BOAC, agreed, maybe they should have sought help in these pages on the subject of descent planning!
Even the phrase "ENERGY MANAGEMENT" doesn't seem to feature in the plethora of FCOMs, OMs and all the other books we're supposed to consult in our attempts to arrive at the T/D point with just the right amount of energy as specified by the manufacturer, training depts, management and others.
It's not rocket science to realise that a tube full of pink quivering people, luggage, freight, fuel and its own structure weight (sorry, mass!) hurtling along at altitude and speed needs to be carefully controlled and managed to efficiently dissipate this energy until touchdown?
Yet the supposedly EASA supervised company for whom I operate has seen fit to remove the "clean" descent tables from the 'Performance Inflight' section of the QRH, see thread querying this.
Luckily I'm a G O F who has worked out his own figures and compensation factors for winds/weights etc and though my trackmiles to impact figure regularly equals the FMC computed figure to within 1%, @ ToD, said FMC regularly deviates from what I'm happy with later in the descent. By which time I have neither the capacity nor interest to attempt to persuade the FMC to "join me", so level change or V/S is regularly used to solve the problem.
At least every 5000' feet in the descent, and sometimes more often, I am comparing my estimate of trackmiles with the computation of height above T/D, IAS+weight compensation and instantaneous W/V and adjusting these to cope with ATC variations
Not surprisingly advice on descent planning is a regular query in this forum, presumably from newbies and those who are confused by the many and varied solutions offered, including by their training staff.
As rushed approaches stiil feature regularly in Airline Safety comics, the problem will not go away til it is grasped and discussed and thrashed out with some EASY method(s) promulgated by the training organisations.
Maybe we should not concentrate too heavily on the culture within AF and look to our own TRTOs who seem to have let this fundamental principle of airframe management slip through the net at best, or have ignored it at worst, so we end up with everyone doing their own thing.
As long as the FDM program demonstrates the rushed approach is still out there as a significant proportion of all approaches, then this sort of story will repeat, and maybe with more tragic results?
