Originally Posted by rich_g85
At airports where the ground staff may not speak English very well (or even at all) how do you convey how much fuel you would like loaded (and the correct units) without misunderstanding?
We use a plastic flip chart (about A5 size) that wedges nicely in the window on the FO's side so the refueller can see how much fuel we need.
Originally Posted by rich_g85
Do airline pilots have the equivalent of 'FREDA' checks performed every 10/15 minutes? I realise they won't be 'aligning DI to the compass', but hopefully you understand what I mean. Perhaps some checks to cross reference fuel state/position/etc.
We don't use any acronyms for cruise checks but we're required to do a time / fuel calculation every 30 minutes. We check for a fuel leak every 30 minutes mentally, and every 60 minutes on paper. No navigational checks other than checking whether we're on time passing a waypoint.
Originally Posted by rich_g85
Say, for some reason, the navigation display/magenta line suddenly disappeared, would the flight crew have the necessary resources (ie charts and so on) in the cockpit to continue navigating 'manually' to the destination? It may be the case that it's not possible for this to happen because of redundancy, backup systems etc, I don't know - I've only ever flown Pipers and Robins :-)
We have high / low altitude enroute Jeppeson charts which have all of the waypoints on the airways that we might use. So if you find the relevant chart, cross check the waypoints against the flight plan you could theoretically fly like that...depending on what the failure is. Plus you can tune nav aids etc or get a radar heading.
Originally Posted by rich_g85
Imagine in the descent, coming down through the clouds the handling pilot becomes unresponsive, maybe drowsy and is therefore said to be incapacitated. How does the other pilot A) realise this if the cockpit is sterile and there isn't a conversation happening and B) what happens next? Does he still say out loud 'I have control' and just carry on flying? I realise not all situations are the same, I'm just curious to know how it *might* be handled. Much respect for the guy (or girl) who then has to carry on and land the thing on their own, the workload must increase massively. Is this something you practice in the sim?
It's one of those things that all depends. In the descent you're rarely cleared from cruise down to an altitude on the QNH so there's various opportunities that the handling pilot would need to reach for the MCP / FCU (autopilot panel) - as pilot monitoring / pilot not flying, you'd soon realise when the clearance you read back to ATC isn't being actioned. Plus, in day time, I think it'd be fairly obvious if the other one was unconscious - it'd probably catch your eye.
Other than that, pilot flying will usually be fiddling about with something or other in the descent i.e. range scale, looking at the flight plan, weather radar / terrain, commenting on something. Lots of opportunity to spot it, in this scenario anyway.
Originally Posted by rich_g85
How many 'memory' checklists are there for flying something like a 737? I imagine there must be a lot.. and you have to be able to recite them all without hesitation?
No idea about the 737, but we do the cockpit preparation scan, after engine start scan, before take off scan, cruise scan, landing scan, after landing scan, engine shut down scan and securing the aircraft scan all from memory. The important bits of those are then immediately backed up by a checklist. Yes you must memorise the flow patterns for your role (PF/PNF/CM1/CM2) but the checklist serves as a backup in case something gets forgotten.
Originally Posted by rich_g85
there is a requirement for all flights crossing an FIR boundary to have a copy of the interception procedures 'on board'. How is this acheived in practice in the commercial world? Do all pilots keep a copy in their flight bag, or will there be a copy stored 'somewhere' in the flight deck with the other aircraft-specific documents?
We have a bag of Jeppeson folders (4 of them) which have all of that sort of info in, amongst other things. The folders belong to the aircraft and are updated by the airline. There is no requirement for us to bring anything like that with us, but you may find the odd person that does.
That's how we do it, but the above is subject to variation dependent on airline, aircraft and country!