This was in Manila. PAL just got itself neck-deep in the doo-doo it's been wading into lately, what with this latest blunder coming right on the heels of: the Guam powerline incident; an A330 that closed Manila for several minutes by exiting too fast and blowing out several tires; baggage carts getting blown over by pilots applying too much breakaway thrust, all within weeks of each other. And just over a year ago, another PAL A330 crew busted their altitude assignment climbing out of a non-radar airport and set off an R/A on an inbound DC-9.
Ironically, the F/O of the 737 in question lectures and trains other pilots in CRM techniques. Perhaps management thinks F/O (in this case rumored to actually stand for "Flap Operator" in deference to substandard flying skills) will do less harm spending more time in the classroom than on the flightdeck. Will this incident--a classic case of CRM breakdown--find a way into our F/O's future case studies? Only if F/O's backer in senior (as in really senior) management persists in keeping his pet onboard.
About time PAL woke up to the fact that it has been very, very lucky. Only just.