BA038 (B777) Thread

[Mmmayday38]

You are all mostly talking about theories, but I was dealing with gut feelings and I now know what 'flying by the seat of your pants' means. I had limited time during the 35 seconds that we knew we had a problem and there were a couple of theories that I recalled. However, although theories have 'their place', gut instinct and the view out of the window on the day also had it's place. I am not going to discuss or discredit the various theories that are being bandied around as they all are relevant in various situations.

I am struggling as to what I can write here. The final report will be released soon and I think you will all be relieved when it is out, I know I certainly will be. All of the speculation and assumptions will be laid to rest as the facts will be presented.

I know that S.F.L.Y is wanting answers and explanations and at this stage I am sorry that I feel I am unable to clear up his questions.

I can tell you that on the day a lot of things happened within a short period of time. At 480 ft it became apparent to me that we had double engine failure (in all intense and purpose, that's what it was to us), I chose to leave my First Officer handling the aircraft to allow me to attempt to diagnose and fix the problem. As a pilot you are taught that 'flying' the aircraft is only about 5% of commanding the aircraft! I checked the systems for obvious reasons that would cause the severe power loss and could not find a solution. I followed the acronym PPP - Plane, Path, People.

After I had checked all I could for the 'Plane' I moved onto 'Path'. In my opinion there was no way anyone would survive if we continued on the Path we were on. At the speed of 115kts I clearly felt from my visuals that the aircraft was not holding the glideslope and we were dipping under it and that I wanted to G/A but I knew we couldn't. The visual location of the impact from my seat at this point, with a vert speed of approx 1800fpm and a gusty headwind was well before the perimeter road - more akin to WojtekSz' post 2743.

After 12 years on the 777, I know how she feels and she felt very draggy, I had to reduce drag. I couldn't raise the MLG as it was obvious we were going to crash and we would need it, plus the drag would have increased as the main doors are lowered first, before the decrease. At this stage I felt certain there would be 100% fatalities. At 240ft I selected flap 25 and I immediately noticed the difference, I felt that fatalities had reduced to 50% from making this action.

Boeing have been testing this in their sim and I have seen their findings, for this reason I am bewildered by Cloud Bunny's post 2757 and what is being taught in the sim.