Xiamen Airlines Almost Scores Jackpot 737 Crash - Internal Memo:
TAIL STRIKE OR HARD LANDING OR BOTH??
On 24th Feb, 2014, MF8310 flight from ZGSZ to ZSCN landed with 2.007G and pitch attitude 8.26 degrees due to flight crew improper control of the airplane.
Now here are the brief description of the weather condition and whole landing process, which would lead us to discuss what we should have done better to avoid such errors occur again.
Weather condition:
wind calm, -RA, FG, visibility 1000m, RVR landing part 1500 meters, middle part 1300 meters, ceiling 60 meters, and RWY03 in use
Process:
The airplane landing configuration was completed on final at 6NM and landing clearance was received thereafter. Flight crew decided to use dual channel approach mode for purpose of possible G/A. With Vref 142, flight crew set MCP 148kts.
Captain on left seat was pilot flying and at altitude 306ft RA he had approach lights in sight and decided to disconnect A/P. Before DA, runway was in sight and flight crew decided to continue to land with captain announced “landing”.
During process of manual control, the airplane continuously stayed higher than glide slope and resulted in passing threshold nearly 100ft higher than normal threshold altitude. PM reminded with callouts “altitude too high, too low airspeed”. Captain started correction by retarding throttle without pitch correction to re-catch normal landing profile. At 110ft, N1 was 48.5 and airspeed 144kts. Airplane passed aiming marker at 50ft with N1 41.4, speed 141kts and descent rate 800ft per minute. One second before touchdown, descent rate was 688ft per minute with airspeed 138kts and pitch attitude 3.34. Captain corrected with abrupt flaring nose up to attitude of 8 degrees and airplane touched down with G force 1.808 at first time, speed 136kts. Followed by airplane airborne again and touched down with G force 2.007 and pitch up attitude 8.26 degrees. We should notice that the tail strike attitude for that condition was 8.8 degrees, which almost lead to an incident of tail strike.
It’s quite a typical case of flight crew improper control of airplane which leads to a serious error. Please discuss with your colleague about what kind of correct action should be taken to avoid such error happen again, and the importance of maintaining stable approach. We hope that this case could give us a chance to think about what better callouts is, CRM or decision making, of course, good understanding of the airplane and procedures.