No, he couldn't have been a North American pilot precisely because of the above. No NA pilot will use flight level for such low altitudes.
Porterhouse, a NA pilot would use FL terminology below FL180 in Europe where the transition altitude is as low as 2,000 feet in some locations.
Originally Posted by porterhouse View Post
Frankly I am surprised no one picked on another problem here - I don't know where the boundary in Europe lies but in the US you are not allowed to use flight-level terminology if you are below 18000 feet
How do you ever get cleared to a flight level?
In NA you only get cleared to a Flight Level if operating above 18,000 feet.
From there ATC will nominate the lowest useable flight level based on the local altimeter setting. FL180 for 29.92 and above, FL190 for 29.91 - 28.92, and FL200 for anything below 28.91.
This is why I see part of what this incident crew did wrong. They're used to hearing a Flight Level as being much, much higher. Then they read that a Flight Level can start as low as 2,000 feet in Europe and suddenly they are confused by a clearance.
What they should have done above all else is to slow their process down. Maybe they did check the MSA but in the flurry of everything else, they forgot. Maybe one of them did read somewhere that they could expect to hear "Flight Level Two Hundred," but then forgot what that means. Maybe, just maybe, they put their trust into the controller who (seemingly to the crew) gave them a clearance to below the MSA and below the local transition altitude. But not knowing all the local regulations, they accepted it...then, when being questioned about what altitude they were at, they read the clearance back as it made sense to them, with a quick jab across the cockpit to say "but here that means this." From there, the spiral began.
Frankly, I'm surprised at the number of "super pilots" who obviously have never read back a clearance wrong, have never forgotten the MSA, or who accepted a clearance without fully understanding it. I guess these "sky gods" all work in a part of the industry where they either never leave home or always fly to the same destinations.
I remember my charter flying well; and I remember being utterly confused and bewildered some of the time by the flow of new information I was suddenly expected to be an expert on. Perhaps that's why I'm willing to throw these guys a bone and say that, while it was a serious mistake with fatal implications that I personally would have clarified before leaving the ground, I understand why they did it and it in no way makes them less of a pilot than I.