a decision...V1 go or dont. And it works...right up untill they have to deal with plane out of paint that was rigged wrong, or bad gas, or nose wheel blew...a situation where these guys would just crash...
A one size fits all approach is easy, people will crash because one solution won't fit all these problems..., but maybe the powers that be understand that you can't teach judgement as well, but you can cull the heard for guys that can read a checklist and take orders...and do what thier told...reminds of the military...
You and I are independent thinkers, capts of our own jets, the responsibility lies on your shoulders and we set the tempo...safe, safer, safest.....
Thirdly: You and I know that the difference between 95 kts and 110kts for stopping distance in a Citation is minimal, so yeah if we have 6000 ft of runway left after a post V1 cut at 110 kts...I won't fly the burning wreck through the 00 layer, into the ice, onto the SID, over the mountains, fight the fire and what ever problems are developing, while trying to shoot the ILS coming back down..
They will go, it's how they were trained, they will lose thier jobs if they don't, and if the plane doesn't fly?...so be it...they did what they were told...and they died,, along with 200 people.
To thier credit, stopping an Airbus at 135kts is not the same as a Citation at 95, but then again, if I operated out of 10,000 ft international runways all day long, I might get real comfortable understanding just how fast one of those can stop. So I just don't know...but for every guy that tells me that a 737 takes 7000 ft of runway to get off...I find a link to the Boeing site where GOL is operating the new 737s out of a 4200 field and I am pretty sure they use balanced field numbers...not just fly it to the fence.. I see some posters pulling my leg, mixed in with some rationale...welcome to the internet..
Fourthly - We have this Flex / Reduced power thing...allowing them to make every take off similar to a short field, low performance, right to the edge, pull it up at the lights type of deal. Now while I know that everyone doesn't do this, some do...as indicated by a poster here, seemingly up on flex issues...
So if a guy on a ten thousand foot field had a balanced field of 5000 ft, he could RTO right after V1, but he wont...again because of training and also because he will use Flex, burn up more runway then max power would have...minimal stopping distances again...and what seems to be what they are all hoping for is that one good engine left will be able to be brought up to save the day...
Well now how many end of the runway crashes have we seen where the airliner hobbled down the road a little bit then crashed?..don't you think the pilot's firewalled whatever they had to keep it out of the dirt? You know they did, and it didn't save them...which gets us back to whether some airliners are overgross, or the pilots are putting in bogus numbers to make it look legal..or they did add that extra flex power, and it didn't work..something as simple as a blown tire took out the whole aircraft.
Fifthy - If I was to simply give these guys the benefit of the doubt, ok ...airliners are different then corporate jets...different animals, the laws of aerodynamics, physics, regs, and logic just don't apply to each other...then I am left with this very un easy feeling...that it just isn't safe to fly on the airliners....to risky...it's all right to the edge, the pilots are robots that don't think, and they can't cope with anything outside of what's on the checklist...
I mean some of these guys have slammed me for comming up with scenarios that because it's screws up thier program I am paranoid...or unrealistic...I don't think a blow tire, bad gas, or the inside of my engines are now a pet store, is a big stretch...
This isn't a slam on airline pilots some are really good...but I always thought that a pilot should be ready for the unexpected, not just sit there towing the company line, just happy to be there up in the air...waiting for something to happen and when it does, they run to thier checklist and hope the problem is on it.
So I got all the airline pilots in here upset with me again...so here's a story that should make you robots happy...
Remember the pilot who's airliner blew it's top off in Hawaii...ex F4 pilot...he had an unpressurized plane, unknown flight charateriticss...he slowly changed configurations, speeds ect to see the edge of the envelop of his 'new' aircraft...if he used company ref speeds plane would have stalled...he basicaly flight tested his aircraft, came up with a new envelope and landed safely...now that's who I want flying my airlier....
Conversely, the Alaska guys that kept fiddling with thier trim for an hour, definate worsening flight control problem...ample opportunities to land in LA, San Fran, ect...kept playing with it untill they put it in the ocean....they kept calling ops to ask what to do...
-Lastly...you can hire 1000 guys to do a basic one skill job description or you hire one guy to do it all...I tend to see a bigger picture...they see what they are told...and sit in a plane...they don't maintain it, they don't do the engines, they don't buy fuel, they don't plan the trips, ....and they are given about zero lattitide in what they do...V1 is probably the biggest decision they make all day, besides what the want in thier coffee..
Don't get bugged by someone's idea of who becomes an airline pilot, I made it to the very end with two airlines...sitting in front of the chief pilots...it's an attitude thing...not an experience thing, not a safety thing...your either a robot or not...I'm not...it's not a slam...we need drones...and we need leaders...to many chiefs and not enough indians is a problem...I'm a chief pilot, it works for me...and I have a reall problem with someone telling me to do something stupid or unsafe, inorder just to go along with the flow...don't let someone in here intimidate you into thinking they have credentials and you don't I have been dealing with 18000 hour legends for years...I stand up to them, and while I may not make alot of friends doing it..it's funny how when they get sick...I get the call from thier boss to do the trip....
You know, many of these guys don't want to be 'pilot's' but they want the seat, the title and the paycheck...
Honestly, I see some sparks of hope in here...I know guys are sitting back shaking thier heads at these posts, but they don't want to rock the boat...just fly thier planes safe...it's been a learning experience for me...I learned from all this...
So Pace...are you going to take off with 50% power, pull it up at the end, and then yell back...'hey boss, just trying to save you some money!"
Over and out....