Asiana flight crash at San Francisco

[Knot Apilot]

Partial Paraphrased Transcript of NTSB Brief 7/9/13

I made this quick partial transcript of the NTSB briefing today.

Included only pertinent points for now.

Thought I'd post it here for quick reference.

Enjoy!

Video found here:

You Tube

(Numbers in parentheses refer to time in video. All emphasis mine.)


Partial Paraphrased Transcript of Third Media Briefing by NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman on July 9, 2013



(3:13) POSITION OF SWITCHES AS CONFIRMED BY INVESTIGATORS

• Flight Director was ON for the right seat, OFF for the left seat
• Auto-throttles armed.
• All 3 fire handles extended - Both engines and APU
• Flaps were set to 30.
• Speed-brake lever was down, indicates that it was not being used.

(5:49) INITIAL IMPACT LOCATION

• When you get down to the sea wall you can identify where the first strikes took place.
• First the main landing gear impacted the seawall and then the tail.

(8.55) FLIGHT CREW INTERVIEWS

• 3 of the 4 flight crew members interviews completed.
• Information from the interviews has not yet been confirmed with flight data/CVR

(9:55) PERSONNEL IN COCKPIT AT TIME OF CRASH

3 pilots in the cockpit at time of the crash; 1 pilot seated in the cabin.

• Pilot Flying seated in the left seat.
• Instructor Pilot seated in the right seat.
• Relief First Officer sitting in the jump seat.
• Relief Captain sitting in the cabin.

(10:46) FLIGHT CREW BACKGROUND AND EXPERIENCE

#1 PILOT FLYING [Captain Lee Kang Kuk]

• 9,700 total flight time, 5,000 hours as Pilot In Command.
• This was his initial operating experience in the 777.
• To complete initial operating experience for Asiana he is required to have 20 flights and 60 flight hours.
• He had completed 10 legs and about 35 hours flying the 777; was about half way through his initial operating experience on the 777.
• He was hired in 1994.
• He did his initial training in Florida.
• Is rated in the 737, 747, A320 and 777.
• Was ground school instructor and a SIM instructor for the A320/321
• He was a captain on the A320 from 2005-2013.
• Immediately prior to his initial operating experience on the 777, he was a captain on the A320.

#2 INSTRUCTOR PILOT (Captain Lee Jung Min)

• The instructor pilot was seated in the right seat and is also a captain.
• He reported total flight time as 13,000 hours with an estimated 3,000 in the 777.
• Total Pilot In Command time was about 10,000 hours.
• He had been in the Korean Air Force for 10 years
• He reported this was his first trip as an instructor pilot.
• The instructor pilot stated he was the PIC and sitting in the right seat.
• This was the first time that he and the pilot he was instructing had flown together.

#3 RELIEF FIRST OFFICER

• The Relief First Officer who was sitting in the jump seat reported he had 4,600 hours flight time.
• He estimated he had 900-1000 flying in the 777.
• He flew F-5s and F-16s in the Korean Air Force.
• He had flown to San Francisco 5 or 6 times as the Pilot Monitoring.
• Suffered a cracked rib. Only one on the flight deck to be treated for injuries.

#4 RELIEF PILOT

• 4th pilot was the Relief Captain and was not in the cockpit for the approach.

(14:55) OBSERVATIONS FROM FLIGHT CREW (Not yet corroborated by CVR)

• Approach asked them to maintain 180 knots until they were about 5 miles out.
• This aircraft has a max of 160 knots to put down the landing flaps for final configuration.
• The Relief First Officer, sitting in the jump seat, identified that he could not see the runway or the PAPI from his seating position and that the nose was pitched up so he could not see the runway.
• Instructor Pilot stated that to the best of his recollection they were slightly high when they passed 4000 feet; they set vertical speed mode at about 1500 feet per minute.
• At about 500 feet he realized that they were low; he reported seeing three red and one white on the PAPI. He told the pilot to pull back.
• They had set speed at 137 knots and he assumed that the auto-throttles were maintaining speed.
• Between 500 feet and 200 feet they had a lateral deviation and they were low. They were trying to correct at that point.
• At 200 feet he noticed the four PAPIs were red, the airspeed was in the hatched(sp?) area on the Speed Tape. He recognized that the auto-throtles were not maintaining speed and he established a GO-AROUND Attitude.
• He went to push the throttles forward but stated the other pilot had already pushed the throttles forward.

DETAILS ON THE AUTO-THROTTLES (27:11)

Auto-throttles documented in the armed position.

Q: Does 'armed' mean engaged?
A: Armed means that they are available to be engaged but depending on what mode is used, we really need to understand that a little bit better, to understand how they were used and what the expectation was for the auto-throttles.

Q: Is there a back-up system of any kind on the auto-throttles with respect to holding speed?
A: We need to gather a little bit more information and corroborate the data before we understand the issue.

She went on to state:
"But let me be very clear: The crew is required to maintain a safe aircraft. That means that they need to monitor. We have a flying pilot and we have two other pilots that are in the cockpit and they have a monitoring function. One of the very critical things that needs to be monitored on an approach to landing is speed. And so we need to understand what was going on in the cockpit and also what was going on with the aircraft."

Source: Chairman Hersman's third media briefing on Asiana flight 214 crash July 9, 2013 - YouTube