Sorry
Guys; I deleted my last post as I was posting in a rumor only; but it seems it was not so much a rumor after all.
Some of my latin american coleagues confirmed to me and I was shown pictures of the Runway Excursion in Hanoi; it was a complete excursion of the right main wheel; the Da Nang excursion did apparently break a few runway lights after it was affected by a 27kt gust left crosswind (reported wind by TWR was wind veing variable with 3!), but returned to the center of the runway without leaving the paved surface; it still requires to be mentioned that it IS and foremost will always be a Captains responsability to decide who is in what function during a critical phase and what to do when things do not go as planned. The Expat Pilot is at fault for that oversight, NO matter the experience level of the First Officer. What I was explained by colleagues is that he IS accepting full responsability, something I admire of him! (Yes, perhaps a local pilot would not, but perhaps he would, we do not know...)
The Hanoi incident crew was reported to have been a local, to say full Vietnamese crew, and the aircraft's right main wheel completely left the paved surface. I was not told if the aircraft returned to the runway, if it taxied to the gate or stayed where it was. And its not important now...
The part that is of importance is that colleagues of us, be it Expats or Locals, made dificult yet wrong decisions, and I belive its easy to blame and point fingers when he/she was not or has never been in that situation, but yes, it would be nice to see "constructive corrective actions" instead of a correction that is typical of the punitive culture that everyone hates so much, be it local or foreign.
What happened last week is bad; not for the Expats, not for the locals, but for ANY pilot professionally operating in Vietnam!