EVA B777 close call departing LAX

[-JC-]

“The air-traffic controller at the approach control who was handling EVA instructed the pilot to make a left turn to a 180-degree heading,” Gregor said.

“She meant to tell the pilot to make a right turn to a 180-degree heading. The pilot turned to the left. The controller quickly realized EVA was turning in the wrong direction."

Jumbo jet?s low turn on wrong course startles Los Angeles neighborhood - CBS News (http://www.cbsnews.com/news/jumbo-jets-low-turn-wrong-course-startles-los-angeles-neighborhood/)

ATC audio ....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFdXax7Zh_g&t=21s

"The Federal Aviation Administration on Monday was investigating ..."

[wallism]

I feel sorry for the homeowner. Imagine how awful it must be to be tossed from your bed.

[RedBullGaveMeWings]

Sloppy ATC.

[Airbubba]

The controller sure doesn't help the situation when she gives EVA a left turn to 270 and then repeats 'turn southbound, southbound now' when EVA asks left or right.

This scenario out of LAX with vectors toward the hills was a favorite for GPWS training in the sim in years past.

[poorjohn]

Sloppy ATC. Yeah, the tape is quite interesting in that regard. Controller seemed okay parroting the routine stuff to other flights but seemed to switch into panic mode when dealing with EVA. End of a long shift/fatigue?

[8314]

Sorry folks, ATC apparently made the mistake to turn them left after departure.
...but if I'm flying easterly off the south part of parallel rwys with a left turn...plus the instructed heading gives me a 270deg change of my path...my SA would make me querie that instruction!?

Her telling to turn southbound instead of 180deg didn't help to solve the situation efficiently either!

[ATC Watcher]

Not very good ATC show. Not using standard ICAO phraseo did not help , and repeating same words over and over when she notices that the guys does not understand seems to be typical US . Reminds me of the " did they clear you to the gate?" famous audio in JFK some years back.

A question to the US guys here : Is an instruction like " stop climb" without specifying an altitude , and "Turn Southbound" without specifying a heading , a normal FAA Phraseology? It was used here on different aircraft not only to EVA .

[fleigle]

Not defending the controller but the normal westerly departures have been to the east for the past few days, so the rote "turn left... blah, blah, blah" caught her out.

[flight_mode]

So how close did this sloppy comms get an aircraft to the hard rocks hidden in clouds?

According to the AVHearld report very.....

BR-15 still continued to the north at about 4900-5000 feet, mountains rising there to 6653 feet. The controller instructed BR-15 to climb to 7000 feet, abeam of Pasadena,CA (USA) the crew finally began to turn right, which brought the aircraft even closer to Mount Wilson (peak and Mount Wilson Observatory at 5715 feet MSL), and to climb. The aircraft passed the peak 0.3nm south of the peak still at about 6000 feet at a heading of about 090 degrees, rolled out at heading 180, climbed to 7000 feet and continued the flight to Taipei for a safe landing without further incident.

[Hotel Tango]

We don't actually hear her turn instructions (did she say left or right?). EVA, on an easterly heading, replies "turn left heading 180"! Now had EVA understood the instruction as going the long way around to 180 then fair enough, but they actually headed north! I would call THAT poor airmanship! Sure, her comms was sloppy and panicky but, in my opinion, the EVA's flying skills were not up to much either!

[Lookleft]

I thought Level 6 English was supposed to fix communication problems like this? Both were at fault IMHO. The controller kept giving EVA ambiguous instructions and the crew were not clarifying the direction of turn she required to go "southbound".

[Airbubba]

I feel sorry for the homeowner. Imagine how awful it must be to be tossed from your bed.

I think her only injury was when she twisted her ankle running to her lawyer's office. ;)

According to the AVHearld report very.....
BR-15 still continued to the north at about 4900-5000 feet, mountains rising there to 6653 feet. The controller instructed BR-15 to climb to 7000 feet, abeam of Pasadena,CA (USA) the crew finally began to turn right, which brought the aircraft even closer to Mount Wilson (peak and Mount Wilson Observatory at 5715 feet MSL), and to climb. The aircraft passed the peak 0.3nm south of the peak still at about 6000 feet at a heading of about 090 degrees, rolled out at heading 180, climbed to 7000 feet and continued the flight to Taipei for a safe landing without further incident.

Opening the .kml file with Google Earth (BR15 on 16 December) is a real eye-opener:

https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/br15#be7fcf0

They must have had plenty of EGPWS warning, I've done the scenario with those hills in the sim more than once. The possibly apocryphal 'shutup gringo' call in the Avianca 011 crash comes to mind.

[testpanel]

I thought Level 6 English was supposed to fix communication problems like this? Both were at fault IMHO. The controller kept giving EVA ambiguous instructions and the crew were not clarifying the direction of turn she required to go "southbound".

Well the Yanks better go back to school...........

(and yes i do fly into the usofa.....)

http://http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20161028-native-english-speakers-are-the-worlds-worst-communicators (http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20161028-native-english-speakers-are-the-worlds-worst-communicators)

[readywhenreaching]

found nothing in the ATC transcript that would indicate the EVA was given a left turn to the north.
SoCal Departure: „(unreadable)..180, climb and maintain 7,000.„
EVA 15: „Left heading 180 (south), climb and maintain 7,000 EVA 15 heavy.„

So no proof madam ATC was at fault in the first place.
There were plenty of time to realize for the crew that the heading they're on to was in fact NOT 180.

FR24 showed a speed of 336 KTS at 6.300 ft. Is this for real below 100 ?

[Right Way Up]

US ATC are not obligated to check readbacks and challenge.

EVA obviously had no SA as exhibited that they happily turned towards terrain with no obvious issue.

The controller once it was obvious that EVA was a rogue should have been very clear in her instruction and guided EVA away from trouble. "turn Southbound" was unbelievably vague in this case.

[testpanel]

FR24 showed a speed of 336 KTS at 6.300 ft. Is this for real below 100 ?

they asked for a high-speed climb and got it approved!

"turn Southbound" was unbelievably vague in this case.

Absolutely!!

[neilki]

LAX & SLC EGPWS Sim scenarios are dereguer in our schoolhouse. There's nothing subtle about a terrain escape maneuver! 250KIAS is the maximum below !0,000 in the Continental US. There is no avenue for a controller to approve faster. Some pretty funky winds this week, so its possible they had a 100kt tailwind at 6000... but if they were faster thats another visit to the Chiefs office...

[Right Way Up]

250KIAS is the maximum below !0,000 in the Continental US. There is no avenue for a controller to approve faster

That is not true!

[neilki]

@rightwayup. Got on then, 91.117. Unless approved by the Administrator, no person may operate an aircraft above a speed of 250kias below 10,000.
Clearly we're talking about the civil system and the military operates under different rules, but no US 121 operator has permission from the Administrator.
I'm all ears if you have something better, cos my jet loves a 290-320kt climb....

[Intruder]

It IS true, in general, outside of Restricted [Military] airspace. The sole exception is when the airplane cannot be safely flown slower, e.g., a heavy airplane after takeoff that has a minimum clean speed >250. That exception is available without specific clearance EXCEPT in a few airport areas such as ORD, where the speed limit is specifically cited.

A controller cannot approve faster. A waiver must be gotten from the FAA for airshows and other specific events.

[testpanel]

I'm all ears if you have something better, cos my jet loves a 290-320kt climb....

When I ask for it And "THE MIGHTY" ATC approves it?

[Huck]

When training for my IFR ticket thirty years ago, I was in Van Nuys, California (just on the other side of those hills) when a Cessna with student and instructor on board was vectored into a mountain when on approach to Burbank.

My grizzled old instructor, who had flown bombers in the fifties, said to me, "If a controller vectors you into a mountain, it will ruin their day. They'll have trouble driving home. But you'll be very dead. So who is really in charge of keeping you out of terrain?"

[aterpster]

flight mode:

BR-15 still continued to the north at about 4900-5000 feet, mountains rising there to 6653 feet. The controller instructed BR-15 to climb to 7000 feet, abeam of Pasadena,CA (USA) the crew finally began to turn right, which brought the aircraft even closer to Mount Wilson (peak and Mount Wilson Observatory at 5715 feet MSL), and to climb. The aircraft passed the peak 0.3nm south of the peak still at about 6000 feet at a heading of about 090 degrees, rolled out at heading 180, climbed to 7000 feet and continued the flight to Taipei for a safe landing without further incident.

The highest antenna on Mt. Wilson is just under 7,000 msl.

[casablanca]

A 777-3 fully loaded has a minimum clean speed of about 280 kts

[YRP]

Listening to the video, I don't agree with posters that say Eva was to blame, certainly not a "rogue".

The controller made a mistake then got flustered and started mixing up what she was saying... call signs, headings, stop climb vs expedite. You can hear the other pilots detecting that, eg AC asking for confirmation on altitude. Then later she was clearing behind events: letting a subsequent departure level at 2000, switching AC to next sector while it still appeared to have a conflict with Eva, and then not fully monitoring Eva despite it all.

Eva got some rapid fire instructions that contradicted each other: the initial left turn, then as they were passing north a reversal to a right turn then back to a left turn to 270, then just "southbound". At that point they were obviously (and reasonably) confused and asked for confirmation of heading (3:08 in the youtube video) which they didn't get, just more instructions where the controller mixes up north and south.


A couple posters mentioned that the turn left to 180 instruction is not on the live atc audio. Liveatc is often unreliable, audio dropouts due to multiple frequencies monitored. The FAA spokesman quoted in the LA times did say the controller gave that left turn.

[MarkerInbound]

@rightwayup. Got on then, 91.117. Unless approved by the Administrator, no person may operate an aircraft above a speed of 250kias below 10,000.
Clearly we're talking about the civil system and the military operates under different rules, but no US 121 operator has permission from the Administrator.
I'm all ears if you have something better, cos my jet loves a 290-320kt climb....
§91.117 Aircraft speed.
(a) Unless otherwise authorized by the Administrator, no person may operate an aircraft below 10,000 feet MSL at an indicated airspeed of more than 250 knots (288 m.p.h.).
(b) Class C and D stuff
(c) Class B stuff
(d) If the minimum safe airspeed for any particular operation is greater than the maximum speed prescribed in this section, the aircraft may be operated at that minimum speed.

No authorization from ATC required, but an advisory "We'll be climbing at 280 knots" is nice. Also, the aircraft can only be operated at it's minimum safe speed. I normally round up about 10 knots. It's not a waiver to push over to barber pole.

There's also no limit in Class E airspace beyond 12 NM. But the Class B at LAX extends beyond 12 miles. Not sure what AngryRat's airline is doing. They could do 270-280 going east bound if that's what their minimum flaps up speed is.

[golfyankeesierra]

The controller made a mistake then got flustered and started mixing up what she was saying... call signs, headings, stop climb vs expedite. You can hear the other pilots detecting that, eg AC asking for confirmation on altitude. Then later she was clearing behind events: letting a subsequent departure level at 2000, switching AC to next sector while it still appeared to have a conflict with Eva, and then not fully monitoring Eva despite it all.
Absolutely agree!
Perhaps she was having a bad day, perhaps it was the end of a long day.. (we have all been there, done that..)
But!
Safety should not be depending on a single person. Where was the supervisor?
There should be more then one layer of cheese.. This looks to me like a fault in the system; going to be an interesting investigation and a very interesting read HF wise...
A lot to learn here (again), pilots and controllers alike..

[172driver]

Hold on here. In the video at 2:30(ish) the controller clearly instructs EVA to take up a heading of 270 (she initially says 290, but corrects to 270). However, EVA merrily carries on towards the cumulugranitus....

Given the extreme rarity of an easterly departure in L.A. (I fly out of KSMO and the easterly rwy is practically never in use) would the crew not brief any possible departure route a bit more thoroughly than normal? MSA to the N is between 7.5 and 10.4 k ft.

[captainsmiffy]

One problem that is evident here is lack of listening to readbacks....the crew made a mistake - and didnt query it with 'turn the long way round?' - but the controller had issued her instruction and didnt pick up on the readback that it was misunderstood. Straight onto the next aircraft when confirmation of the instructions via readback would have been more suitable. I find that this is fairly prevalent in the US. If the traffic situation is too busy to allow for this then the system is pushing too much tin......

I was gobsmacked, also, with one transmission where the climb instruction at the beginning of the message was climb to 5000 but had changed to 6000 at the end of the transmission, only to be changed to 7000 seconds later! Little wonder that confusion reigned. SLOW DOWN! ATC should be a slow, careful process. Same thing in India, where medals are clearly given for the fastest ATC transmissions. I often told them to speak slowly 'because I only had 50 years experience of my native tongue and am clearly inadaquate!!'

I speak with 14000 hours and heavy, worldwide time.

[Flugjung]

Longtime lurker, new poster.

E190 FO and a frequent flyer in US airspace.

As "native non-native" English speaker, I have to say that ATC was almost at fault as the Eva pilots. Evidently, these chaps are unfamiliar with rwy 7 LAX departures (very unusual indeed) but instructions were really confusing. That, and somewhat poor navigation (I don't want to nail the pilots, since no one is clean in this job, regardless of experience).

I really wish US ATC stick MORE to clear and concise instructions, ICAO phraseology, and engrave in their minds that they are talking to NON ENGLISH speakers from every corner of the world.

Giving this confused crew a simple "fly HDG 180 to the right NOW, expedite turn" would have finished the ordeal without the mountain flyover.


But......I have listened to confused Air New Zealand and Lufthansa crews in IAH........

So it is really someting about US ATC...

[Captain Partzee]

Dear neilki,
There are things heavier than a C150.

Larger aircraft can almost always get approval to exceed 250 below 10,000 anywhere in the US. ATC usually has no problem approving high speed when you are a fully loaded 777.

[parabellum]

250KIAS is the maximum below !0,000 in the Continental US. There is no avenue for a controller to approve faster

Departed LAX many times, B744, and been cleared to 'high speed climb' when heavy, which was most times.

[ATC Watcher]

US ATC are not obligated to check readbacks and challenge. .

Is this true ? In rest of the world you are obliged .

EVA obviously had no SA as exhibited that they happily turned towards terrain with no obvious issue

Well , in the rest of the world you always have to follow ATC vectors, as a Controller takes over responsibility for terrain avoidance when vectoring.

A simple correction/instruction like : "Break-Break . EVA15 turn right immediately heading 180" . would have solved the problem. and we would not be here discussing it.

[Mlambin]

Incredible !

[Sailvi767]

Oceanic departures for my operator are approved for high speed climbs out of LA. Where EVA may have gone wrong here is that you have to be clear of the coast to accelerate past 250kts. Runway 25 is usually the duty runway in LA so everyone accelerates past 250kts without thinking too much about it. A change of runway to 07 and having a high speed climb drummed in by almost exclusively flying 25 departures, this previous experience probably contributed to this.

This is bad advice. The FAA never waives the speed restriction with one exception. That is if your minimum clean speed is higher then 250 knots you may fly that speed. If you are more then 12 miles offshore the speed does not apply.

[Sailvi767]

It's not advice. My operater has FAA approval to accelerate to Econ climb speed overwater. Read my post number 33 on this thread if you want further explanation. I merely wondered if EVA has the same approval. If they do, they may have inadvertently made a mistake by accelerating while over land.

I would double check that. Lots of airlines have asked all are turned down.

[framer]

Why would the controller keep instructing the Eva to turn "southbound" without giving a heading or a direction? I think there are inadequacies with both the Eva crew and the controller.
Is there any evidence that Eva initiated an EGPWS escape ?

[VSB via OL]

ive just listened to that audio - like many I'm sure, (and although we know there was no cfit), I still sat here quivering, waiting for what seemed like the inevitable. words escape me.

[Right Way Up]

ATC Watcher Well , in the rest of the world you always have to follow ATC vectors, as a Controller takes over responsibility for terrain avoidance when vectoring.

I would argue you don't. My responsibilities as a Commander dictate I ensure sufficient terrain clearance. If a controller makes a mistake (like we all can all do sometimes), I cannot just sit there and suck it up.

[172_driver]

Why would the controller keep instructing the Eva to turn "southbound" without giving a heading or a direction?

Survival mode, she probably doesn't care as long as they turn southbound. I wonder why the crew hadn't entered survival mode just yet...

One little disconnect between pilots and controllers I can notice at times is the radar delay (lacking a more technical term for it). It's quite common for ATC to tell you to maintain heading whilst in the middle of a turn. The EVA crew is in the right turn south when they're getting a new instruction to turn left 270 deg. The autopilot is quite slow to react to such a change, and they were going quite fast. I guess the ADS-B plot is not updating accurately so it's hard to say what turn they actually did.

ATC and pilots a bit out of sync me thinks.

[.Scott]

They must have had plenty of EGPWS warning, I've done the scenario with those hills in the sim more than once. The possibly apocryphal 'shutup gringo' call in the Avianca 011 crash comes to mind.Just for the record, there was no 'shutup gringo'. It was 'bueno bueno' as reported in the transcript: http://www.fomento.es/NR/rdonlyres/D53C568D-2A84-490B-BEE0-9EC81EE287C4/8766/Anexo_A.pdf (bottom of page 6)

[Three Lima Charlie]

One has to wonder what the ATC clearance was before push back? What SID were they given for an east LAX departure?

[ATC Watcher]

Right way up :
I would argue you don't. .
Unfortunately that is what the book says .
My responsibilities as a Commander dictate I ensure sufficient terrain clearance. If a controller makes a mistake (like we all can all do sometimes), I cannot just sit there and suck it up

Of course you will not suck it up. Common sense should always prevails if/when someones makes a mistake . My point was than in normal ops when receiving a vector , responsibility with terrain clearance move to ATC. That what we have been taught, and that is how people are expected to react and that is most probably the reason why the vector was not challenged by the EVA crew.

[aterpster]

Attached is the pertinent portion of the MVA chart for LAX. Eaton Canyon, referred to in today's Los Angeles Times article, is within the 7,700' MVA area. As is obvious, FAA MVA charts in mountainous areas are unwieldy and quite complex.

[aterpster]

Three Lima Charlie:

One has to wonder what the ATC clearance was before push back? What SID were they given for an east LAX departure?

I believe they were given the Ventura Seven, which is a radar vector SID.

[misd-agin]

"Turn southbound" is terrible comm. The US controllers need to clean up their game for foreign carriers. Speed talking, with US standard comm, is a bad idea for foreign carriers.


"What are you doing" is also terrible comm. Be directive with specific instructions. Hopefully the standards division of the ATC management will use this as an learning example for improved standard comm standards.


Using flightaware's altitude and heading information the flight was at 4800'-5000' northbound and 6200'-6400' when it went through the easterly heading. Too close.

[aterpster]

misd-agin:

"What are you doing" is also terrible comm. Be directive with specific instructions. Hopefully the standards division of the ATC management will use this as an learning example for improved standard comm standards.

Don't hold your breath. She was simply awful. I suspect she was focused on maintaining separation with Air Canada, to keep the computer snitch from going off. I also suspect she didn't even think about the rising MVAs until late in the game, because the Burbank sector of SoCal normally handles that area.

Also, Air Canada was a bit remiss by saying "Twelve Thousand" instead of "One Two Thousand."

[Ian W]

Survival mode, she probably doesn't care as long as they turn southbound. I wonder why the crew hadn't entered survival mode just yet...

One little disconnect between pilots and controllers I can notice at times is the radar delay (lacking a more technical term for it). It's quite common for ATC to tell you to maintain heading whilst in the middle of a turn. The EVA crew is in the right turn south when they're getting a new instruction to turn left 270 deg. The autopilot is quite slow to react to such a change, and they were going quite fast. I guess the ADS-B plot is not updating accurately so it's hard to say what turn they actually did.

ATC and pilots a bit out of sync me thinks.

The surveillance displays often have track jitter - if the track shown is from one radar, or if the multisensor tracker is putting together surveillance responses from different sources. These are filtered with a Kalman Filter that 'smooths' the jitter but also has the unfortunate effect of hiding the start of a maneuver. So it is possible to start a turn and for several seconds dependent on update rate the controller will not see the start of turn the filter will create a response without the 'jitter' caused by the start of turn. If the update rate is every 10 seconds and the smoothing lasts for 2 updates it could be 20 -29secs before the turn is observed. A long time if urgent avoiding action has been given. :eek:

[4runner]

Political correctness and Human Resources have infiltrated all aspects of aviation. A good friend of mine was hired as an air traffic controller after a furlough from a 121 carrier based at JFK. He washed out of training along with half the class who were also pilots. Lots of white men shown the door while the remainder left in training fit a PC "profile". Chickens come home to roost...

[ZOOKER]

Very sloppy RTF phraseology, and poor technique were contributing factors in this. From what is shown on the video and heard on the transcript, the situation was not complex nor was the frequency particularly busy.
The words 'avoiding-action' and 'immediately' are conspicuous by their absence on this tape.

[cappt]

Bad controlling, exacerabated by worse piloting.
Both loss SA,

[Airbubba]

Well, it doesn't seem so in this case now, does it? :rolleyes:

Great rejoinder from a 1986 flying movie. :ok:

A couple posters mentioned that the turn left to 180 instruction is not on the live atc audio. Liveatc is often unreliable, audio dropouts due to multiple frequencies monitored. The FAA spokesman quoted in the LA times did say the controller gave that left turn.

From the LA Times article:

The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating an incident in which a passenger jet was given wrong directions by traffic controllers and guided toward the San Gabriel Mountains, where it flew just hundreds of feet higher than the peak of Mt. Wilson before turning around, according to publicly available flight data.

Bound for Taiwan, the EVA Air Boeing 777 took off to the east early Friday from Los Angeles International Airport’s south runway complex, according to FAA spokesman Ian Gregor. After takeoff, the air crew switched from the LAX control tower to the approach control operations in San Diego, which Gregor said was common practice.

“The air traffic controller at the approach control who was handling EVA instructed the pilot to make a left turn to a 180-degree heading,” he said. “She meant to tell the pilot to make a right turn to a 180-degree heading.”

Following the controller’s instructions, the pilot turned left.

The move sent the plane in the wrong direction, Gregor said.

Instead of flying south, the aircraft flew north toward the San Gabriel Mountains and an Air Canada jet that had departed from the north runway complex at LAX.

When the controller realized the mistake, she “took immediate action to keep EVA safely separated” from the second aircraft as well as ground terrain, Gregor said. She issued the EVA pilot a series of instructions to help him turn south.

“The controller wanted to make sure the EVA aircraft was safely above or away from nearby terrain,” he said.

In a statement issued Tuesday, EVA Air said, “Our flight was never too close to other aircraft or to the mountains.”

Flight controller accidentally sends jet on course toward Mt. Wilson after LAX takeoff - LA Times (http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-faa-investigation-plane-wrong-direction-20161220-story.html)

Just for the record, there was no 'shutup gringo'. It was 'bueno bueno' as reported in the transcript: http://www.fomento.es/NR/rdonlyres/D53C568D-2A84-490B-BEE0-9EC81EE287C4/8766/Anexo_A.pdf (bottom of page 6)

Another mishap sometimes associated with the 'shut up gringo' call is Avianca 410 in 1988. They were doing a high speed climb on a VMC departure into rising terrain and had a CFIT in the haze. The crew had trained at the Pan Am Flight Academy in Miami, I think that's where I first heard about the alleged GPWS response. Perhaps the urban legend came from a gallows comedian there.

[slatch]

Not the first time a PC controller at LAX did some damage

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USAir_Flight_1493

[KelvinD]

The ATC recording shows the pilot read back "left heading 180, climbing 7,000".
This was immediately followed by the pilot's "Request high speed climb" and was answered immediately with "Approved request". Shortly after telling the EVA flight to "turn right, right turn heading 180" with the response "Copy right turn heading 180". One second later she tells EVA to "expedite your right turn" and the pilot's response was "Roger, we are passing heading 010 continue right turn heading". A few seconds later, seemingly going into panic mode, she tells an Air Canada flight to turn left to 360, then, getting a bit more shouty, she instructs EVA to "stop your climb" and in the same breath instructs Air Canada to "expedite your climb, maintain 12,000". She then instructs EVA to turn left 290 270". EVA responded with "Left heading 270". Within 1 second came the "What are you doing? Turn southbound now, turn southbound now, stop your climb" A couple of seconds later, the EVA pilot asks "Confirm heading" and he merely gets a repeat of the "Turn southbound, turn southbound now". Then she goes completely to rat's poo. "EVA 15 Heavy, climb and maintain 5,000. Are you southbound now? I see you are going northbound, climb maintain 6,000". Just 2 seconds later she instructs EVA to climb and maintain 7,000. After the pilot acknowledges this, she says"015Heavy, I see you are going southbound. Turn sou.. 'cos I see you are going northbound. Turn south now, climb and maintain 7,000." After clearing a following Cathay flight to 7,000, she instructs EVA "climb and maintain 7,000 and turn south now". EVA acknowledged this (with what sounds like a 'I am fed up with this' tone in his voice) with "right turn to southbound, continue climb 7,000".
Given that the EVA flight was heading toward 180 and was then instructed to turn left to 270, why was she surprised to see the aircraft heading north? Surely, if you are heading something greater than 90 and are told to turn left to 270, passing through a northerly heading is the only option?
Except for one of the earlier instructions, she constantly used "southbound", rather than give a heading. Other aircraft following the same route were all instructed in good old fashioned degrees. I also noticed that after clearing the Cathay flight to the same level as the EVA, she told the Cathay flight to right turn to heading 120. Given that EVA was now swinging to the right, aiming for 180, doesn't that mean a potential conflict there with the Cathay track crossing that of the EVA?

[Intruder]

Oceanic departures for my operator are approved for high speed climbs out of LA. Where EVA may have gone wrong here is that you have to be clear of the coast to accelerate past 250kts.

AFAIK, your operator cannot approve that unless they have a specific waiver. You have to be beyond 12 miles from the coast to accelerate above min clean speed if >250 KIAS/<10,000'. AIM 4-4-12.j:
j. Speed restrictions of 250 knots do not apply to U.S. registered aircraft operating beyond 12 nautical miles from the coastline within the U.S. Flight Information Region, in Class E airspace below 10,000 feet MSL.

If you think you have such approval, where/how is it written?

[Intruder]

This was immediately followed by the pilot's "Request high speed climb" and was answered immediately with "Approved request".
In the US, it's only a courtesy request, except for a very few airports (e.g., ORD) where there is a specific 250 KIAS speed limit that overrides the 'minimum clean speed' guidance.

However, Eva likely makes the request routinely because Taipei is also an airport with a specific 250 KIAS restriction.

[testpanel]

By intruder:
AFAIK, your operator cannot approve that unless they have a specific waiver. You have to be beyond 12 miles from the coast to accelerate above min clean speed if >250 KIAS/<10,000'. AIM 4-4-12.j:

I am sorry, but I am the Captain of the "ship".
I know in the usa atc "feels" to be in control, well no, its me thats in control!

My company is paying them to work.
ATC is NOT paying my company to work.
So, they better do their (payed) job, and if i don't like some instructions, i will not follow them, period.

As of the language used.....see my previous post..

EVA 15:“EVA 15 heavy, request high speed climb.„
SoCal Departure: „EVA 15 heavy, affirmative approved as requested.„

AGAIN, they had permission for a high speed climb!

[tubby linton]

My old Airbus had a clean speed at high weight of over 250kts. We would ask ATC for a higher speed for operational reasons which was always approved.

[Hotel Tango]

My company is paying them to work.
ATC is NOT paying my company to work.
So, they better do their (payed) job, and if i don't like some instructions, i will not follow them, period.

Wow, what a macho ace flyer you are testpanel. I know, let's do away with ATC, after all so many pilots think they can do it better using TCAS! :rolleyes:

[Fatguyinalittlecoat]

ATC is a SERVICE, they are NOT the boss.

[aterpster]

Bloggs,

I guess it must be different today. LAX was my base. In my last two years (88-90) I flew the L1011 to HNL. We were always at MGTOW. Clean climb was around 275 KIAS. We didn't request it, we advised them we were accelerating to 275.

And, in all the types I flew at TWA 280 was turbulence penetration speed below the Mach cross-over altitude. If we were really getting bounced around we would advise them we were doing 280 below 10,000 for turbulence. Never got any static from ATC on that one either. Obviously, we had to hang stuff out and slow down at some point, but usually that was down low enough that the crummy air had diminished.

[adnoid]

When training for my IFR ticket thirty years ago, I was in Van Nuys, California (just on the other side of those hills) when a Cessna with student and instructor on board was vectored into a mountain when on approach to Burbank...

In an odd coincidence, some 30 years ago when I was just learning to fly out of El Monte (I lived in Pasadena) a controller vectored us into a mountain. The instructor declined, I had maybe 5 hours at the time.

Finally got my ticket when we moved to SBP, much less stressful.

[Airbubba]

So close...

The FlightRadar24 .kml file in the link I posted above has a point plotted at 09:25:10 UTC at an altitude of 6275 feet less than a mile from an antenna on aterpster's terrain chart that shows the antenna top at 6634 feet. :eek:

The FR24 positions seem to be very close to the runway on the takeoff roll.

FlightAware has a similar point in its data at 09:25:07 UTC showing an altitude of 6200 (apparently rounded to nearest 100 feet) that also plots very near the antenna farm on Mount Wilson.

EVA Air (BR) #15 ? 15-Dec-2016 ? KLAX - TPE / RCTP ? FlightAware (http://flightaware.com/live/flight/EVA15/history/20161216/0730Z/KLAX/RCTP)

The EGWPS would have been screaming OBSTACLE, OBSTACLE PULL UP! and/or TERRAIN, TERRAIN PULL UP! with some hard to ignore visual cues on the PFD on the planes I've flown. I realize there are many modes, revisions and database options but I can't see how any EGWPS in a Triple would not see those hills rapidly rising.

Three Lima Charlie: I believe they were given the Ventura Seven, which is a radar vector SID.

Yep, and the filed flight plan started out VTU7 RZS so that seems reasonable. :ok:

[JammedStab]

Some thoughts,

It appears that ATC is approving high speed(above 250K below 10,000 feet) climbs in the US when they are not allowed to do so. As someone mentioned, if if greater than 250 knots below 10, 000 feet is needed for safety reasons, it is already approved by the regulations.

If given a vector that is more than a 180 degree turn, confirm the direction on the readback(or reedback as the LAX ATIS always says).

If terrain is high, consider delaying the higher speed climb until clear of terrain for various reasons.

If significant terrain is around, have the terrain display function selected as a backup to a potential unsafe vector toward terrain.

[ATC Watcher]

To my US friends :
What I hear here only confirms my earlier thoughts about FAA and ICAO differences based on the old " "we do things differently in the US because we have most of the aircraft flying in the world" That was true until 20 years ago, now Asia is catching up , and you get more and more non-US airlines coming into your airspace. Have to get used to it , the Chinese also are going to outnumber you in number of aircraft in a few decades.
Even with Trump around, it is just plain demographic arithmetic.( and Boeing/Airbus order books)
You need common rules to fly together and I bet you FAA rules it won't be.

Time for the US to learn and apply ICAO phraseology I would say .An better make a plan do this smoothly now instead of in a hurry after 400 bodies on the ground somewhere.

On the 250 Kts below 10.000 , this is not to bother pilots nor a " power" thing for ATC . It is there for 2 things :1) giving time to spot and avoid VFRs (and give a chance to VFR to spot you) and 2) survive a hit from a bird in the windscreen ( Civil aircraft certification limit) This is a rule, written down in AIPs. So individual controllers have to apply and you have to follow , or make a request to differ.
And the outcome of that request will depend on what the local authority (e.g. FAA) wrote in the ATC Ops manual that controllers have to follow.

ATC is not there to " make " or " wave " rules . it is there to apply them for the safety of everyone around , not only one aircraft. . As to the machos " My Ship" I do what I want , I pay you ..etc.." yes..good old discussions for the bar in front of 2 beers. Reality is very different . You know that.

[Uplinker]

I have listened to the ATC tape several times and I think this entire incident was caused by EVA015. At about 1:16 they read back 'left heading 180'. Now somebody* got their left and right mixed up, but the 180 degrees direction is pretty clear, and yet they turned north. From then on, despite repeated instructions by ATC, EVA015 does virtually the opposite of what is asked, bringing it into conflict with Air Canada 788. This takes up valuable time while the controller tries to resolve that problem. The EVA015 radio pilot sounds more and more stressed and you can hear someone else in the cockpit shouting at him.

I think that the ATC instruction to turn 'southbound' is also pretty clear, given that EVA015 had ignored or failed to act on all the headings given since they initially turned the wrong way from 090, and were actually heading northbound. I am sure the controller was trying to give EVA015 some situational awareness here.

(Did EVA015 initially turn left onto 018 degrees, instead of 180 degrees, so thought they were following the instructions?)

A couple of points about the RT comms. I don't think the controller was at fault, but she was taking up time by giving frequency changes (to others) twice, e.g: "one one nine decimal nine five, nineteen ninety five", which is unnecessary and a bad habit. Also use of non standard phrases can be misunderstood. 'Nineteen ninety five' for example might not mean anything to a level four English speaker, who may be able to use standard RT phraseology to fly a plane, but might not be able to speak or understand conversational English, so this is another bad habit to avoid.

Secondly, although it did not cause a direct problem here - and they were not at fault at all - you can clearly tell that Air Canada 788 has not got a windshield on his microphone, so all his transmissions are distorted. Such poor quality transmissions do not help general understanding and SA. Also, unprotected mics will fill up with spit etc, so the noise cancelling function will stop working and then comms will become more and more difficult, but you - the speaker - will not realise why ATC cannot understand you properly.



*The EVA015 radio guy later seemed confused again: "left....right", and English is clearly not his first language.

[cat3appr50a]

I’m guessing there was likely around 330-350 passengers onthis B777 300ER flight. As I listened to the ATC instructions (posted ATCaudio) and EVA15 crew responses and considering the flight path and altitude inheading into high terrain and even a potential conflict with ACA788, I thankedGod that somehow this snarl of poor interaction turned out OK for all of them. This couldeasily have turned out very bad.
Despite the back and forth snarled up communication going onbetween the ATC controller and EVA15, surely the EGPWS in that cockpit was screamingwarnings of closure on the high terrain, and assuming the FO’s-if the PNF- ND wason terrain mode (as would be normal) the impending CFIT issue should have beenclearly visible as well, requiring (their own) immediate evasive action asnecessary. IMO the ATC controller instructions were certainly not the most stellarperformance as well, and with unusual variance from more normal instruction protocol.

[aterpster]

ATC Watcher:

On the 250 Kts below 10.000 , this is not to bother pilots nor a " power" thing for ATC . It is there for 2 things :1) giving time to spot and avoid VFRs (and give a chance to VFR to spot you) and 2) survive a hit from a bird in the windscreen ( Civil aircraft certification limit) This is a rule, written down in AIPs.

However, 250 below 10,000 wasn't always a rule. I can only speak to the U.S. When I went with TWA in January, 1964, their was no speed limit below 10,000 except within the old Airport Traffic Area (generally within 5 miles of the airport below 2,000 (or perhaps 3,000) agl).

The TWA/UAL mid-air over New York in December, 1960 finally worked through the regulatory system and sometime in 1964 or perhaps 1965 the rule was changed to 250 below 10,000 and within 30 miles of the destination airport.

Then in 1967 a TWA DC-9-10 was flying from KPIT to KCMH at 8,000. At more than 30 miles from CMH he was doing something near barber-pole. He overtook a Beech Baron and all aboard perished. That accident resulted in 250 below 10,000 in all U.S. domestic airspace.

The 1960 mid-air over NYC was in IMC, so it was not a see-and-avoid issue, rather more for more time to correct errors by pilots or ATC in terminal airspace.

The 1967 mid-air was about see-and-avoid.


Windshield limits were never a consideration in any of this rule-making, at least so far as I recall. There were a whole lot of high-speed operations below 10,000 from the advent of civil jet transports in 1958 until the present rule came about in 1968 (as I recall) from the 1967 mid-air.

[Airbubba]

A couple of points about the RT comms. I don't think the controller was at fault, but she was taking up time by giving frequency changes (to others) twice, e.g: "one one nine decimal nine five, nineteen ninety five", which is unnecessary and a bad habit. Also use of non standard phrases can be misunderstood. 'Nineteen ninety five' for example might not mean anything to a level four English speaker, who may be able to use standard RT phraseology to fly a plane, but might not be able to speak or understand conversational English, so this is another bad habit to avoid.

Yep, that 'nineteen ninety-five' double readback stuff seems to taught in civilian flight training these days and is thought to provide extra redundancy to the communication. And sound cool. But, it sounds like CB radio jargon outside the U.S. and some folks never catch on to that ICAO R/T dialect.

'Delta One Six Six, line up and wait runway zero two center'

'One Sixty Six on the hold'

And it gets worse with Chinese metric RVSM... :ugh:

[ATC Watcher]

aterpster :
Thanks for the historical. . Learn something today! .

On the windshield /bird strike certification I remember during my training of a requirement that said aircraft windshields needed to be able to withstand a strike with a bird of a certain mass atthe maximum approach speed.because 99% of birds are found below 10.000 ft. and a very high percentage ( something in the region of 80-85% ) of actual bird strikes occur in departure and approaches phases.
I seem to remember both criteria were taken together to make a single rule below FL100. of a standard max speed acceptable for jets of the time i.e 250 Kts .
There was a proviso that certain aircraft types (i.e. military) could be exempted. That was long time ago. Maybe someone with better memory or wanting to dig into old books or internet can confirm or correct.

[End_of_Descent]

The EGWPS would have been screaming OBSTACLE, OBSTACLE PULL UP! and/or TERRAIN, TERRAIN PULL UP! with some hard to ignore visual cues on the PFD on the planes I've flown. I realize there are many modes, revisions and database options but I can't see how any EGWPS in a Triple would not see those hills rapidly rising.

I think so, too.

For a flight tracking project, I've learned how to position a camera point of view very precisely in the 3D virtual globe of Google Maps. Using the BR15 ADS-B data on FR24, I can put a camera (or cockpit) position in the Google virtual reality and simulate a cockpit view (yes, simulating! Neglecting bank angle, time of day and weather, of course).

One data point before closest approach to Mt. Wilson would look like this:
https://www.google.de/maps/@34.214313,-118.080428,666a,20y,67h,89t/data=!3m1!1e3,
using the position from the FR24 KML file, an interpolated track(turning!) of 67° (mean value between 59° and 75°) and an altitude AGL of 666 meters (FR 24 calibrated altitude 5625ft (1714m) minus Google Ground Elev of 1048 meters))

Closest point of approach, 306 meters above the ridge, now clear of the ridge.
https://www.google.de/maps/@34.219481,-118.062183,306a,20y,82h,89t/data=!3m1!1e3

And a little bit earlier, over Altadena, at 4805', just starting the right turn (track 028° at that time).
https://www.google.de/maps/@34.186473,-118.113404,1096a,20y,28h,89t/data=!3m1!1e3

Use a modern, WebGL enabled browser to open the links (probably won't work on mobile devices).

EoD

p.s.
If you want to play with URL parameters ...
666a is camera elevation, 666 meters AGL
67h is viewing direction 67° (true)
89t is tilt angle (89=horizontal, 0=straight down/map view)
20y is camera opening angle, fixed

[aterpster]

ATC Watcher:

Indeed, the windscreens were tested by Boeing for some size bird (can't recall the size) at 250 knots. They used some type of cannon.

We were taught that value before the 250 below 10,000 everywhere came into the regs.

[aterpster]

Airbubba:

The EGWPS would have been screaming OBSTACLE, OBSTACLE PULL UP! and/or TERRAIN, TERRAIN PULL UP! with some hard to ignore visual cues on the PFD on the planes I've flown. I realize there are many modes, revisions and database options but I can't see how any EGWPS in a Triple would not see those hills rapidly rising.

I don't know about the current EGPWS database, but when I was on a committee working RNP AR issues circa 2004-07, "peaks and obstacles" was a Honeywell option for the EGPWS. "Peaks" provided better point terrain resolutions and "Obstacles" provided tall buildings and antennas. If "peaks and obstacles" is still a database option, then EVA may not have had the Mt. Wilson antenna farm.

BTW, how do I get that Goggle Earth track file? I am not conversant with how to obtain the file.

I "flew" my Garmin trainer at 6,500 parallel to Mt. Wilson approximating the EVA track. The trainer has Garmin's actual database. It also has synthetic vision. All of the towers lit up like Christmas time, but the terrain did not. So, perhaps if EVA was level and flying parallel to Mt. Wilson there may have not been an EGPWS if the antennas weren't in the EGPWS database.

[armchairpilot94116]

American pilots are not shy to use "unable" when asked a task by ATC. But Asian pilots may not be so confident in their environment. Taipei ATC would take a dim view of pilots dis-obeying ATC "commands". It is a potentially career ending move for Taiwanese pilots.
TAiwan air traffic is dense and it's important everyone follows their instructions.

Perhaps this caused them to not query why they are flying into mountains when they are supposed to be headed towards the ocean pronto.

Unconfirmed rumour has it the pilots have been suspended pending review. And no rumour here, the Taiwan CAA is looking into this incident closely.

Pilots facing dismissal and loss of license.

p.s. TAiwan is only 90 miles away and only 45 miles away from no fly zone of "enemy" China and there are constant military sorties around the island. ATC talks to Taiwan military in Mandarin (not English). Therefore even more important civilian flights follow their instructions to avoid conflict. Especially civilian flights commanded by pilots unable to understand Mandarin.

[aterpster]

This is the 1:24,000 topo for Mt. Wilson with the highest antenna and three of the others plotted:

[Airbubba]

ATC Watcher:

However, 250 below 10,000 wasn't always a rule. I can only speak to the U.S. When I went with TWA in January, 1964, their was no speed limit below 10,000 except within the old Airport Traffic Area (generally within 5 miles of the airport below 2,000 (or perhaps 3,000) agl).

The TWA/UAL mid-air over New York in December, 1960 finally worked through the regulatory system and sometime in 1964 or perhaps 1965 the rule was changed to 250 below 10,000 and within 30 miles of the destination airport.

Thanks for sharing this historical insight. :ok:

That 250 knots below 10,000 within 30 miles lives on in places like Mexico where it's 250 at or below 10,000 AGL within 30 miles of any airport.

Airbubba:

I don't know about the current EGPWS database, but when I was on a committee working RNP AR issues circa 2004-07, "peaks and obstacles" was a Honeywell option for the EGPWS. "Peaks" provided better point terrain resolutions and "Obstacles" provided tall buildings and antennas. If "peaks and obstacles" is still a database option, then EVA may not have had the Mt. Wilson antenna farm.

BTW, how do I get that Goggle Earth track file? I am not conversant with how to obtain the file.

I also don't claim to know what options and database would be installed on a ROC registered 777 EGPWS but the installations I've recently flown will give a pop-up display of the rising terrain even if terrain is not selected on the nav display. In years past we would go over modes and sub-modes ad nauseam in training only to find that the ground school stuff had been superseded by a software update.

I've had the OBSTACLE warning in Mexico before when vectored near a hill with an antenna to intercept the approach course in hazy day VMC. We started a terrain avoidance maneuver and the warning quit as soon as the power came up and the nose rose. We were able to positively establish safe terrain clearance in day visual conditions so we broke off the approach and took a turn for another try. My coworker initially suggested continuing the approach but I decided to start again on the long VOR final just to sort things out (CYA these days ;)).

To view the .kml file on a PC (may also work on an Apple, I'm not sure), first download and install Google Earth using the blue 'Agree and Download' button:

https://www.google.com/earth/download/ge/agree.html

Then, go to this FR24 link and click on the KML button on the right side of the listing for 16 Dec to download the .kml file:

https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/br15#be7fcf0

After the file has downloaded, click on 'open' or click on the .kml file in the folder. It should start Google Earth and you can zoom, tilt and turn to view the flight path and the terrain. Also, you can click on each data point to get time, speed, altitude and heading.

Hope this helps.

[Long Haul]

She tells them to turn FIVE times, each one acknowledged, before they actually turn. If you don't understand "turn southbound now" when you are told to do that, please don't fly to the USA!

[misd-agin]

777-300 'UP' bug would be around 263 kts(?) at max gross weight.

They'd need that as a minimum if they were at max gross weight.

[oicur12.again]

Many of these Asian carriers would have crews that would be confused by the phrase "turn southbound". To "turn" makes sense but "southbound" is not commonly used in aviation. in my previous life in a Chinese carrier, the FO in the jumpseat would be using the radio and the crew in the front seats would respond accordingly. Many old timers have marginal English and i have seen confusion unfold rapidly when the young kids are translating a non standard term to the guy with his paw on the tiller, especially in US airspace where rt is commonly non standard. I suspect that Eva crews have a better grasp of English than the uncles from the mainland however a bit more precise controlling would have helped.

[oicur12.again]

Long haul.

Have you read the report into the GIV crash on takeoff here in Bedford, MA?

There are a lot of pilots that shouldnt be flying in the US!

[ElectroVlasic]

FlightAware has a similar point in its data at 09:25:07 UTC showing an altitude of 6200 (apparently rounded to nearest 100 feet) that also plots very near the antenna farm on Mount Wilson.

EVA Air (BR) #15 ? 15-Dec-2016 ? KLAX - TPE / RCTP ? FlightAware (http://flightaware.com/live/flight/EVA15/history/20161216/0730Z/KLAX/RCTP)

The EGWPS would have been screaming OBSTACLE, OBSTACLE PULL UP! and/or TERRAIN, TERRAIN PULL UP! with some hard to ignore visual cues on the PFD on the planes I've flown. I realize there are many modes, revisions and database options but I can't see how any EGWPS in a Triple would not see those hills rapidly rising.


I imagine that was happening. It seemed the voice of the EVA pilot got more serious as the mountains became closer, presuming the ATC youtube recording above has properly sync'd the flight path and the voice recording.

FWIW I found a pic of the Mt Wilson Antenna Farm as of 2001 and even then it was pretty impressive:

http://www.oldradio.com/archives/stations/LA/images/mt_wilson_1_lg.jpg

I have listened to the ATC tape several times and I think this entire incident was caused by EVA015. At about 1:16 they read back 'left heading 180'. Now somebody* got their left and right mixed up, but the 180 degrees direction is pretty clear, and yet they turned north. From then on, despite repeated instructions by ATC, EVA015 does virtually the opposite of what is asked, bringing it into conflict with Air Canada 788. This takes up valuable time while the controller tries to resolve that problem. The EVA015 radio pilot sounds more and more stressed and you can hear someone else in the cockpit shouting at him.


I don't think I'd go with "entire", but would say this thread seems to be fixated on radio terminology (which I can say is a pet peeve of this forum after reading it for more than a few years) and largely ignoring the fact that the crew was told to get to heading 180, and acknowledged that, and regardless of the issue regarding left turn vs right turn, flew heading 0.

I think so, too.

For a flight tracking project, I've learned how to position a camera point of view very precisely in the 3D virtual globe of Google Maps. Using the BR15 ADS-B data on FR24, I can put a camera (or cockpit) position in the Google virtual reality and simulate a cockpit view (yes, simulating! Neglecting bank angle, time of day and weather, of course).

One data point before closest approach to Mt. Wilson would look like this:
https://www.google.de/maps/@34.214313,-118.080428,666a,20y,67h,89t/data=!3m1!1e3,
using the position from the FR24 KML file, an interpolated track(turning!) of 67° (mean value between 59° and 75°) and an altitude AGL of 666 meters (FR 24 calibrated altitude 5625ft (1714m) minus Google Ground Elev of 1048 meters))


Thanks for this link and the others, they were really informative. The view out the cockpit reminded me of ones from my Pilatus B-4 glider, and not the ones I'd like to see when departing from LA on large commercial transport!

[Long Haul]

Long haul.

Have you read the report into the GIV crash on takeoff here in Bedford, MA?

There are a lot of pilots that shouldnt be flying in the US!
Looks like they shouldn't have been flying in any country!

[aterpster]

ElectroVlasic:

The Mt. Wilson antenna farm hasn't probably changed much since that photo was taken. The really tall antenna is in the far distance and hardly shows in that photo.

[Intruder]

If you cared to read through my posts carefully then you would realise I have said my operator is approved, not self approved, but approved by the FAA. Written in our manuals.

We operate fuel critical long range sectors out of the west coast, often at times with reduced reserves and every kg of fuel counts.
I operate similar sectors, but nowhere in our manuals does it say we can accelerate to high-altitude climb speed once clear of the coast. What are the exact words in those manuals, and which manuals are they?

[4runner]

It's actually expected to address an older male as "Uncle". A sign of respect. Also, you're actually being rather presumptuously monoracial by assuming the original poster is Caucasian. Also, your wife makes you sit down when you pee. I stand by my tosser statement..

[1DC]

Haven't flown EVA for about three years but up until then did so fairly often. The pilot was often an American or Australian, so are you sure of the nationality of the flight crew on this occasion?

[cappt]

I wonder how the autopilot plays into this. I imagine the reluctance to click it off and roll the A/C to heading 180 could have resulted in the delay in turning. We all know how slow auto can be when you need him to do it "now".
Hence the hand flown break-out requirement on PRM approaches.

[White Knight]

If you don't understand "turn southbound now" when you are told to do that, please don't fly to the USA!

in much the same way I sometimes hear 'the good 'ole boys' not understanding ATC outside of their US home grounds:eek: Not often, but it happens...

[Airbubba]

I think so, too.

For a flight tracking project, I've learned how to position a camera point of view very precisely in the 3D virtual globe of Google Maps. Using the BR15 ADS-B data on FR24, I can put a camera (or cockpit) position in the Google virtual reality and simulate a cockpit view (yes, simulating! Neglecting bank angle, time of day and weather, of course).

One data point before closest approach to Mt. Wilson would look like this:
https://www.google.de/maps/@34.214313,-118.080428,666a,20y,67h,89t/data=!3m1!1e3,
using the position from the FR24 KML file, an interpolated track(turning!) of 67° (mean value between 59° and 75°) and an altitude AGL of 666 meters (FR 24 calibrated altitude 5625ft (1714m) minus Google Ground Elev of 1048 meters))

Closest point of approach, 306 meters above the ridge, now clear of the ridge.
https://www.google.de/maps/@34.219481,-118.062183,306a,20y,82h,89t/data=!3m1!1e3

Nice views, thanks for posting this. :ok: As you see, Google Maps and Google Earth don't depict the antennas very well, they are sort of poured down the side of the hill when viewed from some aspects.

I wonder how the autopilot plays into this. I imagine the reluctance to click it off and roll the A/C to heading 180 could have resulted in the delay in turning. We all know how slow auto can be when you need him to do it "now".
Hence the hand flown break-out requirement on PRM approaches.

Even if the crew was indecisive over left or right to 180 and went straight ahead for a while they should have had plenty of EGPWS warning of the hills. In the sim it's hard to get a surprise warning since the hills pop up on the screen and you get close to a minute of notice through visual and aural cues before the PULL UP call.

There are modes and sub-modes and different Mark numbers of the EGPWS systems but I believe every 777 has it installed. But, I may be wrong. Remember years ago after a CFIT when it turned out that Air Inter didn't have GPWS in its A320's since it wasn't required for domestic carriers under French rules?

This was really a close one, like United's near CFIT at SFO in 1998:

United pilot inexperienced in landings nearly crashed 747

Saturday, March 20, 1999
By Glen Johnson, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - A United Airlines jumbo jet that lost power in an engine during takeoff from San Francisco dipped low enough that its thunderous roar set off car alarms and sent airport neighbors scurrying for cover.

The pilot of the Boeing 747 so badly mishandled the recovery last summer that the plane cleared the 1,576-foot-high San Bruno Mountain, a few miles to the north, by only 100 feet, government and airline officials said.

"Pull up! Pull up!" shouted other pilots in the cockpit, as the electronic voice in the plane's ground-proximity device warned: "Terrain! Terrain!"

United pilot inexperienced in landings nearly crashed 747 (http://old.post-gazette.com/headlines/19990320jumbojet4.asp)

[ZOOKER]

Long Haul,
Surely any turn instruction issued by a radar controller, (anywhere), should include the direction of the turn as well as the desired heading?
It's basic stuff, really.

[Uplinker]

I don't think I'd go with "entire", but would say this thread seems to be fixated on radio terminology (which I can say is a pet peeve of this forum after reading it for more than a few years) and largely ignoring the fact that the crew was told to get to heading 180, and acknowledged that, and regardless of the issue regarding left turn vs right turn, flew heading 0.

Looking at the radar plot, it looks very much as though they turned left and headed 018 degrees instead of 180 degrees. That mistake and then ignoring ATC is what caused this whole incident.


Surely any turn instruction issued by a radar controller, (anywhere), should include the direction of the turn as well as the desired heading?
It's basic stuff, really.

Most people heading 090 on being told to turn left heading 180, would query "confirm left heading 180?", and if ATC did require a left turn onto 180, they would normally say something like "left left heading 180" to indicate it was an unusual direction to turn for that kind of heading change.

However, whatever happened, EVA015 proceded to head 018 degrees and ignored all further orders to turn until it got serious in terms of terrain closure. With the EGPWS going off, and the exasperated controller saying "EVA015, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" and telling them to turn southbound. the penny finally dropped and EVA015 probably then realised that they were in big trouble and started actually obeying ATC.

[flyhigh85]

I have flown to LAX several times and other major US airports and I totally agree with you. In very busy airspaces like those they should stick to ICAO phraseology to avoid missunderstandings and unnecessary RT congestions because your respond is "say again". We always mention ATC as a threat going into LAX. It also feels odd when you are number 3 or 4 in the line going in and you are cleared to land!

[EstorilM]

Forgive me if I missed it, since I'm on my phone.

I feel like I've heard terrain mentioned on ATC transcripts before?

Such as "EVA015 expedite right turn, heading 270 for terrain clearance" or something like that? I obviously have essentially nadda comms experience, but I feel like I've heard that on accident tapes or general ATC recordings.

[AerocatS2A]

I heard a a heavy out of Melbourne being told "Expedite climb, terrain!" by ATC. So, yeah it happens.

[ATC Watcher]

uplinker ;
the penny finally dropped and EVA015 probably then realised that they were in big trouble
I normally do not comment on such posts , but yours since the beginning of this thread show very poor understanding of ATC and R/T communications . Why don't you read an learn for a while instead of posting things like his.

[172_driver]

I have flown to LAX several times and other major US airports and I totally agree with you. In very busy airspaces like those they should stick to ICAO phraseology to avoid missunderstandings and unnecessary RT congestions because your respond is "say again". We always mention ATC as a threat going into LAX. It also feels odd when you are number 3 or 4 in the line going in and you are cleared to land!

Sounds like someone who hasn't flown much in the US and simply isn't used to American ATC. I am not native but flew in the US for over 3 years. Once you get the hang of it their ATC is superiorly efficient, imho. However, like driving in the UK, there may be little room for the ones that underperform. Like EVA showed in this case. It's all about what you are used to...
I think it's much better to get cleared to land further out without the stress of hanging on the stall warner (not literally) going into LHR, coz you can expect big bollocking if your wheels are to touch the ground before.

[lilflyboy262...2]

172_Driver, Therein lies the problem. "Once you get the hang of their ATC"

A lot of the long haul drivers do not regularly fly to the USA. Being in South East Asia, it is a very real possibility that you only head there a few times a year.
It could also be that they have never been there before. Combine that with a fatigued or underperforming crew member and you have the potential for a big problem.
Standard ICAO phraseology, while maybe a bit more cumbersome than the USA phraseology, will avoid these issues.

[Out Of Trim]

I agree with ATC Watcher...

Uplinker, they were turned left onto heading 180, which is the the long way round via a Northerly track.. Little wonder they got confused. Very poor ATC in my opinion!

[Dorf]

They ignored the first call to turn left to 270, which they read back. No SA.

The controller was definitely sloppy and should have been handling these guys very carefully as SoCal usually does with the marginal english speakers.

The controller shares a good but of the blame, but if the pilots were competent this wouldn't have happened.

[Snakecharma]

Dorf I am not so sure.

She gave them a left turn the long way around to start with which she followed up with a string of rapid fire instructions including a range of level instructions. If indeed the initial instruction had the nose swing through a northerly direction in its way to 180 and she changed the direction of turn in a subsequent instruction then the machine is going to head north(ish) as it changes the direction of turn, something not easily discernible from the radar paint - coupled with a lag in the radar display vs the actual aeroplane and there is scope for a disconnect.

These guys do not have English as a first language and given her voice got higher and louder with each instruction they would be sitting there go "wtf" in their native tongue trying to figure out what the hell she wanted them to do.

If the aeroplane was turning left and then she countermanded the instruction with a right turn then getting a heavy fast jet (I.E. A heavy jet going fast, not a fighter for the pedants) to change direction isn't a snap roll type of thing and if you then add in the possibility (though I thought you would hear it in the background of their radio transmissions) the egpws going ape**** then there is the recipe for a cockup. There is the added question of whether in the 777 the autopilot always goes the shortest way to a heading or whether it goes in the direction the heading knob is turned. I don't know but it wouldn't surprise me if it takes the shortest turn to the selected heading, so to do a long way around turn you have to turn the heading knob slowly(ish) to get nose to within 180 degrees of the assigned heading before dialling in the assigned heading. Throw in some rapid fire instruction and directions of turn with the oddball "southbound" instruction and there is even more complication.

All in all the start of the problem was the first instruction and it unravelled from there.

I have flown in and through most continents and I find the us Atc to be challenging at times because of the rapid fire instructions that are not necessarily standard phraseology. South America is the worst because I can't for the life of me understand the accents at times, Russia is surprisingly good, though for some reason they always sound like they have a bucket over their heads.

I agree SA is important but whether it was the time and place to start the discussion about the direction of turn when they got the initial instruction is debatable, particularly from a cultural and language interpretation perspective.

In some other jurisdictions the **** would have started hitting the fan and not long afterwards a different voice would have come on frequency as the initial controller got stood down.

[crablab]

Although her instructions weren't great, I believe the English proficiency of some foreign pilots has a lot to be desired. I don't think they understood that they were being asked to do, otherwise why would you continue to fly into some mountains instead of turning southbound!?

Interesting that Eva were given a right turn onto 180 which they completely ignored - hence they ended up going into the mountains.

[KelvinD]

crablab: Interesting that Eva were given a right turn onto 180 which they completely ignored
I take it you can show this? The FAA report says differently.
Snakecharma: Spot on. Once you have started turning left (regardless of the nonsensical order), passing through North is going to be certain.
For me, the mystery remains; why was this flight the only one told, repeatedly, to turn "southbound"? I have no doubt a non-English speaking pilot would understand 180 degrees but the term "southbound" over the air may be a different issue. What we don't hear is the conversation on the flight deck that may, for all we know, gone along the lines of "What the hell is she talking about?" Or "left turn to 180? Well, you heard her, that was what she said".

[IcePack]

ATC watcher. Uplinker only made an observation & speculated what the EVA crew thought ATC had said. Yes I expect they suddenly got situational awareness if their EGPWS suddenly responded to the approaching terrain.
As for poor ATC well the USA is pretty lax but not any way the worst. One controller in another part of the world tx: Xxx for your information I have lots of the aeroplanes coming & going all over the place!

[crablab]

I take it you can show this? The FAA report says differently.


It's on the ATC recording that's linked on the first post.
(Unless I'm completely confused and the mountains are not in a northerly direction?)

[Hotel Tango]

crablab

Interesting that Eva were given a right turn onto 180 which they completely ignored - hence they ended up going into the mountains.

In the initial tx from the controller we do not hear whether she said "left" or "right" heading 180. We only hear EVA acknowledge "left" heading 180. The question remains whether she inadvertantly said "left" or if she did mean left as in all the way around. My own experience is that controllers generally, for clarity, add "the long way around" in their tx when giving such turn instructions. 98% of the time LAX traffic departs on westerlies and indeed turn "left" heading 180. There is an outside chance that in a moment of distraction (a great deal goes on simultaneously on a controller position) she did say "left" by habit. This may have confused the EVA. However, the crew should have immediately sought confirmation.

[Ushuaia]

Snakecharmer: spot on.

The initial "stop your climb" instruction came at a critical time. The controller issued contrary instructions to AC at first ("stop your climb, AC; correction, expedite yiour climb AC") and then to EVA "stop your climb!". All in a raised, urgent tone as if to say: imminent collision. Picture the EVA flightdeck: trying to correct the left/right thing then suddenly it's "STOP CLIMB NOW!" Any pilot knows what happens then: you will get the nose down ceratainly, probably to the brief detriment of getting onto the heading. They'd task shed. They would be briefly rattled; anyone would be. And THEN it was turn "left onto 29, correction, 270", towards the AC who they are thinking potential conflict with. "WTF?" they think. Pause. Then "what are you doing, turn southbound now". The shortest way being at that point..... a right turn now. No wonder these guys came back with "left..right..?" at one point.

Very confusing controlling. I have flown into LAX and other US airports a lot and this sort of stuff doesn't surprise me at all. Most of the Yank controllers are excellent; they have to be. But a significant number are too culturally insensitve, lack understanding of what goes on in a flight deck and seem to forget we're all on the same team. Trouble is, half the people's attitude over there is "if you don't like it or can't hack it, don't come here!"

Poor language skills by EVA, yes, but this is primarily an ATC problem all of their own making.

P.S. Please: every pro pilot knows a turn onto a heading the "wrong way round", is certainly not unusual. Off 06 or 07 in LAX and a left turn onto 180 deserves some extra confirmation, sure, but its not wrong, as such. I have routinely departed LAX from 24L and made LEFT turns initially before heading out to the north, north-east, to Vegas and beyond. Doesn't seem logical but its all about traffic flow. Now these guys read back the initial "left 180", providing the controller a opportunity to correct either her initial, erroneous instruction or EVA's misunderstanding of the turn direction, and she didn't take it. It all started at that point and went downhill with the poor controlling thereafter. Thank God its really only bruised egos....

[JumpJumpJump]

Hotel Tango
My own experience is that controllers generally, for clarity, add "the long way around" in their tx when giving such turn instructions.

Thank you for this observation, as a Pilot and the owner/teacher of an English for aviation language school this is good to know, the rest of the message (below isnt't aimed at Hotl Tango... Just some observations..

With my students, in all classes we run a section about RT used in the United States, which is for my students to have a broader knowledge of how the USA breaks from the norms of most of the rest of the world. As a commercial pilot based in Brazil you will find that a lot of your interational flying is done to the USA and, infact ANAC (th Brazilian FAA/CAA or what have ya) have molded there English exam (to some extent) with this in mind. However, I think that it is absolutely fundamental that when my students leave to take their exams that I can sleep at night in the knowledge that they have received more than just enough education to perform, that they understand that infact, ICAO 4 is far from perfect and while I can not cover every eventuality in the time that we have, the student will certainly continue to consider and study the many differences that exist between reality and standard RT in the States. When I have the time, I will start another thread on this... However, ANAC here in Brazil are now actively lobbying and petitioning the USA to improve and starndardize its phraseology to be inline with (most of) the rest of the world.

With regards to the quoted text, I actually just called a student, who is a commercial pilot for a blue airline here in Brazil, a 10k + hours captain, who has just received level 5.... When I asked him to readback and then to explain the message "turn soutbound, the long way around" after explaining that he was currently climbing through 6000 and heading 030...... The read back was a tongue twister, he mumbled long as something between long and wrong - he was also unable to explain in Portuguese exactly what the controller wanted him to do.... Setting him up in the same position and saying... turn left heading 180.... there were no problems at all, both the read back, and his explanation of the situation were perfect.

[Bestcontracttill...]

Took off easterly,a bit b4 Eva that day, in not your typical sunny LA weather with winds up to say 7000' being no factor for the climb(in a 74-4 just below max TOM).
Of course a direct track overhead Mount Wilson after t/o was no option, even with a slats extended climb and 250kts.

Having flown a mix off meds and heavies it strikes me how often ATC seems to have no clue of the ac performance, especially in areas like SA(Quito-Bogota, although Quito is getting much better).

Was just wondering how much training our ATC colleague's get in ac performance.

Any ATC lads/ladies who can enlighten?

[framer]

Saying " the long way around" is a classic example of where the US controllers go wrong as evidenced by JumpJumpJump 's story. If you want someone to be confident that the instruction is indeed meant to be 'the long way around' you simply say " turn left, left heading one eight zero".
There is so much extra jargon and unnecessary words used in the transmissions that it is no wonder the frequencies are often more congested than they otherwise would be.
I'm not excusing the Eva crew but the ATC was atrocious.

[Uplinker]

uplinker ;
Quote:
the penny finally dropped and EVA015 probably then realised that they were in big trouble
I normally do not comment on such posts , but yours since the beginning of this thread show very poor understanding of ATC and R/T communications . Why don't you read an learn for a while instead of posting things like his.

Ha ha ha, ATC Watcher; that is priceless ! My comments in this thread refer to the ATC recording on the youtube link given in the first post, which I have listened to about 5 times. Perhaps I have missed something?

For what it is worth, I have 16 years commercial passenger flying experience, including 10 years flying heavy twin jets (A330) longhaul across the Atlantic to the USA, Canada, and the Caribbean. I have spent thousands of hours listening to and responding to ATC instructions, including some truly atrocious ATC in the Middle East, India and SE Asia.

The incident on this tape has some mistakes from both sides, but the first one and the majority of the others are made by EVA015. We don't hear whether ATC said 'left' in her original instruction, but that is immaterial. Given 180 degrees from a heading of 090 one would query a plain "left" instruction. But they did not query it and neither did they turn onto 180 degrees - they turned north (I reckon onto 018 degrees) !!

This put them into conflict with the Air Canada 788, who was minding his own business, following the GABRE SID, and the controller then had to rapidly prevent an airprox, by stopping the EVA015 from climbing, and telling AC788 to expedite their climb to 12,000'.

Yes, she starts to sound concerned and trips over herself a couple of times but faced with EVA015 being in completely the wrong place, approaching the AC788 and ignoring all her instructions, who wouldn't? Having got AC788 safely out of the way, she climbs EVA015 as she sees he is heading for Mount Wilson. She is not up to the extremely high standard of UK London TMA controllers, but the instructions she issues sound clear to me, and I would not characterize her performance as "atrocious", far from it.

I did wonder if EVA015 had suffered a compass malfunction, but they do eventually turn onto 180 degrees, so presumably not.

[JumpJumpJump]

Uplinker
Yes, she starts to sound concerned and trips over herself a couple of times but faced with EVA015 being in completely the wrong place, approaching the AC788 and ignoring all her instructions, who wouldn't? Having got AC788 safely out of the way, she climbs EVA015 as she sees he is heading for Mount Wilson. She is not up to the extremely high standard of UK London TMA controllers, but the instructions she issues sound clear to me, and I would not characterize her performance as "atrocious", far from it.

I don't think that at any point the pilots were "ignoring" her instructions. Misunderstanding, misinterpreting or NOT understanding, maybe... but at no point was the controller being ignored.

Atrocious is a strong word, I agree, however.... Both parties were operating within the bounds of their respective licences. The EVA pilot must have at least ICAO level 4, if not his flight plan out of his home country wouldn't have been approved, the controller is also qualified and was operating under the rules and norms of her own country..... And therein we find the problem.

It is largely irrelevant that that clip clips the initial instruction from the controller as the controller had a final chance to spot the left turn was being initiated when the pilot readback "Turn left heading 180". RT communications should be a similar process as establishing who has control control... I have control > you have control > I have control...... in this sense should be.... Pass instruction > Readback > Listen to readback to assure that the readback was correct and that the pilot has understood the message.... or to assure that your first transmission was correct. So depending on the initial message, what we should have had here should have been either...

ATC: turn left heading 180
EVA: Turn left heading 180

or

ATC: turn left heading 180
Eva: turn left heading 180
ATC: Eva, Correction, turn right heading 180
EVA: Turn right heading 180

or

ATC: Turn right heading 180
Eva: Turn left heading 180
ATC: Negative EVA, I say again, turn Right heading 180
ATC: Turn right heading 180

Situation 1, would have led to a situation similar to what happened, but would have been resolved faster with the continued use of standard RT.

Situation 2 would have been a non-event.

Situation 3 would have been a non-event.

What will need to be addressed as an outcome of this event is whether or not the English Language Exam in the pilots state is sufficiently good fr international operations and whether or not US RT is sufficient for foreign pilots operating in the USA. It would also be worth noting the amount of time since the pilots took their English tests and whether or not sufficient time had passed since any language training was given in which the pilots would have suffered a decline in their language skills. However, I am still willing to say that the major factor here was the American system, and that further cross cultural training and a tightening of the US standard RT system MUST be given, whilst I think that this must be rolled out at all stations across the nation, it should DEFINATELY be improved upon at all centers and at all TMAs of international airports. This wasn't necessarily the direct fault of the individuals involved.

[ATC Watcher]

Uplinker:
jumpx3 is very kind with you to explain how it normally works, , and he is 100% correct .
I am however a bit puzzled by 2 points in your reply : I have 16 years commercial passenger flying experience, including 10 years flying heavy twin jets (A330) longhaul
and
I did wonder if EVA015 had suffered a compass malfunction,
Not really compatible I would say.

[c.j.shrimpton]

JumpJumpJump

Well said. I would also add:-

Eva: Request high speed.
ATC: Negative. Do not exceed 250kts.

A stupid request from EVA whist still tracking away from destination, foolishly granted by ATC. Allowing the A/C to increase speed during a large turn only complicates her task to get the A/C eventually tracking towards its destination.

ATC: EVA, What are you doing?

Even the French "say edding" would have been better!

Always was such a welcome sound - that first contact with Scottish or Shannon control after a trip across the pond.

[Back2Final]

When I turn aircraft the long way around:" EVA15 it will be a left turn on course today, turn left heading 180". I also only give the non English types one instruction at a time. May take a few extra transmissions but you save time not having them asking to confirm something or a long winded reply. With the US not being responsible for errors in read backs, I sometimes wonder if they pay attention or if they are already onto the next task in their mind. And did I hear correctly she assigned an altitude with a frequency change and didn't receive a read back? Seemed like an accident/incident waiting to happen.

[physicus]

All Boeing products afaik turn in the direction closest to the HDG target in AP HDG mode. So to turn left to 180 from 90, you would need to turn the heading bug left to 350ish degrees, wait until close, then continue the knobbing left to 180. But I don't suspect any of us know what AFS lateral mode they were in. Likely HDG mode, but we don't know.

[Hotel Tango]

Some observations:

I have watched movements on FR24 prior to this incident. Runway change took place just after midnight (local time), about 1 hr and 15 mins prior to EVA15's departure. During all this time every southerly departure turned right onto 090 followed by a further right turn heading 180. There were no left (all the way around) vectors for any previous departures. Furthermore with the ACA departing off 06R it is incomprehensible that EVA would have been given a deliberate clearance to turn left all the way around as this would have immediately created a conflict with ACA (as it in fact transpired).

So, again it comes down to the unheard (by us) initial tx by the controller. And indeed, as mentioned by Uplinker, the EVA initially turned left and flew on a heading of approximately 018. So, did they hear "left heading 180" and, instead of confirming with ATC, put the emphasis on left and decided "oh she must mean 018"? Who knows?

The official transcript will in time shed more light. What was said on the F/D will also be of interest, but that will probably never be known.

[Airbubba]

All Boeing products afaik turn in the direction closest to the HDG target in AP HDG mode. So to turn left to 180 from 90, you would need to turn the heading bug left to 350ish degrees, wait until close, then continue the knobbing left to 180. But I don't suspect any of us know what AFS lateral mode they were in. Likely HDG mode, but we don't know.

I was thinking maybe the Boeings turned in whatever direction the heading bug went for a turn of more than 180 degrees. In other words, if you start cranking the heading to the left, the plane banks left and will not reverse turn direction if you continue turning the heading knob more than 180 degrees from the current heading.

But, I'm not sure. Some of this detail stuff on the avionics and automation is 'pin selectable' like the single cue or crosshairs flight director. And some of the autoflight behavior is subtly different with with different engine and airframe combinations.

So I do exactly what you describe, walk the heading bug around keeping it less than 180 degrees from the aircraft's passing heading.

And indeed, as mentioned by Uplinker, the EVA initially turned left and flew on a heading of approximately 018. So, did they hear "left heading 180" and, instead of confirming with ATC, put the emphasis on left and decided "oh she must mean 018"? Who knows

I'm trying to think if I've ever had a heading like 018 (other than maintain runway heading) given for vectors in airline flying. If that's what I thought we heard, like everyone here says, I would question and confirm.

Also, is there an ICAO ATC phrase that implies 'turn the long way around'?

[JumpJumpJump]

FAA Order 7110.65—the ATC handbook—lays out the vectoring toolbox in section 5-6-2. Let’s roll with the basics: “FLY HEADING (degrees).” The controller wants you to turn to the assigned heading, but which direction should you turn? The Pilot/Controller Glossary’s Fly Heading entry says, “The pilot is expected to turn in the shorter direction to the heading unless otherwise instructed by ATC.” If you’re heading 089, and ATC says “Fly heading 270”, you’ll make your turn to the left. If there’s ever any ambiguity—for instance, if you’re flying 090 degrees and ATC wants a 270-degree heading—verify the direction with the controller.

If ATC indeed needs the turn in a certain direction, they’ll employ the second tool: “TURN LEFT/RIGHT HEADING (degrees).” Let’s say you’re heading 089 degrees again and need a westbound turn, but off your left wing there’s an obstacle or traffic. “Turn right heading 270” ensures you make that turn in a safe direction. If the direction is truly critical or the turn direction is counterintuitive, controllers may add extra emphasis, such as, “Turn right—again, turn right—heading 270.”

[Ian W]

<<<SNIP>>>

Also, is there an ICAO ATC phrase that implies 'turn the long way around'?

The phrase "Long way round" is in many aviation phraseology collations.

Photocopiable Glossary of Aviation Terms Word Definition and examples Resolution | Toni Lazarovski - Academia.edu (http://www.academia.edu/14915127/Photocopiable_Glossary_of_Aviation_Terms_Word_Definition_and _examples_Resolution)

Normally, repeating 'left' twice is sufficient with emphasis on one of the left's is sufficient: "Left, left, heading 180" -- this avoids the query: "XXX confirm left180?"

Adding 'the long way round' is also common for the same reason and just avoids the potential queries or worse a direct right turn despite saying "left". "Left, left the long way round, heading 180"

[Sailvi767]

When I turn aircraft the long way around:" EVA15 it will be a left turn on course today, turn left heading 180". I also only give the non English types one instruction at a time. May take a few extra transmissions but you save time not having them asking to confirm something or a long winded reply. With the US not being responsible for errors in read backs, I sometimes wonder if they pay attention or if they are already onto the next task in their mind. And did I hear correctly she assigned an altitude with a frequency change and didn't receive a read back? Seemed like an accident/incident waiting to happen.

I keep hearing in posts here that in the US controllers have no read back responsibilities. That is not true. They are required to monitor and correct a bad readback and face discipline if they miss a bad readback. What is true in the US is that as a pilot if you read back a clearance wrong and the controller fails to catch the error it does not absolve you from possible FAA action.

[Hotel Tango]

I'm trying to think if I've ever had a heading like 018 (other than maintain runway heading) given for vectors in airline flying. If that's what I thought we heard, like everyone here says, I would question and confirm.

I totally agree that a radar vector to 018 just wouldn't happen. However, we just don't know what they were thinking. There may even have been a difference of opinion being "discussed" on the F/D, with the captain insisting on his interpretation.

[Denti]

All Boeing products afaik turn in the direction closest to the HDG target in AP HDG mode

Thats a behaviour i have only seen in very old 737 classics. Even in newer classics and all NGs i have flown the AP/FD followed the direction one turned the bug, happily for a 360 degree turn. However, if one selects the bug first while in another lateral mode and then presses the HDG button the AP turns the shortest way.

That might however be a pin programmable thing.

[ZOA ATC]

:ouch: [QUOTE=Right Way Up;9615850]US ATC are not obligated to check readbacks and challenge.


ATC is definitely required to listen to and correct readbacks. If we for example issue a descent to FL 330 and it is acknowledged with a readback of "descend and maintain FL 230" we are now responsible to the same extent as if we had issued the descent to FL 230. On rare occasions I have seen the FAA try to also fault the flight crew, but without fail if a loss of separation of any sort occurs we will be considered at fault.

[ZOA ATC]

[QUOTE=Hotel Tango;9615777]We don't actually hear her turn instructions (did she say left or right?).

Has anyone seen an actual transcript? If so do you have a link for it?

I'm curious if the controller did issue a turn direction. She certainly missed a readback that clearly says turn left which she is absolutely responsible to hear and correct. From the tapes though you cannot hear her issue a turn direction. She had lots of opportunities to help correct the entire situation and failed completely to do so. Just curious about the actual first clearance though

[henra]

I don't think I'd go with "entire", but would say this thread seems to be fixated on radio terminology (which I can say is a pet peeve of this forum after reading it for more than a few years) and largely ignoring the fact that the crew was told to get to heading 180, and acknowledged that, and regardless of the issue regarding left turn vs right turn, flew heading 0.


Thanks!
I thought I was missing something because everyone was so fixated on the "Southbound" Radio stuff.
And I was wondering what on Earth was so complicated in understanding Heading 180, Turn Southbound plus knowing that closely North of LA since Thousands of Years there has been a huge Mountain range with lowest Elevations ~8000ft and chances are that won't have changed over Night.

Yes the comms were surely less than ideal. But I expect from Airline Pilots a minimum Situational Awareness. In this case it is so fundamentally clear that they were completely lacking any SA .
Normally I'm not happy if they hang the Pilots to dry as a PR measure. In this case I would support this. I surely wouldn't want to have these guys in the Cockpit of a plane I fly with.

[RexBanner]

I totally agree that a radar vector to 018 just wouldn't happen.

Precisely. ATC only work in five degree heading increments. A fact that is lost on many pilots who (for instance) report heading of 347 instead of common sense rounding to the nearest heading (345) which is all ATC are interested in anyway. Sorry to thread drift a little with one of my bugbears though.

Regardless of the lack of SA of the EVA crew (and that is clear) how can the controller escape censure for the way she dealt with this incident? Ambiguous instructions and, when clear that a lack of understanding has taken place, she continues to rabbit those same instructions in a frustrated tone in the expectation that something is going to change.

[Hotel Tango]

ZOA ATC, No, there is no official transcript released as yet.

[RedBullGaveMeWings]

I read somewhere the controller has been suspended. Is it true?

[aterpster]

RedBullGaveMeWings:

I read somewhere the controller has been suspended. Is it true?

Reassigned to desk duty according to the Los Angeles Times. Article attached.

[Uplinker]

Uplinker:
jumpx3 is very kind with you to explain how it normally works, , and he is 100% correct .
I am however a bit puzzled by 2 points in your reply :
Quote:
I have 16 years commercial passenger flying experience, including 10 years flying heavy twin jets (A330) longhaul
and
Quote:
I did wonder if EVA015 had suffered a compass malfunction,
Not really compatible I would say.

Hello ATC Watcher. I am sorry to have caused you puzzlement. So far, your contribution to this thread has mostly been regarding the 250 Kts below FL100 rule, and having a go at me. I wonder if you have actually read my posts carefully or just skimmed them? And have you listened carefully to the ATC tape? Judging by your attacks, it would seem that I am missing something obvious, so I would be interested to know what your theory is as to why EVA015, on being told "turn....[something].......heading 180", actually turned north and kept a heading just east of north all the way until it got to Mount Wilson?

I am very familiar with being given heading turns of more than 180 degrees, and in that event ATC usually says something like "left, left onto heading xxx degrees", or "all the way round to heading xxx", or " the long way round to heading xxx". If they don't, then I or my colleague will query the turn direction, just to be sure.

You dismiss my suggestion of a compass malfunction : Was it a Korean 747-400 that crashed out of Stansted UK whose PFD1 malfunctioned and the F/O did not query or take control out of apparent cultural deference to the Captain but just watched as the Captain followed his failed PFD and banked into the ground?

I completely agree; being given a heading of 018 degrees by ATC is most unlikely - they would say 015, or 020. I am merely trying to understand why EVA015 headed just east of north after being given a heading of 180? Was PF dyslexic or confused?

As far as EVA015 ignoring instructions; Well judging by ATC's comments and looking at the graphic:- after his initial incorrect turn, he did not act on any of the heading changes given by ATC until he got to Mount Wilson. That seems to me to be ignoring instructions. Had he not understood the instructions, then why did he not query them?

.

[Airbubba]

Precisely. ATC only work in five degree heading increments. A fact that is lost on many pilots who (for instance) report heading of 347 instead of common sense rounding to the nearest heading (345) which is all ATC are interested in anyway. Sorry to thread drift a little with one of my bugbears though.

That's a new one on me, not saying that you are wrong. What do you do if the controller says 'maintain present heading, say heading'? Stay at 347? Or turn to 345? Is this ICAO or FAA? Obviously a turn to anywhere close to a heading of 180 would have prevented a near CFIT in this case.

Was it a Korean 747-400 that crashed out of Stansted UK whose PFD1 malfunctioned and the F/O did not query or take control out of apparent cultural deference to the Captain but just watched as the Captain followed his failed PFD and banked into the ground?

Actually, the 1999 KE crash out of Stansted was a steam driven 747-200 freighter, not a -400:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Cargo_Flight_8509

[oicur12.again]

The initial call from atc was turn left hdg xxx. These guys were a heavy crew with a significant cockpit gradient and most likely significant language barriers. It may have been a situation where the senior guy flying was releying on the junior guy using the radio to interperet the instruction. As i have seen before, this situation is a recipe for massive confusion in the cockpit. There may have been 4 guys all yabbering at each other with contradictory information, misunderstanding, concerns about terrain AND tcas traffic from the canucks.

None of us were there but i suspect that cockpit was one hell of a s%#¥ show for several minutes.

[Hotel Tango]

The initial call from atc was turn left hdg xxx.

What is your source? Have you not read any of the previous pages of this thread?

There is at present NO official evidence that the controller said left 180. The only tx heard is the read back from EVA which says "left". I do not consider a newspaper article as official evidence.

[RexBanner]

That's a new one on me, not saying that you are wrong. What do you do if the controller says 'maintain present heading, say heading'? Stay at 347? Or turn to 345? Is this ICAO or FAA?

You maintain heading as instructed and report it as 345. When was the last time you heard any vectors from Air Traffic Control ending in anything other than a zero or five? ATC only work to the nearest five degrees (two degrees difference - which is the most it will ever be provided you've rounded the right way - isn't going to make any difference and in the unlikely event it does, ATC can give you a further heading change). I've had this discussion with controllers many a time.

Epic thread drift, which is what I feared by making the comment in the first place, so apologies!

[donotdespisethesnake]

Flight controller accidentally sends jet on course toward Mt. Wilson after LAX takeoff - LA Times (http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-faa-investigation-plane-wrong-direction-20161220-story.html)
Bound for Taiwan, the EVA Air Boeing 777 took off to the east early Friday from Los Angeles International Airport’s south runway complex, according to FAA spokesman Ian Gregor. After takeoff, the air crew switched from the LAX control tower to the approach control operations in San Diego, which Gregor said was common practice.
“The air traffic controller at the approach control who was handling EVA instructed the pilot to make a left turn to a 180-degree heading,” he said. “She meant to tell the pilot to make a right turn to a 180-degree heading.”
Following the controller’s instructions, the pilot turned left.

[Check Airman]

I'm putting the blame on the pilots here. Yes the controller may have given an initial left turn to 180, but as a pilot, my reply would have been "confirm LEFT turn 180" or (non-std) "left turn 180, long way around". I'd like to think that anyone with a bit of SA would have said something similar.

The only bit of the ATC transmission that didn't make sense to me was the left turn to 270/290- towards ACA788.

On the "southbound" comment, perhaps she used to work at a VFR tower before, but it's quite common RT to hear when handling VFR traffic. "Fly southbound to join the final for runway 9".

On the use of "southbound" vs "180 degrees"- I'm not sure if it's the way they're trained, but I've observed that quite often, when dealing with disoriented pilots, ATC will sometimes revert to cardinal directions. I'd like to think that despite a different culture, "turn south now" is pretty clear.

Someone else suggested "stop your climb" is ambiguous. I disagree. It isn't at all. If that instruction is given, in my experience ATC needs it done immediately. Just level off wherever you are. How is that ambiguous?

[Airbubba]

You maintain heading as instructed and report it as 345. When was the last time you heard any vectors from Air Traffic Control ending in anything other than a zero or five? ATC only work to the nearest five degrees (two degrees difference - which is the most it will ever be provided you've rounded the right way - isn't going to make any difference and in the unlikely event it does, ATC can give you a further heading change). I've had this discussion with controllers many a time.

Maybe that's how they do it some places but not here in America. ;) If ATC asks you to say heading, you are supposed to give the actual aircraft heading, not the nearest five degrees. If you are asked to say altitude you do round it to the nearest 100 feet if you are climbing or descending, however.

And, if you're given runway heading on runway 4, you maintain the actual mag heading of the runway centerline, e.g. 044, not 040.

Hope this helps. :ok:

[COflyer]

Language/phraseology may have been a contributing factor, but the EVA crew were largely at fault here. They were not situationally aware and turned North toward terrain without clearance and ignored repeated ATC requests to turn right to a heading of 180.

[Ushuaia]

They were NOT repeatedly told to turn right unless we are listening to different tapes.

They were told to turn LEFT, then RIGHT, then STOP THE CLIMB!, then turn LEFT. Thereafter they were told repeatedly turn SOUTHBOUND. Repeatedly.

They didnt know which direction the controller wanted them to turn to achieve that! There's been a near miss as far as they know and the last direction given was LEFT. So they hesitated.

Poor SA on the crew's part re terrain, yes, but the controller really blew the thing up with the "LEFT ONTO 29... CORRECTION 270 " followed by "TURN SOUTHBOUND"

She managed to use the word RIGHT with the other callsigns on frequency, but not with EVA when they needed it most. Just SOUTHBOUND, SOUTHBOUND. "Which WAY do you want us to turn to achieve southbound?" these guys were thinking in two languages. You hear the confusion when they say "LEFT...RIGHT?"

[henra]

They were told to turn LEFT, then RIGHT, then STOP THE CLIMB!, then turn LEFT. Thereafter they were told repeatedly turn SOUTHBOUND. Repeatedly.


Sorry but the Key Instruction they were given is "180" and "Southbound". REPEATEDLY. What part of 180 is so difficult to understand?
The 1? The 8? Or the 0?
Turn Left to 180 would have meant a 270° turn to the left towards 180°. What on Earth made them go for a Course 0? I haven't seen any request in that direction.

What is so difficult to understand in "Southbound"?? How many "South's" did they have on their Compass?

Yes, the Controller delivered a less than stellar performance, much less than stellar and surely initiated some confusion.



But the real major :mad: Up was clearly by the Crew.
I absolutely expect an Airline Pilot to be able to distinguish between Course 0 and 180. And I expect him not to mentally fall apart as soon as anything goes a little bit different than expected.

[Ushuaia]

Sorry but the Key Instruction they were given is "180" and "Southbound". REPEATEDLY. What part of 180 is so difficult to understand?
.......

What is so difficult to understand in "Southbound"?? How many "South's" did they have on their Compass?
......

The difficulty/confusion was the DIRECTION OF TURN to get there. Left? Or right? Left is towards traffic they have just been told STOP CLIMB! for and Right is towards high ground - and they've been levelled off.

The controller has told us to turn LEFT then RIGHT then LEFT. Which way does she bloody-well want us to turn to get southbound? The most recent direction was left - does she mean go that way? Or the more direct way which is right?

When faced with two diametrically-opposed options, the human reaction is often to do nothing. Human Factors stuff. You need to clarify, and do so quickly.

Can you blokes truly not put yourself in that cockpit and picture this confusion?

I have 15,000 hours of 744/767/737 experience and I can picture this - how one insidious mistake is compounded by further factors and the whole thing can go pearshaped in a matter of minutes.

I really do wonder about the real world flying experience of some of the Monday morning quarterbacks around here who assert that this was primarily the crew's fault. Walk a mile in his shoes, etc etc

[henra]

The controller has told us to turn LEFT then RIGHT then LEFT. Which way does she bloody-well want us to turn to get southbound? The most recent direction was left - does she mean go that way? Or the more direct way which is right?



Then ask the bloody question but don't continue in a direction with a known huge accumulation of big Cumulu Granitus and in opposite direction to the Course given by ATC, FFS.


How did they end up with Course 0 instead of 180 in the first place? And that was long before Left, Right...

[aterpster]

henra:

Yes, the Controller delivered a less than stellar performance, much less than stellar and surely initiated some confusion.

She immensely compounded her incorrect instruction by focusing on separation of EVA from Air Canada. She did this to exclusion of terrain clearance, which she permits to become a near fatal event. KLAX is only 125 feet above sea level. It is only 23 miles to terrain and obstacles nearly 7,000 feet above sea level. It is only 18 miles to the point where the minimum vectoring altitude (MVA) is higher than EVA's achieved altitude. Keep in mind he had ask for and been granted a "high speed climb" (which is not an approved ATC procedure in the U.S.)

In any case, she became fixated on airplane-to-airplane separation to the exclusion of the pending rising terrain disaster. Once EVA entered the MVA area of 7,700 that surrounds Mt. Wilson, the controller became a passenger. She may have well been in the lunch room for all the good she could do by that point. It's a no-mans land when she has an airplane some 2,000 feet below MVA. Yes, she has an emergency map called the Emergency Obstacle Video Map (EOVM), which provides only 300 feet of obstacle clearance, but which does not have the resolution or fidelity to avoid a ridge line or a massive array of tall antennas.

Her blunders, compounded by a much more serous blunder, did not result in a catastrophic aviation disaster essentially only because the dice rolled in her favor.

I've worked with issues of instrument flight procedures and associated terrain clearance issues for many years. MVAs in mountainous areas have always been a very weak link in the safety chain with the FAA. In the year 2016 it is as bad as it was 50 years ago when you factor in a weak air traffic controller and a crew not familiar with the area.

This woman should find another line of work. But, the FAA will simply decertify her, send her to Oklahoma City for remedial training, then she will be back at the scopes.

And, the "cops" will have by then finished their investigation of themselves. (No conflict of interest there.)

[henra]

This woman should find another line of work.



I absolutely agree. She seemed to be not up to the task from a mental strength perspective.
She quickly collapsed with a situation that started with a small lapse. From tiny Error to full panic mode within a few seconds and with no immediate danger present. Someone working in ATC at an Airport like LAX needs to be much much more resilient and stress resistant. Something which can't be fixed with a little bit more training.



But, the FAA will simply decertify her, send her to Oklahoma City for remedial training, then she will be back at the scopes.



Hopefully not. Maybe she gets the hint by herself that this profession isn't for her.

[golfyankeesierra]

This woman should find another line of work
I absolutely don't agree; she did not turn up at work to do a bad job.
She wouldn't be there in the first place if she weren't a first class controller anyway.
But I agree that she did mess up big time!
So I would like to repeat my post of 5 days ago on this thread:

Perhaps she was having a bad day, perhaps it was the end of a long day.. (we have all been there, done that..)
But!
Safety should not be depending on a single person. Where was the supervisor?
There should be more then one layer of cheese.. This looks to me like a fault in the system; going to be an interesting investigation and a very interesting read HF wise...
A lot to learn here (again), pilots and controllers alike..


There would be a lot more smoking holes if we were in the cockpit alone..
Where was her backup? :=

[Bedder believeit]

Forty plus years ATC here, Sydney, Dubai, Kai Tak, Chek Lap Kok, and it never ceased to amaze me how many of my ATC colleagues from North America that I worked with, somehow managed to get things confused. Culturally many of them could not flatten down the Americanisation of their personalities to Keep It Simple Stupid. Now before I'm jumped on, I did use the word "Many" and I did not use the word "all". I'll also add that the "good" North Americans were very good. That sheila was bloody hopeless.

[Airbubba]

I'll also add that the "good" North Americans were very good.

'North Americans' is often a code phrase for Canadians in my experience. It doesn't mean Mexicans. Beware cheap imitations from the Great White North. And never get between a Canadian and a Walmart in the lower 48. ;)

Kinda like when someone says they are a 'pilot with a major airline', it usually means a commuter or freight dog FO. And when they are a 'consultant', it often means that they are between flying jobs. :)

But, mentioning Hong Kong, you can see vast cultural differences in say, the departures out of HKG and those out of LAX, both with significant terrain in the area. We Americans like simplicity in aviation. But I do agree that we need to do much better with our ATC phraseology in the international realm.

This woman should find another line of work. But, the FAA will simply decertify her, send her to Oklahoma City for remedial training, then she will be back at the scopes.

She certainly won't be fired. And, if it is like some cases over on the pilot side, she may be able to get a settlement and be paid not to come back to work.

[RatherBeFlying]

The cockpit crew was understandably confused as to what the controller wanted, especially when the initial compliance to instructions produced a confusing series of contradictory instructions from the controller.

Even native English speaking pilots can have difficulties when a controller pulls something unusual out of the hat - as I have had in my own country.

We don't know yet if terrain considerations were addressed in the cockpit, but it seems they were concerned about traffic .

It would be interesting to throw random selections of PPRuNers into a sim with the ATC tape and score the damage to the antenna farm along with Snitch alarms.

[COflyer]

I guess we are all using the same Real ATC recording from the 1st post on this thread.

From the recording it's unclear why EVA 15 made the left turn northbound, but lets assume for sake of argument that the controller did indeed make an error and issue the left turn the EVA crew confirmed. However, as soon as the controller saw them turn left she issued an unequivocal correction:

SoCal Departure: „..turn right, turn heading 180.„
EVA 15: „Copied, right heading 180, EVA 15 heavy.„
SoCal Departure: „..please expedite your right turn.„
EVA 15: „EVA 15 heavy, roger just passing heading 010, continue right turn heading.„

Pretty clear to me.

But for whatever reason, they didnt continue the turn to 180 as instructed but appear to have maintained their 010 heading setting up the conflict with Air Canada 788 and getting ever closer to terrain.

Why are we blaming the controller?

[Ushuaia]

They didn't continue a turn right, COFlyer, because they were suddenly told "STOP YOUR CLIMB!", closely followed by "TURN LEFT HEADING 29 CORRECTION 270."

[Ushuaia]

I too hope this lady gets back to work soon, as well as the crew if it's true that they were stood down too. I have no doubt they are all proud professionals.

Even the very best people make mistakes. These days we don't simply discard such individuals; we evaluate errors, work out improvements, do retraining and get people back in the saddle if they're up to it. Besides, the system is more than just one individual: they need to look at the what supervision was happening in SOCAL that day, what oversight of "the big picture" was going on. That's more than this one lady.

We are all on the same team; just got to get the team working together and running down the field in the same direction.

[172_driver]

I don't trust the ADS-B plot to perfectly reflect turns. Ian W mentioned that it could be up to 30 sec. (Worst case) before a turn is seen on the radar scope. But it's something like 21 nm, mesaured on Skyvector, from the point where they're heading for Mt. Wilson to Mt. Wilson. What happened during those 21 nm?? Even at 360 kts over the ground, it's 3,5 min. No sign of a turn.

I can agree it would be better by the controller to keep direction of turn to the same direction, as the autopilot (which i am sure was never disconnected) can be quite sluggish.

[Stone69]

This whole " incident " is a fiasco and the controller is not the only one that should be under scrutiny. I think the front end crew didn't have a clue. Why in hell would they allow the speed to be in the 330 to 360 range as they head toward the high ground ( mountain ) .....I seriously doubt they even knew of the high ground until the GPWS started going off....

[henra]

I too hope this lady gets back to work soon, as well as the crew if it's true that they were stood down too. I have no doubt they are all proud professionals.



Hmm, dunno. It is not so much the error made (that was a rather minor one -can happen) that shocks me but the total collapse of structure on both sides following that small hickup.
The pilots seemed to have frozen and merrily continued towards the Mountains on opposite direction to the one given by ATC even after repeated requests to turn even if erratic in detail. All this in a relatively benign (at least initially - they let it become critical by no structured action for several minutes) situation.
The controller got into panic mode a few seconds after she made a minor mistake.
Both showed personality traits that are profoundly worrying in their respective profession. And this cannot simply be fixed by a few hours training. I would not want to think about what all of them would do in a direct emergency situation. Resilience should be a top personality criterion in both professions: Airline Pilot and ATC.

[aterpster]

172 driver:

I don't trust the ADS-B plot to perfectly reflect turns.

No doubt about that. But, it generally shows what happened. The FAA has great data, though, but we will never see it because, alas, the NTSB didn't get involved.

The SoCal TRACON, like all FAA mega-TRACONs has Fusion radar; i.e. all the radars they are using are in a matrix. Their radar recordings are impressive, no doubt. But, since the FAA is investigating itself, those data will not see the light of day.

[DaveReidUK]

I don't trust the ADS-B plot to perfectly reflect turns. Ian W mentioned that it could be up to 30 sec.

ADS-B is not subject to any appreciable delay.

If all the packets it transmits are captured, the resulting plot of the turn will be far more accurate than radar, and as near to real-time as makes no practicable difference.

[172_driver]

Ok, makes it even stranger that an airplane is plotted tracking north for 20 odd miles while repeatedly instructed to turn south.

[aterpster]

172 driver:

Ok, makes it even stranger that an airplane is plotted tracking north for 20 odd miles while repeatedly instructed to turn south.

An Asian crew in disbelief (understandable) and a controller overloaded with only 2 or 3 airplanes in normally quiet airspace at that early morning except for the fact that LAX is east at the time, which requires a better skill set on the part of the controller for the unusual.

[DaveReidUK]

And, if some packets are missed, you do get a few herky jerky turns in areas of poor coverage as the FR24 constant velocity Kalman filter attempts to connect the dots.

No argument there, although I wasn't aware that FR24 used any kind of estimating algorithm other than crude extrapolation and dumb joining-the-dots.

That's why a track on the map is only useful given a sufficient plot density and, preferably, timestamps for each point.

Ironically, given the current context, the worst example I've seen was where FR24 turned a lazy 270 into an instantaneous 90 in the opposite direction ...

[DaveReidUK]

Another plot may be found on this LAX nimby noise page:

WebTrak (http://webtrak5.bksv.com/lax4)

Set the date for 12/16/2016 and the time for 01:19, the local takeoff time of the Eva flight to see the aerial ballet toward the mountains.

Plot from WebTrak, showing both the EVA and Air Canada:

http://www.avgen.com/EVA015.jpg

[Snakecharma]

If you look at webtrack they turned left, turned right (abeam the Montebello label on the map, turned left and then right.

This basically lines up with the various instructions as best I can tell.

[Airbubba]

No argument there, although I wasn't aware that FR24 used any kind of estimating algorithm other than crude extrapolation and dumb joining-the-dots.

I probably got the idea from some of the FR24 forum posts like this one from 'FlightAware Staff':

The current mlat server tracking filter has trouble with things that are maneuvering hard, as you've probably noticed (it's a constant-velocity Kalman filter which works well enough for commercial flights most of the time)

MLAT - This flight is restricted from public view: ADS-B Flight Tracking (http://discussions.flightaware.com/ads-b-flight-tracking-f21/mlat-this-flight-is-restricted-from-public-view-virus1-t36031.html)

This was discussing an mlat plot of maneuvering fighters but it does seem to explain some of the FR24 plotting behavior as the ADS-B coverage gets spotty.

[Uplinker]

If you look at webtrack they turned left, turned right (abeam the Montebello label on the map, turned left and then right.

This basically lines up with the various instructions as best I can tell.

Well.......apart from the fundamental 'heading 180 degrees' instruction !

As pilots, our primary response to any ATC heading instruction is the heading given. If we are told to turn onto a new heading, then that heading is the number one priority, and that 'number' is what we set with the heading knob. If the turn direction is not given or seems illogical or wrong, we will query that turn instruction. BUT we will not ignore the heading given, (as long as we are not being turned directly towards a hazard of course).

EVA015 were given a heading of 180 degrees. The actual turn direction might have been wrong or odd or whatever, but they :

a) failed to query the turn direction, and;
b) failed to turn onto the heading they were given.

They actually maintained a heading which was about 160 degrees opposite to what they were initially told (and read back) - despite repeated instructions to turn - and it could have got them killed. Twice. First with AC788 and again with Mount Wilson.

I still wonder if they had a compass/heading malfunction, because I find it hard to believe that a longhaul B777 crew would ignore such basic instructions otherwise.

[fepate]

I still wonder if they had a compass/heading malfunction, because I find it hard to believe that a longhaul B777 crew would ignore such basic instructions otherwise.
I doubt it. It looks to me more likely that they were about a third of the way through the original left turn to 180 deg when they were told to reverse the direction of turn, which they began, only to be told to reverse the direction yet again (and head 270 deg), which they began, and then told to head southbound to which they tried to query the controller about the direction of turn and got no answer. It is only during that last part that they maintained their present heading (which happened to be north-ish as a result of the previous maneuvers) while they tried to obtain clarification about the direction of turn. After all, it was the controller getting her left and right mixed up that started the whole mess, so they figured direction of turn was important. Had they maintained heading and queried the controller for that first turn, all of this would be averted, so they were just a bit late in doing the right thing.

Anyway, it wasn't their compass, but rather the timing of the controller's instructions that got them going north.

[epc]

EVA015 were given a heading of 180 degrees. The actual turn direction might have been wrong or odd or whatever, but they :

a) failed to query the turn direction, and;
b) failed to turn onto the heading they were given.



You have been repeating the same of line of argument in this thread. FAA spokesman has said the controller meant to say "right" but said "left."

We could hear the EVA crew read back the first "left turn" instruction, and the controller did not correct. So what do you think the EVA pilot should do at this point? Steer left or right or keep chatting on the radio?

Additional tracking data have shown that EVA had initiated turns as instructed, but appeared to have repeatedly been given new directions to turn the opposite way before the current turn was completed.

Towards the end, the controller stopped giving turn directions all together. But, like others have pointed out, after having been given repeated, emphatic instructions for turn direction, the EVA crew could assume by this point that somehow for reasons beyond them that the turn direction was important. Hence the delay to commence the turn to southbound.

If the compass really malfunctioned, how did the flight complete the trip to TPE later?

[aterpster]

Uplinker:

I still wonder if they had a compass/heading malfunction, because I find it hard to believe that a longhaul B777 crew would ignore such basic instructions otherwise.

The 777 doesn't have a compass. It is a highly redundant inertial system (three inertial platforms) that also has mag var tables to convert true heading into magnetic heading when in domestic airspace. These inertial platforms also provide the attitude platform for the airplane. On rare occasions one inertial reference unit (IRU) might fail. In that rare event the airplane only loses triple redundancy.

[Bleve]

These highly redundant inertial systems are not foolproof and if not aligned properly can display incorrect headings. eg:

AirAsia Navigation Error (http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/584093-airasia-flies-melb-instead-kl-navigation-error.html)

[sherburn2LA]

It passed pretty much over the top of my apartment. I was there but don't claim to have heard it.

Here's the LAX Terminal Chart (1:250,000). I have pretty much stopped flying now so it is from 2014 but they had not built any new towers the last time I looked out of my window.

Perhaps some photoshop whizz with a bit of time could superimpose the track to see how close to the towers it was but it looks pretty near to me by eyeball. Maybe a fraction to the South. In the class G for sure.

[aterpster]

Bleve:
These highly redundant inertial systems are not foolproof and if not aligned properly can display incorrect headings. eg:
Gross pilot error combined with a company too cheap to buy the mod from AB that would have prevented that.

EVA obviously did not have that problem as represented by their track to TIA once they got it pointed in the correct direction.

[Snakecharma]

Uplinker, I think you are missing the point.

The aircraft started various turns in response to instructions from Atc.

Give someone a turn through 270 degrees to turn to 180 and the aircraft will, at some point turn through north.

When it is pointing in the northerly direction give it another instruction to turn right and it will head generally north while the angle of bank comes off and the right turn commenced.

Issue another instruction and the right turn comes off and a left turn commenced, all the while the aircraft heads generally northish.

Would an native English speaking crew have handled it differently, possibly, but they weren't put in that position. It was a crew with English as a second (third or fourth) language.

On another point I am not sure what the panic was re air Canada. The webtrack (I don't know how accurate this is) on face value has plenty of vertical separation between the two, despite the various level off instructions given by the controller. The webtrack may not give the complete (or accurate) story but by the time the two aircraft got close there were thousands of feet vertical separation according to the webtrack labels. Davereiduk's screen shot shows that there is close to 6000ft vertically between the two aircraft.

[enola-gay]

Snakecharma has summed it up perfectly IMO.

[Retired DC9 driver]

Snakecharma,
I will make some inquires with a 787 pilot I know in Toronto, and see if he heard what the AC crew saw..re EVA below them. I'm sure they were looking for the other aircraft and had it on their TCAS!

[aterpster]

Retired DC9 Driver:

I will make some inquires with a 787 pilot I know in Toronto, and see if he heard what the AC crew saw..re EVA below them. I'm sure they were looking for the other aircraft and had it on their TCAS!

The chances of a collision was near zero. The controller had been trained to think airplane-to-airplane separation and had only absorbed that into her "priority memory bank." Knowing the ATC facility I am sure they thought they had trained her better,

Alas, she was trapped by the terrain to the north of LAX, which may have been a cursory part of her training.

Damn, this is all pathetic without an NTSB incident investigation.

[HighSpeedAluminum]

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the 270 heading was meant for AC to provide additional separation but the controller was pre-occupied with EVA and gave the wrong aircraft the westerly heading.

[aterpster]

HighSpeedAluminum:

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the 270 heading was meant for AC to provide additional separation but the controller was pre-occupied with EVA and gave the wrong aircraft the westerly heading.

The Ventura 7 SID requires radar vectors.

[DuncanF]

Would an native English speaking crew have handled it differently, possibly, but they weren't put in that position. It was a crew with English as a second (third or fourth) language.
A question for non-native English speakers on PPRuNe ... what would be understood by the colloquialism "southbound"? Granted it contains the word "south", but if you were not familiar with the word, what would "bound" mean to you as an adjunct? And what did these guys take it to mean?

[vmandr]

towards a Southern direction (as ATC instruction), towards the South, 180°

going / heading / travelling / flying / navigating towards and maintaining a Southern direction,
say, from 120° through 240° or from SE to SW roughly.


to me it is clear she wanted them to avoid flying Northbound where the mountains are.

[enola-gay]

"Southbound" is an adjective which describes the direction of a track, such as " southbound M6"

"South" can be an adverb which tells which way a specific motion goes.

So the correct English, whether in California, Cumbria or China is "Turn South" and no one will be confused.

[Hotel Tango]

Or even better, "turn heading south", but preferably with a "right" or "left" after "turn"!

[Mora34]

The way he hesitates reading it back suggests that he's unfamiliar with the word.

[Snakecharma]

Duncan, while the southbound instruction is a bid odd in my opinion it is decipherable, my point was more directed towards the initial instruction to turn left and the language and cultural differences that might have led to the instruction being followed without question, this leading to the problem in the first instance.

Perhaps a native English speaker should have been able to articulate their concern about the turn direction, whereas a crew with essentially procedural English would need to have a conversation on the flight deck.

The additional complication would be the cultural issues associated with questioning authority, if the culture of the crew is such that instructions are adhered to and only questioned under extreme circumstances then there is further room for problems to occur.

I am not suggesting the crew handled it perfectly or even well, but I don't think we can hang the crew given all the circumstances.

[sardak]

Here are 2D and 3D views of the path near Mt Wilson. These are reduced size, links to larger size images at bottom.
http://i.imgur.com/MsGwsWa.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Mo6DGYA.jpg


http://imgur.com/vlBVLbh.jpg
http://imgur.com/SKUY8o8.jpg
http://m2ei.com/EVA_Flight_015/EVA_Flight_015_total_height.kmz

[Airbubba]

Wow. Close indeed. :eek:

Thanks to you and DaveReidUK for the plots. :ok:

WebTrak may be showing the FAA data which is denser than the FR24 .kml file.

At any rate, the data from various sources that I've found is in close agreement, this incident was very nearly a major tragedy.

[HighSpeedAluminum]

Aterpster,

The Ventura 7 SID requires radar vectors.

That is factual but it doesn't address the point i was making.

After ATC corrects their initial error with "right turn, right turn heading 180" which EVA acknowledged "copy, right turn heading 180". Seconds later ATC instructs "expedite your right turn" which was responded with "roger, we are passing heading 010 continue right turn heading". In the next transmission to EVA, ATC instructs "stop your climb" and moments later "turn left, left turn heading 29..correction 270" and EVA responded with "left heading 270".

EVA crew were (albeit with apparent loss of SA) following each ATC instruction without query. The left turn heading 270 interrupted the "expedite right turn" instruction. This second ATC error IMO was meant for Air Canada to provide additional separation. Had that instruction been given to the proper aircraft EVA might likely not have been in the situation they found themselves in.

[Aluminium shuffler]

It appears that the crew failed not only to be aware initially of the terrain to the north, but also failed to respond to the GPWS warnings. Regardless of whatever ATC clearances they were given, they should have been responding much more aggressively to the GPWS. However, that aside, their confusion would have been caused and then compounded by all the contradictory instructions and non-standard phraseology. That was wholly incompetent controlling.

[HighSpeedAluminum]

failed to respond to the GPWS warnings

they should have been responding much more aggressively to the GPWS

I have seen and read what is pictorially depicted above but unless you have the CVR/DFDR data, can anyone be so certain of this?

[gatbusdriver]

I didn't hear the EGPWS during any of their transmissions, although not to say it didn't happen.

[Aluminium shuffler]

Highspeedaluminium, if you look at the charts of their track and the terrain and obstacles, then the EGPWS would have been going nuts. Their terrain clearance was minimal judging by the data on those charts, and if accurate, then they must have merely followed ATC instructions and ignored the GPWS.

[HighSpeedAluminum]

You are using information (in this thread) to suggest they narrowly missed antenna, terrain etc...and then conclude that they "IGNORED" GPWS warnings?
Case closed!

[aterpster]

Using the FlightRadar24 .kml file (which is all we will ever see about this incident) and plotting it on 1:24,000 topo maps I see a distinct possibility they were paralleling Mt. Wilson flying east, and above the terrain off to their left, but possibly level with the main array of antennas. If their EGPWS did not have "peaks and obstacles" it is possible their EGPWS never went off. But, EVA isn't talking and the FAA's precise radar tracks will never be released to the public.

[unobtanium]

A question for non-native English speakers on PPRuNe ... what would be understood by the colloquialism "southbound"? Granted it contains the word "south", but if you were not familiar with the word, what would "bound" mean to you as an adjunct? And what did these guys take it to mean?
When faced with an unfamiliar term, the natural tendency is to directly translate each word. It is easy to translate word for word, but meaning can be lost in translation.

Not made any easier with beeping cockpit warnings and an ATC lady shouting at you in Americanglish.

[ATC Watcher]

Highspeedaluminium You are using information (in this thread) to suggest they narrowly missed antenna, terrain etc...and then conclude that they "IGNORED" GPWS warnings?Case closed!
+1
This tread is going nowhere and I am surprised it still goes on. Trial and mobbing by internet.
For those waiting for a CVR transcript , as the flight continued to destination I doubt you will ever see it ..but that said. today with smartphones , everything is possible...
Rest assured that Eva Air will investigate , and probably send the FAA a nice letter. The guys running the airline OPS are very good and quite sharp.

As to the " southbound" calls , this would have probably been queered and understood in a normal no-stress situation. But here the lady first confused the crew by mixing up instructions, then lost it when spotting the potential conflict with ACA, , then shouted , words like " What are you doing? " and her repeated " turn Southbound" calls. confusing even more the crew.
A simple call " EVA turn right heading 180" at any time during the event would have solved the problem.
That is the lesson to be learnt here , used standard phraseology, the more so when in an emergency situation . She could have even added " expedite" . nothing else.

I bet you the lady will go back to the sim with a few reminders , something will be learnt out of that one for everybody else in San Diego and it will be a bit safer for everybody as a result.

[West Coast]

This tread is going nowhere

Honestly, where do you expect the thread to go? This is typical of every other similar thread, pilots (and often times, non pilots) minus the relevent data to do so attempt to play judge, jury and executioner.

[MrSnuggles]

DuncanF

A question for non-native English speakers on PPRuNe ... what would be understood by the colloquialism "southbound"?

With all the usual disclaimers about me being a non-pilot, although very familiar with the common spoken language etc, I would absolutely imagine myself being confused by this word in a moderately stressed situation where directions are of the essence.

A native Swedish speaker, I would have no problems with the "south" part of the expression, but I can easily see that the part "bound" would have me reaching for the more dwindling parts of my brain. "Bound" is part of the verb "to bind" which would make me hesitate for those extra seconds about the meaning of this instruction. While I have heard the word "southbound" before it is always in the context of "he is going southbound on the M4" that is, the person is already travelling in the south direction.

"Southwards" would be easier for me as a Swede to associate with an instruction to turn south because I am currently heading in the wrong (that is, north) direction. The use of "wards" is the same as in "towards" and thus is easier to understand for me.

These chaps were Asian and I do not know how much this might have affected their thinking. Usual disclaimers about Indo-European (esp. Germanic) vs Asian languages apply.

[framer]

That is the lesson to be learnt here , used standard phraseology, the more so when in an emergency situation
I agree but....... To use standard phraseology when stress levels are high you have to have been using it regularly during normal ops, so the lesson is to use standard phraseology all the time without the verbiage.

[Sunamer]

southbound is a confusing word, when you dont know its meaning, despite the fact that part of the word is recognizable. If a person does not know what the whole word means, disecting it might not help. I remember when I first time encountered it it was the name of the song and I had to look it up. Even though I suspected that it meant direction of some sort. And I wasnt preoccupied with some afterTO routine.
Every new word even among other familiar onces might throw you off because you realize that i might mean something completely opposite to what you think it would mean.

[thwipt]

MrSnuggles

“Bound” is part of the verb “to bind” which would make me hesitate for those extra seconds about the meaning of this instruction.

Except that in this case, it isn’t. The “bound” in “the train bound for somewhere”, or “homeward bound” or “south-bound” is an independent adjective that originally means ready (i.e. in a state of readiness), and has an etymology which has nothing to do with the verb bind.

Which I think only reinforces your point that it could cause even an advanced English speaker to hesitate if they weren’t familiar with the phrase!

[ATC Watcher]

framer To use standard phraseology when stress levels are high you have to have been using it regularly during normal ops, so the lesson is to use standard phraseology all the time without the verbiage.
Good point . Absolutely agree.
I am curious if the FAA as a whole , and not only in San Diego, will use this incident to change their ATC training syllabus, especially in their refresher courses.

[aterpster]

ATC Watcher:

The more likely conclusion is that this particular controller was not performing to present FAA standards. A lady friend of mine who is a former center controller listened to the tape. Her comment was "lazy controlling." She said she worked alongside a couple of those, which drove her up the wall. She added they were both "white boys" so the fact the controller at issue is apparently black is irrelevant.

[horizon flyer]

Yes as native English speakers it would not be confusing although its meaning is contextual as bound has several meanings from how you run, tied up with rope or travel plus others.

I have always found when teaching people with English as a second language always be direct stick to a standard set of words for understanding, even if bad English, no hidden meanings. So agree standard phraseology is the best and safest.

ATC is not there to pass the time of day. Clear consistent English to a known set standard that's why takeoff and departure are used now as 500+ died due to the mix up over takeoff.

The question do we expect the USA to change ? Don't expect so they have a very poor concept of what they call Aliens. Their cabin crew and airports are terrible when dealing with international travellers, I know of people who travel the opposite way round the world to avoid passing through a US airport, so don't expect ATC to change they just don't get what the problem is.

[aterpster]

horizon flyer:

The question do we expect the USA to change ? Don't expect so they have a very poor concept of what they call Aliens. Their cabin crew and airports are terrible when dealing with international travellers, I know of people who travel the opposite way round the world to avoid passing through a US airport, so don't expect ATC to change they just don't get what the problem is.

That sounds almost vindictive and all, except the part about ATC, is irrelevant to this thread. As to ATC, most of the staff at the Southern California TRACON are professionals who use standard ICAO phraseology. Had the majority of them made this mistake, once it became apparent, they would have said, "EVA 15, make an immediate left turn to heading one-eight-zero," or whatever heading was felt appropriate. "Southbound" would not have been used by the vast majority of them.

[MrSnuggles]

thwpit

Except that in this case, it isn’t.
Oh dear, goodness mee, I didn't realise this. I was under the impression that it had something to do with ties and knots. And I thought I was above average in English: I never use subtitles when watching English or Murican films/tvseries/whathaveyou anymore and I am fairly fluent in writing. In Sweden we always subtitle all foreign language shows so most Swedes are surprisingly good at English because our ears get used to it from an early age. I know in other parts of the world they don't have this luxury.

Which I think only reinforces your point that it could cause even an advanced English speaker to hesitate if they weren’t familiar with the phrase!
Yep, I totally made this point obvious. :-)

[HarryMann]

Bound.. boundary... rebound...
Complicated but nothing to do with 'Bind' Germanic Binden

Has several roots... Latin French Old Norse...

Hundreds of meanings

Dreadful word !!!

But probably to do with boundary, getting to the edge of something, a noun now an adjective or adverb?

Most unfortunate...

[armchairpilot94116]

Guess we may never hear anything further officially about this incident.
It will all be dealt with internally by EVA as far as the crew and by the FAA as far as their controller and/or procedures.

[aterpster]

That's my feeling, too. Having said that, my sources have just told me that the NTSB has sent an investigator to the TRACON to investigate. I don't know whether it is an official or ad hoc investigation. But, apparently the incident has piqued their interest.

[ATC Watcher]

That will depend if EVA files an occurrence report and pass it to the Taiwanese ASC. (the Taiwanese NTSB equivalent) they are pretty good and are known to investigate even minor occurrences.
If ( big if) there were EGPWS alarms generated, those will be on the QAR and likely to generate a report from the crew.
If it was only an R/T misunderstanding issue with no safety consequences, then it is up to the crew to decide to make a report or not.

But for the moment ,as far as I can see there is no open investigation of this case on the ASC database ( searchable on line)

[henra]

That's my feeling, too. Having said that, my sources have just told me that the NTSB has sent an investigator to the TRACON to investigate.

Let's hope so!
If there ever was a catastrophic accident to learn from which actually just ever so barely did not happen, this is the one.
If the guys had waited for another 5 seconds to initiate the turn there would be dozens of NTSB investigators crawling through the charred remains since 16th December.
These 5 seconds do warrant a few investigators in my eyes.

[ATC Watcher]

henra : If the guys had waited for another 5 seconds to initiate the turn there would be dozens of NTSB investigators crawling through the charred remains since 16th December.
This is the kind of posts that sometimes makes me want to leave this forum.

[Uplinker]

.......A simple call " EVA turn right heading 180" at any time during the event would have solved the problem...........She could have even added " expedite" . nothing else.


There are some drop outs on the original youtube recording; hyperlinked at post #1, but:

At 1:44, ATC says "... [drop out]...turn right, right turn heading 180", and this instruction is read back by EVA015.

At 1:50, ATC then says "...[drop out]..015 heavy expedite your right turn".

[henra]

henra :
This is the kind of posts that sometimes makes me want to leave this forum.
Your post is an even better example: Unfounded patronising against all facts but with enormous self confidence.

Did you even bother and check the track posted and the distance to Obstacles at the same elevation as the flight was on?
Obviously not, otherwise you would have noticed that the minimum horizontal distance to obstacles was approximately 500m. Flying at 300 kts equals ~150m/s. The rest I leave up to you. (Even if we assume that the Track isn't 100% accurate there is basically no way they could have continued on their track for more than 10s without changing the shape of the aircraft significantly).
Why is it for some so difficult to grasp that this one was a really close call?

[ATC Watcher]

Uplinker : yes of course but the real confusion starts 30 seconds later when she turn him back left heading 270...and then goes on with her " southbound calls" until the crew finally gets to understand what she meant/wants ..

henra: Unfounded patronising against all facts but with enormous self confidence.
Which facts ? a FR24 print out posted on YouTube is " facts" ? Common man! (as Obama would say) .
Patronising? me ?:hmm:
I give you a small clue why :
On post #1 you can see that the timing between the R/T and the map is wrong. Also the ACA is never in conflict with the EVA in there . So the ATC picture on radar was most probably quite different from what is on this FR24 youTube track. Until I see the Tracon radar recording and the R/T sync that goes with it I would abstain from making terrain clearance comments.
.
Now, posting comments like " 5 seconds before ..charred remains" is not going to be winning you much credibility in here.

[gatbusdriver]

Sorry for stating the obvious (again) but would you not expect to hear EGPWS warnings on the transmissions of the EVA if they were 5 seconds from death?

[henra]

Which facts ? a FR24 print out posted on YouTube is " facts" ? Common man! (as Obama would say) .

Agreed, fact would be a bit too much. That said, FR24 and WEBTRAK traces don't have a history of notoriously being totally off.


Patronising? me ?:hmm:
That's at least how it came across.


I give you a small clue why :
On post #1 you can see that the timing between the R/T and the map is wrong. Also the ACA is never in conflict with the EVA in there . So the ATC picture on radar was most probably quite different from what is on this FR24 youTube track.

Fair point, the question at the end simply is: Is the FR24/WEBTRAK picture completely off or not?! So far I see no reason to assume that we were shown a false picture neither in the video nor in the posted WEBTRAK chart.


Now, posting comments like " 5 seconds before ..charred remains" is not going to be winning you much credibility in here.
That was admittedly a bit harsh, but the idea that NTSB was seriously not clear about investigating this drove me mad. Every small Cessna that dings a wing is investigated and here we have case of a potentially very close call situation for a fully laden Heavy and they are not sure if they need to investigate :eek:

[DaveReidUK]

Fair point, the question at the end simply is: Is the FR24/WEBTRAK picture completely off or not?! So far I see no reason to assume that we were shown a false picture neither in the video nor in the posted WEBTRAK chart.

As a general rule, FR24 positioning (except when they do their dumb extrapolation and unfeasible joining-the-dots) is reasonably accurate provided that the aircraft's ADS-B is GNSS-sourced. As long as you disregard any abrupt track changes, what's left is probably OK. Timings can be subject to some latency because the data is being sent to FR24 over the Internet and isn't timestamped at source, so probably shouldn't be taken as gospel.

WebTrak data originates from the FAA's radars, so what you see is what the TRACON is seeing. Timings should be pretty accurate and the granularity will depend on how many radars are currently tracking the target.

[aterpster]

henra:

That was admittedly a bit harsh, but the idea that NTSB was seriously not clear about investigating this drove me mad. Every small Cessna that dings a wing is investigated and here we have case of a potentially very close call situation for a fully laden Heavy and they are not sure if they need to investigate.

The NTSB delegates non-fatal GA accident investigation to the FAA. Fatal GA accidents are not delegated but some of the field investigations these days are sloppy.

Incidents are strictly optional.

[Uplinker]

Uplinker : yes of course but the real confusion starts 30 seconds later when she turn him back left heading 270...and then goes on with her " southbound calls" until the crew finally gets to understand what she meant/wants ..

We don't know who initially said 'left' because there was a drop-out, but EVA 015 read back "....left turn heading 180...". They got as far as about 010, (a left turn from 090), and their next transmission was a request for high speed climb, NOT to query the turn direction.

"the real confusion", as you put it, actually starts much earlier at 1:44 when ATC realises a problem and EVA 015 are told to "turn right, right turn heading 180...", but which they fail to do, even after reading the correct instruction back and then being told to "expedite your right turn....." six seconds later.

So they were told three times to turn right, AND the heading to turn onto, but they still failed to do so - WTF ? (And this was well before the 29....270 and subsequent instructions).

[aterpster]

In this morning's (Jan 14) Los Angeles Times article about NTSB officially investigating the EVA near-CFIT with Mt. Wilson. I take away from the article that the FAA is going into the bunkers.

[vmandr]

preliminary report here (courtesy Kathryn's Report web site)

https://app.ntsb.gov/pdfgenerator/ReportGeneratorFile.ashx?EventID=20170104X45517&AKey=1&RType=Prelim&IType=IA

[surfman96]

There's an excellent analysis of the incident on Medium: ATC nightmare in the hills by Mark Zee

(Former ATC, Airline Pilot, Flight Dispatcher and airline Station Manager)

medium.com/@markzee/atc-nightmare-in-the-hills-680407b9629b

Short conclusion: "ATC agencies should make available to their controllers the same degree of emergency and “unusual situation” training that airlines offer to pilots."

[Jet Jockey A4]

Interesting article and yes perhaps ATC dos need better training.

[aterpster]

The controller was in way over her head. The fact that a different voice didn't come on to resolve the mess early on tells me her position wasn't be monitored by a supervisor. LA was "east" and the weather was lousy. The lack of redundancy under those circumstances was bad form, to say the least.

Hope we get to see a final report, complete with ATC transcripts and TRACON radar readouts.

[Less Hair]

Time for clickable text messaging for ATC instead of voice. There will be more and more non US and non english speaking pilots in the future system. With US pilots no problem but with a global mix we are asking for trouble.

[pax britanica]

I think there is better technology than text but voice is always faster and mistypes may not get picked up by 'foreign' crews and more and more and more people on this earths speak English every year especially in professional occupations so the language problem will go away.

[wiggy]

Time for clickable text messaging for ATC instead of voice.

Which I suppose many of us already have and use in the shape of CPDLC, but in it's current iteration I can't see it being an improvement on "voice" in a busy terminal area ( though it's great in remote areas) ...

I'd pity the poor controllers trying to shuffle the Heathrow arrivals solely through CPDLC...each controller would probably need a dozen "scribes" or more if things started to go off script.

[SLF3]

I think part of the issue with US ATC is the assumption that everyone is a native English speaker.

If you listen to a Heathrow ATC tape (probably as good a mix of nationalities as anywhere) and a US ATC tape it is immediately obvious even to a non pilot that the language in the US is much looser and the scope for misunderstandings much greater.

[aterpster]

Absolutely correct!

During my airline career it was an issue on the flight deck as well. Few pilots would follow the FAA's phraseology guidance set forth in the Aeronautical Information Manual.

[Hotel Tango]

The fact that a different voice didn't come on to resolve the mess early on tells me her position wasn't be monitored by a supervisor.

Was she a trainee? If so she would have had a coach sitting with her. If she was fully qualified why the need for a supervisor to monitor her? With multiple sectors operating it would need a lot of supervisors to monitor each controller. But maybe I'm just misunderstanding what you mean.

[aterpster]

You missed my point. Southern California TRACON (SCT) functionally operates as separate TRACONs. There is supposed to be a supervisor on the floor for each of these separate TRACONs. The Los Angeles Sector covers KLAX and a few small IFR airports. At 1:00 the only activity was at KLAX. As soon as her situation got bad he/she should have been alerted and immediately plugged in. But, if he/she wasn't on the floor he would not have known.

KLAX doesn't "go east" that often so it is supposed to be a heads up operation.

[Hotel Tango]

As soon as her situation got bad he/she should have been alerted and immediately plugged in. But, if he/she wasn't on the floor he would not have known.

I think that if you look at this in real time (and not Monday morning quarterbacking) by the time it may have dawned on her that it had become a real issue it was almost immediately over. She was too busy trying to sort the problem out rather than call the Supervisor over. Perhaps it's different in the USA but where I came from Supervisors did not generally monitor control positions unless requested to do so.

[West Coast]

HT, same hold true here.

This notion that there’s a supervisor just waiting to override at any given time is incorrect. If the controller wasn't full performance level qualified (fully qualified in other words) then there was an instructor involved, not a supervisor. If she was a FPL, then the controller themselves or their data assistant called for help.

[aterpster]

In my view she became overloaded as soon as she saw EVA turn north. She was more concerned with separation from the departing Air Canada than terrain clearance. Her phraseology went down the tubes. My guess is that the supervisor wasn't on the floor. Hopefully, the NTSB will eventually let us know.

[Hotel Tango]

Sorry aterpster, you don't seem to want to listen to what ATC people are telling you. Your notion that a Supervisor would have saved the day any sooner is misplaced. Perhaps you need to go visit one of your TRACONs to get a better understanding.

[aterpster]

I have many times, including the TRACON at issue, which is 50 miles from where I live. My last visit was to get a nice briefing on FUSION.

As to saving the day, I would hope we all would see the NTSB final incident report before too many more months go by. What I said is that a supervisor could have (not would have) saved the day.

[Hotel Tango]

And I worked at an European equivalent of your TRACONs for 44 years and I fail to comprehend your logic, sorry.

[aterpster]

And I worked at an European equivalent of your TRACONs for 44 years and I fail to comprehend your logic, sorry.

You apparently don't understand how a FAA TRACON is organized. It's not worth the banter.

[Annex14]

Ahem, Ahem, HT 44 years in TRACON ?

Though retired for a while, I deem to remember that retiring age used to be 53 and turned to 55 when our Civil Service Organisation became an ATC company. Thought that the 55 years of retirement age for active ATCON was almost identical in all European states.

aterpster
Having had the chance to visit many years ago LAX / SFO / Oakland ATC installations I fully agree in your last comment.

[West Coast]

You apparently don't understand how a FAA TRACON is organized. It's not worth the banter

I’m a former GS2152, if you know as much about ATC as you think, you won’t have to google it. HT’s understanding wrt to how a supervisor oversees the area is correct. I respect your knowledge of TERPS, at times reading your web site. That doesnt translate to the nuances of the ATC system. I won’t belabor the point, but if you’re going to continue down this path, go find an active controller at SCT and ask them how it works. There’s a number of them on prune.

[Plazbot]

aterpster

Being a controller and a Supervisor myself, I can positively state that there is no way on earth that a person not already listening to a frequency can jump in and immediately issue instructions to aircraft accurately let alone in the case of recovering from an error. no way, no how. never.

Do you think that the Supervisor is walking around with a headset on, Jack in hand hovering behind each and every position waiting to jump in and enact furious recovery vectors all shift long?

Whilst I don't have 44 years on the floor, my experience is measured in decades and in all that time I can think of only one instance where a qualified controller had the frequency taken off them and that was during a particularly ugly weather scenario. The controller who took the frequency was already plugged and and monitoring due to the complexity and it was easier to take it than explain what the problem was. It is still spoken about a number of years later as it was such a rare event.

I don't fly but I would expect that the suggested course of action would be like a dead heading pilot on the jump seat jumping in and executing a go around.

Probably the most absurd comment I have ever read on pprune with respect to the expectations of air traffic control.Im so annoyed by this I had to edit twice.

[Hotel Tango]

Though retired for a while, I deem to remember that retiring age used to be 53 and turned to 55 when our Civil Service Organisation became an ATC company. Thought that the 55 years of retirement age for active ATCON was almost identical in all European states.

Correct. However, you make an incorrect assumption. My figure of 44 years is correct, thank you. Now you tell us which sort of unit you were a Supervisor at? How many sectors operated simultaneously at your unit? Did you monitor all your fully qualified ATCOs on all sectors at all times? I'm just curious how you come to a conclusion which no other ATCO/Supervisor working at such a facility would.

[Annex14]

Sorry, I am not intending to join a peeing contest on who is correct with his / her assumptions.
It is obvious that something went wrong and that the help of a "second" person on the side of ATC might have delivered more satisfying results.
But once again it appears also that "the native language " problem may have played a role, in addition to the probable use of non standard phraseology.
As was said before the results drawn into the coming Incident report will be interesting.

[MajorLemond]

After reading through this as pilot, I'm stunned at how much flak ATC is copping for this. Almost entirely flight crew error and frustrating to listen to.

Firstly, yes, Atc made the initial error of issuing a left turn, however any pilot with even a moderate shred of situational awareness would query this as it is not logical. Even if you are half asleep when you start winding the heading bug looking for a Hdg of 180 it's immediately obvious that something isn't right as the digits in the FCU window start winding back from an easterly HDG. It was never queried by EVA, just blindly followed.

Secondly, the error was corrected by ATC soon after and acknowledged by The crew who proceeded to then carry on North (Towards high terrain) after repeated instructions to turn south. I'm with ATC wholeheartedly she says "What are you doing!?"

Yes, What the actual :mad: are you doing?

Thirdly, in the process of ignoring / not complying with repeated ATC instructions these guys completely screwed up the traffic situation that the controller had to manage. Her workload increased 10-fold in a busy traffic situation and I feel she managed it quite well - considering she had to deal with what became essentially a rogue aircraft in her airspace.

I hear a lot of these particular guys on the airwaves with varying degrees of spoken English. The guy responding to to ATC seemed to have excellent english so I doubt that it was a factor in this incident.

I would imagine that that these guys did some sort of pre-departure brief, surely the threat of high terrain to the North would be the sticking point of this, but who knows... maybe their pre departure brief consisted of a dart in the cockpit.

Sorry, but both of the crew need a massive boot up the ass for this. Huge lack of situational awareness and basic airmanship. :ouch:

[ussatlantis]

There are plenty of incompetent captains and non-assertive FOs in Asia.

[RubberDogPoop]

Sergeant Lemon, I know it's a lot, but please go back and read the thread - it's been done to death that the crew didn't just fly a heading of 360 when they meant 180. Language or no, we all use the same numbers - are you seriously contending that the crew "just" flew 360 in error?
1. Give a heavy jet multiple, rapid reversals of turn and pretty soon they'll appear on your scope to be "maintaining a heading".
Should some query have taken place? Absolutely. Though, not having your read-back of the instruction corrected would go some way to alleviate any doubt.

2. No. They did not "proceed(ed) to then carry on North"

3. Her traffic situation should not be a concern of theirs.

4. Speaking English, and translating it in your head to native language is not the same thing.

Yes. Yes they do, more for the loss of SA on terrain than for anything else...
As always, multiple factors, and players involved.

[Zeffy]

...Hope we get to see a final report, complete with ATC transcripts and TRACON radar readouts.

NTSB -- nearly two years have passed and we are still waiting to see the report.

[Gipsy Queen]

And never get between a Canadian and a Walmart in the lower 48. .

Having spent 15 years in the Florida boat business, I really understand this comment!

[Zeffy]

NTSB Docket (https://dms.ntsb.gov/pubdms/search/hitlist.cfm?docketID=62361&CFID=2573862&CFTOKEN=a3cf3bcc138889b1-3B357D01-A4FB-81DE-001AC54658BDA149)

[AerocatS2A]

Wow. If I'm reading correctly, while all this was happening, another aircraft in a missed approach was vectored below the MVA.

[Zeffy]

https://www.ntsb.gov/_layouts/ntsb.aviation/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20170104X45517&ntsbno=OPS17IA010&akey=1

NTSB Identification: OPS17IA010
Incident occurred Friday, December 16, 2016 in Mt. Wilson, CA
Probable Cause Approval Date: 05/07/2019
Aircraft: BOEING 777, registration:
Injuries: Unavailable
NTSB investigators used data provided by various sources and may have traveled in support of this investigation to prepare this aircraft incident report.

A near controlled flight into terrain (CFIT) incident occurred near Mt. Wilson, California, when a Boeing 777-300 departing Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) was instructed to turn left toward rising terrain after departure from runway 07R. The aircraft was operating on a 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 129 international flight. Air traffic control services were provided by the Federal Aviation Administration Southern California Terminal Radar Approach Control (SCT TRACON). There was no damage reported to the aircraft, and no reported injuries to the passengers or crew.

Due to weather in the area, LAX was operating in an east flow configuration with aircraft departing to the east. The Boeing 777-300 pilot contacted the SCT controller and was given an initial climb to 7,000 feet. A short time later, the SCT controller instructed the pilot to turn left to a heading of 180 degrees which required a left 270 degree turn. The turn resulted in the aircraft turning toward rising terrain and back toward the airport; normal procedures in an east flow would have been for a right turn to a heading of 180 degrees. While in the left turn, the pilot requested a high speed climb which resulted in the aircraft accelerating beyond the 250 knot LAX class B speed restriction and required additional airspace in order to complete an assigned turn. After recognizing the aircraft was in a left turn, the SCT controller issued the crew a right turn to a heading of 180 degrees. As the aircraft began to turn right, the air traffic controller instructed the crew to expedite the turn due to recognizing a developing proximity issue with another aircraft that had departed from LAX. The air traffic controller stopped the climb of the B777-300 and issued a left turn to a heading of 270 degrees. These turns in quick succession, combined with the speed of the aircraft, resulted in the flight tracking northbound toward rising terrain. The closest lateral and vertical proximity between the airplane and terrain/obstructions was about 0.3 miles and 0 ft, respectively, which is less than the minimum separation requirements.

The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause(s) of this incident as follows:

The incident was caused by the air traffic controller assigning the pilots a left turn instead of the required right turn after departure which placed the aircraft in an unsafe proximity with terrain and obstructions. Contributing to the incident was the air traffic controller's inadequate recovery technique during the development of the incident.


Full narrative available (https://www.ntsb.gov/_layouts/ntsb.aviation/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20170104X45517&ntsbno=OPS17IA010&akey=1)

[aterpster]

I recommend downloading the entire docket and, if the audio is still available on the Internet, to give it a good listen once you have read the docket materials.

[bill fly]

What an interesting thread... We are all in the same profession - have the same aims and try to be professional in our work.
We rely on each other and communicate together every day.

Yet pilots and ATC both use almost slanderous terms here to describe each other, US and non-US pilots pontificate at each other,
everybody is certain to be "in the right".

If that can happen here, in our prestigious club, no wonder that the World is falling apart in other respects.

The internet has a lot to answer for if this is the best we can do.