ghostflyer,

I think you'll find Amos was implying that 14yrs is not much experience for a CP at an airline of that size.....at least I hope he was, 14yrs is a junior captain at my airline.

ok all sweet now..................:ok:

Is everyone so sure that third world countries still have third world standards?

Nope, nor do I know whether they are applicable in this accident.

let he who casts the first stone be without...

Don’t worry too much about amos2. Seems he’s had a chip on his epaulets for five years, at least. Perhaps he’s the reason for - ‘How do you know there’s a pilot in the room?’ With amos2 it isn't a joke.

One of his (much) earlier contributions. :hmm:

Sad this has to happen....
 

I worked for OX on the B752 during furlough from my current job. It's with great sadness and anger that I read about this accident for it did hit close to home...

I have been telling friends intending to travel to the Far East not to fly on the low-cost carriers (except those affliated with the national carriers such as Tiger and Nok-Air), especially on OX 747s and MD-80s. For those of us who have worked at OX, this accident seemed inevitable with their "management" culture. Their attitude was to save money at all cost and ask the crew to do something illegal - if the crew do it and get caught, that's their own problem. Fortunately for me all the B752 pilots were western trained (Americans, Canucks, Aussies, Kiwis, and Brit) so we did follow FOMs and SOPs. I personally overheard a conversation in which the "management" person told another pilot that all the TROUBLEMAKERS in the company were the American pilots on the B752. I assume he meant that we were troublemakers because we followed rules as well as refused aircraft for maintenance issues.

With my experience at OX, I could confirm most of what was in shiftpattern's post #123. I do not know the pilots involved (may they RIP) for the MD-80s arrived just when I quit OX and I am sure those initial MD-80 pilots no longer worked there. IMHO, Udom and his "management" is at fault and DCA is also to blame for looking the other way. Unfortunately I don't think much of the story about exceeding duty limitations and maintence issues would ever come out (so on one could loose face).

As the scheduler, I had a disagreement later with that same "management" person mentioned above regarding duty limitations. OX added seasonal service from HKT to HKG on the B752 in Aug '05. I had wanted the pilots to layover in HKG (BKK-HKT-HKG, layover and do the reverse next day) but he wanted the layover be in HKT. Quoting him, "it's easier to get hotels in HKT and his boys on the B747 really like the HKT layover." I gave in to that so we flew BKK-HKT-HKG-HKT, but realized within the first week that it was not legal (out of the first 4 flights, the fastest was 8.1 hrs flight time and the average was 8.3 hrs). When I complained that this was illegal for it exceed the domestic limit of 8 hrs, the answer was that it followed international limit of 10 hrs. Since there was an obvious disagreement over our interpretations of the FOM, I asked him to go to the DCA to clarify whether BKK-HKT-HKG-HKT should be considered domestic or international. The initial answer was that he was too busy and had no time to do that. When I persisted, his answer was that he did ask and DCA's answer was that it was up to OX to decide so it is international. I then ask him to put that in writing in the FOM or a memo but that request was just ignored. These flights concluded just about then and the isssue never came up again during my remaining 3 months at OX. Of course now I deeply regret not forcing the issure more. With Thai pilots, I could easily see they simply do whatever they are asked to do even if it was illegal according to the FOM.

With the exception of the stress from dealing with "management", I enjoyed my experience at OX - worked with good people, formed great friendships, and learned much from flying to locations I would never see at the major airline I work for. RIP to those who perished and my prayers to the recovery of those injured.

Let's just hope this doesn't happen again...

Looks like the note from the American pilot posted earlier has made it to the Daily Mail:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1811

They can't even admit they got it from here...

Response time
 

I have seen no evidence what the response time was. The critical remarks seem to relate to the Swedish video. All the shots in this video have views from say 330 through to 135 degrees, nothing westerly from which the response was coming. Note the 09 distance remaining board 4 so the scene is a mile from 27 threshold. Now the firetrucks are to the south and the accident is to the north, so say a total of 1.2 miles to travel from a standing start in a heavily loaden truck with atleast 2 turns on a wet surface. Required average to be there in 1 min 72 m.p.h.!!!!!!!!! The final tenth on grass with a limestoney derived clay base (glue?).
Some later still shots show 2 sets of tracks on the grass indicating considerable wheel spin from the 2 heavy fire trucks.
Remarks about the video in most of the shots to the east the poor vis is due to smoke and water on the lens.

GA rumo[u]r from Thai aviation official
 

From today's The Nation (Bangkok daily):
Do keep in mind that something does not become a fact simply because a Thai aviation official says it to be so.

http://www.imagehosting.com/out.php/...nginetouch.jpg

What are these three ground indentations ? Landing gear? Or landing gear during retraction at the time of the impact?

Looks like it didn't touch and went towards the fence... somehow...

PK-KAR

Tricky photo. scale doesn't seem to match landing gear. Could be tail plus Starboard engine

From the Phuket Gazette :

PHUKET AIRPORT: Survivors and the families of those who died in the crash landing of One-Two-Go flight OG269 on Sunday will each receive an insurance payout of US$150,000 (about 5 million baht), Udom Thantprasongchai, managing director of Orient Thai, which operates One-Two-Go, said today.

Speaking to the press at Phuket Airport Office, K. Udom explained that One-Two-Go had already offered up to 50,000 baht for each survivor’s clothing and other immediate basic needs.

“We are insured up to US$300 million… We are currently working on the documents and fine-checking the contracts,” said K. Udom.

Families of Thais who died in the crash will also receive 100,000 baht per victim to cover funeral costs.

yes!
 

I would second that!

And I'm, originally, from a third world country.

Was given a job to fly the A320, but declined after finding out that they switched their training from a First Class facilty in France to a third class facility in Jordan. You know why...because most of their pilots were failing training event in France...and in Jordan, they have 100% pass ratio.

Said it all for me. No thanks. My life is more important thatn flying a A320. Very happy now flying a most modern jet here in the US after training at one of the toughest and best training facilities in the world.

Personally, I will have tough time flying with or as a passenger on a plane with an Indonesian pilot!

And yes, originally, I'm from a Third World country.

nothing wrong with indon pilots
 

Hi there betterave, I remember you from 757 days.The comments on indon pilots is a low blow, some of the best(and worst) come from there.The same for every country.We are best served by directing our venom at the owners of OX type companies who will encourage dodgy operations in the interest of making a buck, but exposing poor unsuspecting pax to too much risk going from A to B.I could write a book about what goes on there, but whats the point in a corrupt system?.Waste of time.

98.Mr Stephen Saunby R.I.P.

Only just got married and was on his honeymoon, only just brought my local pub and was going to run it on his return.

Hits home when its someone you know..

To The Reverend N - Nothing about Indonesian pilots
 

I do not belive I posted any low-blow against Indonesian pilots. What I said was that I advised friends against flying on low-cost carriers in the Far-East, except those owned by the national carriers. The main reason for that was the fact I had little faith in these airlines.

My experience at OX really opened my eyes! Prior to then my knowledge of low-cost carriers consisted of what I know about Southwest, Westjet, and Jet Blue. I had thought all low-cost carriers were like them! The OX experience of course shattered that because I learned that not all carriers have equal selection and training process for pilots, and that there are blatant abuse of rules and regulations.

You will encounter good and not so good pilots everywhere. IMHO, even a pilot with good aircraft handling skills but bad airmanship is dangerous. Unfortunately we read about too many accidents that could have been easily avoided.

It is prudent for an airline to save money, but to save money by avoiding replacing defective parts or forcing pilots to exceed duty limitiations to avoid commercial deadheads and layover hotels is simply dangerous!

What I tried to explain (apparently not so successfully) was that becasue of our western background, the B752 pilots at OX spoke up when there were issues with maintenance and duty limitiations, whereas sometimes that did not happen with the B747 fleet. I could say very little about the MD-80 fleet since I left soon after they were introduced - the only facts I knew was that the MD-80 pay was lower than that for the B747/752 and the new-hire pilots were told that to expect 26 duty days a month! I suspect the main reason that the OX B752s were replaced by the MD-80s was the fact that us B752 pilots stood up against the management's abuse (Yes a MD-80 is cheaper to own and operate than a B-752 but it could not have been cheaper to have many more MD-80s than a few B-752s.) I am sure you have more knowledge of the abuse and corruptions that was happening...

From what I seen in Thailand, many Thais will simply do whatever they are asked and OX "management" took full advantage of that. I suspect that it is the same in many other countries in the region - from what I have read about Adam Air, it is a clone of OX. Obviously there are many more similar operations around. That is the main reason I have little faith in these low-cost carriers and advised friends against flying on them.

As I mentioned before, IMHO, the fault of the accident lies with the OX "management" for abusing the pilots and also with DCA for looking the other way.

Hopefully my ramblings have made more sense to you.

And again hopefully we will not read about similar accidents in the future...

From the limiting visibility of the video it doesn't appear that any folks were assisting passengers get off/out of the aircraft.

CFR response
 

After studying all the videos and looking at an approximate time-line, the CFR response was only after about 3 minutes :ugh:

This is much too slow. I am sure, if the response would have been within the 90 seconds, more people would have survived.

The only way they could have responded within 90 seconds, if the fire engines and personnel were on board the aircraft when it crashed.:rolleyes:

Air France accident in Toronto. CFR was on the scene in 56 seconds.

Betterave:

A very minor point here, but let's clarify for pilots outside of the US that Southwest Airlines, although it is called 'low cost', in general, has high salary airline staff. There appear to be misunderstandings about Southwest on Pprune among many foreign pilots. Maybe among US pilots and those who misrepresent themselves.

The phrase 'low-cost' is sometimes quite misleading, and seems to portray such pilots as being paid less than most other pilots who fly the same type.
At Southwest, the pilots are probably the highest-paid B-737 pilots in the Western Hemisphere, possibly in the whole world. This contradicts the common portrayal of 'low-cost' pilots. And at SWA they do not pay for trivial typical things such as a cup of coffee from the 737 galley, or for an airline ball point pen (Stilo, Kugel-), as is alleged at the European darling 'low-cost' carrier, RyanAir. The mentality is quite different.

And based on new contracts at several US major airlines, as we (here) are well aware, most of us could also be described as 'low-cost', when our hourly salaries are often similar to that at 'low-cost' carrier Airtran (formerly ValueJet, whose Upper Mgmt was so publicly shamed by its incompetent "leadership", so to speak, that it changed its name...). Airbus salaries for thousands of US pilots can also be less than for JetBlue A-320 pilots (where each pilot is reportedly an "Army of One", with individual contracts {divide and conquer}).

Those '757/767 hotels' can be very nice, if you have hotel language in your contract as good as that in Delta's contract.

...the note from the American pilot posted earlier has made it to the Daily Mail
 

The article refers to the writer as a "former pilot" and "former airline employee", things I did not gather from reading the post.

If he was not a former employee, I'm sure OX will try to make him one soon. :(

Quite correct, Ignition override, there is a distinctive parallelity between pilot salary and airline safety.

But once again, it's not about low cost carrier. There is no real difference between low cost and other carriers, but between safety cultures.

Lots of main carrier in Asia have had a miserable safety record, if you look at Taiwan and Korea. Only after integrating rigid policies in western style, their situation has changed.

Probably the best indicator for a safe airline industry is the corruption index of a country. Also this is obvious. If there is no free trade and respect of your business partner, there is also no gain in producing safety.

In certain countries, I don't care if its a low cost or a main carrier, I just don't board the plane!

Dani

CFR Response; the following from Pom Pax:

Must be your best contribution on pprune, Dani!:ok:

From todays Nation newspaper

Chaisak Angsuwan, director-general of the Civil Aviation Department said One-Two-Go Flight 0G029's pilot had retracted the landing gear when the plane was 100 feet above the ground so he could ascend, said

Chaisak, a director of Airports of Thailand (AOT), he told the AOT board yesterday the plane's wheels did not touch the runway at the time of the accident.

Flight Recorders
 

Today's Bangkok Post has the following news item:-

"Department of Civil Aviation chief Chaisak Angsuwan said the process will take about a week.
After that, information will be forwarded to a committee investigating air crash, which will be chaired by permanent secretary of Transport Ministry, to verify the information and result.
Mr Chaisak said information will be revealed to public briefly, adding that detailed information will not be made public as they do not want to point their finger to the one responsible for the crash."

They do not want to point their finger to the one responsible for the crash! Is this yet another example of ass-covering? :=

Politicians and/or political appointees know about as much of aviation as some of the more insane posts on accident threads.

Finger pointing might start when the investigation is completed but at this juncture everything you read in the media, especially here is basically garbage.

maybe the a CB was the approach path of Rw27? so the capt decides its better to land with 10kt tailwind

:confused:
VTSP 161030Z 29011KT 3000 -RA SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 25/24 Q1006 A2973
VTSP 161000Z 27009KT 3000 RA SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 25/24 Q1006 A2973
VTSP 160930Z 27008KT 3000 RA SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 23/22 Q1006 2972
VTSP 160900Z 27012KT 1000 RA SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 24/23 Q1006 2973
VTSP 160830Z 24012KT 4000 SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 26/24 Q1006 A2971 VCSH NW
VTSP 160800Z 27007KT 4000 SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 26/24 Q1006 A2972 VCSH N
VTSP NIL
VTSP 160700Z 33003KT 3000 -RA SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 25/24 Q1007 A2975
VTSP 160630Z 33004KT 3000 -RA SCT015 BKN110 BKN300 25/24 Q1007 A2976

Oh believe me (and as you can probably tell from on here) it's no "darling" for the folk in the pointy end or the SLF.

Quote:
"
In certain countries, I don't care if its a low cost or a main carrier, I just don't board the plane!

Dani
"

Would you board the national carrier in Thailand ?

h_north

About as clear as mud!
 

Once again in todays Bangkok Post is this excerpt re the flight recorders

As readers peruse this newspaper, experts in several countries are well at work unravelling the facts around the last flight of the One-Two-Go plane. In due course, these facts will be known, and probably made public.

".....probably made public?" After all the media attention and speculation, whatever is determined, should be available not only to the aviation industry but the travelling public at large!

h_north,

Yes, to your question. And have done so over and over and over again.

A300Man

Thai Airways is most probably one of the better national carriers in SE Asia.

Dani

The non Thais were "proudly" phased out in the wake of the 1997 financial crisis.

I try to avoid the A300 between BKK and HKT, otherwise I am quite relaxed flying J class on the 777 and 744 on that particular run.

One should bear in mind that the alternatives to air travel within Thailand are really quite unpalatable.

But my preferred carrier to HKT is MI by a long stretch.

BKP are excellant. Nok Air pretty good also and very cost effective.

Thai Carriers
 

I spent most of my life living and flying in BKK for a few airlines. Orient Thai was ATROCIOUS. So was Thai Sky and Phuket Air. I could probably guess that a bad airplane combined with poor pilots was the excact reason for this. Who would land in Phuket with short runway, dangerous terrain, one Ils and one VOR? Not to point all the blame there, but Udom, the owner, would fire people for not breaking rules, even filling out the log book. If you could get ahold of them, they all say -nil. This is 1-2-Go's fault and mor specifically Orient Thai. Here is why... one time I got off of STBY at 8:00 pm. I had a few drinks with my girl before preparing for sleep. Scheduling calls me for a last minute Chaing Mai run. I inform them that I have condumed 5 glasses of jack and Coke. Do you know what they said???????? It's only a short flight and the Captain will do both legs... there is no one else! (I refused) I have a million other stories similar to this one which eventually got me dismissed for refusing to take a peice of :mad: airplane int CHina at night in bad weather. These people are dead because of CEO Udom, no one and nothing else. I hope it ruins them!