Eventually !!Probe Blames Captain for GF Jet Crash

[gulf_slf]

See original thread on GF 072 Crash below for new story .......

Sorry for the text being intertwined...see
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Articles.asp?Article=27765&Sn=BNEW
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Articles.asp?Article=27767&Sn=BNEW
for the news stories

[gulf_slf]

The probe seems to confirm the speculation and assumption made for the past two years........Sad days ...but hopefully GF can now focus on improving standards all round and become an airline of note once more......

FINAL
TRAGICMOMENTSOFFLIGHTGFREVEALED... MANAMA

TheGulfAirdisasterwascausedbyadeadlycombinationoffactors,are portdeclaredyesterday.

"Theinvestigationshowedthatnosinglefactorwasresponsibleforthe GFaccident,"itsays.

Theplane,enroutefromCairo,smashedintotheseajustoffMuharraq ataround.pmonAugust,,killingallpeopleonboard.

Inthefinalsecondsoftheflight,BahrainipilotIhsanShakeebwas soconfusedhepitchedtheplaneintothesea,saysthefinalcrashrepor t, releasedbytheAccidentInvestigationBoard.

CaptainShakeebmayhavethoughttheplanewaspitchingupwheninfacti twaspitchingdown.

Heincreasedspeedandthrusttheplaneintoadiveforseconds,before tryingtopullup,butitwastoolate,saysthedamningreport.

CaptShakeeb,agedandhis-year-oldOmanico-pilotFirstOfficer KhalafAlAlawi,mayhavebeenspatiallydisorientatedastheyperform ed atightorbitafterafailedattempttolandatBahrainInternationalAi rport, saysthereport.

Theyignoredrepeatedcomputervoicewarningsto"pullup,pullup", inatragiccatalogueofsafetyviolationsandmistakes,itsays.

ItcitesfatalflawsinGulfAir'sorganisational,managementandtrai ning systems,leadinguptotheaccident,combinedwithhumanerroronthefl ight deck.

GulfAirfailedtorespondtosafetywarningsissuedbyitsregulatoryb ody,ortoattendinternationalsafetymeetings.

Italsofailedtoprovideadequatetraininginemergencyproceduresan d toproperlystaffitsflightsafetydepartment,saysthereport.

"Theaccidentwastheresultofafatalcombinationofmanycontributory factors,bothattheindividualandsystemiclevels.

"Allofthesefactorsmustbeaddressedtopreventsuchanaccidenthappe ningagain."

[Kubota]

maybeyoushouldtryandproofreadbeforecuttingandpastinganarticl eliketheoneabove.

(Maybe you should try and proofread before cutting and pasting an article like the one above.)

[PPRuNe Pop]

It would nice if you would re-post and make into some kind of English. Spacing would be a help!

On second thoughts I have done it myself

The Gulf Air disaster was caused by a deadly combination of factors, a report declared yesterday.

"The investigation showed that no single factor was responsible for the GF072 accident," it says.

The plane, en route from Cairo, smashed into the sea just off Muharraq at around 7.30pm on August 23, 2000, killing all 143 people on board.

In the final seconds of the flight, Bahraini pilot Ihsan Shakeeb was so confused he pitched the plane into the sea, says the final crash report, released by the Accident Investigation Board.

Captain Shakeeb may have thought the plane was pitching up when in fact it was pitching down.

He increased speed and thrust the plane into a dive for 11 seconds, before trying to pull up, but it was too late, says the damning report.

Capt Shakeeb, aged 37 and his 25-year-old Omani co-pilot First Officer Khalaf Al Alawi, may have been spatially disorientated as they performed a tight orbit after a failed attempt to land at Bahrain International Airport, says the report.

They ignored repeated computer voice warnings to "pull up, pull up", in a tragic catalogue of safety violations and mistakes, it says.

It cites fatal flaws in Gulf Air's organisational, management and training systems, leading up to the accident, combined with human error on the flight deck.

Gulf Air failed to respond to safety warnings issued by its regulatory body, or to attend international safety meetings.

It also failed to provide adequate training in emergency procedures and to properly staff its flight safety department, says the report.

"The accident was the result of a fatal combination of many contributory factors, both at the individual and systemic levels.

"All of these factors must be addressed to prevent such an accident happening again."

[Low-Pass]

So BOTH pilots were disorientated? Rather unfortunate for all concerned, n'est pas?

[Desertia]

I should have said "passengers' relatives" of course, lest you all think there is some hideous conspiracy theory here, or possible something even more Machiavellian!

[Desertia]

A SERIES of fatal flaws that led to the Gulf Air disaster had been ignored for years, says a final report on the tragedy.

The airline failed to respond to safety warnings issued by its regulatory body, to attend international safety meetings, to provide adequate training in emergency procedures and to staff its flight safety department properly, says the final report by the Accident Investigation Board.

"The investigation showed that all of the latent organisational and management conditions that precipitated the accident to GF072 were present long before the accident," states the report.

"They had been identified and should have been rectified long before it happened.

"If these deficiencies had not been rectified, similar accidents could occur again, for the same underlying systemic reasons."

The agency responsible for the overseeing flight operations, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation and Meteorology (DGCAM), Oman, had repeatedly warned Gulf Air about its lack of compliance with Civil Aviation Regulations (CARs), according to the report.

During the three years preceding the accident, the DGCAM "could not achieve compliance by Gulf Air with respect to some critical regulatory requirements."

This was due to "inadequate supervisory oversight within Gulf Air, rather than a deliberate disregard for the regulations", said the report.

It said the airline did not emphasise Ground Proximity Warning System (GPWS) training, which would have trained Captain Ihsan Shakeeb to respond instantly to the warning that he was about to crash into the sea.

This is despite the fact that such training was originally introduced in the industry as defence against such Controlled Flight into Terrain (CFIT) accidents, which still account for the greatest number of airline fatalities each year, according to the report.

Gulf Air's flight data analysis system was not "functioning satisfactorily" at the time of the accident and this could have warned them that some flight crew were not complying with Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), said the report.

The airline could then have taken action to ensure that SOPs were followed.

If Capt Shakeeb had complied with these procedures the accident would not have happened, noted the report.

Crew Resource Management (CRM) training, which was implemented at other airlines to increase safety, was apparently stopped in 1996 or 1997, when there was a change of management said the report.

"One of the goals of CRM training is to provide crew members with the tools to foster co-operative collaborative teamwork and overcome counterproductive styles of leadership and group interaction," noted the report.

"Such tools include assertiveness training for First Officers and participative management training for captains.

"The evidence shows that CRM in the cockpit of GF072 was ineffective, and that this contributed to the non-adherence to SOPs by the flight crew, which initiated the sequence of events that led to the loss of the aircraft."

Capt Shakeeb was found to be taking the lead in the cockpit at the time of the crash, while his co-pilot did not raise any alarms, perhaps because he was intimidated.

"At the time of the accident there was no formal CRM training programme within Gulf Air. The accident was consistent with that organisational deficiency," added the report.

"The value of CRM training to operational safety should and could, have been recognised by the company a long time ago."

The airline also failed to provide adequate CFIT training.

Gulf Air had a one-man safety department from 1998 to the time of the accident.

"This lack of resources within the flight safety department and its inappropriate corporate status within the company was a serious deficiency," said the report.

The airline had stopped taking part in the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Safety Committee meeting years before the crash, it added.

"This greatly restricted the airline's awareness of new information and developments in areas such as accident investigation studies, safety and risk management programmes, training, safety information systems and safety management programmes."

It has now resumed its participation in the meetings.

[Desertia]

This pretty well covers everything, even if it is a long read. The interesting point to me is that the DGCAM had absolutely no power to enforce regulatory compliance. How useless are they?:

CONCLUSIONS

Findings

1) The captain did not adhere to a number of SOPs, particularly during the approach and final phases of flight:

(a) During the descent and the first approach, flight GF-072 had significantly higher speed than standard.

(b) During the first approach, standard 'approach configurations' were not achieved and the approach was not stabilised on the correct approach path by 500ft.

(c) When the captain perceived that he was 'not going to make it' on the first approach, standard go-around and missed approach procedures were not initiated.

(d) Instead, the captain executed a 360-degree orbit, a non-standard manoeuvre close to the runway at low altitude, with a considerable variation in altitude, bank angle and 'g' force.

(e) A 'rotation to 15 degree pitch-up' was not carried out during the go-around after the orbit.

(f) Neither the captain nor the first officer responded to hard GPWS warnings.

(g) In the approach and final phases of flight, there were a number of deviations of the aircraft from the standard flight parameters.

2) During the approach and final phases of flight, in spite of a number of deviations from the standard flight parameters and profile, the first officer (PNF - pilot not flying) did not call them out, or draw the attention of the captain to them, as required by SOPs.

3) During the go-around after the orbit, it appears that the flight crew experienced spatial disorientation:

(a) During the go-around the aircraft was accelerating rapidly, as the captain was dealing with the flap over-speed situation, he applied a nose-down side-stick input that was held for about 11 seconds, resulting in a nose-down pitch of 15 degrees.

(b) A perceptual study conducted using FDR recordings of the accident flight indicated that while the aircraft was accelerating with TOGA power in total darkness, the somatogravic illusion could have caused the captain to perceive (falsely) that the aircraft was 'pitching up'. He would have responded by making a 'nose down' input.

As a result the aircraft descended and thereafter flew into the shallow sea.

4) Controlled Flight into Terrain:

(a) The GPWS 'sink rate' alert sounded, followed by the ground proximity warning 'whoop, whoop, pull up' which sounded every second for nine seconds until the impact.

(b) The analysis of flight data recorder (FDR) and cockpit voice recorder (CVR) recordings indicated that neither the captain nor the first officer perceived, or effectively responded to, the threat of the aircraft's increasing proximity to the ground in spite of repeated hard GPWS warnings, and continued addressing the comparatively low priority flap over-speed situation.

(c) The captain did not fully utilise critical information provided by the aircraft instruments during the final phases of the flight, where he was also experiencing 'information overload'.

5) During the approach and final phases of the flight, the captain did not consult the first officer in the decision making process and did not effectively use this (the first officer) valuable human resource available to him.

A lack of training in CRM contributed in the flight crew not performing as an effective team conducting the operation of an aircraft.

6) Gulf Air's Organisational Factors:

(a) Inadequacy was identified in Gulf Air's A320 training programmes such as adherence to SOPs, CFIT and GPWS responses.

(b) At the time of accident, Gulf Air's flight data analysis system was not functioning satisfactorily and the flight safety department had a number of deficiencies, which restricted the airline's awareness in many critical safety areas.

7) Safety oversight factors:

A review of about three years preceding the accident indicated the following:

(a) The regulatory authority DGCAM, Oman had identified cases of non-compliance and inadequate or slow responses in taking corrective actions to rectify them, on the part of Gulf Air in some critical regulatory requirements.

(b) Although the DGCAM was attempting to ensure regulatory compliance by Gulf Air, it could not accomplish it in some critical regulatory areas, due to inadequate response by the operator.

(c) The regulatory authority and the airline are expected to fulfil complementary roles in maintaining safety of aircraft operations.

The evidence indicated inadequacies in the fulfilment of the above and highlighted the systemic factors in the airline's mechanisms to respond to the regulatory requirements.

8) The airline has taken a number of post-accident safety initiatives in the areas such as:

go-around procedures, ab-initio training, CRM training, command upgrade training, A320 fleet instructions, recurrent training and checking, instructor selection and training, pilot selection, modification to the A320 automatic flight system, and the flight safety department.

Gulf Air has further reported that it is in the process of enhancing its flight crew training, particularly that of A320 aircraft and introducing more safety initiatives.

Contributory Factors

The factors contributing to the above accident were identified as a combination of the individual and systemic issues.

Any one of these factors, by itself, was insufficient to cause a breakdown of the safety system.

Such factors may often remain undetected within a system for a considerable period of time. When these latent conditions combine with local events and environmental circumstances, such as individual factors contributed by "front-line" operators (eg: pilots or air traffic controllers) or environmental factors (eg: extreme weather conditions), a system failure, such as an accident, may occur.

The investigation showed that no single factor was responsible for the accident to GF-072.

The accident was the result of a fatal combination of many contributory factors, both at the individual and systemic levels. All of these factors must be addressed to prevent such an accident happening again.

(1) The individual factors particularly during the approach and final phases of the flight were:

(a) The captain did not adhere to a number of SOPs; such as: significantly higher than standard aircraft speeds during the descent and the first approach; not stabilising the approach on the correct approach path; performing an orbit, a non-standard manoeuvre, close to the runway at low altitude; not performing the correct go-around procedure; etc.

(b) In spite of a number of deviations from the standard flight parameters and profile, the first officer (PNF - pilot not flying) did not call them out, or draw the attention of the captain to them, as required by SOPs.

(c) A perceptual study indicated that during the go-around after the orbit, it appears that the flight crew experienced spatial disorientation, which could have caused the captain to perceive (falsely) that the aircraft was 'pitching up'. He responded by making a 'nose-down' input and as a result, the aircraft descended and flew into the shallow sea.

(d) Neither the captain nor the first officer perceived, or effectively responded to, the threat of increasing proximity to the ground, in spite of repeated hard GPWS warnings.

(2) The systemic factors, identified at the time of the above accident, which could have led to the above individual factors, were:

(a) Organisational factors (Gulf Air):

(i) A lack of training in CRM contributing to the flight crew not performing as an effective team in operating the aircraft.

(ii) Inadequacy in the airline's A320 training programmes, such as: adherence to SOPs, CFIT, and GPWS responses.

(iii) The airline's flight data analysis system was not functioning satisfactorily, and the flight safety department had a number of deficiencies.

(iv) Cases of non-compliance, and inadequate or slow responses in taking corrective actions to rectify them, on the part of the airline in some critical regulatory areas, were identified during three years preceding the accident.

(b) Safety oversight factors:

A review of about three years preceding the accident, indicated that despite intensive efforts, the DGCAM as a regulatory authority could not make the operator comply with some critical regulatory requirements.

[ironbutt57]

GF has lots of problms true, but it is far from a crap airline, and many good folks work there, so lets hope the new leaders are ALLOWED to **** in anybody's cheerios they need do, to fix it...will be interesting

[126.9]

Desertia Your views are that strong huh? Perhaps you should ask for a password protected, private forum of your own? That way the rest of us won't get so bored with your bullsh!t!

[sweeper]

pompous style...
however my lot have used this accident to re inforce most of what you are saying...
if SOP,s break down, and the break down is not due to bad SOP,s
you get errors,like not following TCAS over germany/swiss airspace.
you are right..don,t lecture ,help[:(

[Desertia]

I don't apologise for upsetting "126.9" or anyone like him, who prefers to stick his head up his arse and puff and bluster in the face of criticism, instead of accepting and addressing the huge flaws that lead the to deaths of these people, including friends of mine.
Here's hoping the down-to-earth Aussie approach satisfies the owners and at the same time clears out the dead wood!
Desertia

[autoflight]

My friend, Jim Dunn, died because airlines in the ME grill the captain if he makes a missed approach. Pax feel badly treated & write letters. Airlines do not make the effort to explain that its a normal & safe procedure. The [usually] simple solution is to make an orbit on final. Officially, not a missed approach. Thus no explaination required! Its all a half baked idea to save face. Well now there is some explaining to do. Let us not think for a moment that this is the only half baked idea residing in the heads of people who think such considerations are worthwhile. No wonder they need a few aussies, brits, SA etc to help them dilute the harmful influences of their own kind.

[ironbutt57]

An orbit at night, on a dark night flying from a lighted area to a dark area, is not an adviseable maneuver, as is evident by the very large altitude variations that occurred during the first orbit, spatial disorientation was present then as well, as was a loss of situational awareness, as is evidenced by the subsequent overshoot of the runway extended centerline, thus requiring the fateful go-around, which again was not flown to SOP's. daylight clear conditions are entirely another matter, as visual references would have been sufficient to preclude the onset of vertigo. In any case, it is clear that training crews to avoid these conditions that lead to spatial disorientation needs to be emphasised, no experience level can preclude the onset of spatial disorientation, it can and does happen to pilots of all experience levels, however, a more experienced pilot is more likely to realize the potential for this problem, and adhere strictly to standard operating procedures, and carry out a proper go-around...training...training...training...is the key. Let's all hope GF has risen to the occasion, and remedied the problem. I still fly as a pax with them, as does my family, and will continue to do so...but this accident was clearly a "private-pilot" type accident.

[Desertia]

It may appear to be a "private pilot" type accident, but unfortunately the opportunity for something like this to happen has been created by the environment, and from the many GF air crew and cabin crew I know, the only surprise is that it didn't happen earlier.
Of course GF would have you believe that passenger safety is uppermost in their mind, whereas in reality for several years now it's been about trying to survive on budgets slashed to pieces by people with their hands in the corporate pocket, placed there by their uncles/friends/other people in high places!
Many ex-GF'ers I know here point to the number of ex GF expat staff in management positions in Emirates to show what GF could have been now if it hadn't been ravaged over the years and turned into a local YOPS scheme.
But I work for the government and it's the same story there, too.
Conclusion: Jobs for the boys and passenger safety do not go hand in hand.
Cheers,
Desertia

[SLF3]

In the immediate aftermath of this accident many contributors to PPrune said the enquiry would be a whitewash and would exonerate Gulf Nationals.

Later, many said the report was delayed so that the appropriate number of coats of whitewash could be applied.

Perhaps a special thread is required so that those who made comments along these lines can tender their apologies?

[Desertia]

Interesting comments there. With Airbus obviously unwilling to take the blame, they really couldn't just turn round and say the pilot was a cowboy, because if he was, who let him fly?
The report, which is extensive, spreads the blame across a wide area, and I don't think it's a coincidence that senior management have been replaced in most if not all areas prior to it being released. After all, what better direction to point fingers than at the people you've just got rid of?
It's also interesting to note that there has been hardly a mention of this in the world's press, which is exactly what GF would prefer. And I don't think the way the report is constructed and the way it expertly obfuscates the key flaw - nationals being promoted too quickly - is any accident either.
Whitewash, maybe not. Quick lick of paint, most definitely

;)

[ironbutt57]

bodstrup......yes it would have...hindsight is 20-20, but as you mentioned, you have to be aware of the potential problem to avoid it....it obviously was not emphasised enough at somepoint in his past training either at GF, or where he did his initial training.....

[Rananim]

I see the poor first officer had never flown anything other than the A320,and that the Captain started life as a F/E.Dangerous combination.It worries me that 200 hour pilots should go straight into an Airbus 320;where do they get the chance to build the basic flying skills?Perhaps if he'd done a bit of time on a proper aircraft,he would have known which way was up and which way down.As for the skipper,he had flown the 767(a fine a/c) and the L1011 but his first command was the 320.Add to this he only had 100 hours as 320 skipper.And there you have the reason for this crash.How were these two pilots allowed to operate together?This Captain needed a high-time First Officer who had good flying skills(2 years on a 767) but who was also experienced on the computerized Eurobus.

[Captain Sensible]

He "started" as a Ground Engineer in the hangar. He didn't "fly" the Tristar; he was a Flight engineer on it. But his "F/E" time was counted towards his Command flying time.

[GULFPILOT76]

I remember this fatal night like nothing else in my aviation career,
landing just before them. I was probably at the gate pointing my tail to all that happened. Arriving from the west we were held high (7000 ft is normal) until passing the Saudi coast. Changing to APP. we were asked if we could accept 12 for landing (ATIS was 30). Ofcourse then you are high, asked for surface wind, it was around 130/8. I just thought why bother to go for 12 with new setup, breefing, loosing considerable amount of altitude, VOR app. etc, etc. Just take a bit of tailwind, I am not an ace, I want to relax. My guess is that the guy had been bragging to the F/O about his skills from way up, and when he saw he was going to lose out he felt so embarrassed ( loss of face) he tried to make up for it by trying to show more skills, fatal skills. It is an enormous tragedy that should not have happened on this clear but dark night.

[Carruthers]

A more experienced pilot would have engaged the bl----y autopilot.

[GlueBall]

There is a cure for spatial disorientation: As a last resort, look only at the SAI, avoid sensory overload by ignoring flashing lights, voice alerts, bells, horns, clackers, tones, chimes and whistles, then level the wings, raise the nose ten degrees, add a handful of power and maintain attitude. It works in a dark cockpit, with CADC and static system failure, and with all generators gone on vacation, in IMC.

If each recurrent simulator training session would include just 30 consecutive minutes of nothing but "hands on" flying during complete electrical failure, with one engine inoperative (without A/P, without F/D, without glide slope)....One would not lose the magic touch of raw data instrument flying during extreme circumstances.


:cool:

[strobes_on]

GF used to have a requirement that low time on type F/O's and low time on type Captains would not be rostered to fly together.

What happened to that ?:confused:

[Lodestar]

One should not be teached basic flying skills in an airliner.....You learn them during your training on props.

You do not need to have a 1000 hours before you can fly.....and unusual attitudes are part of your first 100 hours of flying!!!!

In europe it is common to have F/Os on an airliner with 300H TT. And by my knowledge nothing severe happend because of that untill now. Also lots of guys immediatly start out on the Airbus....again, nothing wrong with that! You do not need a 767 to learn how to fly an airplane!

But when flying an airliner it is dangerous to team up two inexperienced pilots in a cockpit....and thats probably what happend here and to my concern, that was the major cause of this tragedy.....

[scanscanscan]

Gulfpilot76.....

I see the GF 072 Captain did not fly the full Vor approach from overhead the Vor as per the published approach plate.

He accepted the baited invitation from ATC to self position at night from the non turn side to a short FAF from a large intercept angle when already high and fast plus under stress being inexperienced on type with a similar configured FO.

He did not have a STAR arrival or gate speeds to guide him off of a Saudi navigation beacon to a sensible distance initial final fix for Rw 12.

I had hoped the accident investigation team would have recommended a Star for RW12 now be published.

When I joined GA/GF in 1974 there was an SOP rule that pilots would always use an ILS if available and within wind and aircraft landing limitations.

This Sop rule was introduced because two Air France aircraft had crashed in one week on Black Hole Night approaches into RW12 Bahrain.

What happened to this Sop :confused:

What happened to the inexperienced pilots Sop :confused:

GF 072 A320 loss $36million :confused:

Back to the drawing board :)

[Fox3snapshot]

This accident was a "system" error, the system being Gulf Air and the DGCAM (civil aviation authority of Oman). This has been clearly highlighted in the report and the appropriate reccomendations made. Lets hope that there is a shake up within these bodies to tidy up an ongoing, festering problem. The crew were the end product of a poorly administered aviation system and whilst it can be seen by some that they directly caused the accident, they were in fact indirectly put there by poor administration and regulation. I am sure this type of situation is not unique to Guilf Air, many aviation bodies can learn from this to avoid another catastrophe of this magnitude.

:(

[GULFPILOT76]

Triple Scan,

To my knowledge there is no SOP in effect nowadays that requires pilots to use an ILS app. when available / suitable.
There is however a SOP / fleetinstruction dealing with a stabilized approach before 1000ft in IMC and 500 ft in VMC. As far as rostering rules for blue line captains, there must be one in effect.
Although from what I heard this captain considered himself as 'experienced'. A STAR for VOR 12 is not in force, but it might be better in this case for BAH/ACC to negotiate their jurisdiction in the DMM airspace ( lower altitude) in case RWY 12 is in use. The full procedure could have been an option, but then in this case ILS 30 was still available with around 8 kts steady tailwind. Hope this answers your questions. Good luck.

GP76.

[Belgique]

It's a dangerously dismissive attitude to start talking about visual disorientation, unusual attitudes, vertigo and sensory illusions all at the same time - as if they are interchangeable terms for much the same phenomenon.

Some of these Human Factors phenomena are much more attention-getting, alarming and confusing than others. The somatogravic illusion is unique inasmuch as it can and does affect both pilots simultaneously. That fact explains much of what didn't happen in the GF072 cockpit at that crucial time.

So if you experience it, don't expect that your oppo will be much help - or that you will exit it successfully. Long-term USN experience and a wealth of "unexplained" accidents bear out that morbid fact.

If you read on from this 31 Aug 2000

http://www.pprune.org/ubb/NonCGI/Forum1/HTML/009550-15.html
Belgique post, you might observe that apparently few people had at that time heard of the "pitch-up illusion". Hopefully that's now changed. You cannot practice it in a sim but you can ensure that it's not something you'd fail to recognise when it comes your turn.

[Captain Sensible]

R/W 12 @ BAH now has an ILS recently installed, should be operational reasonably soon, one hopes.

[ironbutt57]

really.....when was the ILS installed? and belgique....you are missing the point...we are all aware of the pitfalls of spatial disorientation....but an education and an acute awareness of the situations that favor such perceptions are what need to be avoided...thus the need for training...not only what to do if and when it happens to you, but how to recognize/avoid the onset of the vertigo...

[Chuck Hog]

Despite the Analysis, Findings and conclusions, readable at http://www.bahrainairport.com/GF072investigationreport.htm, the factual information had previously lead to point some comments about an hypothetical malfunction of the aircraft systems, specifically the well known hard limit "fly-by-wire" conception.

According to the readouts of the DFDR, it appears that, despite the effective actions of the PIC, the aircraft did not respond and continued descending. In fact, TRIM and elevators were consistently in opposite positions, up and down respectively, until the moment of impact.

Some experts have talked about an APC phenomenon, caused by overcommand on the sidestick from the PIC.

Surprisingly, any comment is done about this. Even to say that everything worked out properly ...

[Belgique]

Ironbutt
Er, I think that's what I said. In fact I first said it about this accident two years ago... and if you go back to those old threads you will note that even a Chief Pilot piped up and said he'd never heard of it (the somatogravic illusion). In this respect it is an area (like hypoxia and altitude chamber training) where the old military hands have a distinct advantage in their background. Most Western Military pilots still undergo AVMED Refresher Lectures every few years .... including a very real hypoxia experience and disorientation training in a spin-chair or centrifuge.

The point that I was making is that until it happens to you, you tend to treat it as a bit of mythology (a bit like retreating blade stall, dynamic rollover and vortex ring for the rotary brethren). You cannot have a somatogravic illusion ("pitch-up") experience in a simulator and I'm quite sure that you won't have it in any airplane's conversion syllabus. It remains as one of those silent deadly gotchas. One cannot guarantee that you will remain clear of it; it's not like avoiding coffin corner. It's potentially there in any light-weight go-round. There are many pilots on this forum who will tell you that they have experienced it as an overpowering sensation. Many of them will have been high performance mil-jet operators, but some will not. It even happens very regularly to sailplane pilots on winch and auto-tow launches. Derek Piggott wrote a book about it about 20 years ago.... after a series of unexplained UK glider launch accidents in VMC.

But I reiterate that it is the most dangerous illusion because it normally affects both pilots at once (from a USN Study). That makes it deadly and derates much of what has been said about those latter failures of CRM in GF072.

Without that phenomenon the GF072 accident chain wouldn't have been complete.

[Chuck Hog]

I am not talking about disorientation, I am saying that some facts (see the DFDR readouts) may lead to consider the possibility of an aircraft malfunction, a lack of proper response to the out of doubt energic nose up PIC command after the GPWS warning.

[Centaurus]

It's probably a safe bet that neither pilot was proficient at hand flying raw data. The gyrations described are very similar to what I have witnessed in the simulator when pilots have experienced a situation where a quick disconnect of the automatics and hand-fly would have saved the day. Unless they retain currency on raw data flying (which few do) they are all over the sky - especially IMC or at night.

[Lodestar]

That is exactly the reason why a skill test is now obligatory once a year during an Jar checkride....

More and more companies are allowing their pilots to fly raw data when the conditions permit to do so. This is a very good evolution....

[Seriph]

What's all this nonsense about raw data hand flying, if the automatics were engaged then this would not have happened, they don't get disorientated, fight amongst themselves or get into p.i.o. It was the pilots playing 'pilots' that caused this accident, much safer to 'operate' the airoplane.
Scanscan scan, i'd stick to flightsim if I were you.

[Lodestar]

Okay, you have got a point......BUT

I have been flying the A320 for three years now within an airline environment . So I have done quit a few Go Arounds in this airplane and I have to say that very little of those where executed using the AP......

Why? My guess is that pilots still feel more at ease taking controlls themselves. In those situations it is easier to do so because the use of the automatics in those situations can be really confusing. Besides that a G/A does not always require the TOGA thrust/follow procedure things programmed in the FMA. A lot of times the controllers give you an ammended procedure with an altered height to level off which makes the automatics way more difficult to use.

A third tought is that Airbus itself is still advising pilots that if they should get lost in the automatics they should disconnect everything and fly raw data!

So your comment about using automatics is very correct indeed but only in an ideal standardisized world....which does not exist.

It is my firm belief that everybody who flies an airlinere should be able to perform every manoever/procedure that exists 100%perfectly flying raw data as well as using automatics!!!!
Any pilot who is not able doing so, being that because a of lack of training or lack of skills, should not be allowed to fly these airplanes!!!!

[strobes_on]

The use of the automatics should obviously be encouraged to "off load" pilot workload.

The problem arises where the flight crew don't understand what the automatics are doing. This creates unintended confusion particularly in critical flight phases. Coupled, perhaps, with crews who may be fatigued, or who are new on type, this can develop rapidly into an undesirable situation.

For this reason, the all engine go around manoeuver must be practiced regularly in BOTH manual and automatic modes up to a SAFE altitude. It must be second nature to pilots.

Unfortunately, we just do not seem to practice this enough.:mad:

[arcniz]

Airbus automatics and configuration details aside, it seems to me that the critical bad decision came about when the GF crew realized their original approach was not going to work. At that point they knew (because it was obvious) they were behind the aircraft, and yet they still had all the good options wide open ahead.

Even with the motive to avoid having an official 'missed approach' on the record, the decision to do a tight 360 close to the ground in pitch darkness seems unsupportable. As long as one is playing fantasy - land with the nomenclature, why not climb a few thousand feet and standardize the turn so there's time and room to improve the layup - or better yet, fly the MA Procedure anyway, to the letter, and just call it 'manoeuvering'?

In a more perfect world, the crew observation that Plan A had not worked should have inspired some moments of introspection and then a change to MORE conservative plan B requiring less artful manoeuvering and simpler procedure, rather than the increasingly nonstandard and uncontrolled flying that ensued.

When you abandon SOP, decisionmaking becomes a philosphical thing. At such times, one had better have the right philosophy.

[Ignition Override]

As others pointed out, are pilots at many airlines told to not use the autopilot during a go-around, and what Boeing calls VNAV, FLCH or VS, along with Heading Select for steering? I used the autopilot in Las Vegas after the Approach Controller suddenly "inserted" a B-737 ahead of us, while telling us to go-around (between the invisible mountains at night-I told the Captain that we would remain over the valley lights in case the controller gave us a questionable vector to downwind or base). Were the Gulf Air pilots already on an ILS or LOC etc hand-flown approach when the go-around began, and if so, either the plane flies the published go-around procedures or the pilots could have pushed an autopilot button and used simple vertical and lateral control modes, while following the flight directors??

I know almost nothing about the sad tragedy, but are Gulf Air pilots (and also pilots at YOUR airline) encouraged to engage whichever autopilot modes allow the easiest control of the airplane when the workload is very high? Did those Gulf Air pilots by chance have very little instrument curency or total experience? I'm not blaming the unfortunate crew a bit, but wonder just what we all can learn.

My impression of the Airbus A-320/319/321...(which I've never trained on-yet) design philosophy was that both the aircraft's unique fly-by-wire technology and the most "advanced" level of automation, could compensate for limited pilot experience, if necessary. If advanced technology=safer aircraft, and can be proven to be so throughout global airline operations, then I will avoid using quotation marks in a skeptical manner in the future. Of course several tragedies have taken place due to pilot complacency or misunderstanding this technology, if I understand the articles about the accidents in France and India.

I have not forgotten the accidents involving the B-757, MD-11 etc. What is the common denominator among accidents involving newer aircraft types, limited simulator+line training or cockpit culture and CRM?

[Seriph]

Lodestar if you can't operate the aircraft through all stages of flight with the automatics then you have no business being there. It was always the problem during the early days of the 75 that guy's were getting confused and the most frquently asked question was 'whats is doing now?' The answer is not to reduce the aircraft to the level of a C150. Just about all of the losses of 757's have been crew induced, the same with the Airbus although here the leap in technological interface in the early days caused problems. It was an easy cop out by the instructers to say revert to manual, it is very rarely necessary or desirable to do so. What runs through all these discusions is the underlying belief that when the going gets tough then pilots must be pilots, you don't take the automatics out, you use the increased capacity to do what the automatics can't, think ahead, programme and operate the aircraft not reduce yourself to the level of mere driver and degrade the effectiveness of your other pilot who now has to monitor your flying in addition to his other tasks.

[Lodestar]

Okay Seriph, I tought that was exactly what I said as well.

Pilots should be able to perform all manoevres 100% perfect by flying Raw Data as well as using the automatics!!!!!

But what about if you where flying an approach all raw data (No AP/AT/FD) and you are instructed to do a go around....In many cases there will not be enough time to reengage automatics (except the FD which reengages automatically when setting ToGA)....When you where flying a hand flown approach you should be able to do the same during the event of a Go Around!!

Also it is a misconception that the automatics in an airbus will compensate for the pilots skills! I have flown both Boeing and Airbus and I have to say that the automatics in an airbus are much tougher to handle and sometimes really are totally against Human Nature! Do not forget as well that the whole fly by wire system has several stages of degradation which means that an airbus (Normal stage is normal law..)becomes difficult to handle when it degrades from normal law into Alternate law-Direct law and mechanical back up!!!!
From Direct law on these aircraft requires a lot of stick and rudder so stating a pilot can afford to be less skilled .....NO WAY!!!!

A bus driver has to be equally skilled as in any other advanced airplane and has to really know all his systems....despite what Airbus is trying to say in its commercials!!!They as well need to study up and invest time to keep their knowledge up to date!!!Otherwise an Airbus becomes an unpredictable and consequently dangerous aircraft in the hands of a badly trained pilot!!!!

[Chuck Hog]

I agree to all what you say ... except one thing: the GF072 did not have the automatic reinsertion of FD bars at TOGA ... Airbus considered this not useful when the plane was built (1994), and afterwards they have only recommended this implementation, but did not make it mandatory ... so the crew intiated the go around in dark night, without any kind of reference .. in fact, the SOP impended them to re-engage the FD bars in SSR mode until reaaching the acceleration altitude (in BH, 1500 feet as I believe).

Scaring ...

And I insist that, upon the lecture of the DFDR readouts, a very suspicious lack of response is seen in the graphics: the PIC commands almost AFT sidestick for two seconds, releases and repeats the command, but the plane keeps descending and descending ...

[Rananim]

"the PIC commands almost AFT sidestick for two seconds, releases and repeats the command, but the plane keeps descending and descending ..."

Can this be correct?Have we been maligning the crew when the aircraft was at fault all along?
Please somebody confirm that if you pull back on the stick in one of these deathtraps,the nose comes up.Thats basic.Trim-related lag?Sounds bs to me.U can get out of trim in a Boeing and still get the a/c to do what u want.Now they want to build a 800 seater....

[Covenant]

Rananim

My god! You mean an 80 ton aircraft travelling downwards at over 100 ft/s doesn't immediately start going up again as soon as you pull the stick back? :D

No it is NOT true that the aircraft didn't respond to the pilot's input. At least not according to the official report I'm looking at. I don't know what report Chuck Hog has been reading, but I guess there's always someone who wants to flog that tired old Airbus/Scarebus theme again. It really is getting a bit boring and a bit tiresome.

The report clearly states that nose down pitch trim is automatically applied to counteract the tendency to pitch up when TOGA thrust setting is selected. Now, I'm not an Airbus jockey (actually, I'm not any kind of a jockey), but could an Airbus operator confirm that this is normal operation please?

Even if the trim was acting counter to the elevators, I rather suspect that full aft stick deflection would have considerably more authority than trim. Again, I'm no expert. Maybe an Airbus pilot could comment?

Here are some salient excerpts from the official report that should lay your fears to rest. Unless, that is, you subscribe to some conspiracy theory that Airbus are somehow involved in a big cover-up and have doctored or influenced the official report. :rolleyes:

Approximately 2 seconds after the GPWS warnings began, FDR data indicated movement of the captain’s side stick aft of the neutral position, with a maximum aft deflection of approximately 11.7 degrees reached. However, the FDR data showed that this nose-up command was not maintained and that subsequent movements never exceeded 50% of full-aft availability.

If you were fighting against a control system that was ignoring your commanded input and flying you into the ground, wouldn't you be yanking back on that sidestick for all you're worth and not letting go until the GPWS shut the hell up? I think even the most rabidly anti Airbus among you will have to admit that this was a CFIT incident.

The report continues:

During one of the simulator sessions, the 360º turn and go-around manoeuvres were performed to approximate the flight path and sequence and timing of events recorded on the FDR recovered from A40-EK. However, in these scenarios, the pilots were instructed to recover with full aft stick movement at the onset of the ground proximity warning system (GPWS) “whoop, whoop, pull up” alert. In this scenario, the simulator recovered with about 300 feet of altitude loss.

In the following scenario, a half-back stick command was applied instead of a full back stick command. The delay between the GPWS warning and the stick command was approximately 4 seconds. In this scenario, the simulator recovered with about 650 feet of altitude loss.

In another scenario a recovery was performed by the co-pilot after he verified that the captain took no action to recover from the GPWS “whoop, whoop, pull up” alert. The co-pilot depressed the priority button on his sidestick, announced his control override, and applied full aft side stick input. In this scenario, the simulator recovered with about 400 feet of altitude loss.

Now admittedly that was the simulator, but the FDR did not show anything like this kind of response from either pilot. The PNF didn't even touch his sidestick during the entire accident sequence, so he clearly wasn't aware of the situation.

[edited to correct VS estimate at first nose-up command input]

[Seriph]

Well Lodestar perhaps the aircraft should be operated in conditions such a these with the automaics engaged i.e. no hand flown raw data nonsense then it's simply 'go-around, flap---, gear up, autopilot re engage if the go around was late and the autopilot had been disengaged tfo landing. Hand flying is for nice clear conditions in good weather and only then in a quiet environment. The time cannot be far off when the autopilot will be engaged with the before take off checks and disengaged at the end of the landing roll, 'pilots' will have to know how to operate the system and their should be far fewer cfit's.

[Chuck Hog]

See the objective data yourself and create your own opinion, do not lean on indirect subjective comments.

DFDR readouts, vertical parameters, 5 last minutes, 1 last minute.

http://www.bahrainairport.com/civil/finalreport/pdf/AppendixC1/planche1.gif

http://www.bahrainairport.com/civil/finalreport/pdf/AppendixC1/planche1b.gif

green line, sidestick deflection; red&grey line, elevators; light blue line, TRIM (I recall automated TRIM controlled by the fly-by-wire system); purple line, pitch attitude. Analyse the graphics together and you may see something strange.

See also another interesting graphic in

http://www.bahrainairport.com/civil/finalreport/pdf/fig3.pdf

and check the effects of the commands of the pilot in the pitch attitude and the vertical speed.

[757 Gti]

Regarding the nose pitch down on a go-around.

Virgin had an "incident" about two months ago in Hong Kong. A340 entered wind-shear and the crew selected toga at low level (300ft or so). Trouble was that despite full aft on the sidestick the aircraft pitched nose down (sufficiently for the chap in the Dragon Air office (next to r/w?) to see the entire upper surface of the wing!

The a/c reached 70ft before the nose came back up and the a/c climbed away.

Mr Airbus saw this as full vindication of his systems, the operators are not so sure...

As told to me by a BA training Capt.

757 Gti

[HotDog]

So he pulled out at 70 ft in a microburst. Many non FBW aircraft of different manufacture were not so lucky!

[Chuck Hog]

Same thing happened more than a year ago in Bilbao, with an A320 from Iberia. Hard windshear, go around decision, full aft sidestick from both pilots, and the TRIM automatically noses down to avoid a computed potential stall condition (alpha floor protection). Result: the aircraft impacts the runway at a high vertical speed, nobody resulted seriously hurt but relevant structural damages in the plane.

Airbus recognized the problem of the software and has implemented the change of the ELAC computers. Maybe the Virgin aircraft you mention had not made the neccessary improvements ...

[tulips]

If the Iberia incident had been a 737 and both pilots had pulled full back, the result would not have been a hard landing. It would have been a conventional stall, spin, splat!

The GF 072 aircraft was functioning perfectly and did exactly as its pilot commanded it to do. The fact that the pilot commanded a totally inappropriate flight path is a different matter entirely. A 2-second aft-stick input does not miraculously 'recover' the aircraft; it merely lessens the angle of dive by a corresponding amount. Again, the aircraft did what it was told to do.

Seriph, with your desire to fully automate every aspect of flight, please enlighten me as to how the aircraft is going to perform your 'auto-takeoff, auto-approach and autoland' at a field where there is no landing aid, or when the glideslope is knocked out during a storm, or when you need to do a visual circling off an ILS to a different (non-equipped) runway..... And fyi, yes, I do fly A320 and A340 into fields exactly like these.

Much has been written since that sad night nearly 2 years ago. I believe the report is accurate, and damning. It is, however, indicative of the Company culture and mindset at the time. GF believed for too long that 'it would never happen to us'. Then it did. Much has changed since then, but the cost has been extremely high.

[BlueEagle]

Tulips, I beg to differ only on your remark about a B737 in a similar situation to the Iberia aircraft.

I have flown B737, 747, 757 and 767 in Europe, Middle East and Far East and experienced some really bad weather scenarios, why do you say that a B737 would go,'coventional stall, spin and splat!' whereas the A320 only did a heavy landing? Presumably you are only referring to the action of pulling fully back on the control column by both pilots and having stall protection?

In a B737 and upwards, from my experience, in conditions other than a microburst the Boeings will, with full power and two pilots who know they cannot apply full rearward control without the strong possibility of a stall, climb away.
What makes the Airbus so special?

[Covenant]

Chuck Hog

So you are saying that the official investigation overlooked, either deliberately or inadvertently, something in the data that you have managed to discover from looking at a couple of FDR graphs. :rolleyes:

For what my opinion is worth, I read the graphs differently from you anyway:

1) The captain commanded significant nose down input between 16:29:43 and 16:29:53 - more than ten seconds of it anyway. During this time, the aircraft went from about 6 deg nose up attitude to about 16 deg nose down. The aircraft responded to his aft sidestick commands thereafter by reducing the nose down attitude to about 5 deg nose down at the end of the FDR recording. This strikes me as ain aircraft doing exactly what it's been told to do. The elevator response (brown and grey lines) confirms this.
2) Soon after TOGA power was selected, trim moved to around about 1.5 deg nose down and stabilised there during which time the aircraft was established in a stable climb. When the captain started to command the nose down on his sidestick, the trim blipped down a fraction, maxing out at maybe 2 deg nose down and finally ending at about 1 deg nose down.

I don't believe you are telling me that this trim graph indicates that the aircaft flew itself into terrain against the commands of its pilot! All the evidence points to CFIT. There is no evidence from the CVR that the pilots were surprised by the response of the aircraft to their command input. The PF didn't pull back as if he was fighting to bring the nose up. The PNF didn't even activate his sidestick. How do you answer those rather more pertinent facts?

The other incidents that have been mentioned regarding the A320/A340 response in windshear do not have any real bearing on this incident, and particularly not on the question you have raised about the automatic trim. A40-EK was responding only to TOGA selection and had established a steady climb with nose-down trim. In the case of windshear, it is likely that the FBW system was limiting command authority to the elevators because of approaching stall conditions.

I'm sorry Chuck Hog, but I have to say that I think what we are seeing from you and the other Airbus scaremongers is technophobia (I give the benefit of the doubt that it is not just parochialism or, worse, protectionsim). No matter how advanced we become technically, and how educated or professional we are, we still do not really trust machines deep down in our psyche. In essence (and I apologise for crossing threads here), this is why we had the tragic loss in the recent mid-air collision over Germany. In the face of a conflict between advice being supplied by a computer, and the reassuring human voice of the ATC, the Russian pilot chose to trust the human.

Unfortunately, as has been amply demonstrated so many times, most tragedies are caused in some way by human error. If we could bring ourselves to trust machines more, maybe the world would be a slightly safer place.

[Seriph]

Come of it Tulips, you know what I mean. If you can't fly ILS then you still fly non precision or even visual approaches with the autopilot, certainly flying manual circling approaches in difficult conditions has proved time and time again to be dangerous! 3D sat nav will take care of the lot, won't be long, in the meantime when I'm down the back I keep my fingers crossed that we haven't got a macho pilot up front.

[tulips]

Hi Blue Eagle

Yes, that is exactly what I am referring to. I mean that in the Iberia case, both pilots were able to apply full 'back stick', resulting in probably the best possible resulting landing (taking into account sink rate, full power and pitch input). In a 737, or an A300B4, it is not possible to pitch to exactly the critical alpha; one can only get close, which is not quite as efficient.

No slur intended on Mr Boeings product, merely an observation that you cannot have both pilots applying 'full back stick' in a low energy situation in a 737 aircraft without ending up in an unusual attitude, to say the least! The same comparison would be valid in the case of the very first A320 crash. The aircraft ended up in the forest, but my point is that it was the right way up, which has to help limit injuries or fatalities.

The Airbus is not special, just different!:cool:

[SID the STAR]

Tulips

are you sure you are flying BOTH A320 and A340?:rolleyes:

[tulips]

Hi SID; yes, I reckon a few thousand hours in each type qualifies.

Seriph, if you look at FCOM3 you will see that it is against Airbus SOP to fly a visual circuit with the autopilot. ('At the beginning of downwind, deselect FD'). Further, there are times when a manual circling approach is required, whether the pilot likes it or not. That is the time when he/ she had better be able to fly the airplane. Depending on pilot ability, there can be a big difference between a 'demanding' approach and a'dangerous' one, to use your phrase.

Don't forget, the conditions in BAH that night were neither demanding nor dangerous. Clear skies, serviceable aircraft. It was only dark.....

[Seriph]

The autopilot will always do it better than you Tulip, you just need to know how to tell it to.

[tulips]

Yes, sir, Seriph. Thank you.....

[Capt Pit Bull]

Seriph,

No it won't.

'Always' do it better that is.

I just don't comprehend how you continually attribute such infallibility to autoflight systems. Are you saying that you have never had to intervene because an autopilot has been performing less than brilliantly? I'm talking modes correctly selected, as opposed to having to intervene manually as a quick way of sorting out finger trouble?

CPB

[411A]

Clearly Seriph is a young(ish) guy/gal who has not been in aviation for very long. Pity the punters down the back should he/she be in charge at the pointy end when the autopilot is unserviceable. Day or night.:rolleyes:

[MasterGreen]

"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. No knowledge at all is frequently fatal."

An Autopilot / AFDS is best regarded as an extra set of hands and a big help most of the time. However it is far from perfect some of the time and needs watching. The modern equipment is becoming more and more reliable it is true, but herein lies a big trap. (and if I need to explain that then you should not be reading this.)

An autopilot will only fly better than you if :

1. You are tired, distracted or busy.
2. You are disorientated or overloaded.
3. You never learnt to fly properly in the first place.

These are then the conditions when it is best to use the A/P. All other times its' use is best left to that old fashioned term - Airmanship.

Before anyone starts about Cruise Economy / Turbulence / Departure Tracking / Workload etc etc - I refer to the paragraph above.

There is a new generation of Nintendo Kiddies out there folks - Pinball Wizards to a man (I will totally discount the females here since,without exception, all that I have had the honour to train have been great handlers). On the rails these PBWs / NKs are fine, if mechanical. Get off the rails and then watch out for the recovery. It's a worry.

MG

[Seriph]

Capt Pit Bull, yes they do, I defy you to fly any procedure as accurately as an autopilot and if you try have any capacity left for the real world on a dark and dirty night and if you try it why?

411A - 37 yrs 16000 hrs. Trainer. I have flown all types with and without autopilots. I have never had to operate glass cockpit aeroplanes with all autopilots u/s, if I had to fair enough, but in 15 yrs with my current airline we have not had a single occurance of multiple autopilot failure. I have witnessed many near misses and crashes in simulators because guys cannot operate the aircraft and revert to manual flying. I have never seen a correctly operated flight system crash the aircraft. We have cases by the dozen where aircraft have crashed because the crew screwed up, this looks like one, engage the autopilot in hdg and alt and you won't hit the sea!

Master Green - 777's ? you're in the DC3 era.

[Lodestar]

Hasnt it occured to you all that the way to do it lays....


EXACTLY in the middle between everything you are saying....

100% Autopilot......BAD!
100% Manual.........BAD!

Try to combine both in a way that suits you best considering fatigue, situation, traffic, etc......

:cool:

[Rananim]

Seriph,
You sure dont talk like a trainer who's been flying 37 years.Most good trainers emphasize raw data and handling skills.Pilots who spend too much time on automation(not crusie) can become detached from the aircraft they are operating.eg,L1011 crash in the Everglades.Both pilots watched that A/P take them into the swamp...No disrespect to the crew..they fell into a trap that would fool most..misunderstanding of CWS and A/P mode annunciations.
You must surely know there are maneuvers that must be flown by the pilot...Windshear/TCAS/GPWS escape maneuvers.Visual approaches are to be flown manually.
I strongly suspect you fly Airbus...then dont forget that their chief pilot died with the A/P engaged.
A/P is a tool..a good tool.Use it as such.

[Lodestar]

"I strongly suspect you fly Airbus...then dont forget that their chief pilot died with the A/P engaged. "

A lousy remark dont you think, RANIM?
:o

[Seriph]

The autopilot flies the airoplane, you programme it and monitor. Simple really, of course you can 'fly it' like Buck Rogers but you reduce the crews efficiency and significantly increase you chances of hitting something. This has been established time after time. Apart from the few cases where temporary reversion to manual flying is required then you only do it for fun not for safety. I fly Boeings.

[Pegasus77]

Seriph you are starting to bore me; yes the AP is a good tool to use for reducing workload, but in many conditions the AP stinks.

Ever in your 16000 hours flew an automated approach with too much crosswind (say 40 knots) and saw what happened?
Ever seen a 320-AP shoot 150ft through its level, because of the builtin passanger comfort?
I don't need to be in the DC3-era to see things like that happen, and I'm glad I'm there to take over from my autopilot when it just doesn't do what it is supposed to do, or to be able to take over when the conditions met are not what designers thought off on beforehand.

I go with Lodestar, 50% automated, 50% manual suits me fine.

Besides... the remark about the airbus chiefpilot who died while flying automated may be pretty macabre, but the case shows perfectly well, that if you encounter circumstances not before thought of at the design-table, the autopilot will not be able to handle it and then you should be.

P77

[Seriph]

Bet you drive a horse and cart.

[ia1166]

Seriph, autopilots on boeings such as the 75/76 don't even have rudder control unless you're on a final approach. if the eng fails in the cruise the thing will roll onto its back and kill every one.

[Carruthers]

Not if you apply a bit of rudder and trim it laddy.

[apfds]

An uncalled for remark about Nick Warner and incorrect,the a/p was diconnected.

There is nothing wrong with flying manually but remember high performance a/c are more efficiently and comfortably flown on the a/p.
I am afraid the day of the macho pilot is over.!

[Capt Pit Bull]

Seriph,

I am not disputing the virtues of using automatics.

I am simply taking issue with your statement that the automatics will always do it better.

I defy you to fly any procedure as accurately as an autopilot and if you try have any capacity left for the real world on a dark and dirty night and if you try it why?

You are joking, right?

Any Procedure? How about any landing with a crosswind in excess of 20 Kts.

[AhhhVC813]

What excactly does a BA captain know about the A340? And please, if you need to fly at alpha max and in order to do that the pitch attitude is less than zero, so what? After all, in a microburst of large downhill proportions than alpha max may not be positive with reference to pitch. Heave the nose up and stall in a conventional a/c? I believe that too many people comment on things that they know nothing about.

[tulips]

AhhhVC813, your sentence

I believe that too many people comment on things that they know nothing about.

is exactly correct.

(A certain 37-year old "trainer" with 16 000 hours and 15 years in one airline, which makes him a tender 22 when he joined..., AND who has still managed to fly "all types", comes to mind).

Personally, thanks to the people who have posted meaningful and thoughtful replies to a topic which, after all, discusses the death of 143 people.

To seriph and his spoiler mates, while it is your 'right' to be patronising, disparaging and rude to people about a subject that you successfully give the impression of knowing very little about, it might be an idea to start a new thread where you can all squabble and argue among yourselves, and come away feeling victorious about having 'won'.

[Desertia]

I'm not a complete technophobe (hey I can program my VCR!), in fact I work in the tech industry, but I can say that Airbus software is almost certainly FLAWED.
Before you start, no I am not saying that has anything to do with this incident, merely that probability tells us that the sheer volume of code, and the complexity of the calculations involved for each of the permutations involved means that it could be flawed in several ways. It may be missing an essential response simply because the circumstances haven't happened yet for them to be added to the code.
It may have an error in incident response code for circumstances it DOES knows about, but that haven't happened yet. It may have flaws in code that does get executed, but doesn't have a significant or noticeable impact on aircraft activity.
But it IS flawed, I guarantee you that.
So to all you technophobes: Yes, the Pilot should always be ready (and able) to take control in the blink of an eye.
To all you technophiles: It's written by HUMANS. Humans make mistakes. Ergo it makes mistakes. Be ready for them!
Here endeth the lesson, aaaaaaaamennnnnn.
Regards,
Desertia

P.S. In the 36th century, Robots will take over and come back looking like Arnold Schwarzenegger. Is that what you want? 'Cos that's what'll happen!

[arcniz]

As Seriph is misunderstanding autopilots, so Desertia is having his shot at misunderstanding the whole scope and breadth of modern control technology. Too much sand up the nose, mayhap?

The short answer is that - contrary to Desertia's assertion - we currently know how to make (at considerable cost) software, computers, and composite systems that are provably more reliable and more nearly 'correct' than any other component one finds on an aircraft.

To the extent that autopilots, control systems, etc. are not perfect in practical use, the problem in well-engineered designs is almost always one of incomplete SPECIFICATION of the circumstances to be dealt with and/or UNDERSTANDING of the appropriate solution. In less completely engineered ones, a lack of complete TESTING can also be an issue.

To the extent these issues exist, all are basically matters of as- yet incomplete communication between the people flying and the people designing. The full automation of aircraft is a 125-year problem, with only 75 years so far under the belt. When it's done, there will still be pilots and they'll still be saving the bacon now and then, so don't worry about that.

In a PC-dominated world it is an easy mistake to confuse the motives and abilities of those who design truly critical systems for health and safety with the products of highly visible companies, like Microsoft, that aim to profit greatly from a perpetuum of faulty consumer products requiring frequent replacement.

[ironbutt57]

Like any computer...GIGO garbage in...garbage out...bad inputs either to the flight controls or the FMC can have bad results...obvious which one was the case here...:confused: :confused:

[Seriph]

No Tulips 37 yrs flying not age. I wish. Oh and if you switch your flight directors off, you can still fly the 'birdie'

Arcniz, stick to theory, problems with auto systems are very rare. The difficulties come with the human / machine interface and was why initially Airbus had so many accidents. Now that the pilots have learnt how to use it the system works very well. As long as you are prepared to come out of the stone age.