Turkish MD-83 Crash

[MOCA]

Reuters reports:
(Reuters) - A Turkish plane with 59 people on board has gone missing in central Turkey, the private airline company AtlasJetair said on Friday.
The plane disappeared from radar screens shortly before it was due to land at Isparta, a town about 150 km (90 miles) north of the Mediterranean resort of Antalya.
Chief executive Tuncay Doganer told the CNN Turk broadcaster there were 49 passengers and seven crew. No further details were immediately available.

[CptCaveman]

Atlas Jet MD83 crashed while approaching to Isparta, Turkey. A/C Leased from World Focus.

[MOCA]

CORRECTED-Plane carrying 56 goes missing in central Turkey
(Corrects number of people on board to 56 from 59)
ANKARA, Nov 30 (Reuters) - A Turkish plane with 56 people on board has gone missing in central Turkey, the private airline company AtlasJetair said on Friday.
The plane disappeared from radar screens shortly before it was due to land at Isparta, a town about 150 km (90 miles) north of the Mediterranean resort of Antalya.
Chief executive Tuncay Doganer told the CNN Turk broadcaster there were 49 passengers and seven crew. No further details were immediately available

[MOCA]

UPDATE 1-Plane carrying 56 goes missing in central Turkey
(Adds more details)
ANKARA, Nov 30 (Reuters) - A Turkish plane with 56 people on board has gone missing in central Turkey, the private airline company AtlasJetair said on Friday.
The plane disappeared from radar screens shortly before it was due to land at Isparta, a town about 150 km (90 miles) north of the Mediterranean resort of Antalya.
AtlasJetair chief executive Tuncay Doganer told the CNN Turk broadcaster there were 49 passengers and seven crew aboard the aircraft, which was flying from Istanbul.
Turkey's state Anatolian news agency said aviation authorities lost contact with the plane at 2336 GMT on Thursday, just after the pilot said he was preparing to land at Isparta's Suleyman Demirel airport.
The agency said a crisis desk had been set up at the airport.
Isparta is a mountainous area of Turkey, which is now in the grip of winter with snow and fog common on higher ground across much of the country.

[enjolras]

Crash site found according to Spanish newspaper "El Mundo".

[MOCA]

Wreckage of Turkish plane found, says governor
ANKARA, Nov 30 (Reuters) - A Turkish regional governor confirmed the wreckage of a missing plane carrying 56 people had been found on Friday, hours after disappearing from radar screens, the state Anatolian news agency said.
Semsettin Uzun, governor of Isparta province in central Turkey, told the agency military aircraft had identified the wreckage in the mountainous region but had not yet been able to reach the site. There was no immediate word on casualties.

[RiverCity]

From CNN:
The plane crashed near the village of Keciborlu, Turkish media reported, but officials at Atlasjet were not able to verify the information.

From the NY Times:

A rescue helicopter had reached the wreckage of the plane and reported back that no one had survived the crash.

[Earl]

http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/11/29/turkey.jet/index.html
(CNN) -- A Turkish jetliner with 56 people onboard crashed in southern Turkey early Friday as the pilot was preparing to land in Isparta, according to Atlasjet's chief executive officer.
art.atlasjet.jpg

An image grab of the first video to come from the crash site shows the downed plane in southern Turkey.

"Search groups have not seen any survivors as of now," said Atlasjet CEO Tuncay Doganer. "We are hopeful to find some survivors."

The plane went down in a mountainous region near the village of Keciborlu, Doganer said.

Video from the crash site shows the fuselage of the plane largely intact but broken into at least three pieces, with the tail and cockpit separated from the body of the aircraft. There appeared to be no evidence of a fire.

The plane, which was carrying 49 passengers and seven crew, was en route from Istanbul to Isparta when the pilot radioed the tower, saying he was starting his descent. The flight never arrived at the Isparta airport, disappearing around 2 a.m. (7 p.m. ET Thursday).

Atlasjet leased the plane from Worldfocus Airlines, whose pilots were flying it, Doganer said.

[Earl]

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2007/11/30/vo.turkey.plane.crash.dha

[Skydrol Leak]

According to the pictures from crash site ,looks like a slow speed impact, maybe stall due to engine out while on final or some kind of troubleclose to the ground. Definately low altitude thing....any news on crew reporting any difficulties during final???

[ETOPS]

looks like a slow speed impact, maybe stall due to engine out while on final or some kind of troubleclose to the ground.

Amazing - detailed report of the cause within a few hours of the accident :=

[SLFguy]

Looking at the video I'm suprised there are no survivors.

[dolly737]

LTFC 300120Z 01004KT 9999 FEW035 M01/M02 Q1020 NOSIG
LTFC 300050Z 36005KT 9999 FEW035 M01/M03 Q1020 NOSIG
LTFC 300020Z VRB02KT 9999 FEW035 M00/M02 Q1020 NOSIG
LTFC 292350Z 34006KT 9999 FEW035 M01/M03 Q1020 NOSIG
LTFC 292320Z VRB01KT 9999 FEW035 M00/M03 Q1020 NOSIG
LTFC 292250Z 05004KT 020V090 9999 FEW035 00/M02 Q1020 NOSIG
LTFC 292220Z 02006KT 350V060 9999 FEW035 00/M02 Q1020 NOSIG
LTFC 292150Z VRB01KT 9999 FEW035 00/M03 Q1020 NOSIG

[Skydrol Leak]

ETOPS; nothing is detailed It is an assumption in plane English...

[Dysonsphere]

Looking at the video I'm suprised there are no survivors.


I agree with SLF that looks quite surviable no fire and fairly intact at least 1 wing attached (only seen the photo) and fairly low speed impact, the only querry is I wonder how many vertical G`s on inpact.

[Earl]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22033274/
updated 2:16 a.m. ET Nov. 30, 2007

ANKARA, Turkey - An Atlasjet plane crashed shortly before it was to land in central Turkey early Friday, killing all 56 people on board, the airline’s chief executive said.

A rescue helicopter had reached the wreckage of the plane on a mountainous region near the town of Keciborlu, in Isparta province, and reported back that no one had survived the crash, airline CEO Tuncay Doganer said.

Doganer said the cause of the crash was not known. But he ruled out weather conditions as a possible cause, saying there was no fog or strong winds at the time of the crash.


The MD-83 jetliner with 49 passengers and seven crew members took off from Istanbul around 1 a.m., headed to Isparta, but went off the radar just before landing at the airport near the city of Isparta.

Helicopters took off from Ankara, the capital, to search for the plane. It was spotted some five hours after it went missing.

'No abnormal situation'
“There was no abnormal situation where weather conditions or the plane’s technical condition are concerned,” Transport Minister Binali Yildirim said.

A reporter for the state-run news agency, Anatolia, who reached the scene on board a police helicopter said bodies were lying around the wreckage, some still attached to their seats.

Pieces of the wreckage and personal belongings were strewn across a vast area. The plane’s front and rear were smashed. Rescue crews were seen placing the dead into body bags.

Soldiers had sealed off the area, keeping people from nearby villages from approaching the wreckage, Anatolia said.

Yildirim said the plane crashed some 7 miles from the airport.

The private airline, established in 2001, operates regular flights inside Turkey and chartered flights to Europe and other foreign destinations.

In 2005, one of its planes ran off a runway in winter conditions, but the company has not been involved in any fatal accidents. In August, one of its planes was hijacked by two men who held several passengers hostage for four hours until they surrendered.

Families of the passengers first rushed to the airports of Istanbul and Isparta for news of their loved ones and later began heading toward the crash scene, private NTV television reported.

In January 2003, a Turkish Airlines plane crashed while attempting to land on a fog-covered runway in the city of Diyarbakir, killing 75 people. Five people survived the crash with injuries.

In May that year, 62 Spanish soldiers returning from peacekeeping duties in Afghanistan and 13 crew members were killed aboard a Ukrainian charter flight that crashed on a fog-shrouded mountain slope near the Turkish Black Sea port city of Trabzon.

In 1994, a Turkish Airlines jet crashed as the pilot tried to land in a snowstorm despite repeated warnings from the control tower to turn back. Fifty-four people were killed.

[GOLF_BRAVO_ZULU]

We really shouldn't be stoking rumour and speculation. If we do, we should go to a rumour forum.

[gravanom]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/turkey/story/0,,2219693,00.html

The above speculation about this being a slow speed impact has already been used by the Guardian :=

[Fish]

"No matter what measures you take, plane accidents happen... " said Transport Minister Binali Yildirim.

Great, that's really comforting for the victim's families at this time.

[GearDown&Locked]

The overwing exits are open, but it's probably due to the impact forces... the seats seemed in the right place at a glance. No fire, maybe they run out of fuel :confused:

[MaxBlow]

Here's a publication from the Turkish newspaper Hurriyet. (In brackets a translation by a friend of mine)
SAAT (Time) 01.18
Kaptan Pilot: Isparta Kule, iyi geceler. (Tower, good evening)
Isparta Kule: İyi geceler, devam edin. (Good evening, continue...)
Kaptan Pilot: Atlasjet KK 4203, Isparta VOR üzeri. (KK 4203 overhead Isparta VOR)
Isparta Kule: Anlaşıldı. In-bound oluş ikaz. (Roger, report in-bound)
SAAT (Time) 01.36
Kaptan Pilot: Isparta kule, in-bound olduk
(Tower, established in-bound)
Isparta Kule: Anlaşıldı Atlasjet. Yaklaşmaya devam edin.
(Roger, Atlasjet. Continue approach)
Uçakla yapılan son konuşmada pilotlar in-bound oldukları yani pisti karşıladıklarını kuleye bildirdiler. Bu noktada uçağın pist başından uzaklığı yaklaşık 18 kilometre. MD-83 tipi uçağın bundan sonra alçalma yaparak piste iniş yapması gerekiyordu.
(last transmission by the crew was 'established in-bound' 18km from the rwy-at this point the MD-83 should normally start it's final approach/descent).
Source: Hürriyet

[Propellerhead]

Just to repeat a previous question, is EGPWS mandated for Turkish aircraft? I'm sure we can all learn from whatever the outcome of the investigation brings.

From the guardian :
A blogger on the Professional Pilots Rumour Network suggested the state of the wreckage implied the crash was a "slow speed impact" and maybe caused by a stalled engine or other problem as the pilot prepared to land.


That link to the Guardian - it has an advert for Vodafone half way down where it shows a phone capable of downloading funny videos from U-Tube. The caption is 'A LAUGH WHEN YOU NEED ONE'. I'm sure the families will really appreciate that and will all be rushing out to buy one. :* Innapropriate or what.

[Danny]

Not the first time this has happened here:

Date: 09/20/1976
Location: Karatepe Mountains, Turkey
Airline: THY Turkish Airlines
Aircraft: Boeing 727-200
Registration: TC-JBH
Fatalities/No. Aboard: 154:154
Details: The aircraft struck Mt. Karatepa during an approach to land. The crew attempted a landing at Isparta instead of Antalya.

[Obbie]

If the flight was established inbound, then perhaps an error made on a
step down alttitude on the approach.

Don't know the approach for the runway, but assume there would be
a couple of steps with hills like those ones arround the airport.

[sevenstrokeroll]

I had trouble seeing the images...can anyone tell me the position of flaps/slats and landing gear?

does anyone have a copy of the approach?

CFIT?


very sad

[Mungo Man]

The pictures remind me of pics of the Trident crash just out of Heathrow in the 70s where the aircraft stalled and landed flat in a field with little forward velocity. There was no fire, the airframe was largely intact, though distorted, and all on board died. Most died quickly but one or two were removed alive by rescuers only to later succumb. A relatively unusual type of crash. Always stikes fear in me that one as my parents drove round the roundabout in Staines seconds before it crashed there. They heard a big bang and thought it was a gas explosion or something only realising later when they heard the news.

[MrNosy2]

Was the B727 which crashed in 1976 on approach to the same airfield at Isparta?

Subject to copyright of course, can someone post the approach procedures for Isparta?

[ron83]

looking on metar at the time of accident and that they were 10nm out when established,shouldn't they have Visual contact with airport?:bored:

[readywhenreaching]

there are some maps and charts here:
http://www.jacdec.de/news/news.htm

http://www.jacdec.de/media/pdf/LTFC_Isparta.pdf

[DoNotFeed]

The terrain was propably not lighted and looks steep there, gear and flaps in landing position to silence EGPWS, sinkrate not that high.

On my plane i would only be warned by stepdown constraints. Non precision at night ist still a killer.

just a thought....sad story.

is there a md jockey out to check this.

[Propellerhead]

maybe I'm being dumb here but from the charts the final approach path to 05 is over the water. If they impacted high ground 4km SW of the airport they were way off course from the final approach track. From the charts available there is no primary procedure, just a secondary let down in the hold.

[Propellerhead]

The whole point of egpws is that the gear, flaps, and low descent rate DON'T silence the warning! :rolleyes:

[MrNosy2]

If the aircraft crashed 4km SW on approach to 05 then would'nt that put it more or less on the extended centreline of the rwy in an area of flatish gnd at the head of the lake. Looking at Google earth, this area is more or less the same elevation as the rwy thr with higher gnd to the north.

[Propellerhead]

I was looking at the hill to the west of the field?

[hetfield]

What about radar monitoring?:rolleyes:

[dartagnan]

did the copi paid for building time?

[WindSheer]

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j290/GARF25/Isparta.jpg


Looking at the image, the rwy is 3km long, so 4km SW would be roughly where that elongated brown mountain type of feature is???

[FlightDetent]

The whole point of egpws is that the gear, flaps, and low descent rate DON'T silence the warning! That is quite correct. However, the Terrain Clearance Floor function of EGPWS provides no warnings within cca 2 NM from the runway. According to Earl's post, the crash site is 7 NM far. However 4 km would be too close for EGPWS to alarm.

[bobmij]

Wonder what the difference in cost is between dealing with this incident and an ILS or MLS installation?

[Dani]

maybe they couldn't install an ILS, because of the obstacles...

Anyway, every airliner crew must be able to deal with NPA (Non Precision Approaches). Because we have so many ILS, people lack the training for NPAs.

Dani

[marshall737]

Nice picture windsheer.

If they crashed mainly in the brown area of your picture, they must have been extremely off-track. Just look at the VOR approach procedure. It is off-set South of the extended centerline and mainly the final approach track is over the water ?

[rwy_hdg]

Reports say that the aircraft crash site is in the village Keciborlu which in relation to the airport is around 7nm NNW looking at google maps. This position is very off track looking at the published procedure VOR approach chart to RW05. IMO the crew must have been very disorientated when stating that they were 'established inbound'.

[blue up]

BBC reporting site as Kerciborlu, some 12km short (ie NW) of the Isparta airfield. Terrain there between 3 and 4,000+ amsl.

[jezzbaldwin]

Good point from Dani. I know we have a lot to say about the FlightSimmers on here, but heres a thought if you havent flown an NPA in a while - pull a random NPA plate out, boot Flight Sim and go fly it! Not entirely realistic, but keeps you on your toes and if you do it regularly puts your brain an extra mile or two ahead of the AC when you do one for real (ILS U/S, charter etc etc).

Of course there are likely to be many factors involved in this tragedy, but keeping up to speed with NPAs is a good idea for all of us lest we become compacent!

[MrNosy2]

If its at Keciborlu it begs the question what was it doing up there?

[robbreid]

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e16_1196425627
http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2007/11/30/219972/md-83-crew-sighted-airport-before-crash-atlasjet.html
http://www.atlasjet.com/en/hakk_bizdenhaberler.asp?m=11

[hetfield]

What about Antalya Radar coverage?

[Outlook]

Maybe a British attitiude but I am uncomfortable with reading pax lists so soon after an incident. It's an unpleasent way for extended families / friends / co-workers to be made aware someone they knew was involved.

Edit: Post was deleted by the owner. Thank you kindly.

[robbreid]

http://www.jacdec.de/info/2007-11-30_TC-AKM.pdf

[twistedenginestarter]

Everytime there's an accdient we all want to know the reasons. But please let's just wait for offcial facts and stop speculating.
This is probably PPRUNE's greatest strength. Lots and lots of knowledgeable people with access to all sorts of relevant information. It's no wonder the likes of the Guardian look here first. There's no other group of people who know more but would be allowed to say what they know.

[Earl]

Quote
"Maybe a British attitiude but I am uncomfortable with reading pax lists so soon after an incident. It's an unpleasent way for extended families / friends / co-workers to be made aware someone they knew was involved."
Earl
Maybe you are correct, it was a relief for me to see this list but maybe not for others.
Its on many of the the Turkish websites now to include CNN Turk, not a secret.
List deleted

[Stubenfliege 2]

Especially when the specific country has the reputation, often not to release facts and findings about such accidents. Because of good or bad reasons.

Or do I have missed some press and accident report relaeses by the turkish aviation accident authorties?

Stubenfliege

[CptCaveman]

Nope you didn't, and don't expect anything detailed for this one.

[Cyclone733]

Is there an airfield radar or is the line of "Disappeared from Radar" in the news articles because it sounds like something technical. Just wondering if the airfield is fully proceedural?
Condolences to those affected

[Southernboy]

This is bound to be a controversial issue but the comments about simulator practice for NP approaches are right on target.

Without knowing anything personally about Turkish culture in this regard, the statistics give them one of - if not the - worst safety records in the European area. There has to be a reason.

Given the struggle that UK pilots have to get safety priorities pushed to the top of the spending priority list, how much training do these guys get for unusual procedures? Maybe lots but it would be interesting to hear from a pilot who knows the country. This is not easy terrain.

It is a tragedy when people have to die before operators & regulators apply already well known principles.

Afterthought: The crash site appears to be in the Go-around area.

[MaxBlow]

Southernboy,

you touch a very sensitive but very valid point about training. Fact is that some of the companies in Turkey only do the min req training sessions. I don't know if that is the case for World Focus Airlines and don't want to assume things.

Looking at the pictures and plates again I agree with your comment about the crash site - but why didn't they tell the tower than.

I flew with the captain in the past for another company on a different airplane (he has been F/O that time) and would not be able to say anything bad about his abilities. He has also been flying bigger jets in the US in the past.
I just don't get why they would be so far off on that approach.

Twistedenginestart,

true, it's a rumours network. So could the altimeter setting be a factor - or how about this...

it has been reported that a group of nuclear physicists were on board of flight 4203...:=

Food for the media ? No - it comes from the media

The recorders have been recovered and I really hope we find out soon.

[CptCaveman]

It's not the training but the education. A quick look to a few past CFIT accidents in this country shows the cultural education, for example the people still doesn't buckle up, run at red light and things like that continues to blowing the minima, saying rwy insight when there is nothing visible..

[Southernboy]

Thanks for the feedback Max Blow.

Nice to hear from one who knows those involved. Am not surprised you rated the guy, as my concern was the system in which the crew were operating rather than individuals themselves.

About 10 years ago a highly experienced Korean 747crew hit a mountain in Guam, also at low speed and in landing config. Fatigue was an issue but so was training. They only ever did one NP approach in the sim each check ride. The one at the main base airfield and always in benign weather.

It's the little things adding up that can get you no?

IF it was a go-around accident, maybe they were busy with something - a problem? - and didn't call ATC?

obviously its all guesswork, so good to know the recorders have been found but a previous poster raises doubts about openness, so...........

[Heading 123]

Obviously the plane crashed near the Cukurören village in the Keciborlu district of Isparta. This position is more or less on the PELIL 1C STAR at waypoint PELIL (R260 D6 Isparta VOR).

[constable dean]

well said, er somehow its obvious its a low altitude incident, it hit the ground!!:ugh:

[sevenstrokeroll]

I hope that someone makes a graphic of where the plane was and where it should have been.

my thoughts take me to the almost disaster at Hartford,CT USA (KBDL) in which an American Airlines MD80 hit trees on a non precision night approach...barometric altimeter issues...trees at a height not accounted for in chart due to growth.

They made it by their whiskers.

I am also concerned that perhaps the crew were victims of a night/mountainous area visual miscue.

don't know if the plane had EGPWS

So sad...non precision, still a killer, especially night/mountains...etc

[RRAAMJET]

I believe the a/c had GPWS...it was an ex-Reno jet. Don't think they had modified to EGPWS standard when the a/c were released by AA. I think they had dual-FMS, though, so with map display it is odd if they were miles off course, as some have suggested. Time will tell...

[nano404]

Has anyone else noticed how little there has been on the news about this crash. I sudgest if this had happened here or anywhere in northern Europe it would be still frontline news. Shame:(

Real shame. I remember numerous times when aircraft crash in foreign countries. I always hear " Its not clear if any Americans were on-board." And I keep thinking so its not news if there aren't any Americans on board? I haven't seen it on CNN but i heard them talk about it on BBC. Its on MSNBC though. Thats how I found out.

[flash8]

arguably if FMS equipped over reliance on glass and both heads down is a real contributory possibility. I'd argue the scenario is easier to slip into than in a clockwork environment where for the need of a better word alertness comes easier.

[PBL]

I think Skydrol Leak's comment was pretty astute.

Look at the IHT photo of part of the wreckage at
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/30/europe/plane.php

If heshe turns out to be right, I hope those who trashed himher for the brief observation will have the grace to apologise.

PBL

[cwatters]

What about it?

[SLFguy]

One thing noticeable from PBLs link is that the a/c appears to have slid sideways into it's resting position. There is undisturbed vegetation, (to my eyes), directly behind.

Not sure what this says about the speed/profile of the a/c upon impact but that added to the fact it has come to rest on a downslope, (again, to my eyes), seems unusual.

[lomapaseo]

I think Skydrol Leak's comment was pretty astute.
Look at the IHT photo of part of the wreckage at
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/30/europe/plane.php
If he she turns out to be right, I hope those who trashed himher for the brief observation will have the grace to apologise.
PBL


Well up till now I hadn't even bothered to read Skydrols post. But since you didn't quote it I think that what I quoted below might be what you are referring.


According to the pictures from crash site ,looks like a slow speed impact, maybe stall due to engine out while on final or some kind of troubleclose to the ground. Definately low altitude thing....any news on crew reporting any difficulties during final???
Rumors and news are fine with me and what I expect to read here, with attribution of course.

Discussion of said rumors and news is also fine with me and pretty much anything goes. However, opinions expressed are also subject to minute vetting and on this subject Skydrol deserves his time in the barrel of fish.
IMO we should not be instigating a popularity poll regarding who got what right and when.

Guesses are one thing and regardless of who says them I can read right by them. Guesses backed up by reasoning are what I spend more time about and I believe that the reasoning (not necessarily the conclusion) is worth a discussion. So for me I vote for no points for a guess right or wrong. For credible reasoning we don't even have to wait for the final report to judge that.

I am a strong believer that if one jumps to a conclusion on an accident cause without passing through 2 or more probable layers of things that went wrong then I call it a guess and not worthy of discussion or any kind of vote of confidence in the poster.

I do however support postulations followed by questioning of supporting facts, and this I believe was included at end in Skydrols post.
I also have no problem with an initial comment about it looks like low/high speed impact, for that is just and opinion observation of a visual fact.
However his interpretation of his visual observations pointing to an engine failure and a stall condition leading to the crash itself stuns me as being without any further support and in my view is a WAG be it right or wrong

[lomapaseo]

G-ARPI didn't scrape aluminum across the ground for half a mile spreading atomized fuel everywhere.

So in the Turkish accident (the subject of this thread) were the fuel tanks ruptured:confused: or do the investigators have to drain them before they can start moving the wreckage?

Looks to me like the area of the wing with the paint pattern on the top of the wing is intact

[armchairpilot94116]

quote:

1: The loss of an engine in an MD83 on final approach would cause little more than mild disappointment - I know from personal experience.

unquote:

Thats as it should be , however, some crews don't handle one engine out very well as per following write off:

http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19931025-2

luckily no fatalities in this FAT md82 crash

[Super VC-10]

Wikipedia has a page on the crash http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlasjet_Flight_4203 - interesting to see what is said about the location of the two areas of wreckage.

[PBL]

Lomapaseo,

thank you for your detailed and finegrained suggestions on what is OK to say and how, and what not.

I don't share your view.

From what I can see from the pics and videos, the vegetation uphill of the fuselage-wing part is also largely undisturbed. If that is correct, it means he went in underside-first and not nose-first. That in turn would mean it is not CFIT, but a stall-in. But I could be wrong.

Is that enough reasoning to qualify as an acceptable post?

BoeingMEL,

in contrast to my suggestion, you seem certain that the aircraft did not stall in. Any reasons for that?

charterguy,

you imagine that the box data might be made public? Maybe; maybe not.

Does anyone know who has the boxes and where they are being read?

PBL

[WindSheer]

With the MD-83 being a 'non-glass' flight deck, there is plenty of potential for crew disorientation.
But more importantly, something I think we have missed on this one........thought's go out to all the families...:(

[Charles.]

PBL Wrote :

From what I can see from the pics and videos, the vegetation uphill of the fuselage-wing part is also largely undisturbed. If that is correct, it means he went in underside-first and not nose-first. That in turn would mean it is not CFIT, but a stall-in. But I could be wrong.


It is important to notice that what we have seen on the photos until now is only a relatively small part of the plane.

It has been written in some press releases that the tail of the plane possibly hit the summit of a hill first. That could explain what we see : the center of the fuselage broke apart and falling like a dead leaf on the ground, for example.

[Avman]

Non pilot speaking.

PBL,

Just a personal observation regarding your post. It doesn't need to be a stall. If it was in it's final approach configuration it would have been in a nose up attitude and would thus have impacted terrain tail first.

Again, with that typical nose up attitude it is conceivable that the crew would have an unobstructed view of the runway. Wasn't the Avianca B747 accident at Madrid such a case?

[PBL]

Charles and Avman,
..... the tail of the plane possibly hit the summit of a hill first. That could explain what we see : the center of the fuselage broke apart and falling like a dead leaf on the ground, for example.
If it was in it's [sic] final approach configuration it would have been in a nose up attitude and would thus have impacted terrain tail first.

Certainly worth thinking about.

The craft has some considerable forward momentum at 140 kts (nose up or not). If the tail hits, the nose comes down. And stays, and slides. You don't lose 140 kts forward by converting it suddenly into rotation.

The pictures of the wing-box/rump from behind show the trees and no sliding trace, so assuming a tail strike at 140 kts airspeed this part would have had to have bounced into the air from this initial impact and come down again. I don't quite picture that. My intuition still tells me that with a tail strike and 140kts forward and still flying there is going to be a lengthy trace on the ground; which there isn't.

PBL

[Shiny side down]

Without getting into a blame exercise...

The crash site has been suggested ot be located about 7miles NW of the field.
The Sector safe in that area is 10000', but on the Pelil star, inside of 6 miles(pelil) is 8000', and the VOR procedure starts at 8000', descending to 7000' downwind, and then 4500' (which is about 7miles from the threshold) to the final descent point, south west.

The actual terrain in the area west to north west of the field ranges from 4000-6000'.
At 7miles inbound it would be expected that an aircraft on a NPA would be partially configured, and slow, (and posssibly with a fairly low descent rate).

It would be a simple error to not appreciate the levels associated with the procedure. A crew made a similar error going into alicante (i think) about a year or so ago, and got a pull up alert (heard over the radio), when they accepted a self position to final, and descended a little too early.

All conjecture at this point.

[Rainboe]

Charles and PBL, you won't take the hint! Stop this stupid speculation based on zero information. This is getting like the Kenyan thread. It takes trained investigators looking at scratches and gouges to work out what the aeroplane was doing. Analysing the post ground contact movements is not really at all productive, we are really after why the collision took place in the first place, not your musings. There seems to be a competition with every accident to be the first to come up with the cause- it's getting embarrassing. Why do you think people want to hear your idle, inexperienced speculation? Most experienced pilots will have a fairly good suspicion as to why and how the event took place, but until further details are released, better to hold their peace, as they are- leaving it to enthusiastic aviation fans with a computer and absolutely no training or experience (or understanding!) to bombard us with garbage!

So far, we have had verbal diarrhea from someone saying the accident looks survivable! Not to me Jose- I suppose really careless of the victims to succumb.

Can we please wait for news to be released, and any pertinent comments from someone who knows what they are talking about?

[411A]

With the MD-83 being a 'non-glass' flight deck, there is plenty of potential for crew disorientation.

Have to admit, got a laugh out of this.
Maybe it is time to restrict the 'non-informed' access to this august site...:rolleyes:

[Rainboe]

The idiots are taking over again! It would be funny if it wasn't so tragic.

The problem is Pprune needs the 'hits' (for revenue). The other problem is that airline pilots need hard information, not daft speculation from people who don't know what they are talking about, but having a computer in front of them makes them an instant expert.

Why can't these people just keep off one forum? This one! It does say at the top 'affects OUR lives....as professional pilots' Any idiot with a computer seems to think that means them.

[SLFguy]

"So far, we have had verbal diarrhea from someone saying the accident looks survivable! Not to me Jose- I suppose really careless of the victims to succumb."

Ok then oh great one, point me in the direction of ANY a/c accident where there were no survivors and where this much of the fuselage maintained this degree of structural integrity and without manifest evidence of fire.

Please - any - just one - please.

It was an observation of my suprise - no conjecture why - no opinion - nada.

But in your forum, I take it that it is yours - yes/no? - I guess that's verboten.

[StressFree]

411A
You're right on the money! Maybe the time has finally come or else we have to accept that these forums have descended into a free-for-all rather than a place for serious discussion between professionals..............

:(

[Centaurus]

With the MD-83 being a 'non-glass' flight deck, there is plenty of potential for crew disorientation

Does that mean all non-glass aircraft should be grounded due plenty of potential for crew disorientation?

[lomapaseo]

PBL
From what I can see from the pics and videos, the vegetation uphill of the fuselage-wing part is also largely undisturbed. If that is correct, it means he went in underside-first and not nose-first. That in turn would mean it is not CFIT, but a stall-in. But I could be wrong.
Is that enough reasoning to qualify as an acceptable post?

I have learned never to antognize lawyers journalists or academics so I'm not trying to provoke your anger, but just trying to broaden your insight.
and yes your postulation above is certainly worthy of discussion by those that choose.
I tend to agree that it likely went in underside first, partly broke up and bounced. But my judgement is clouded because I haven't recognized more than the center wing box and the tail and of course no wreckage scatter diagram as yet.
However I don't agree that striking underside first necessarily points to a stall. I have two points of experience that conflict with that supposition.
First, I have only seen flat impacts from stalls in rare cases. In most cases of stall one wing drops and the aircraft upsets leaving asymentrical damage from one side to the other. In other events the nose pitches down.
Second; I have seen numerous CFIT events where the wreckage pattern had bottom fuselage impacts, breakup and bounce. Much of which depended on what side of the terrain it impacted. Consider that in most events you are not centered on the hill so either the left or right wingtip hits first, sometimes spinning the fuselage as it progresses forward.
In this case I have no conclusions (too little data), but I am always mindful that it takes a lot of time to go from a flameout to an uncontrolled ground impact. Most pilots use this time to aviate, navigate and communicate

[lomapaseo]

Thats as it should be , however, some crews don't handle one engine out very well as per following write off:

http://aviation-safety.net/database/...?id=19931025-2

luckily no fatalities in this FAT md82 crash

well they did fine until they touchdown long, on the runway and then departed off the right hand side. I got a laugh out of the link reporting about the loss of the inlet cowl as a factor (it was only a pointer that an engine failed)

[flash8]

Actually I value PBL's input. A good number of years ago at University (early 90's) as a so called "spotter" as I were then I used to read a lot PBL used to write on the Risks list, and now RHS 737 EFIS I have to say my opinion of him hasn't changed one iota.

I suggest you review his previous literature going back perhaps 20 years before personally attacking the guy.

And flame me all you like.


Rainbowe said:
Charles and PBL, you won't take the hint! Stop this stupid speculation based on zero information. This is getting like the Kenyan thread. It takes trained investigators looking at scratches and gouges to work out what the aeroplane was doing. Analysing the post ground contact movements is not really at all productive, we are really after why the collision took place in the first place, not your musings. There seems to be a competition with every accident to be the first to come up with the cause- it's getting embarrassing. Why do you think people want to hear your idle, inexperienced speculation? Most experienced pilots will have a fairly good suspicion as to why and how the event took place, but until further details are released, better to hold their peace, as they are- leaving it to enthusiastic aviation fans with a computer and absolutely no training or experience (or understanding!) to bombard us with garbage!

So far, we have had verbal diarrhea from someone saying the accident looks survivable! Not to me Jose- I suppose really careless of the victims to succumb.

Can we please wait for news to be released, and any pertinent comments from someone who knows what they are talking about?

[ibelieveicanfly]

First of all,the MD83 has not a EGPWS but only a simple GPWS(without terrain clearance floor datas of registered airports) so if you are fully configured and in a normal rate of descent,you will have no warning despite you are offset centerline!
MD83 equipped with only conventional RDI(radio directional indicator) without any ND and MAP display.
the captain said he had the rwy in sight but still possibility of black whole if between you and the threshold you do not see the green lights of the start of the rwy.
Last week I saw this plane or another Atlasjet MD83 in Pristina.As we were waiting for the RVR improvement for T/O(2 and half hours in the plane with PAX on board),during this time that plane landed in front of me with a very low RVR and you need 800mPLUS ceiling of 300ft for the ILS 17 PRN which is the lowest min for PRN(special state case).then he took off just a while after with RVR much below the min requirement!!
SO I REALLY WONDER ABOUT ANY POSSIBLE SAFETY CULTURE in this company but again this purely speculation and wait for the investigation.Sad for all persons killed.

[RatherBeFlying]

I have not yet seen any information on the flight path relative to the impact terrain and the pictures only show the immediate wreckage.

As Lomapaseo has noted:I have seen numerous CFIT events where the wreckage pattern had bottom fuselage impacts, breakup and bounce. Much of which depended on what side of the terrain it impacted. Consider that in most events you are not centered on the hill so either the left or right wingtip hits first, sometimes spinning the fuselage as it progresses forward.In contrast to those who have postulated a straight down impact or descending at a greater rate than the downslope (neither yet excluded), a more likely impact sequence is being pivoted by a wing impact followed by the upslope wingtip impacting the ground and the fuselage impacting sideways, caveat more complete information.

The energy absorption by the wing would explain the apparent integrity of the fuselage, but that does not count for much. Films of experimental crashes conducted by NASA on flood damaged Navahos show massive dynamic deformation of fuselages before they resume an apparently intact appearance.

[Earl]

Is EGPWS required on Turkish aircraft?
Atlas jet flies into Europe according to what I read.
I am almost sure Europeans require this, I know most Middle East and Asian countries do require it, upgrading is not all that difficult.

[clearedtocross]

Can someone confirm the exact location of the crash site?

So far, I few contradicting indications have been given, and it is not even confirmed that the approach was for Runway 05

[FINpilot]

ibelieveicanfly wrote:


"First of all,the MD83 has not a EGPWS but only a simple GPWS..."
This aircraft has been flying charter flights from and to Europe this summer, including Scandinavia and if it not had EGPWS it would not been able to operate example from Finland, our so loved CAA is taking care of this. So there fore I would say that they did had an EGPWS installed.


You also wrote "MD83 equipped with only conventional RDI(radio directional indicator) without any ND and MAP display."


If you are referring with this line to ex Swiss MD83´s (You´re Swiss right?) you´re correct but if you do a search there is a lot of MD80´s out there with EFIS/ND/FMS/GPS/INS -installed... For example this aircraft used to fly with RenoAir and they did had EFIS/ND/FMS cockpit layout.


Your comment about Turkish pilots safety culture is absolutely correct. What I have seen they are negligent to everybody in this business! Latest stunt from their country men was few weeks ago in Finland when they almost hit ground vehicle because they decided to leave the holding and do the practise approach (ILS CAT I) with RVR less than 550m. Bad thing was that they did not informed anybody about this and they terminated their approach to VERY LOW. The airport did not had radar surveilance. Well the investigation is under way anyway...Way to go Turks:yuk:
http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=300884&highlight=Pegasus

[Earl]

Thanks Fin Pilot for the EGPWS requirement in Europe.

[md80forum]

http://www.md80.net/yabbse/images/atlas_isparta_pprune.jpg
Map layer from Navigraph

Here are the published procedures plus crash site according to information from news media.

What puzzles me is that the ATC transcript (post #24), if correctly relayed, states that the MD-83 reported "overhead VOR" at time 2318Z and the last communication "established inbound" was 18 minutes later - you hardly fly a D12 racetrack for that long?

Could anybody familiar with Turkish ATC procedures enlighten what the guys might have done during that time? Could the flight originally have come DCT IPT VOR at high altitude with handoff from Antalya radar for descent to published procedure at 8,000 ft over the VOR? MSA is 11,500 ft in the area.

In what direction is the wreckage pointing?

[ibelieveicanfly]

ok good but it is the first time hear an 83 has an EFIS maybe you confuse with the 87.
if the acft would have been equipped with EGPWS(unless it was u/s) and not a simple GPWS,an alert would have come automatically to the pilot if not flown in rose mode,isn'it?who knows?

[sevenstrokeroll]

dear "IbelieveIcanfly".

I feel that your post is probably what we will find to be true, My only complaint is that it is not "black whole", but it is "black hole".

As this is a giant nothing, I apologize for even mentioning it.

Over 40 years ago, responsible people asked for ILS approaches at all jet served airports.

its that simple.

shortcuts at night near mountains are an accident waiting to happen.

I don't discount an improperly set radio nav receiver, HSI course selector incorrectly set or the like.

[Mauersegler]

In what direction is the wreckage pointing?

-no pilot speaking-
from the video cnn-turk and the picture http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/30/europe/plane.php (Herald Tribune)
looks like the hill gets down to the west, and if the picture is from this morning it would point to NW. But searching for more pictures or description would be indicated.

[PBL]

flash8,

thanks for the kind words.

lomapaseo,

glad you are engaging. I don't buy your dynamics yet. Let's stay on it.

RatherBeFlying,

I don't buy your dynamics either.

PBL

[xsbank]

"looks like a slow speed impact, maybe stall due to engine out while on final or some kind of trouble close to the ground."

Like they used to say about the Cub, flies fast enough to just kill you.

[punkalouver]

Unfortunately there are a couple of people here who think they are investigators and can determine the probable cause of an accident by a picture or two of part of the wreck. Its not worth arguing. Just stick to the facts like any professional safety expert would. More info will probably come out.

http://aviation-safety.net/database/dblist.php?Country=TC

[DozyWannabe]

True, but the worst offenders tend to join for one accident that affects them, then bugger off after the investigation and thread has run its course. I've been variously lurking and hopefully contributing stuff of some use for a few years now and I'd miss this place were I no longer admitted.

[PJ2]

TwoOneFour;

PBL has a level head on his shoulders as his extensive academic output clearly shows. Sadly there are a few too many people on this forum who think that shoulder stripes equate to IQ and whose egos outweigh their manners.

Could not agree more strongly. PBL has an enormous amount to offer those who set aside an unfounded prejudice against "academics" in favour of an open mind. PBL has never claimed to know it all but instead contributes from his expertise as we all do.

PJ2

[DozyWannabe]

He's also a very friendly,courteous character as well, and tenacious in the face of getting to the bottom of safety issues, even if it means re-evaluating his initial opinions.

This place would be significantly poorer for lack of his presence.

[BelArgUSA]

It seems that the first priority, for some, is to broadcast the fact on Pprune. It is a contest to be the first... Then of course, we get two, three, a dozen of statements that repeat essentially the same thing... Obviously, if the BBC says so.. clearly, Radio Deutches Welle or RAI will do as well. No need to cite each separate reference...
xxx
Then from threads nº 10 through nº 50, we get the early expert reports of why the accident happened. Occasionally, an intelligent assesment appears, but gets lost in the flood of expert "reports".
xxx
Personally, if something unfortunately happens to an airplane, I like to know about it, but I do not expect to know about the likely reason or circumstances, until many days or weeks later. What I like to know, is to which airplane it did happened to, such as registry, manufacturer's s/n, maybe know which airline operated that aircraft previously, some might know what was the standard equipment of that airplane then... I also appreciate those who are, like here, publishing the applicable approach procedure of the airport (or the departure if a take-off or climb incident/accident) as well as the MET reports at the time of the event. That is it... Nice to know also if the plane just came out of a "C" check, or that the RH engine got changed the day before.
xxx
I called upon the MD-80 fleet manager of my airline this morning, to ask him if he had anything already transpiring from official sources. He told me nothing had already been published. What was his idea of what happened, he said "very likely to be a CFIT situation" as a likely reason after he probably read the news, he just asked me "there are mountains there in Turkey, is it...?"
xxx
Then in a few weeks, probably the voice recorder and flight recorder findings will be published. I will read through them, and if applicable, will make a note if mentioning something of benefit for out pilots, and if necessary, to our MD-80 troops. That is about it... That will be thread nº 300 or so... most of the rest will be rubbish. So... non-glass cockpits are source of disorientation of pilots...? Well, I clean the fingerprints of previous crews from my instruments with Windex spray, and can perfectly read my FD and HSI, as well as the DME counter. At my age, glass cockpits do confuse me.
xxx
As I would speculate that it is a scenario of CFIT, airplane possibly off its course, or not, I am certain that the operations and training management of that Turkish air carrier are already thinking of it as well, and issuing notes to all their pilots with recommendations of minimum sector altitudes to be maintained, or reviews of approach procedures for that particular airport, or similar places, which abound in that part of the world.
xxx
I appreciate the value of "educated discussions" among aviation people and the education value of these discussions. But do not expect my own criticism, at this stage, of what could be done to improve flight safety in similar circumstances. to which all of us flight crews, could benefit. Maybe in 3 months, in classrooms, I will mention the "Turkish MD-83 accident" and suggest some reviews of procedures.
xxx
I will however, mention one thing. As a pilot, I will never descend "as soon as I can", based on MEA or radar MSA for approaches, as I see many pilots do. I descend at the latest possible point, as cleared or able to do, but, instead, based on the distance to be flown to touchdown, which is for most jet planes, to be at 10,000 feet AGL if 30 NM away, 6,000 AGL if 20 NM, 3,000 if at 10 NM, and 1,000 AGL about 3 NM from the deck. Agreed...? Altitude often implies safety. I dont need to be at 3,000 feet AGL 20 NM away, at Vref and configured for landing unless ATC instruct me and requires me to do so, especially at night, with a "black hole" in front of us.
xxx
:)
Happy contrails

[barit1]

PBL says: The craft has some considerable forward momentum at 140 kts (nose up or not). If the tail hits, the nose comes down. And stays, and slides. You don't lose 140 kts forward by converting it suddenly into rotation.

The pictures of the wing-box/rump from behind show the trees and no sliding trace, so assuming a tail strike at 140 kts airspeed this part would have had to have bounced into the air from this initial impact and come down again. I don't quite picture that. My intuition still tells me that with a tail strike and 140kts forward and still flying there is going to be a lengthy trace on the ground; which there isn't.

I am reminded of videos of the A-10 crash as Paris LBG in June 1977. Tail struck the ground first and was immediately disabled (bent upwards) - the remainder of the the ship skidded straight to a stop. (I lost a former student, Howard "Sam" Nelson, that day.)

Applying this scenario to the MD83 case, if he recognized rising terrain and pitched up, we might see a similar outcome - skidding uphill.

[RRAAMJET]

Ibelieveicanfly: not just -87....MD-82/83 were delivered with EFIS as standard after about 1988...about the time the green paint in the cockpit turned grey. FMS (loran-based) was optional. Dual FMS (INS-based) came later. RNO jets had EFIS and FMS. The chaotic cockpit has the displays partly hidden behind the control column, leading to the sub-conscious 'leaning scan'.

I agree with 411A here - how on earth did we ever find our way in the 1011?;) No ND....terrible....

Here's my stoking the rumours time:

All I can see from the photos is:

Leading edge slats are deployed inboard (look like 'land' position, but impact could have jolted the actuators downwards)

The stab has considerable nose-up trim (there's a single screw jack in there -unlikely to jolt); don't know where the 50 pax were seated...ie don't know likely trim setting for light aircraft...

If you look carefully at the blown up photo of the tail, you can just make out the leading edge of the elevator sticking up ...from behind the stab hinge line. I looked at this because if there was a slow-speed condition, the MD-80 series has a hyd stick pusher actuator that pushes the elevator (not the entire tailplane) nose down at 3000psi - ie: leading edge up. Doesn't mean impact couldn't have jolted it there, either....the elevators free float otherwise, but they are mass-balanced...

The fuel tanks look like they are ripped completely open beneath the overwing heater blankets - you can see the lower inspection panels in one of the pics, from inside the wing...

There, that's sure to cause flamethrowers...no opinions, just observations...what's wrong with that with on PPRUNE? Incoming...

[Earl]

http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=77499
Some very interesting reading from the THY crash in 2003

[PenTito]

Very sad event, indeed. We learn very slowly: http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19811201-1

[md80forum]

The insider testimonies from MD-80 drivers with bankruptcy-ridden World Focus, who operated the AtlasJet flight on wetlease, are not that encouraging:

http://www.md80.net/yabbse/index.php?topic=1765.0

Delayed salary payments, recruitment problems, whole business grounded March to May 2007, frequent search for new capital plus new owners, sub-standard technical conditions of the aircraft, full elec power blackouts, engine fires, get the money where you can get at least some, get the spares where you can get them, frequent short-time ops in Iran, Eritrea...

Over at MD-80 Forum we are starting getting these scary "stick-shakers" about how airlines operating ageing cheap airliners are run - you hear these signals 6 to 12 months in advance, and you can start betting they are going to crash soon.

Specific Isparta followup here:

http://www.md80.net/yabbse/index.php?topic=4007.msg12552

[DingerX]

Okay, fine, dynamics:

In the East Granby, CT (http://www.ntsb.gov/Publictn/1996/aar9605.pdf) incident, mentioned above, an MD-83 cut a trough eight feet deep and 290 feet long in the forest two and a half miles from the threshold. In addition to losing both engines, there was damage to various aircraft parts, including the horizontal stabilizer, and leading edges of the wings, and scrapes/punctures to the fuselage. No damage was reported forward of the front wing spar.
So a descending MD-83 could very well strike tail-first. And the Uruguayan Fairchild CFIT hit wing first, which sheared off the tail.
As for no signs of slide, we don't have a photograph clearly showing the wreckage according to the direction of travel, and what photos we do have, suggest that it did slide to that position. The IHT photograph shows the wings and attached fuselage having come to a rest at a 45 degree right angle to the direction of travel (right-to-left in the photograph). To the right you can see a tree that has been knocked over, and you can see the black streak going off to the left where the forward half of the fuselage continued traveling and disintegrating.

Once metal hits terrain, all kinds of complicated dynamics take place, and even to make an educated guess, we'd need at least some larger view of the terrain and direction of travel. But I don't think we can say that the evidence points to a "low-speed" impact.

[Earl]

http://www.airdisaster.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86975&page=4&pp=25
Here is a link from another site with some more pics, shows what someone thinks is the initial impact point in relation to the wreckage.
These are originally from a Turkish newspaper.

[CaptainProp]

I believe "md80forum" is on to a much more interesting track, at this stage anyway.
Delayed salary payments, recruitment problems, whole business grounded March to May 2007, frequent search for new capital plus new owners, sub-standard technical conditions of the aircraft, full elec power blackouts, engine fires, get the money where you can get at least some, get the spares where you can get them, frequent short-time ops in Iran, Eritrea...
Over at MD-80 Forum we are starting getting these scary "stick-shakers" about how airlines operating ageing cheap airliners are run - you hear these signals 6 to 12 months in advance, and you can start betting they are going to crash soon.
Problem here is that in some of the "eastern european" countries, and also Middle east, Northern Africa/Turkey, the safety culture is just not the same as in EU/US, GENERALLY speaking... A friend of mine got his "lucky break" and landed his first airline job in turkey. He left six months later, not because he did not like staying in Turkey, he actually quite enjoyed it, but because he was scared. Yes, scared. If even half of his stories are true, then Im afraid there are more accidents/incidents to come.
As md80 rightly states there are clear signs months, sometimes years, before something happens. Most of the time cash, or rather the lack of cash, is the root of the problem. Safety costs money, lost of money, simple as that. EU can help improving the safety standard in surrounding countries by being more proactive in auditing and setting clear standards for airlines wanting to operate in and out of EU. This will force airlines to develop and improve safety. We have a responsibility here as well.....
/CP

[ibelieveicanfly]

to captainprop:
I agree with you.
I flew many years MD80 serie and this a very reliable acft but of course it must be in a good condition like any acft

[FINpilot]

ibelieveicanfly,

No I´m not confusing to MD-87... For example take a look:

http://www.groundspeedrecords.com/records/record%20MD-83%20603kts.htm

I have personally flown everything from "old" instrument (HSI/RMI only) to "latest" EFIS/ND/GPS/INS/FMS/HUD/DIGITAL ENGINE INSTRUMENTS/ALL YOU CAN GET WITH MONEY -MD83´s and all kind of mix between...It´s no big secret that your situational awareness is greater with the EFIS plane but it´s not either a big secret that somebody can CFIT the plane with EFIS´s...ND is only showing you what you have selected, as we all know

[Southernboy]

MD80 Forum indicates my fears (somewhat timidly expressed)may have a basis. It is so often culture - not just national but company - The signs were all there for Helios but nobody did anything.

[decemberflower]

According to the Turkish media, the plane had EGPWS.
They are saying the captain has failed the simulator training and was not promoted to captain at his former job and resigned from there. He was promoted at World Focus airlines.

The first officer was a former air force pilot who has flown f-4's and f-16's
The news stories claim the captain wanted to take a short cut and he was not familiar with the airport. He approached from the opposite direction and hit the terrain.
I don't have the time to translate all the news stories, but friends who have done landings at that airport are saying that it looks like a pilot error, and the shortcut speculation is most likely to be true.

[bear11]

We spend a lot of time slagging journalists off, but in this case it appears that the Turkish press are accurately relecting the private opinions of the Turkish aviation community on this tragic event.

[hans_airbus]

Why is the First Officer who was an ex Military something General now a martyr. If they really had a CFIT ( probably YES ) they are fully responsible for the death of more than 50 people. This is ridiculous.

I flew couple years in Turkey and the attitude of many of the ex military guys is very dangerous.

Very sad again for Turkey. And unfortunately they wont learn.

I feel so sorry for the PAX and Cabin Crew.

Safe landings to everybody

[Earl]

These small charter companies in Turkey leave a lot to be desired.
Onur Air is another one that is just an accident waiting on a place to happen.
They were previously banned from the EU.
Back in 2003 they touched down in Medina KSA with the gear up, a few days later another one taxied into a light pole all on the Saudia contract.
I think the Turkish people are getting fed up with these low cost airlines and the accidents that have happened, most due to pilot error.
It is surprising to read these things from there own media as they are really proud people, shows that things are changing.
Some of these companies are really slow to pay the crews, many times no salary for weeks or months, the crews then push things so the company can make a profit in the hopes that they will collect there salary.
I have heard many Turkish pilots state this.
The one a few years ago with THY a major airline that tried to land with zero vis and no ILS.
I think 5 pax survived that one.
Just makes you wonder what is going on there?

[sevenstrokeroll]

should we really say "pilot error"?

sorry, it is the entire way we train, supervise, test, and corporate philosophy that should be blamed.

Make it corporate philosophy to give a bonus for each well flown instrument approach and every pilot will fly the full instrument approach. Give a bonus to save money and you will end up on the side of the mountain.

Don't make it corporate philosophy to save fuel (see continental)

I guess you get my drift by now.

too many times, short cuts, looking out the window and abandoning the full IFR procedures leads to an untimely event.

[twistedenginestarter]

How many more people are going to die before the authorities make use of modern technology? For a few hundred quid you can buy a gps pda that knows all the terrain in the direction you're going, not just underneath you, and will display it as red if you're about to hit it. Loony regulations and tight management prevent such basic aids from saving life. People have got to wake up to the fact that low-cost and third-world growth means the old model of highly professional pilots has got to be adjusted. It's no use whingeing on - we need to stick more safety equipment on planes and in control towers.

[FINpilot]

First of all, this aircraft had EFIS/ND and EGPWS. Second of all, how about we start this "saving life" -campaign by changing these pilots way to think and their attitude...There is too many bad examples about bad attitudes and habits in Turkish aircrafts cockpit.

[Earl]

I agree totally Fin Pilot.
I seen the things going on with the old Istanbul Airlines that folded in the summer of 2000.
The owners of these companies are getting rich, yet they claim poverty and don't pay the crews, even the cabin ones.
We used our pilots and Istanbul Airlines cabin attendants.
When AAI refused to operate for IST airlines threats were made against the AAI ops manager and we stopped flying.
The courts ruled that the owner had to pay, He has yet to this day refused to do this claiming poverty.
Yet he owns several 5 star hotels in Antalya.
These Turkish pilots are trying to feed there families and this is when the shxt hits the fan.
Corners are cut, regulations are not followed, aircraft are operated against the MEL and problems happen.
My own opinion is that its time for the Turkish pilots put there foot down, no pay, no fly.
If the airplane is not operated according to the regs and mel, it sits on the ground.
When you have a set of standards, every time you let the company exceed these standards, you set a new standard.
Before long you have no standards at all, anything goes, move the airplane no matter what!
The only time I have seen this pay issue is with middle eastern countries, anything goes there!

[hans_airbus]

It is very difficult to change their bad happits. As long as the turkish aviation industry is controlled by ex unprofeesional military guys nothing will change.

[hans_airbus]

I HAD ONCE A CONVERSATION WITH ONE OF THEES GUYS AND AND HE TOLD ME THAT HIS CAPTAIN DESCENT BELOW THE MDA and landed. He was very proud that they didnt divert and saved so much money.

This is exact the mentality. NOTHING WILL HAPPEN.

[hetfield]

Excuse me, what is ACMI ?

[Shiny side down]

ACMI= Wetlease
Aircraft
Crew
Maintenance
Insurance

something like that...

[Earl]

Aircraft, Crew, maintenance and insurance.

[hetfield]

@shiny and earl

thx

[MaxBlow]

Earl,

...Back in 2003 they touched down in Medina KSA with the gear up...

The guy who did this is the DO of world focus airlines!:ugh:

[ibelieveicanfly]

really great airline,isn'it?

[barit1]

You mean there's no difference between "getting away with it this time" and a "well flown instrument approach"?

:rolleyes:

[sevenstrokeroll]

hey guys, I'm just making a point...do "too many shortcuts to save money" sound at all familiar

[SUNTURK 69]

hans,earl,fin pilot you guys are kidding me or what...?? I flew a while in turkey and I'm the first to admit that some of the airlines over there need to get their act straight. Having said that, please do a research of how many airliners in the western world crashed because of stupidity and commercial pressure before you go at it to airlines in your so called third world airlines. You guys know as well as I do that corners are being cut in every airline. And if you want to do it 100% legal no airliner will t/o and you know that it is true. I'm not new in this game and from reading your posts so are you guys, so please stop talking like a rookie who gets a hard on from watching a aeroplane. You guys claim to have years of experience act like it and a little more nuance is at it's place.

rant over..

[barit1]

SUNTURK 69: I look at & compare the statistics. :uhoh:

[FINpilot]

SUNTURK 69:
I have personally seen, with my own eyes, some incredible stunts and behaviours by these Turkish pilots, not just by one company but few...Not to mention all the accident reports you can read!!! Referring these FACTS I am saying that there is something wrong with these pilots attitudes:hmm:

By the way, I´m still getting a hard on watching aeroplanes, sometimes even with out the "little blue pill":}

[ibelieveicanfly]

fully with you FINpilot:D

[Shiny side down]

If there is any doubt that there is a fundamental deficiency in that area, a quick look at this link maybe in order.

http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=299771&highlight=aaib

I seem to recall several years ago, Korea (KAL) had some issues, that required some drastic action.

[Earl]

I agree finpilot!
Unless you have been there its difficult to imagine some of the things these Turkish pilots try to do.
They really need some standards.

[PBL]

Now the consensus seems to be that the root cause of this accident is that all pilots in this region are cowboys and their bosses all swindlers, I am hoping that there are some still reading this thread who are less interested in these fascinating political comments and more interested in explaining the progress of the accident and the phenomena we can see in the photos.

flash, 214, PJ and Dozy, many thanks for the encomiums, folks. I hope you're all still reading, as also bumpyride, barit and Dinger.

DingerX suggests that there are broken trees and some sliding. After looking at the heli photos from the newspaper, I still don't agree. I say hardly any. Barit1 compares with a 1977 crash in Paris in which the tail hit first - but also says "skidding". That is the odd thing to me. There is apparently a strike mark on top of the hill. Then there is the tail more or less sitting in (intact) trees and the wingbox/fuselage assembly sitting further downhill, also in more or less intact trees. Where's the rest?

If he set down hard (high rate of descent) at the place at which there is the strike mark, then the tail can have broken, whether or not he is hitting flat or tail first. There is a YouTube video of a DC-9 setting down hard on a test flight, in which the tail breaks downwards (I tend to believe this is not faked, but don't know the details of the test). But then the wing box/fuselage piece must have bounced and come down with very little forward momentum at the place at which we see it. A counter indication is: where is the nose? Much further along?

I still think this points to the velocity vector being aimed significantly downwards at the point of impact and that the most likely way to account for that is previous loss of control.

I also wonder whether we will ever see recorder data.

PBL

[DozyWannabe]

PBL:
There is a YouTube video of a DC-9 setting down hard on a test flight, in which the tail breaks downwards (I tend to believe this is not faked, but don't know the details of the test).

http://www.alexisparkinn.com/Photogallery2/MD80_NTSBReport/AAR82-02.pdf

It was the first MD-80 off the production line on a test flight, and it was real. Sink rate was well over 1,000fpm on touchdown.

[Mauersegler]

Non-pilot speaking...


I was also puzzled about the missing front fuselage. Seeing the Milliyet pictures (http://www.airdisaster.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86975&page=4&pp=25) it seems to me that
-due to the impact at the hill the rear fuselage got broken (this must be a very flat impact, the tail don't had a direct contact to the ground, like the wingbox-middle fuselage, so the forces are not distributed downwards in a large area but at the cross section of the fuselage where it goes upwards and thins, surely the same thing with the youtube video) maybe separating directly on the impact or a fraction of second later as
-the plane continues a ballistic trajectory (due to the very flat impact there was no big change of direction), but without the tail and engines it goes nose down, impacting where it comes to stop (I saw at Hurriyet www-site pictures of an engine, I don't know the position, but I think it should be near the tail)
-The front of the plane absorbed almost all of the energy as it failed/desintegrated (you can see debris scattered in a "star" display in the front of the "intact" section, also a big piece of fuselage near the left wing, showing the orange colored insulation).
-The mid section comes down "softly" because of this and maybe the wings. I think the damage was mostly due to the first impact on the hill. Also almost no slide.

In another matter, in a video there was a reporter lifting a piece of material to show it and let it fall again, how can this be possible?!!! I hope he was the only one doing that...

[GearDown&Locked]

Mauersegler, exactly my thoughts, word for word!

It seems logical that the crew must have seen the danger at the very last second and tried to clear the hill top, hence the flat impact at the wing box point; a spare couple of feet would probably have made their day.

From then on, tail snaps off and the rest keeps going by inertia, helped a little by the remainder of aerodynamic forces still in effect.

:sad:

[SUNTURK 69]

BARIT ever heard of RTFQ let's change this for now and call it READ THE F..STATISTIC's Not so long ago some us pilot's took of from the wrong runway? God have their souls but check your fact's buddy and the USA is the aviation country per say right?

FINPILOT hehe thank you for the suggestion for the blue pill but you would be amazed with what I can do without it. And by the way I'm not going to enter a childish debate with you about some other stories I heard about finnish man :hmm: And by the way you went there probably as a cadet and paid for your rating right and now you are throwing **** at these guys with your statemen't's because non of your great finnish airlines would give you a chance...dude no more words for you

Guys please you act as if the western countries are that much better. I call this ignorance and arragonce. This accident should not have happened but I don't think these guys in the cockpit did it on purpose did they?

Alot of off topic bs, sorry to clutter the thread.

[clearedtocross]

From the pictures shown on this thread it is not a confirmed fact that the aircraft hit first where the skid marks are visible on the hill. Maybe it hit first at a location not shown and bounced off into the hill shown on the fotos, shedding its tail at the first strike which then travelled a bit further.

It would also be helpful to know the day-time these heli pictures where taken, because the shadows would give a clue to the impact track of the aircraft.

[FINpilot]

SUNTURK69:

I know that I´m lucky since I haven´t had to pay my rating ever...And if I would had to done that Turkey would be the last place on earth I would do it!:yuk:

Who has said that this was done purpose by the cockpit crew? That is not what we are talking about here:ugh:

Like you said, lot of BS, especially from you mate:hmm:

[DingerX]

PBL:
Well, there are now more photos available. Yes, you can see an area to the rear-right of the aircraft with knocked-down trees, debris, and the rest, but not enough to suggest the thing came sliding through.

But, since we have a little more information, here's what I see:

If that "impact mark" is indeed an impact mark, then it hit wings level, so that the "loss of control" would have to be a fairly straightforward stall. At that point, we would be arguing over the distance covered and the degree of damage sustained. The distance covered is considerable, most of the aircraft disintegrated, and the debris field is some distance from the "impact mark".

If you want some speculation, I'll throw this out:


the aircraft hit, and hit hard on a rising slope. It had enough forward momentum that it was likely flying and not stalled. I have not seen any photos of the engines, but there is no indication of double-engine failure at this time. The impact was severe enough that only the structurally hardest segments (tail and wing area) stayed intact for long. The wing section presumably went airborne, spraying debris, landed and slid a small distance. The "nose" -- actually more than half of the fuselage on an MD-80, and, given the number of souls on board, probably had the majority of passengers -- disintegrated from the force of the impact and the subsequent dynamics.



CFIT remains the most likely suspect. But who knows what the other factors will be?

[FINpilot]

DingerX: CFIT remains the most likely suspect. But who knows what the other factors will be?

The crew did not followed published procedures, either did not wanted to or did not know how to!

[Mauersegler]

in this cnn-turk video at 00:40 is something like a piece of tail, maybe an engine too? And at 04:40 you could see an engine. Sadly I don't understand turkish, maybe there is another cue.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucKa4O05YQQ
And the MD-80 video is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3SVvtJcPJY

[Magplug]

It is reported that many passengers were found in their seats which had detached from the mountings. The seats attachments are stressed to a little beyond the crash G tolerance of the human body. Whilst portions of the fuselage appear intact the fractured seats bear witness to the forces involved. The crash was patently not survivable.

I am however intrigued by the resting place of the tail section. Harsh pilot handling has contributed to separation of the empennage in the past... perhaps here also ?

[RRAAMJET]

Magplug: no. At normal approach speeds (and I feel this 80 was in a slower flt regime at the time, due to the large amount of nose-up stab exhibited by the fin), there is simply not enough control authority or pitch-rate in the '80 to overstress it to failure. It has manual flt controls via tabs, and flies very sluggishly on approach compared to more modern PFCU-type aircraft. I don't believe this a/c broke up prior to ground impact. The aircraft would be more likely to depart if you pulled very hard at approach speed (thru' the pusher) than break up.
Clean min. manvr speed and above - different story.

[Checkmate 707]

Regarding Turkish Aviation Culture....
First of all my deep sympathies for all concerned.
As long as we see ex military pilots who have problems in adapting to civil aviation combined with crooks running disorganized and unsafe airlines in this country, we will continue to experience such sad accidents. :uhoh:
The problem is not that these guys do not know how to fly, on the contrary. It is their mentality.Turkey boasts some of the worst safety records in the western world. :bored: With the exception of the DC-10 crash in Paris (1970s) every tragedy has been the result of human error, or better said mentality error. Despite all that over the years Turkey has made considerable progress in civil aviation even becoming a JAA member state. However they still have some potential criminals in their airline industry which need to be cleaned out. It is high time the Turkish CAA and the JAA take strong action against these.:=

[PBL]

Following my invitation, Dinger speculates:

the aircraft hit, and hit hard on a rising slope. ............ The impact was severe enough that only the structurally hardest segments (tail and wing area) stayed intact for long. The wing section presumably went airborne, spraying debris, landed and slid a small distance. The "nose" -- actually more than half of the fuselage on an MD-80, and, given the number of souls on board, probably had the majority of passengers -- disintegrated from the force of the impact and the subsequent dynamics.


OK, but where is that debris from the forward fuselage? I have been looking for it in the photos too and haven't seen it. Things don't shatter so much as to become invisible. There is a debris field somewhere that we have not seen yet. Either that, or I have become selectively blind.

PBL

[Mauersegler]

looking at the pictures that I don't wanted to look before, I ellaborated my thoughts a litle:
As the plane touched the terrain it did it at a flat angle, the end of the middle section taking the most of the forces, making a lever system (a long but lighter section in the front, a heavy and short section at the rear) the wing box-middle section withstands the forces and at the point between the front section and the wing box , due to the distances, the force was not as much as at the rear (this would result in lesser damage to the front section). Like sitting in the front of a long bus, you will feel a irregularity of the road (as a vertical acceleration) as the front wheels impact this, but almost nothing as the rear wheels do.
Like the test MD-80 in video, were the force surely was not so big, the tail got detached (from the pictures it looks the same way). Due to the bigger forces and direct damage to the structure (no landing gear here), the engines and further tail section detached also.
The middle section was badly deformed (flattened and fractured). The plane continues gliding due to inertia and aerodynamics (thanks GearDown&Locked!). It goes nose down because of the missing heavy tail/engines, the front section beeing then fully destroyed in an almost explosive way as it touches the ground. This reduces the impact to the middle section. It looks like the bodies of the passangers lied in the area directly around the middle section and in the middle section(the rescue teams collected them to two sites ca. 15 m from the plane in the front and rear areas and there are blue seats in the area). If the front section was badly damaged at the first impact they would have beeing scattered in the path. It would be also improbable that the middle section ends pointing forward and right side up (due to aerodynamical instability). In pictures of the middle section taked direclty from the front it seems that the seats are pointing forwards (but the forces at the first impact would be almost vertical, otherwise the nose would have impacted the ground there), also the right side of the fuselage looks like bursted away (and is free of tree-debris or soil, not likely crushed directly with the surface). See pictures B205_108143_0007 and B205_108143_0004 at http://www.photoshot.com/imageset.jsp?iset_id=192501&gid=&cid=1

OK, but where is that debris from the forward fuselage? I have been looking for it in the photos too and haven't seen it. Things don't shatter so much as to become invisible. There is a debris field somewhere that we have not seen yet. Either that, or I have become selectively blind.
PBL
Hmmm, if the plane touched ground at say 45 degrees, could the floor of the front section have beeing ripped off and laid under the middle section? and the debris that we see are only the walls/ceiling of it?
#######added######
Looking at the pictures, there could be a debris field at the rear of the middle section ( at 5 o'clock), it is not easy to tell if this is snow or white plane fuselage portions.

[Skydrol Leak]

Just some clarification here;

BoeingMEL;It seems you are the "know all" guy here, I was questioning the possible causes, and not determining any conclusions.

1. An engine flame out or engine stall is more likely to happen to a rear engined a/c's, It is the fact and If you are a pilot you should know that!
2. The normal speed on approach is about 1.3 of your stall speed, so one can say that you don't have much margin for error.
3. About impossibility of stalling where your MOCA is 2000 feet above mountains, gives you a very limited time to recover. Some crew even had problem to recover it from more than 30000 feet high (check out the West Carribean MD-82 flight 708 crash in Venezuela)
4. Looks also like CFIT etc, but let's not bragg about everyone's comments and assumptions at the pickpoint.

So, let's be observant and not nasty shall we???

[MrNosy2]

Maybe I've missed it amongst all the posts etc but can any one tell me the the basic information about the crash :-

*What is the elevation of the initial impact point
*What are the coordinates of the impact point
*What heading does the acft appear to have been on at impact
*What part of the approach was it on at impact - was it still arriving inbound to the IPT VOR or was it, as reported in some sources, flying the final part of a VOR/DME app to rwy 05.

I can't see how there can be so many posts speculating on what may have happened without even this basic factual information, which should certainly have been established by now.

[sevenstrokeroll]

skydrol leak...

you mention that rear engine planes are more likely to have engine stalls

I'd like to remind you that a certain near CFIT disaster near Hartford (with an MD80) Connecticut. The rear mounted engines probably kept the plane flying, as below the wing engines would likely have sucked in enough trees to make them stop working.

[PBL]

I can't see how there can be so many posts speculating on what may have happened without even this basic factual information, which should certainly have been established by now.

It has certainly been established within minutes; observe journalists and rescue people at the site. They certainly know where they are. I would also like to know. The nearest I have come to coordinates so far is JACDEC's "4km southwest of the airport".

The airport is at 2827 ft, the MDA at 3750, the procedure turn to final at DME 12 at 7000 ft, and the step down to DME 5 at 4,500 ft. The 4,000 ft contour WSW of the airport at DME 5 is some 3.5 nm NW from the final approach track, as is the 4000 ft contour on the other side. However, the terrain rises steeply NW of DME 5 on the final approach path from 4000 ft to a peak at 6073 ft in 2.5 nm.

If you have trouble understanding the discussion, observe that the physics and phenomenology of impact is invariant with respect to geographical location and altitude, although obviously not invariant with respect to the immediately surrounding terrain.

P.S. to others: we are still missing the front fuselage. I can't see that it wouldn't be visible in the photos, and it is certainly not under the other wreckage that we can see!

PBL

[MrNosy2]

The reason I was interested in the actual location, heading etc was that, assuming it is a CFIT, was the aircraft at the wrong height, the wrong place or both.

[Mauersegler]

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2007/12/05/220069/germanys-bfu-expected-to-analyse-crashed-md-83-recorders.html
PBL, I don't see anything more in those pictures, are other places we don't have seen then?
Sadly the resolution of the area in google earth is very coarse, but maybe we could localize the place there, I will try later.

[md80forum]

*What is the elevation of the initial impact point
*What are the coordinates of the impact point
*What heading does the acft appear to have been on at impact
*What part of the approach was it on at impact - was it still arriving inbound to the IPT VOR or was it, as reported in some sources, flying the final part of a VOR/DME app to rwy 05.

I have tried to update a map as accurately as possible in post #99 (http://www.pprune.org/forums/showpost.php?p=3742856&postcount=99), based on press reports. The impact point has been reported to be slightly above 5,000 ft at 7 nm (11 or 12 kms) NW of the airport - which means JACDEC's information is not correct. Aerial shots of the scene indicate that the MD-83 impacted on an SE heading direct towards the VOR, see for instance:

http://www.md80.net/yabbse/index.php?topic=4007.0

Turkish pilot sources, as well as Turkish press, say that the Atlas (or actually World Focus) crew reported "overhead IPT VOR" 18 mins before last transmission, even though they were not nearly at the VOR entering their racetrack. By doing so they allegedly bought themselves space to move around in the sector west of the airport on an improvised visual shortcut to final 05 via left base. This would be supported by the fact that the aircraft crashed in landing configuration.

The other possibility is that the racetrack was flown, but for some reason it went wrong, bringing the aircraft far left of extended rwy centerline 05.

If people familiar with ops into Isparta could enlighten if a SE heading DCT IPT VOR is likely as depicted in post #99 it would be helpful.

[Earl]

http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=90446


Aviation chief investigated
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
ANKARA – Turkish Daily News

The transportation ministry has initiated an investigation into the conduct of Civil Aviation Authority President Ali Arıduru, which one newspaper yesterday claimed he made the World Focus Aviation pay his hotel bill.



Transportation Minister Binali Yıldırım asked the ministerial Inspection Council to investigate the claims.



A report claimed that Arıduru's hotel expenses were paid for by World Focus, which had also rented to Atlasjet the plane that crashed seven kilometers from Isparta last Friday.



The plane crash killed all 57 people on board.

Earlier yesterday Arıduru said the plane had veered off course for a yet unknown reason. He said it was premature to conclude that a pilot's navigation error caused the crash, adding that transcripts of the plane's cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder would shed light on the accident.

[PBL]

Flight International (just got it in the post) is reporting that the impact point is just north of the village of Cukurören. Flightglobal (thanks, Mauersegler) is reporting that the impact was 7 nm west of the airport. Cukurören is about 7 nm west of the airport, and about 7nm from the final approach path to Rwy 05 (which is 043°).

MrNosy2, there is nothing wrong with wanting to know that info, and I agree with you that it is essential to figuring out what procedurally or otherwise may have gone wrong.

Looking at the terrain around Cukurören, the ridge extends NNW/SSE, so I would guess (and I emphasise this is a guess!) from the lie of the wreckage in relation to the downslope that he was flying SSE to SE; alternatively NW to NNW when he struck.

Yes MrN2, he was in the wrong place if he was making an approach, and certainly at the wrong altitude because the sector altitude there is 10,000 ft.

PBL

PBL

[Earl]

One would think that the Turkish Government would have more important things to do concerning this accident.

[Earl]

Every CRM recurrent it is said that many things build up to any accident.
Not just one thing causes this.
Will be interesting to see the final report and read what factors led up to this one.
With the Turkish officials wasting time and resources arguing over hotel bills it might be some time before we hear this information!
:ugh:
Dont want to try and translate some of these things from the Turkish media as my Turkish is not all that good.

[PBL]

I'm so glad you know exactly what happened, BoeingMEL. Maybe you were there at the time? Perhaps you could enlighten the rest of us, who are still working through only what we see and read?

PBL

[Mauersegler]

Well, I play a litle with google earth and maps and I think here ist it:

http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/7502/areal4bi3.th.jpg (http://img230.imageshack.us/my.php?image=areal4bi3.jpg)

http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/7029/areal5rp0.th.jpg (http://img148.imageshack.us/my.php?image=areal5rp0.jpg)

The pics are aligned with the airport, please see the indication in the upper right corner.
1 is the likely first touch place and 2 the likely wreckage place. North of Cukurören, west from Yesiyurt, both points ca. 13,8 km to the airport.
1: 37° 52' 22.11'' N 30° 12' 03.57'' O 1786 m
2: 37° 53' 17.16'' N 30° 12' 25.77'' O 1415 m
Two pics more, from another point,

http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/2289/persp1wr1.th.jpg (http://img156.imageshack.us/my.php?image=persp1wr1.jpg)

http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/7205/persp2nz7.th.jpg (http://img156.imageshack.us/my.php?image=persp2nz7.jpg)

[PBL]

Good work, Mauersegler!

Well out of the approach path at well less than MSA.

Can someone who knows tell us whether there is such a thing as a Contact Approach in Turkey? Or if airlines are allowed to go visual on approach?

PBL

[Checkmate 707]

You are right Earl. Mine isnt too good either but as usual when such things happen 80 percent of what the Turkish media has been broadcasting about this crash is irresponsible B.S. :confused:

They have been using the plight of others to make a big show.

The airing of the funeral and the interviews of family members of the first officer who was a retired general was particularly tasteless.

He was declared a martyr and buried with full military honours.

One should not talk badly about the dead, its tragic enough.

But to make such a show for someone who probably is sharing responsibility for the deaths of almost 60 people and great pain for hundreds more is not right.

There must be a fundamental change in Turkish aviation culture.

[md80forum]

Mauersegler,

Good work (which implies a theory of things gone wrong after the downwind). Check out this picture from a Turkish newspaper, indicating another direction of impact if I interpret it correctly

http://www.md80.net/yabbse/images/atlas_hurriyet.jpg

"Pist" stands for runway, the clipped blue arrow to the right said "lake" in the original newspaper story.

Your pin #1 may be correct, but #2 may have to be on the opposite side of the ridge. On Google Earth, I have also tried to locate the white building on the top of the ridge visible on many news photos without finding it.

[Machaca]

It appears the aircraft hit the slope nose first, compacting the front fuselage up to the wing root, the massive deceleration causing the tail to tear up and off while the engines parted their mounts, followed by a virtual explosion of the shattered front fuselage over the hilltop chasing the lobbed center section. Peace be with them...

Here is a huge collection of images, including some of the "missing" front fuselage (pieces) and one of part of the cockpit.

http://img153.imageshack.us/img153/4889/4203areareliefmap2qo1.th.jpg (http://img153.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203areareliefmap2qo1.jpg)
http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/8888/4203areareliefmap1qe2.th.jpg (http://img218.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203areareliefmap1qe2.jpg)

http://img453.imageshack.us/img453/6186/4203centersection5sr0.th.jpg (http://img453.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection5sr0.jpg)
http://img478.imageshack.us/img478/576/4203centersection4fi6.th.jpg (http://img478.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection4fi6.jpg)
http://img478.imageshack.us/img478/8024/4203centersection3tf1.th.jpg (http://img478.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection3tf1.jpg)
http://img153.imageshack.us/img153/6149/4203centersection2dk4.th.jpg (http://img153.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection2dk4.jpg)
http://img456.imageshack.us/img456/2893/4203centersection1hp6.th.jpg (http://img456.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection1hp6.jpg)
http://img475.imageshack.us/img475/3267/4203centersection0no3.th.jpg (http://img475.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection0no3.jpg)
http://img153.imageshack.us/img153/2930/4203centersection6sh1.th.jpg (http://img153.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection6sh1.jpg)
http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/6784/4203centersection99kt6.th.jpg (http://img151.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection99kt6.jpg)
http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/9343/4203centersection9vr9.th.jpg (http://img151.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection9vr9.jpg)
http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/6641/4203centersection8rp4.th.jpg (http://img151.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection8rp4.jpg)
http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/5117/4203centersection7je4.th.jpg (http://img151.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203centersection7je4.jpg)

-=Machaca=-

[Machaca]

http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/3848/4203sitehilltoptailwingti0.th.jpg (http://img227.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203sitehilltoptailwingti0.jpg)
http://img216.imageshack.us/img216/6326/4203sitehilltoptailwingbr5.th.jpg (http://img216.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203sitehilltoptailwingbr5.jpg)
http://img489.imageshack.us/img489/7894/4203sitehilltoptailwingjr2.th.jpg (http://img489.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203sitehilltoptailwingjr2.jpg)
http://img456.imageshack.us/img456/8505/4203sitehilltop6ye5.th.jpg (http://img456.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203sitehilltop6ye5.jpg)
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[Machaca]

http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/6174/4203tailhilltop1sx7.th.jpg (http://img227.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203tailhilltop1sx7.jpg)
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http://img489.imageshack.us/img489/1599/4203landinggearmain1fn4.th.jpg (http://img489.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203landinggearmain1fn4.jpg)

[Machaca]

http://img216.imageshack.us/img216/3655/4203wingrttip1te2.th.jpg (http://img216.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203wingrttip1te2.jpg)
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[Machaca]

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[Machaca]

http://img459.imageshack.us/img459/5/4203debrisunknown1kl2.th.jpg (http://img459.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203debrisunknown1kl2.jpg)
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http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/589/4203debrisfieldbelowtaiiy9.th.jpg (http://img151.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203debrisfieldbelowtaiiy9.jpg)
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http://img463.imageshack.us/img463/6725/4203cockpitrtside1oz0.th.jpg (http://img463.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203cockpitrtside1oz0.jpg)

-=MachacA=-

[Mauersegler]

thanks md80forum,
I am nearly sure to have the site, this picture "looks" not so similar, but I have seen this picture before and even tried to match the view. This is why the google earth captions are oriented with the airport . One problem is the optical instruments used, also the optical angle ( tele, normal, wide...) Google earth operates with a artificial reconstruction based on very high altitude fotos. This was taken from a helicopter, I think this explains it. But look at the pictures von Milliyet in Airdisaster, I think this seems to match. Of course the GPS coordinates would be very helpful, anybody here with the information?
Google earth has a low resolution at this area and it could be imposible to resolve in this pictures or who knows how old this fire detection tower is, it could be builded in the recent time and the pictures of google be older (I know that from other areas, from one day to other there were houses and other constructions in google earth). But in the pictures of Milliyet you see a very light shinning road that goes down at the divide of the hill (the road for this building...), I think it is in google earth too.

http://img527.imageshack.us/img527/2871/upperview1fi9.th.jpg (http://img527.imageshack.us/my.php?image=upperview1fi9.jpg)

http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/5800/upperview2ku6.th.jpg (http://img205.imageshack.us/my.php?image=upperview2ku6.jpg)

Also a road comes near the impact site. Another cue is the vegetation, if you see the videos from the news, there is a area with relative high trees (for the zone, of course), and you see the fog/clouds that bring the high humidity there. I think this could only posible in a north (+/-) exposed side, otherwise you will find only shrubs. And there are small snow patches near the summit and others scattered there (yes, it is snow, one picture near the road shows one very clearly). The videos give also a better sense of the altitude difference between the two sites, they zoom a lot to get the views. With pictures, and digital cameras you see sometimes "all crispy" pictures and it is a lot harder to grasp the distances. they show also a concave hill side.
I'm to 95% sure, but only gps data would give us really certainty.

[pilotbear]

Well here I am reading about this obviously tragic incident on the RUMOUR network where speculation and conjecture are part of the RUMOUR framework, and where any idea however ridiculous is valid until proven otherwise.
Then sadly I come across the same 'smart arse' (sorry I cannot bring myself to call you Captains) pilots telling everyone what they should and shouldn't post.
GET YOUR HEADS OUT OF YOUR A****. You are clearly not regarded as important within your own company (conjecture) perhaps even at home (speculation) as you have to make your presence felt here and it is quite frankly boring. (fact)
Speculation gives rise to discussion and that is where answers come from, if you don't like it DON'T READ IT. :ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh:

[BelArgUSA]

Thank you for your assistance and expertise in your analysis of circumstances and reasons for this accident.
xxx
Being too busy re-learning how to fly airplanes, what might cause accidents, and CFIT impact geometry and structural damage, if not navigation accuracy, I find myself unable to furher participate in Pprune forums.
xxx
... and soon to retire anyway...
:)
Happy contrails
(s) BelArgUSA
Manager Flight Training
Aerolineas Argentinas
(another "Cowboy" - we call ourselves "Gauchos" here)

[one of Pax]

Checkmate 707:
There is a cultural misunderstanding, that has nothing to do with aviation.
The word "sehit"(turkish: martyr) may be used not only for someone who has sacrificied himself for a cause, also for some one who has died while performing his duty. In this case you don't need to be a pilot or a retired general to be called as sehit. You might be a flight attendant or a passenger who is on a business trip.

You are right about the media, some of the scientists died are working for years in important projects, but they got attention only after the crash.

One of the claims in the media is that with ILS such accidents would never happen.

Assuming the crash reason was CFIT, is this claim true?

well if you don't guessed it yet I am just turkish a passenger who has booked on Atlas Jet to a flight to Antalya. ( ILS installed. )

[Rainboe]

Well I had decided I had made my last post here, the idiots have chased out the professionals, but this thread had gone so totally out of control I can't believe it. A bunch of self appointed amateur investigators ghoulishly turning over what evidence they can get from grainy phone cameras? Would it help to have been allowed to peek into the body bags? All this analysis of the last moments of the occupants in perverted and prurient, and you should be ashamed of yourselves. It is not what happened after contact with terrain that is important- all that matters are the events leading up to first contact, and why......understand? Not how they died.

So thank you for the verdicts and lectures from people with no practical experience. It will be borne in mind.....not. The only lessons to come out of this accident will be for the professionals to find ways of it not recurring, not for ghouls to go photogaphing the cockpit and hunting the engines. A foolish and perverted obsession with some of you.

[RatherBeFlying]

It would not surprise me if this accident has commonalities with the C-130 accident at Alert in 1991. In the Alert case, the Captain elected to bypass the NDB approach in favor of a visual approach. The runway was in sight but they impacted high terrain.

Some of the available photos for this accident show that the airport is visible from the crash site vicinity.

There's also the 2001 Gulfstream crash at Aspen where a ridge was struck on a visual final at night.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/91/AvjetAspen.jpg/350px-AvjetAspen.jpg

[sevenstrokeroll]

Mountain flying at night in nice weather...

well, in bad wx, you have to do an instrument approach and it usually works out.

but,

on those nice nights, perhaps moonlit, its easy to go for a shortcut.

I don't have my almanac handy, but was this tragedy on a night with a full moon? (visibility and not any werewolf jokes please)

remember, when you fly at night in mountains, you should see more and more lights if you are doing things right...less lights means climb like all get out.

I've flown very much in the western USA mountainous areas...and believe me...you better know where you are

[PBL]

Unlike Rainboe, I am interested in the information about the accident I can get from photographs and thank the people who are providing them and trying to interpret them.

I also don't necessarily go with the suggestion of leaving investigation to others, just as others would not necessarily go with the suggestion of leaving investigation to me.

I understand that some sensibilities might be adversely affected by some of the images, but consider that the official pictures as well as the reality will be far more unpleasant, and my sympathies go out mainly to those whose job it is to sift through and clean up the site as well as those who have lost family and friends. I don't really sympathise with the complaints of those who can choose to look or not to look at pictures on a public forum as they wish. The pictures we have seen are not prurient; they are informative to those of us who think about aircraft accidents.

Some observations from Machaca's astonishing collection.

There is, obviously, wreckage from the nose section, as well
as from the rear fuselage section. The piece of cockpit shell including window frames has been crumpled before the window by a longitudinal impact by something somewhat wider than a tree. And the main piece of fuselage/wing box has suffered a massive vertical impact, sufficient to crease the fuselage outwards on both sides and crease the roof downwards in the middle. Note also that the impact point on the hill as suggested by Milliyet is almost flat.

Descent angles of commercial jets under control are usually of the order of 3-6 degrees. If you strike a flattish hilltop at that angle, I doubt you are going to get a longitudinally crumpled and shattered nose and the middle fuselage creasing in on itself like that. And you are likely to get a trail somewhat longer than that apparent at the supposed initial impact point. I think I see three grooves at that point and it doesn't surprise me that some have said that the gear was down.

I agree that the supposition of someone cruising around on a visual descent below MSA and finding the air full of rocks has a certain simplicity. But the damage is still suggesting to me that he went in steep, and also apparently nose down, and that suggests further to me that control was already lost. But no one, least of all me, has any suggestion as to why that might have been.

PBL

[Checkmate 707]

One of Pax...

Thanks for the "sehit" clarification. Yes an ILS might certainly helped prevent this tragedy. Most approach accidents happen on so called non precision approaches (VOR, NDB etc.)

[Checkmate 707]

RAINBOW....

You sum it all up.

....all that matters are the events (and everything else :*) leading up to the first contact, and why.

[GMDS]

A ILS just might have prevented this accident, or it might not. A Non Precision Approach is not necesseraly unsafer than a ILS. Such a argument is misleading but unfortunately often picked up by chief pilots, therefore gaining momentum. Many operators ban NPA's if PA's are available and by doing that take away training and skill for the day when there is no alternative. With no training, logically more accidents loome. Now what was here first, the chicken or the egg?
In my humble opinion this comes as a cover up of the deteriorating quality of pilots. Not the basic human potential around the world, but from bad selection, lack of training and even worse leadership, all in the name of cutting costs up to a litterarly cynical stage. The call for ever increasing aids on ground or on board, for even greater automatism is only a consequence of a lack of skill and airmenship of pilots. Again, it's not their fault.
Back to the question: If you really want to install ILS in most places, you should at the same time ban all NPA's, because not allowed to train them and decreasing possibilities to actually fly them, means a increased danger potential once forced to execute them.
But then you should ban every car without ESP, because the bloke driving a such at home and occasionally hiring a different brand without, will definitely screw up when he gets in trouble in a curve.

I am personally all for increased training, even down the route with good WX conditions. NPA's should be a routine approach with a minimum required number , just as autoland approaches.

[PJ2]

Rainboe, Checkmate 707;

....all that matters are the events (and everything else :*) leading up to the first contact, and why.

Agreed and that is the most valuable area of learning-for-prevention, but I offer this: While I can comprehend a level of intolerance for prurient interest, (recognizing that it is always there and this remains an accessible forum for anyone), let us set aside the non-professional opinions and inexperienced speculation for the nonce and recognize that examination of photographs by professionals (flying and non-flying) and/or experienced/trained AIs of wreckage distribution and condition can nevertheless reveal something about antecedents. I haven't read all posts but have absorbed the provided photographs over time. I think they are helpful in determining some basic notions which may carry us beyond idle and inexperienced or, as you observe, prurient speculation, although by no means can we come to know the critical "why" - that is for the DFDR/CVR to reveal. At the very least, we might know a bit about angle/rate of descent, speed, likely configuration and heading as well as pitch and roll attitudes and thereby know regimes of flight etc. I fully realize that DFDR information, providing it was working and was reliable, may determine this as well, but this is a forum, not an AIB or a read-out center and speculation is both natural and beyond anyone's control. By the main fuselage section's damage and surround with relatively little disturbance, I had come to a tentative conclusion that the aircraft had been in a flat descent, possibly stalled. As they became available however, the photographs may tell us a different story. We know they show a short section of the tail in which it may be seen has some deformation upwards at the forward break and a substantial section of the fuselage forward of the wing box separated, leaving the wing-box section on which it may be seen shows some downward deformation at the forward separation point. For most here, until today the location and condition of the forward fuselage has been in some question. In short, at initial impact where the marks are on the hill, (which show deep gouges likely from the extended gear and the flap canoes as well as the rear fuselage), quite possibly the tail section separated upwards and the forward fuselage separated downwards both immediately while the remaining fuselage section with wings "flew" a short distance before an almost-vertical, flat descent. The photographs provided today answer the question of what may have happened to the forward fuselage and may therefore establish that the aircraft was under control at the time of initial impact. Whether there was a rapid pitch-up movement prior to impact or whether the terrain was rising and the aircraft was in a gentle descent or whether the descent rate was high remains to be settled by the DFDR. I know information has been posted in re an EGPWS installation but we don't know officially whether it was and whether it was functioning. Why they were where they were cannot be answered by any wreckage or speculation. Hopefully the recorders and any radar tracks plus any non-volatile chip memories (if installed - I don't know what equipment was on board), will answer these vital questions.

[DingerX]

Yeah it's gruesome, and some of it's uncalled-for. But if you're going to speculate about what happened beforehand, you need to go on the evidence that there is. PBL would like to leave open the possibility that the aircraft was not in controlled flight. In order to do so, he needs to discuss the evidence for this. The only evidence that he has to go on is the physical wreckage.

CFIT has historical precedent (NPAs, Night and CFIT go together), matches the location (loss of control is indiscriminate of high and low ground, CFIT prefers high ground), and corresponds to what we know of the radio traffic (often there's a radio transmission after loss of control; CFIT doesn't usually give so much warning). Conclude CFIT, and then you can go about speculating what institutional, procedural and airmanship factors went in to producing it, and from there you can take your lessons, if there are any.

Fortunately for our world, and unfortunately for this thread — for this is one of the things that attracts crackpots, conspiracy theorists, aetiologists and ghouls to the subject — a transport plane crash is a very rare occurrence, and likely causes for an unlikely event can turn out not to be the case. Alternatively, vested interests can and do manufacture "likely causes" that aren't likely, or that are insufficient.

The state of the wreckage tells the story. Yes, I have a natural bias against archaeology: I think archaeologists waste too much time finding out too little information. And there's such a mess, it's hard if not impossible to make a conclusive statement about what was going on. Yet it's needed. Chasing after engines" may seem ghoulish, but if those engines were turning at the moment of impact, they are going to look very different from how the would appear if they had already stopped.

So, assume that the aircraft did hit hard with a positive AoA (CFIT while descending), what would we see? A big aircraft-shaped divot on at the point of impact. The structure would fail both in front of the wing box, and between the wing box and tail. The front part would continue forward. The tail would go downwards (and tumble), and the wing section would go upwards. (as in Sioux City)

I wouldn't rule out PBL's possibility, but I don't think there's any evidence that points to it as more likely.

Now, sorry for the interruption, please continue.

[clearedtocross]

Way back at Post #24 there was a short transcript of RT communications:

Kaptan Pilot: Isparta Kule, iyi geceler. (Tower, good evening)
Isparta Kule: İyi geceler, devam edin. (Good evening, continue...)
Kaptan Pilot: Atlasjet KK 4203, Isparta VOR üzeri. (KK 4203 overhead Isparta VOR)
Isparta Kule: Anlaşıldı. In-bound oluş ikaz. (Roger, report in-bound)
SAAT (Time) 01.36
Kaptan Pilot: Isparta kule, in-bound olduk
(Tower, established in-bound)
Isparta Kule: Anlaşıldı Atlasjet. Yaklaşmaya devam edin.
(Roger, Atlasjet. Continue approach)

Now, the transcript may be completely wrong and in this case does not give any clues.

But if the transcript contains the true messages, the airplane spent 18 minutes to get inbound after passing overhead Isparta VOR at an unknown altitude. This only makes sense if it was holding somewhere in between for unknown reasons (which might be missing in the 'transcript') or had an awfull lot of altitude to shed. But one can rule out a shortcut (as other posts suggested): that would not lead over the VOR and then take 18 minutes! Furthermore, the aircraft reported "established" in the last communication which also means the crew believed or was indeed aligned with the runway, not seven miles off track. If they were still far too high inbound and made a wide 360 left, they would have hit the hill in the opposite direction. So either the transcript is rubbish or the mystery widens. Even on a non precision approach, you cannot miss the inbound track by seven miles after passing the destination VOR correctly unless something goes wrong in the big way.

[PBL]

ctc,

do we know definitively that they were still IFR? If they were, and not on a contact approach, then the approach was seriously screwed up. If they were on a contact approach, or had cancelled for a visual, then we are back to not knowing what was up.

(I am assuming that Turkish regs have a similar distinction between contact and visual approaches to that in the U.S.)

PBL

[lomapaseo]

Having visited multiple web-sites didscussing crashes I can tell you that there is nothing unique about the discussions on this web site.
Rather than just absorbing all the information from jounalists or in some cases waiting years for a final report the aviation curious among us start asking questions early on before making up their minds about the well being of their favorite interest.

To most of us there are little verifieable facts so there is a great tendancy to extrapolate from minute and fuzzy evidence to as far as our postulations will take us. The difference being in just how far will some of us go.
In the latter question the answer seems to have a great deal to do with the variations in persons among us. I hesitate to identify good or bad personal characteristis in discussion boards, but it's pretty easy to identify clashes between these personality types.

Given the discussion rules I see no way to forestall the clashes between the types of posters. There will always be type persons who questions every minute detail even among actual investigators on-site. There will be yet another person who picks at seemingly unimportant nits of information and extrapolates these far beyond the available evidence at the time to see if they might be missing the big picture. And still there are the types that become fixated on a cause du jour in proving their point while disparaging the other types.

To me all are acceptable as long as they operate within an acceptable framework which is an organized investigation, analysis, and reasonable recommendations for prevention without blame.
From a personal experience standpoint I will admit that the reason that I first started visiting some of these discussion boards a decade ago was to make sure that my investigations covered enough bases to be able to refute or confirm some of what I read on these boards.

[clearedtocross]

PBL:

do we know definitively that they were still IFR?

No, we do not. But does it really matter? If you have to do the approach in the middle of the night over a mountainous area sparsely lit, I think you would rather follow the IFR procedure anyway at least as a general pattern or then make sure you stay over the lake that leads to the airport while descending. At least as long as you do not want to provide scenic moonlight sightseeing while waiting for some other aircraft to land or clear an obstructed runway. So night VFR alone does not account for the 18 minutes spent after passing the VOR outbound neither and meandering 7 miles off long finals.

[repulo]

:ok:Just for the sake of being correct, JAR 25 you don´t cancel IFR, a visual approach is part of the original flight plan, you just take some responsibilities as active crew yourself. (terrain, traffic..)

[md80forum]

the idiots have chased out the professionals [...] a bunch of self appointed amateur investigators ghoulishly turning over what evidence they can get from grainy phone cameras [...] The only lessons to come out of this accident will be for the professionals to find ways of it not recurring, not for ghouls to go photographing the cockpit and hunting the engines. A foolish and perverted obsession with some of you.

Rainboe,

What an insulting post. As a journalist by profession, I have had 12 years of sheer pleasure being an aviation webmaster in my spare time, communicating mainly with professionals like you and, indeed, listening and learning from what experienced airmen and -women have to say to each other. I may be an idiot, but I, like many of my fellow amateur imbecils in here, certainly understand when to lean back and see the pros doing their job or offering their opinions.

If were are to discuss this crash at all, you pilots could long time ago have pulled out your Jeppesens, (1) posted the Isparta approach plates (2) told us what you know to be the most common ATC procedures around this airport and (3) what the default flight plan for this flight might have been. None of that is speculation; it's information.

(The likely correct answer is YAA A16 EKSEN, which normally leads up to STAR from the east; if cleared for DCT IPT VOR early, they would have entered Isparta TMA on a hdg of 155 or more).

Instead you pros are wasting precious oxygen by speculating which is worse in general, an amateur on PPrune or a Turk, and whether the deceased Turkish ex-general in the right seat of the MD-80 had paid for his rating himself or not, which is just as speculative as whether the MD hit that hill nose or tail first.

Also it would also be appreciated if you pros would sift through the thread in general before hitting the radio switch and offering your opinion, just like it was something you'd have to read back on the frequency within a split second, and which already been expressed by someone else.

[hetfield]

@Rainboe

In generell terms I don't like how you get along with PPRuNe users at all, but I must admit that I fully agree with your last post.

[PBL]

ctc,
[PBL] do we know definitively that they were still IFR?
No, we do not. But does it really matter? .... I think you would rather follow the IFR procedure anyway .......

Well, *I* would, but then I wouldn't think I'd get 45° off course on what is after all a relatively straightforward VOR approach (sorry, VOR DME but then I always regarded a DME as cheating :) ). I think when explaining mysteries one cannot infer things from what people would "normally" do, for it ain't normal when you hit a mountain 45° off course.

repulo,

I am probably not using the right terminology. For me, a contact approach is an IFR procedure and a visual approach a VFR procedure. Ipso facto you can't do a visual without cancelling IFR, and as a commercial scheduled operation you couldn't do that.

And for the rest of us, if hetfield's agreeing with Rainboe we know we're doing OK :)

PBL

[clearedtocross]

And for the rest of us, if hetfield's agreeing with Rainboe we know we're doing OK :)


Thank you for that, PBL!

You are certainly right, it is weird that they went off course that far and they were away unaccounted for a long time. I still suspect that the ATC transcript is a fake, because the time gap just does not make any sense.

I once had a strange GPS malfunction over Croatia which showed me far out in the adriatic sea and at a ridiculous ground speed. Now I know that this is not exactly in the vinicity of the crash site, but maybe they did some sort of GPS approach which went wrong for some unkown reasons. I dont know if the plane was GPS equipped but the pro's can enlighten us on this. Pure speculation, but that's what this thread is for.

And then more than a decade ago there was an Alitalia DC-9 that hit a hill on approach to Zurich, mainly because the captains glide path receiver was u/s and the crew did not make any cross checks relating to there position after the ILS receiver comparator alarm was flagged (the copi unit was okay).

So maybe in this case they had a NAV equipment failure which went by unnoticed. Then they fly the DME arc but get no interception to the inbound track. Until it's too late.

[cwatters]

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2007/12/05/220069/germanys-bfu-expected-to-analyse-crashed-md-83-recorders.html

Germany's BFU expected to analyse crashed MD-83 recorders
By David Kaminski-Morrow

Flight recorders from the Atlasjet Boeing MD-83 which crashed while preparing to land at Isparta Airport in Turkey are expected to be sent to the German accident investigation agency BFU for analysis.

Early findings from the inquiry released by the Turkish transport ministry have revealed little new information about the 30 November accident. It states that there was no radio communication problem and air traffic control has a clear record of the transmissions.

“The crew did not declare any technical problem to the tower,” the ministry adds. Both Pratt & Whitney JT8D engines were operating normally and the landing-gear had been deployed.

Flight KK4203 from Istanbul struck high terrain about 7nm (13km) west of the airport. Isparta has a single runway, designated 05/23, which is not equipped with an instrument landing system.

All navigation equipment at Isparta Airport was calibrated and functioning properly. Meteorological information in use at the time of the accident has been verified as correct and there were no weather-related difficulties.

There is no indication of in-flight fire and no evidence of sabotage, says the ministry. Turkish police are carrying out routine alcohol and drug tests.

Representatives of Germany’s BFU are to meet with Turkish counterparts in the next few days and a source familiar with the situation says that the two sides are to discuss co-operation on the investigation. He indicates that this will include BFU analysis of the cockpit-voice and flight-data recorders.

All 57 occupants of the MD-83 were killed in the accident. The Turkish transport ministry revised its original casualty figures upwards, to 50 passengers and seven crew members, after discovering a child had been omitted from the original

[PBL]

ctc,

Then they fly the DME arc but get no interception to the inbound track.

It doesn't look like a DME arc to me, but rather a procedure turn at 12 DME after extending the outbound leg of the holding pattern at the VOR.

PBL

[glob99]

I wonder if it is similar to this crash:

20 December 1995; American Airlines 757; near Buga, Colombia: The aircraft crashed into Mt. San Jose at night at about the 9,000 foot level while descending into Cali, Colombia after its flight from Miami. All 8 crew and 155 of the 159 passengers were killed in the crash. Colombian civil aviation authorities report that at the time of the accident, all navigational beacons were fully serviceable and that the aircraft voice and data recorders did not indicate any aircraft problems.

[Nakata77]

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/68657/tristar_crash_on_landing/

This shows how easily the tail breaks off...

The fact that there are no survivors shows just how strong the impact was. How quickly did the rescue teams get to the crash site? The aircraft was so badly deformed that it would be impossible for anyone to survive.

i'm not sure it's a good idea to put such explicit pics on here - on one of the pics I could see a passenger still strapped to seat

[PBL]

Glob99 wonders:

I wonder if it is similar to this crash:

20 December 1995; American Airlines 757; near Buga, Colombia:

Not as far as I see yet. Let us go through some of the most significant factors.

First, the AA crew were given a change of approach, with which they were unfamiliar, and they were confused about ATC instructions (with the help of ATC saying "affirmative" to an incorrect readback).

Comparison: there is only one approach to Isparta, they would have had that plate out, and according to the tapes ATC was not involved in guiding the flight. According to what I take to be regs, I imagine the crew would have briefed that approach in pre-flight planning.

Second, the AA crew were trying to fly to an NDB which had an identical frequency and ID with another one within reception range, but at about a right angle to their intended route of flight, which is down a narrow valley in which the Cali airport is located, amongst 12,000 ft peaks. They put FREQ and ID into the FMS and the aircraft turned out of the valley.

Comparison: 1. The inquiry found a number of places in the world where this atrocious radio nav situation exists, and Isparta is not one of them. 2. The peaks aren't at multiple thousands of feet above the airport. The highest is about 3,000 ft above and is 7 nm off the final approach course.

Third, the Cali crew were rushed, and behind the airplane and nav.

Comparison: if that 18 minute gap is to be believed, the Isparta crew were not at all rushed.

Fourth, the court determined that the nav kit suppliers, Honeywell and Jeppesen, knew about the ambiguous-navaid situation and had not taken appropriate steps to mitigate it. They were held coresponsible for the event.

Comparison: as I said above, this is not one of those situations.

Fifth, the airplane impacted a peak while flying direct to the navaid (then called ROZO).

Comparison: the photos with both accident site and runway clearly show the aircraft dynamics aligned somewhat with the runway. The site has been identified as about 7 nm off the final approach course. The crew were not flying direct IPT.

Now obviously some other characteristics are similar. The aircraft was flying at night in good weather in a sparsely-lit region of what aviators designate as "mountainous terrain" and attempted an NPA; collided with terrain off-course. They also descended below MSA well away from the protected airspace of the final approach course. But in those respects it is similar to dozens of other accidents.

PBL

[jetjackel]

Visual Approaches at night in mountanous terrain is not good airmanship. Saving a few minutes of time does not warrant shortcuts.

Every charter company, that was worth a s**t I've flown for, strictly forbids night visual approaches in areas of terrain or areas the crew is unfamiliar with. Part of OM Part A is where the rule usually "lives".

Real simple, instrument approaches, if flown correctly, are foolproof. Enhances safety and takes the "guess work" out of visual approach profiles....in the dark.

[the flyingenglishman]

For those of you who haven't already seen the charts for Isparta, here is a link to them. http://turkce.acuwings.com/LTFC_SULEYMAN_DEMIREL.pdf

[ibelieveicanfly]

for which company do you work for now?

[PA-28-180]

Jetjackel-
The 135 operator I was with ALSO had strict no visual approach rules with night mountain flying. I personally learned this lesson as trained by my primary/instrument instructor...all for the reasons already posted here. I was flying in/around California, and there are many mountain/hillsides there with wreckage strewn all over them (Porterville in particular).
Be safe!

[PBL]

At night, IFR or VFR, given that terrain, wouldn't you just do anyway what the VOR DME approach plate says, whether you had it or not?

The electronic misdirection is an intriguing possibility, but I don't think we would ever find out about that unless it happens there again. And the likelihood of in-aircraft interference depends on how you assess the likelihood of a dozen people clattering away on their old laptops and chattering away on their old cell phones all at the same time. Pretty unlikely, I would guess.

PBL

[clearedtocross]

Electronic misdirection does not necessarily mean faulty ground equipment (VOR, DME, ILS), bad receivers or electromagnetic interference. Some years ago a Crossair Metroliner crashed after takeoff, and at the beginning of the chain of events there was a wrong entry of a new waypoint into the FMS by the PNF which led to utter confusion of the PF. Many other crashes were results of wrong autopilot mode settings.
So if the approach was not flown manually, some troubles with the flight automation equipment (whatever was installed and used in this MD-83)might also be a factor.

ctc

[SeattlePilot]

Md80forum,
a very close friend of mine was working that airplane as a departure controller. She mentioned that the aircraft was cleared direct Afyon VOR. She also listened to the transcripts of Ankara Control (the next controler) and the airplane was cleared direct Isparta VOR. So the airplane was not doing the STAR.

[PJ2]

Wow.

invaded and compromised by those who have never skirted around CBs, never been responsible for fare-paying pax in their hundreds and never fought bean-counter management.

One can suppose then that you dismiss with equal black-and-white derision, Jim Reason, Earl Weiner, Robert Helmreich, Dan Maurino, Diane Vaughan, William Starbuck, Tony Kern, Don Bateman and the Australian film crew who credits PPRuNe for the exposure work they did on the Phuket accident?

While nothing substitutes for the aviation/crew experiences which you capture in your last post such absence of same does not preclude comprehension nor expertise in accident cause/assessment and prevention nor does it diminish the value of carefully thought out contributions which intend to point rather than resolve.

[PBL]

BoeingMEL,

what exactly is your point?

PBL

[lomapaseo]

....Well I may or may not read future Pprune posts...but this is for sure my last reply. Good Health and a Happy New Year. bm

you need to read beyond the obvious clash of personalities and rather than responding with bitterness and vitriol , simply enter in your own opinions. Some of us do read Pprune for the "right stuff" and if the wide ranging opinions become an inbred clan than where else can we get a scope on the issues?

[hetfield]

@BoeingMEL

I totally agree with your very last post. Too bad PPRuNe is losing another pro.

Good Health and a Happy New Year to you also.

Bye

[PBL]

Not only that, PJ and loma, but it is somewat fanciful of BoeingMEL to think that sitting for X number of years in a commercial airplane cockpit confers on him the expertise to judge the quality of an accident investigation.

He might have that ability, of course, but if so then by virtue of his intellect and personal capabilities, not simply his profession. And given the style of his intervention I incline to doubt it.

PBL

[punkalouver]

And some feel that their large number of technical qualifications gives them the expertise to point out a likely cause of an accident from a picture. He might have that ability, of course, but if so then by virtue of his intellect and personal capabilities, but any professional accident investigator/analyst will not rush to judgement and wait for more facts.

Originally posted by GMDS
A Non Precision Approach is not necesseraly unsafer than a ILS. Such a argument is misleading but unfortunately often picked up by chief pilots, therefore gaining momentum.

I think you will find that statistically there are way more accidents on non-precision approaches than precision approaches.

[md80forum]

http://www.md80.net/yabbse/images/pprunegoat.jpg

[clearedtocross]

So some of you do not like sugestions, opinions, rumors, and contributions from non- professionals. They ask for hard facts, and coming from 10'000 hours plus captains. They would rather wait indisturbed for the final accident report which contains the truth and nothing but the truth.

Now please rainboe, hetfield and boeingmel, do not re-load your guns. As one of those guys who do not get payed for flying (nobody would probably) and set out to the skies in jeans rather than smart uniforms and four thick stripes, I would just like to explain why „outsiders“ have a right to be here.


The contributions from the professionals are important, they provide excellent knowledge of procedures, aircraft and ATC systems, SOP's and you name it. But to guess what has gone wrong, you need people outside the „pro“ community. A friend of mine was a chief accident investigator for a European country, charged also to investigate some of the big bangs. He had no ATPL, but he flew everthing from gliders to choppers as instructor. His credentials were a methodical, unbiased approach, and a vast know-how in co-related fields like software, engineering and management. Not being part of the 'pro'-club was an asset to his investigations, not a deficiency. Sadly, he passed away far too early.


My point is that for a guess, you should never ask a pro, because he's not allowed to guess. No cockpit crew gets paid for guesses, they fly the aircraft as they were trained, based on procedures that provide a good safety margin as long as you stick to them. But then an accident „happens“. Excluding the rare occasions were an accident must be regarded as an unforeseeable act of fate (e.g. a volcanic eruption), accidents in the commercial aviation nowadays do not happen, they are made. Please do not confuse errors with blame, I hope nobody acts as a judge here.


If something has gone wrong where the causes are not immediatly and completely obvious, it is often very useful to „brainstorm“ the information with outsiders. They are not bothered by professional pride, and they may have intelligent opinions based on their own experiences. It does not matter if their input is sometimes complete rubbish, so is once in a while a contribution from a pro. I personally have learned to value brainstorming in many other professions like engineering and even more in management, why not in aviation?


This forum has a mixed audience. That's what makes it worthwhile. But we could do without the „bashers“, those that go ranting about cultural issues, aircraft makes and people having different background and different views.

[hetfield]

As these are anonymous forums the origins of the contributions may be opposite to what may be apparent. In fact the press may use it, or the unscrupulous, to elicit certain reactions.

[pls8xx]

The one thing I keep coming back to is the location of the crash. With all the photos, you would think that google imagery would confirm the site. For the suggested locations so far, I can't seem to do that.

Reports have been made that said it was near Keciborlu, near Cukuroren, west of Kilic, 12km nw of airport, 7mi west of airport. All this doesn't zero in on a single point. All of these probably have some point of validity, if we had the original statement and the context in which it was given.

The slopes and elevations of the photos would be of great help if we had a topo map of the area. If there is such a map, I can't seem to find it.

That said, I have found one site near the halfway point between Keciborlu and Cukurroren that has many surface features like those in the crash photos. It is 7mi nw of the north end of the runway.

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a93/pls8xx/map.jpg


As can be seen below the site has a road that matches the photos, a very clear field downslope from the wing section( in white), and a clear spot for the initial strike location( in red), and many other similarities.

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a93/pls8xx/crashsite.jpg

By comparing the above with the runway 50, I find the heading indicated by the strike point to wing section to be about 043 degrees, the offset being almost exactly 9km as seen below.

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a93/pls8xx/offset.jpg

I can't say how this might enlighten us as to a possible cause of the crash.

[bjornhall]

I personally have learned to value brainstorming in many other professions like engineering and even more in management, why not in aviation?

Fair enough, but do it somewhere else! airliners.net, airdisaster.com, the misc forums here (spectator's corner); places where such contributions are both welcome and solicited. But not in the flight deck forums at pprune!:ugh:

[lomapaseo]

I personally have learned to value brainstorming in many other professions like engineering and even more in management, why not in aviation?


bjornhall
...... Fair enough, but do it somewhere else! airliners.net, airdisaster.com, the misc forums here (spectator's corner); places where such contributions are both welcome and solicited. But not in the flight deck forums at pprune!

Bjornhall, that's like telling a guy to get lost. It's not a solution, message boards are magnets for discussion. The tighter the restrictions on them the less the discussion and suddenly all is quiet except for the moaning over deleted posts, malfeasance and administrator coverups. Of course the moderators could move the posts, but then we would all just follow them there and leave this room empty.

I'm afraid that all you can do is to bemoan the credibility of some of the arguments and yes brainstorming is used in accident investigation by trained professionals, only it's followed up by gathering facts to prove or disprove the hypothesis.

[Earl]

Waiting myself for the final report.
I just hope they are the true facts about what happened and what led up to this.
Honesty is not a common word in this part of the world.

[md80forum]

Earl,
Waiting myself for the final report.I just hope they are the true facts [...] Honesty is not a common word in this part of the world.
Why are you waiting for the final report, if you know for a fact that it's not going to be honest?

:rolleyes:

[Earl]

Lets all hope it is.
Everyone has a general idea about what happened here.
The report should tell us what factors led up to these bad decisions that were made if indeed this was the case.
Lived and worked in this part of the world for years, anything goes there.
Will save the comments for after the report is released.

[chuks]

I find something very strange in the notion that it's useful to have non-professionals "guessing" about the cause of this or that crash or incident. The pros cannot or will not guess and we need the non-pros to do that? Well, WHY, for heaven's sake?

I always found it amusing at best but often simply annoying to be told, for instance, that "That was a bad landing," when it might have been a normal firm touch-down, flown exactly according to the book. You know, the sort of thing you do to get the WOW switches activated so that you have all that boring stuff such as ground spoilers and brakes working. Okay, you didn't "grease it on," the sort of thing some dodo down the back with a little bit of knowledge is looking for, but so what?

Nowadays, what with Microsoft Flight Simulator and all the on-line information available to the averagely-bright non-professional, there has been a great proliferation of arm-chair aviators, poised to second-guess every decision and event. To encourage this is insane, in my opinion. Far better to tell them to wind their necks in and concentrate on getting that little bag of peanuts open. "There's a good boy!"

Generally if I want to "guess" about the cause of something then I can do that myself, keeping that to myself! Sometimes, yes, there might be something urgent to discuss, some "gotcha" we have overlooked, but all this Google Earth stuff with bearings and distances and wild guesses about what a crew may have been thinking... what is the point?

[md80forum]

Chuks,
Far better to tell them to wind their necks in and concentrate on getting that little bag of peanuts open.
I sometimes wonder how many paying passengers the airline-industry has lost for the overt arrogance pilots expose towards the so called "self loading freight" in a public forum like PPrune.

During my past 10 years as a TV producer, I saw a revolution bring new digital cameras and editing decks to the markets, where they became available to the general public. A knowledge and gnosis once reserved for "us" was now available to everybody. Even "average-bright" pilots started making movies and expressing opinions about how to make them. Is that an offence to me? No.

Just finished the '08 travel budget for my department. We cut back on the domestic flights this year considerably, since people appeared to favour hi-speed train travel and going by their own cars instead. As a long-necked peanut-eater, I didn't put my irrational fascination for aviation in their way.

[PBL]

chuks and others,
I find something very strange in the notion that it's useful to have non-professionals "guessing" about the cause of this or that crash or incident. The pros cannot or will not guess and we need the non-pros to do that?


1. There are professional accident investigators participating in this thread.

2. Nobody has guessed yet about a cause of the crash, as far as I remember. (There has been some discussion about CFIT versus stall, but those are phenomena, not root causes.)

3. There have been some very perceptive contributions by people trying to locate the impact site, notably Mauersegler and more recently pls8xx. I understand neither of them are professional analysts but why should that matter? (Edit: Actually wrong, as Mauaersegler has just noted that he knows aerial photography analysis.) Are only certain people allowed to use Google Earth and say what they see, according to you?

4. I am most interested in reading perceptive contributions, and it is very, very secondary to me what the CVs look like of the people who make them. I am surprised that more people don't have a similar attitude on this forum.

5. This thread is entitled "Turkish MD-83 Crash".
Presumably people looking at it are interested in reading about, shall we imagine, a Turkish MD-83 crash. It is a little odd to find such readers complaining about people discussing, say, a Turkish MD-83 crash.

PBL

[Mauersegler]

Professionals:

well, I get the message, you should not talk in an area you don't are a professional. Good, I have done aerial photograph analysis in my studies, could I speak about it?
Oh, by the way, please pilots stop speaking about the (non-existence) of global warming, since you don't have a professional title in this area, or I'm wrong?

For me, having a pilot in the family, was a very decepting experience here.

Bye, bye

[one of Pax]

According to first results the crash reason is declared as loss of orientation.
Although the devices have warned about low attitude, the pilot miscalculated his position and continued on the wrong course and attitude.
As he realized his mistake he tries to pull up, therefore first the tail
then the body touched the ground.
First officer should warn the pilot but he was also confident...

Exact results will be availabe in two months.

Sorry for translation errors if there are any.
You may check the original at :
http://www.milliyet.com.tr/2007/12/11/son/sontur21.asp

[Nakata77]

air crashes are shocking and full of sorrow. it is completely right and just for people to debate and ask why, and to analyse and put forth observations... everyone has a common interest in this. we are all human, we are all capable of putting forth educated guesses - the fact that people are on pprune means they have some common interest in air travel and the safety of it.
very often if debates are left to ''only the professionals'' it can sometimes result in more simple observations being ignored or forgotten.
lets all allow each other to continue to honor the people who died or were affected by this tradegy by giving our thoughts and analysis professional or otherwise into the causes of this tradegy (superfluous to the air accident investigation team)

[Shore Guy]

And now the vultures descend......
US law firm to assist families in airplane crash suits
Lawyers from the Ribbeck law offices, a famous US law firm that has handled the largest number of international aviation cases in the world, has come to Isparta to provide attorneys to relatives of people who died in a tragic airplane crash.
An Atlasjet plane recently crashed in the mountains of southwestern Turkey, killing all 57 people on board. Ribbeck's lawyers said they plan to sue the McDonnell Douglas and Boeing companies.
Monica Kelly, one of the lawyers from Ribbeck Law Offices, told the Anatolia news agency that they had launched an investigation into the airplane crash in Isparta as a preliminary step to bringing an action for damages.
Kelly said their aim was to find the cause of the crash and provide the right to compensation for the relatives of people who perished in the crash. She said she and her assistant would meet with the relatives and provide legal advice for suing for physical and emotional damage incurred during and after the accident, explaining, "After we complete all these processes, we will bring an action for damages against companies and persons involved, in particular the McDonnell Douglas and Boeing companies, in Chicago." She also added that an expert from the US would come to carry out a technical investigation of the wreck.
11.12.2007
Business
Today's Zaman

[rodthesod]

EARL

Honesty is not a common word in this part of the world.

If by that you mean S Carolina then I have to agree with you.

Like you I eagerly await the final, hopefully 'unbiased', final report and will leave the speculative analysis to others. Like you I have lived and worked in both Turkey and the USA and would say that both places have an equal proportion of liars and bigotted a$$holes.

Regards,
rts

[pls8xx]

There is a feeling of unease that comes from the wild and not so wild speculation after an accident. Maybe the guesses act to trivialize the large loss of life and disrespect the grief of family and friends. One could make a good case for waiting for the official report, and many have.

If the point of speculation is to find the one true cause, then it is a useless endeavor. But if speculation should uncover an incorrect cause, is that not also beneficial?

The official report serves to guide us to prevent a re-occurrence. But what about an incorrect cause that could have happened. Must we wait until it does happen before we act to prevent another? One thing I have learned in life is, that if something can happen, sooner or later it will happen. And speculation is more likely to be fruitful before the true cause be known. There is nothing like the official report to suppress the imagination.

Then there is the financial aspects to be considered. Let's just say that where there are large sums of money at stake, there can be pressure to slant the the truth a bit. This tends to be offset by an independent inspection by a large number of interested parties who have studied the facts. Isn't that what's happening here?

[Earl]

Quote:rodthesod
If by that you mean S Carolina then I have to agree with you.
Like you I eagerly await the final, hopefully 'unbiased', final report and will leave the speculative analysis to others. Like you I have lived and worked in both Turkey and the USA and would say that both places have an equal proportion of liars and bigotted a$$holes.
Regards,
rts
Earl:
Doubt you will find this in South Carolina.
Door must have hurt on your departure from there as your post states.
Take it to JB or the pub dude, dont post it here.

[MaxBlow]

Turkish media reports that the 'black box' (CVR, DFDR) has been - quote -'faulty'

Could it been damaged by the impact or was it not working at all?
The caa director didn't confirm this rumour but admitted that they do have problems with it.

If this thing really didn't work - I'm affraid we'll never find out what happend.

[lomapaseo]

black box
If this thing really didn't work - I'm affraid we'll never find out what happend

Oh, and just what critical question did you expect to get answered only from the black box:confused:

[MaxBlow]

Oh, and just what critical question did you expect to get answered only from the black box ?
......................

Media talks about 'pilot disorientation'. I thought that a good readout of the CVR/FDR could sched more light into this.

I'm not an investigator but sure enough believe that the recorders could prove any major sys malfunctions. Correct me if I'm wrong.

It still bugs me that they reported 'runway insight & established inbound' (might have been 'airport insight') and than end up where they eventually did.

But than again, radio transcripts have 'only' been published in a Turkish newspaper.

[Machaca]

http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/3043/42035cresim4bdk3.th.gif (http://img261.imageshack.us/my.php?image=42035cresim4bdk3.gif)

http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/1816/42035cresim5blc7.th.gif (http://img515.imageshack.us/my.php?image=42035cresim5blc7.gif)


30 derecelik sapma Türbetepe’ye çakti
www.hurriyet.com.tr (http://www.hurriyet.com.tr) 12 Aralik 2007

Türbetepe’ye çakilan uçakla ilgili ilk incelemeler, kazaya 30 derecelik bir sapmanin yol açtigini ortaya çikardi. Buna göre alçalmada fazladan 30 derecelik hatayla dönen uçak, Burdur Gölü yerine daglara yöneldi. Inis irtifasinda gelen ’Çarpma sinyali’ üzerine pilotlar motorlara tam güç verse de, uçak ve yolculari kurtulamadi.


Tolga Özbek yaziyor

ISPARTA’da düsen, World Focus Havayollari’nin AtlasJet’e kiraladigi uçagin kara kutu kayitlarinda yapilan ilk inceleme, uçagin 30 derecelik bir hatayla yanlis yöne döndügü ve Burdur Gölü yerine Türbetepe’ye yöneldigini ortaya çikardi. Çarpma sinyali üzerine son anda levyeye asilan Kaptan Pilot Serhat Özdemir ve Ikinci Pilot, emekli Tuggeneral Tahir Aksoy’un kiçtaki motorlara güç vermesiyle alçalan kuyruk dikmesinin yere çarptigi anlasildi. Bu arada, uçagin kara kutu olarak bilinen ve iki ayri kayit sisteminden olusan CVR (Cockpit Voice Recorder-Kokpit Ses Kayit Cihazi) ile tüm uçus verilerini dijital olarak kaydeden FDR (Flight Data Recorder-Uçus Veri Kayit Cihazi), kaza kirim heyetince Almanya’ya götürüldü. Federal Uçak Kaza Arastirma Bürosu’nda yapilan ilk incelemede, kara kutu kayitlarinda her hangi bir bozukluga rastlanmadi.

GÖL ÜZERINDEYIZ SANDILAR

Devlet Hava Meydanlari Isletmesi radar kayitlarindan olusturulan bilgilere göre, MD83 tipi uçak, Isparta’ya inmek üzere yaklasma haritalarina uygun olarak 8 bin feet (2 bin 600 metre) yükseklige alçaldi. Önce Isparta meydanindaki VOR üzerine gelen uçak, yaklasma planina göre pistin üzerinden geçerek Burdur Gölü istikametine 12 mil uzaklasip /_newsimages/4606141.jpggeri dönecek ve piste inecekti. Ancak, bunun için VOR üzerinden 223 dereceye dönmesi gereken uçak, fazladan 30 derece daha saga dönüp 12 mil ilerledi. Bu açi da uçagi göl degil daglarin üzerine getirdi. Göl üzerinde olduklarini sanarak yaklasma haritasini takip eden pilotlar tekrar saga döndüler ve uçagin yönünü piste çevirdiklerini düsünerek devam ettiler. Plana göre 43 derece basla 05 numarali piste yaklasacak pilotlar, ilk dönüsteki 30 derecelik kaymanin üzerine, ikinci dönüste de açilarini genis tuttular. Bu da uçagi olmasi gereken uçus hattindan tam 50 derece saptirdi. Böylece 43 derece yerine 93 derece ile piste dogru uçan MD-83, daglarin üzerinde alçaliyordu. Mehtap olmasi, görüsün gece sartlarina ragmen 10 kilometre ve üzerinde olmasi pilotlari psikolojik açidan rahatlatmisti.

’PULL UP’ IKAZI YETMEDI

Pilotlar, daha sonra uçus planina göre piste 9 bin 250 metre kala, irtifalarini 1500 metreye indirmek için alçalmaya /_newsimages/4606142.jpgbasladi. Bu irtifada pisti karsilayacaklarini sanan pilotlar, 1951 metre yüksekligindeki Türbetepe’ye yaklasirken Kara Yakinligi Uyari Sistemi (GPWS) ’Çarpma uyarisi’ vermeye basladi. Önce ’mania’ diye pilotlari uyarin sistem, ardindan sesli ’pull-up (lövyeyi çek)’ ikazi vermeye basladi. Kaptan Pilot Özdemir yere birkaç metre kala gaz açarak yükselmek için lövyeyi kendine dogru çekti. Ancak MD83’lerin motorlari kuyrukta oldugu için, gazla birlikte uçagin kiç tarafi asagi çöktü. Kuyrugu yere degen uçak, Türbetepe’ye çarpti. Uzmanlar, kesin degerlendirmenin FDR kayitlarinin analizinden sonra bulunacagina dikkat çekerek sorunun pilotaj mi yoksa uçus göstergeleri arizasi kaynaklimi oldugunun belirlenecegine dikkat çektiler.

Enkaz kaldirildi

Isparta’da, 30 Kasim Cuma sabaha karsi, 7’si mürettebat 57 kisinin hayatini kaybetmesiyle sonuçlanan kazada düsen uçagin enkazini kaldirma çalismalari tamamlandi. Enkaz parçalari Isparta Organize Sanayi Bölgesi’nde kiralanan bir depoya götürüldü.

=============

Translation anyone?

-=MachacA=-

[Machaca]

http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/7749/4203cnnturkfdrcvr2cc5.th.jpg (http://img505.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203cnnturkfdrcvr2cc5.jpg)

http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/5043/4203cnnturkfdrcvr1jl9.th.jpg (http://img505.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203cnnturkfdrcvr1jl9.jpg)Report: Pilot error caused plane crash that killed 57

An initial investigation suggests pilot error caused a plane crash that killed all 57 people on board an Atlasjet plane last month, with authorities saying they believe the pilot became disoriented while preparing to land at Isparta in southwest Turkey and further investigation was needed.

"The primary data suggests the pilot lost spatial awareness," daily Zaman quoted an unidentified civil aviation official as saying. The office of Ali Ariduru, head of Turkey's Civil Aviation Authority, said he was not immediately available to comment on the reports. Atlasjet, the flight's operator, also declined to comment.

The Atlasjet MD-83 was flying from Istanbul to Isparta when it crashed early on the morning of Nov. 30, killing 50 passengers and seven crew members. Authorities said the plane was off its flight path when it crashed. The wreckage was found 11 kilometers from the airport, on a mountain at and elevation of around 1,500 meters.

Studies showed the cockpit voice recorder was not recording before the crash while the flight data recorder had little usable data. Officials had said there was no indication of sabotage in the disaster, which occurred in good weather just minutes before the plane was scheduled to land. Atlasjet, a private airline established in 2001, operates regular flights inside Turkey and chartered flights to Europe and other foreign destinations. Istanbul Today's Zaman with wires

12.12.2007
ALI ASLAN KILIÇ ANKARA
www.TodaysZaman.com (http://www.TodaysZaman.com)
And now this:
Opposition asks for black box of crashed plane
Budget negotiations in Parliament yesterday were marked by opposition parties' focus on the lack of information recorded on the black box of a recently crashed Atlasjet airliner.

Bayram Meral, Istanbul deputy for the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), asked why the black box was empty and claimed that the ruling Justice and Development Party's (AK Party) government performed poorly with respect to investment in transportation. "In order to boost consumption, some people curbed the development of railways. The prime minister wore a hat and you called it a fast train. You led to the deaths of people," he said. Speaking on behalf of his party concerning the budget to be allocated to the Transport Ministry for 2008, Meral criticized the sale of highway buffets and Türk Telekom.

AK Party Izmir deputy Erdal Kalkan, speaking on behalf of his party concerning the Justice Ministry's budget, asserted that the decisions of the Supreme Military Council (YAS) and the Supreme Board of Prosecutors and Judges (HSYK) as well as the acts of the president should be subject to judicial review. Kalkan maintained that doubts about justice will lead to corruption in society and therefore trust in the judiciary should be reinstated.

AK Party Kastamonu deputy Musa Sivacioglu stated that two institutions, Parliament and the judiciary, make decisions acting on behalf of the Turkish nation. He explained that the judiciary has problems, but these are not new. Sivacioglu claimed that the AK Party government has "saved judges and prosecutors who were trapped between their conscience and their wallet, and left them facing only their conscience." AK Party Denizli deputy Mehmet Salih Erdogan asserted that all parties should unite in defending and relying on the law. Erdogan, noting that given its current workload it is impossible for the Supreme Court of Appeals not to make mistakes, said: "Of course, the Supreme Court of Appeals has given controversial decisions, but it has also ruled in many cases for protecting and extending freedoms."

Istanbul Today's Zaman with wires

12.12.2007
ALI ASLAN KILIÇ ANKARA
-=MachacA=-

[Machaca]

The following excerpts are from an AA Flight Safety article about results found in their Aviation Safety Action Program (ASAP (http://www.faa.gov/safety/programs_initiatives/aircraft_aviation/asap/)).


ASAP Turns Five and a Half
Prominenet Trends and Observations
Tom Chidester, Ph.D., Manager Human Factors & Safety Training
AA Flight Safety First Quarter 2000 (http://www.fsinfo.org/FSI-journals/1q_2000.pdf)


...

The [heading deviations] increase was associated with decommissioning of the Omega Navigation System (ONS) and its delayed replacement with GFMS on MD-80s. Heading deviations on these aircraft rose sharply as the decommissioning began. The decline from the peak rate may be attributed to pilots on these aircraft re-establishing habit patterns for enroute navigation by ground based facilities or to increasing numbers of aircraft having GFMS installed, but overall, heading deviations remain significantly more frequent than 3 years ago.

...

Distraction from primary duties to other tasks (13% of randomly sampled reports). Distractions at a critical point in flight have produced altitude deviations, navigation errors, and runway incursions. The word “distraction” usually implies that attention is drawn from critical tasks to irrelevant factors in the situation. That is rarely the case in these reports. While distractions include factors within the pilots’ control such as timing of cabin communications and PA’s, most are inherent in the operation, such as weather, ACARS messages, distractions related to autoflight systems, and minor mechanical problems. Most of these events have occurred at a point of flight where more than one duty must be accomplished – pilots must set priorities between primary and secondary tasks.

...

NAV tuning, course selection, or altitude selection not coordinated between pilots (11%). A number of reports describe navigation to a fix or course other than intended. This re-emphasizes the need for both pilots to communicate their intentions for radio navigation. Frequency of these reports increased sharply following decommission of ONS, and most involve MD-80 crews. No comparable trend has been reported on the B-727, most of which have GPS replacing ONS navigation. These deviations have included early turns on airways where a turn point was defined by adding several DME segments, tracking a wrong (and unidentified) VOR, and failing to change course on station passage. All of these were potentially automated using ONS and all could at least be cross-checked with ONS information when the system was operative. Perhaps more importantly, MD-80 crews had frequently been using ONS-direct clearances, reducing their enroute radio navigation. Without this tool, MD-80 crews must revert to more basic IFR navigation, and that is something of a challenge to habit. Greater vigilance in navigation is necessary.

...

MEL noncompliance (7%). Crews have misinterpreted, not read, not signed, or flown with open items in the E-6 logbook resulting in deviations from the MEL.

...

Selection of wrong mode on mode control panel or autopilot interface, or entry of incorrect data into FMS (2%).

...

Autopilot or FMC anomaly – autoflight did not perform as expected (2%). These reports involved a failure of the autopilot to capture and hold an altitude, heading, target speed, course, or ILS as expected.

...

Checklist errors. Over the past six months, the ERT has observed a number of events where failure to complete items on a normal checklist led to a deviation or unsual situation. For example, events have resulted or been associated with failure to capture localizer due to NAV/RAD switch not reset to RAD, failure to set hydraulic pumps to high on the MD-80, and failing to verify final landing configuration. Many of these events are associated with distractions, but others are associated with low time in type by one or more crewmembers.

...


-=MachacA=-

[Machaca]

In the first few days following the accident, rumors were rampant the pilots short-cut before CARDAK.

Next we heard that they were cleared direct IPT.

Now we are told flight 4203 flew YAA KFK EKSEN1C IPT.

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/3074/4203atlas01bls3.th.jpg (http://img139.imageshack.us/my.php?image=4203atlas01bls3.jpg)


Hmmmm. 18 minute racetrack, lawsuit filed, empty CVR, incomplete FDR data. Any chance the logbook with any MEL's will apppear?


-=MachacA=-

[PBL]

Machaca,

thanks for all the info.

There are a lot of things wrong with the images used to illustrate the supposed track. For example, they look as though they come from some sort of official publication, but the runway is oriented at about 40° to "upright" and the inbound course at about 60°. Whereas the runway is designated 05, which means it is oriented somewhere nearer 50° magnetic and the inbound course is 043° magnetic. The magnetic variance is 3.2°E, so the difference between magnetic and true does not account for this discrepancy.

Interestingly, the outbound course of the aircraft is shown on these images as more or less aligned with the Rwy. Which it wasn't, if the track data are to be believed.

If he wasn't on radar, I wonder how someone managed to reconstruct the track? And if he was on radar, how come nobody said anything to him as he proceeded outbound 30° off track into mountainous country? And if this is from the FDR, I guess all that "unusable" data somehow became usable.

The track doesn't cohere with md80Forum's observation that he reported overhead VOR at 23.18Z and inbound at 23.36Z (post of [email protected]), according to MaxBlow's transcription of the Hurriyet report on 30.11@10:54PPRuNe. (Emphasised also by clearedtocross on 07.12q12:39PPRuNe. Note: I give PPRuNe time, because, despite claims, PPRuNe does not time posts at UTC. Neither does it maintain a constant offset to UTC: PPRuNe posting times changed by an hour when European daylight savings ended.) It would mean he took 18 minutes to traverse what looks to be about 24 nm, which does not compute given there was only a light wind.

Lomapaseo asked what critical data one expected to get answered only from the black box. I would have thought that the box's recorded heading, altitude and airspeed would be crucial info, whether it corresponds to real heading and altitude or not (nav equipment failure, for example, as suggested by clearedtocross on [email protected]). Or is there some reason to expect these not to have been recorded?

Speaking of the boxes, MaxBlow was reporting on the day of the crash that they were said to have been recovered. I wonder why it took almost two weeks to figure out if the data were usable? Flightglobal (David Kaminski-Morrow) was reporting on 05.12 that the German BFU was expected to analyse the data (link from cwatters [email protected]); it has still taken a week since then.

hetfield and Cyclone733 asked about radar and have not been answered. I don't know for sure yet. Given that the airport has virtually no facilities (no fuel, for example, and no jet starting unit) I would be surprised if it had radar. I doubt that en-route radar would be much help at approach elevations some 1000 ft above terrain: the procedure turn on the approach is at 7000 ft and there is 6000+ ft terrain some 5 nm left of the approach path and also at about double that distance right.

I don't see what relevance the list of nav problems apparently associated with decommissioning of ONS might have to this crash yet (listed by MachacA just now). This was a simple VOR-DME procedure, and they were supposed to have been following a VOR radial outbound at 223°. It is hard to see how one could be 30° off that unless one completely misread the chart (a mistake which has little to do with what kit is on board).

During the discussion about CFIT versus stall-in, there were various "if" scenarios involving hitting with one wing first, on rising terrain, and so on. Do we now agree from the pictures that the aircraft hit flat on the roughly flat top of a hill; that there appear to be gear traces in the impact point; and that the impact trace is unusually short for incidence parameters of (say) 140 kt at 3 degrees-ish?

I also noticed that a lot of posts have disappeared, expecially all those by BoeingMEL. I wonder if that is embarrassment or censure?

PBL

[maxrpm]

PBL: "This was a simple VOR-DME procedure, and they were supposed to have been following a VOR radial outbound at 223°. It is hard to see how one could be 30° off that unless one completely misread the chart (a mistake which has little to do with what kit is on board)."


I seems that they were cleared direct to the VOR from the north to start the VOR/DME from there. If that is the case they were not supposed to fly 223° outbound as they had to enter the racetrack yet.

Inbound from the north - a parallel or a teardrop entry would have been the appropriate choice.

A teardrop entry would have called for 193° heading (30° to the left from 223°) follwed by a right turn to 43° to establish on the 223 Radial inbound.

I do not know if the information about their actual heading of 253° outbound can be confirmed but if this can be confirmed it looks like an error in the direction of the turn.

Instead of 30° to the left in order to enter the racetrack they turned 30° to the right giving them 253° heading.

The rest of the picture would fit. In 12DME they turn right in order to establish inbound on the 223Radial. But from their actual position this is impossible.
223 Radial is not coming in so they extend their turn to the north still waiting to get established on radial 223.


If this hypotheses has some ground than they must have realeased after a few minutes that something was wrong. Seeing the airport lights 10 miles to their right they might well have decided to stop the confusion and just turn in visually on that clear but dark night.

They never reported established inbound on the VOR/DME appr. instead they reported field in sight. Not an uncommon or suspecious call but fitting the picture.

Still there is no explanation for the 18min timegap.

[Earl]

http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=91065
ISTANBUL - Associated Press

An initial investigation shows that pilot error caused the plane crash that killed all 57 people on board last month, local media reported yesterday.

Authorities say they believe the pilot became disoriented while preparing to land at Isparta in southwest Turkey, but further investigation was needed, CNN Türk television and the daily Zaman newspaper reported.

"The primary data suggests the pilot lost spatial consciousness," Zaman quoted an unidentified civil aviation official as saying.

The office of Ali Ariduru, head of Turkey's Civil Aviation Authority, said he was not immediately available to comment on the reports. Atlasjet, the operator of the flight, declined to comment.

The Atlasjet MD-83 was flying from Istanbul to Isparta when it crashed early on the morning of Nov. 30, killing 50 passengers and seven crew members. Authorities have said the plane was off its flight path when it crashed. The wreckage was found 11 kilometers from the airport, on a mountain around 1,500 meters high.

Zaman and another newspaper, Yeni Şafak, said investigations showed the cockpit voice recorder was not recording before the crash, and the flight data recorder produced little usable data. However, CNN Türk said the recorders were working properly.

Officials had said there was no indication of sabotage in the disaster, which occurred in good weather minutes before the plane was scheduled to land.

Atlasjet, a private airline established in 2001, operates regular flights inside Turkey and chartered flights to Europe and other foreign destinations.

[Earl]

Conflicting reports from the media, CNN Turk is quoted as saying the recorders were working properly.

[PBL]

maxrpm,

I won't disagree with anything you're saying, but I would like to point out two possibly conflicting pieces of information.

1. I acknowledge the intervention from SeattlePilot who reported his good friend working the flight, and then finding out that Ankara gave them direct IPT, which would have them coming in from the north.

But then MachacA just suggested "we were told" he was on the EKSEN 1C arrival, but printed a map showing a path from CARDAK (CRD), which is the PELIL 1C arrival. These are reciprocals of each other: EKSIN comes in to IPT on the 078° radial, on a heading of 258° from EKSEN, and PELIL comes in on the IPT 260° radial, on a heading of 080° from CRD. So on PELIL he would be making a direct entry.

2. You say
They never reported established inbound on the VOR/DME appr. instead they reported field in sight
Looking at the ATC transcript from Hurriyet, reported by MaxBlow on 30.11.2007@10:54PP, he was asked to report inbound by ATC and reported "established inbound" at 23:36Z. We don't know yet which approach he was on, the VOR DME, or the VOR/NDB (the difference I see is whether you measure the turn inbound by DME or by time).

PBL

[Machaca]

maxrpm,

I believe you nailed it. Tired crew makes simple error. Comports with Ockham's razor.


-=MachacA=-

[Machaca]

I've more trust in SeattlePilot's hearsay re direct IPT than the "officials" at some press conference aired by CNN Turk yesterday:

http://www.cnnturk.com/VIDEO/index.asp?vid=2679

What a circus! Those diagrams!!! What black boxes are those -- I thought they were in a lab in Germany?!


-=MachacA=-

[lomapaseo]

I believe you nailed it. Tired crew makes simple error. Comports with Ockham's razor.


-=MachacA=-

If the "tired crew makes simple error" is simple and probably common, what is the backup barrier that should have caught this and prevented the rest of the combinations that resulted in this accident:confused:

I mean that we can expect more tired crews and more simple errors but we should not be accepting this as the only cause of the accident.

Where's the intervention to this?

[Machaca]

what is the backup barrier that should have caught this and prevented the rest of the combinationsAll the standard answers apply. Training, CRM, equipment upgrades (EGPWS), double checking your sums, duty time/rest, communication...


-=MachacA=-