Albert Driver, well said! Me too!

The workload on the Flightdeck is inversely proportional to the speed of the aircraft!

"How fast were they going down the wrong taxiway at night to chop through it like butter?"

Probably no more than normal taxiing speed. It looks like a brick building. You can take those apart with nothing more than a 2" brick bolster and club hammer. Once you've breached a mortar course, bricks come down very easily.

A 747 is strong and would take some stopping...

The first 388 service is BA057/25JAN.

It will then operate BA055 on WED FRI SUN from 12FEB - 07MAR.
From 09MAR daily except TUE.

Subject of course to change.

I saw the impressive on-site repair that Boeing did on the Condor 767 which was flown through the mast array on top of the mountain at Margarita Island. After a test flight, the aircraft went back into service. That was eighteen or so years ago, but I presume the capability still exists.

Eyewitness report, FWIW ... FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Incident at JNB [BA 744 G-BNLL collides with building]

I suspect that an A380 wing will also take a chunk out of the building if it is taxied down M :p

Sorry, that is ridiculous. If there are too many tasks while taxying you stop them or set the parking brake. All of the crew pays attention to the here and now. Taxying in an unknown area with minimal lighting (if it was well known to the crew or well lit.....) all heads are up. No exceptions.

I'm sorry are you a private pilot?

Airlines usually provide the performance numbers through ACARS or they are computed on laptops/tablets prior to pushback. The only task would be getting a route clearance (if not obtained prior to push) and the checklists.

I'm sorry but Nigel really did bad for the rest of perfection on this one. Pull the FOs head out of .. and have him look out the window.


Distraction from the primary task of taxying safely.

These days airline crews are given far, far too many tasks to do while taxying out to the runway.

It's become a macho thing: "Yes we can handle any task you give us while navigating to the end of the runway".

But be honest. Who hasn't looked up while taxying - and got a bit of a shock? Yes?

Someone claiming to have been on the flight has just posted this on the Daily Mail article comments....

Judge for yourself the veracity :hmm:

If it had been KAL or similar the place would be full of people blaming "cultural problems..."

exactly,

nigel's are again showing their superior airmanship!

Would you believe there are cultural problems at BA? Is there a Hierarchal culture which prevents crew members from expressing concern?

Gosh, flyertalk is even more uninformed and speculative than here. Didn't think that was possible. Whilst I'm sure it will fall on deaf ears is there any chance we could keep the speculation and uninformed comments to a minimum? I'm sure the guys were doing their best last night and I'm sure lessons will be learned.

Could ATC have warned them?

British Airways Incident at Johannesburg
 

Bus Junkie - I understood BA have role reversal across all fleets. One of the FO's may have been taxiing the aircraft. Where was the third crew member at time of impact?

See? There's denial about this issue.

And no, I'm not a private pilot. I logged many thousands of hours on this type of aircraft without hitting anything. But I am now old and wise enough to admit that unnecessary distractions lead to more close calls than there should have been.

boeingdriverx- I think most British Pilots would like to be a Nigel at one time or another- I never made it past the HR department. I think though the airmanship at BA probably reflects that of all British Pilots. The safety record of British pilots has been pretty good since the 80's.

Nope, the distance from the tower at night to this point is too great, and the B747 only deviated from the taxiway by a few metres before it hit the support equipment building, probably in the order of 5 to 10 secs from deviation from the taxiway to impact.

Last I checked, 744 have windows which enables one to see outside.

When in doubt, just keep taxiing................:ugh:

The surprise to me is not the ground Nav error but the width of the taxi-way they went into. It only looks about 20m wide. As for the Asiana apologists, a bit different, clipping a building in the dark to missing an airport completely on a clear day!