Remember this conclusion of 'human factors' and more specifically pilot error was made by our wonderful CAA after a ramp inspection after the accident:
11 November 2011 - 14:58
By Sapa and Karabo Gill
An SA Airlink aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing on Thursday night
A forced emergency landing by a plane was due to "human error", the Civial Aviation Authority said on Friday
The CAA launched an urgent probe at SA Airlink after a plane was forced to make an emergency landing at OR Tambo International Airport on Thursday evening.
The CAA's Zakhele Thwala said preliminary investigations have shown that there was nothing wrong with the aircraft.
"It was not a stuructural error. What happened is that one of the pilots made a mistake," he said.
Zakhele said that all Airlink aircrafts based the the OR Tambo International Airport would be subjected to inspection.
"This is to make sure that this was not an error on one aeroplane but that the other aircrafts are safe," he said.
Flight SA 8739, with 72 passengers and four crew on board, was forced to ground on its belly on Thursday night after experiencing problems with its nose-wheel.
So that in itself is a total joke
Again, a group of CAA officials with not so much as an hour of flying or experience in aviation to their names and they go shooting off pilot error after a preliminary inspection!
What they say may have happened is that the RJ85 has a complex gear system. It involves gear levers for each wheel...one for the main wheel that moves forward and one for the each main gear wheel extending backwards...and the crew may have forgotten to extend the nose wheel. The system is more complicated than most regionals yes, but its not rocket science...
I cannot see how two rated pilots would miss that!
Add the fact that they circled over ORTIA for 2 hours and this should really have given them enough time to have realised that the gear lever was not in the right spot. In that time how many times would you or I have gone through the appropriate emergency checklists? In most checklists I know for gear failure, im pretty sure the first few points would include something along the lines of: gear lever in the down position (or up position)
I think its total crap to be honest...but guess we'll need to wait for the incident report.
