Erebus 25 years on

[ampan]

Desert Dingo #554:

The Simplest Explanation: I don’t think “Wilson didn’t tell them that the track was over Erebus” is the simplest explanation, because you then have to ask what he did tell them. And that’s going to lead into all sorts of complications. Whereas “Wilson told them that the track was to the NDB at McMurdo Station” explains everything, including the captain’s decision to turn left. (On that topic, I accept what Mahon says about the “sudden manual application of left rudder”. But before this, a left turn was initiated using the autopilot, and there is no dispute about that.)

As to the points raised -

“All the briefing material implied that the track was not over Erebus.” Even if that were true, ‘over Erebus’ is not the relevant issue. The correct question to ask is whether all the briefing material implied that the track went to somewhere other than the McMurdo Station.

Wilson did not notice the Dailey Islands waypoint for 14 months – Although it was 14 months, there were only four briefing sessions during that period. When put like that, the failure to notice seems much less strange.

The denials of the surviving pilots – The only denials concerned ‘over Erebus’. None of the three disputed Wilson’s evidence re the nav track going to McMurdo Station.

Why Collins engaged the nav track – He believed it went to the Dailey Islands. His belief was the result of an error.

Why didn’t Cassin object? – Cassin also believed that the nav track went to the Dailey Islands. He adopted the captain’s belief, which was an error.



End of #552:

Mahon’s findings:

In the passage quoted by Desert Dingo, Mahon is not referring to Capt. Simpson’s evidence concerning what Capt. Wilson said about the nav track. Mahon is referring to Capt. Simpson’s evidence about his telephone discussion with Capt. Johnson.

Even if Mahon had said that he accepted Capt. Simpson’s evidence in its entirety (which he didn’t) the plain fact of the matter is that Capt. Simpson never disputed Capt. Wilson’s evidence that the he told the crew that the nav track went to McMurdo Station. Capt. Simpson only disputed Capt. Wilson’s evidence that he told the crew that the track went over Erebus.

This might explain why Mahon’s only finding on the subject appears to support Capt. Wilson’s version – see #499. He hears Capt. Wilson say: (1) "I told them that the nav track was to McMurdo Station”, and (2) “I told them that this track went over Erebus”. He then hears Capt. Simpson and two others say that “Wilson did not tell us that the track went over Erebus”. So what would you conclude from that, assuming that you preferred the evidence of the three surviving pilots where there was a conflict. You would conclude that Capt. Wilson told the crew that the nav track went to McMurdo Station, but that he did not say that this track went over Erebus. And that’s exactly what Mahon concludes – see p60, para 164(b).

[ampan]

some new photos

taken, poignantly (if that's a word), from the promotional brochure:

http://www.christchurch.archives.gov...ebsite/Erebus/

[ampan]

Transcripts of Evidence

http://nz.briefcase.yahoo.com/[email protected]


PDF files of the evidence of the pilots who were briefed by Capt Wilson.

[grummanavenger]

Among the briefing material supplied to crew were two copies of charts, an RNC4 and a McMurdo area chart.
Both these clearly showed a waypoint at “BYRD”, S 77.30 E 165.00, this at least visually would have encouraged the impression the approach to McMurdo was over sea or pack ice.
But whether the Collins crew had a mandate for the descent remains debatable.
While in practice the radio/inertial nav system was accurate, it did have an acceptable drift rate of around 1.7 nm/ hour without radio update so after the transit to the ice there could have been a circle of position around 6 nm diameter. Additionally, instrument approaches using the nav system were not permitted.
The mis-identification of the landmarks visible was an unfortunate map reading error. We should recall that Jim Collins as an airline pilot had not map read for about 22 years since his time in the RNZAF.
To add to the what if, there was certainly one flight where the second F/O transferred the nav position from the display on the overhead panel onto a topo map.
I also ponder what the plan was for the exit from the area assuming there had been a successful lower level sight seeing activity.
An early post mentioned the other F/O, “Brick” Lucas. His body was found within the wreckage in a position suggesting he was seated back within the cabin on impact.
The missing pages of the diary also puzzles observers. I suspect, that as WW2 aircrew who did not return invariably had their personal effects sanitized, that similar may, just may have happened in this case. The latter comment is not an attempt to condone the alleged break-ins of the homes.
Note should also be made that at the Royal Commission witnesses were required to speak at dictation speed or slower. Maybe this in part explains Ian Gemmell’s responses frequently in “monosyllables?” And yes he did spend some years as Ops Manager with Polynesian at Apia.

[ampan]

Could never see any motive for Captain Gemmell destroying evidence while down on the ice. I also read somewhere that it was he who found the black box, after digging for half a day, tied to rope. Not bad for a chap in, I'm guessing, his 50s.

[grummanavenger]

Yes Ian Gemmell would have been 50-51 back in 1979.

[ampan]

I’ve found the reference. It’s from the first book written about the accident, entitled ‘White Out’, by Michael Guy in mid-1980, just after the release of the Chippendale Report (pp119,120):

“The search for the flight and voice recorders began straight away. Ian Gemmell from Air New Zealand had promply made a reconnaissance of the area as soon as he reached the crash site. Roped to a Face Rescue mountaineer he had located a part of the fuselage near where the recorders were racked. The mountaineer was the first to see the bright orange voice recorder, but there seemed to be no sign of the flight recorder. They made another sweep along the strewn wreckage, but there appeared to be no trace of it above ground. They decided to dig around the area where the first recorder had been found. It took some time to dig about 30 yards of snow, and they then decided to take a break for tea. By 11pm they were digging again, and within five minutes they were lucky. Gemmell’s spade struck the box, 15 yards away from where they had found the voice recorder. It was an immense relief. Neither recorder appeared damaged and they would possibly yield clues as to why the plane had crashed.”

[ampan]

Been doing some more research on Ian Gemmell. People might ask why the CP was sent down to the ice, but it looks as if Gemmell had been AirNZ's accident man for years. I note that an AirNZ DC8 crashed on take-off during a training flight in 1966, and that Gemmell was on the investigating team. So I can't see anything sinister in sending down the best man, even if he happens to be the CP.

[punkalouver]

It appears that descents below 16,000 feet were only allowed in a sector to the true south of McMurdo. Why were they descending even if VMC north of McMurdo?

[prospector]

" It appears that descents below 16,000 feet were only allowed in a sector to the true south of McMurdo."

Exactly.

[punkalouver]

Not only that but no descent was allowed if snowshowers were in the area and apparently there was snow reported in the area. Why would this snow restriction/no descent allowed be created in the first place. Potential for whiteout conditions possibly.

[Oakape]

It's called 'normalised deviance'.

It goes along the lines of -

Everyone is doing it
Everyone knows everyone is doing it
No one has got in trouble for doing it
No one in authority has said to stop doing it

So it becomes 'the way we do things around here'

Often it ends in embarrassment, occasionally, in tears

[NS14]

2015

Hi experts,

recently came across Mahon's book in a 2nd hand store.
Interested upon finishing to see other points of view, original details etc and found my way to erebus.co.nz where I read the Chippendale and Mahon reports then found my way here and have read various threads including this one in full.
I now find I want to spend some more effort to tidy some loose ends though I fear this may be the end of the road.

Any help with the following will be greatly appreciated:
1) is there now online transcripts of the royal commission evidence? For example the link http://nz.briefcase.yahoo.com/[email protected] from ampans post re "PDF files of the evidence of the pilots who were briefed by Capt Wilson" doesn't work now.
2) What was SOP for pilots re- navigating and cross-checking INS? Was Collins expected to confirm each leg was heading where he expected / to confirm exactly where it was headed? Was it a SOP to check that if going down? I think I may have read it was but only if landing and note also desert-dingo said "Should have verified waypoint by plotting on a chart. No. The company SOPs are to check waypoint entries against flight plan data". It just seems so obvious, perhaps especially in hindsight, that you should.
3) The issue of Simpson vs Johnson, the 27 miles vs the 2 miles between the NDB and TACAN, is really difficult (and noted by Mahon who said it was very confusing the last part of the waypoint changing saga). Johnson's position seems to be Simpson didn't mention a 27 mile difference - how else could it be explained that he thought it was a 2 mile difference? Simpsons story seems to have been well assessed by ampan when he described Simpson calling up to ask for the other pilots to be informed Simpson couldn't tell the difference between 27 and 10 miles when looking at a map. Seems this was an area the commission should have probed hard at.
4) It was speculated that "McMurdo" was used to disguise that the track was over the volcano as the US would have objected. Question then is what was the situation when it orginally did go over Erebus? Was the US informed then? Did they not object?
5) and just a point of interest that came up. How did INS account for wind in making its assessments? Does it get forecaste conditions input?

Perhaps I should have started another thread but it seems to me having one thread more convenient.

[Welsh Wingman]

2015

NS14,

Re: (3) and (4), don't get too focussed on the waypoints, or you will lose sight of the wood for the trees when it comes to the Erebus mishap.

Williams Field? NDB? TACAN? Western (i.e. Dailey Island)? It was all part of the systemic failure within the AirNZ of the time (and the (lack of) oversight by CAD). There was only one waypoint those flights should have had programmed from the very first flight in February 1977 - the military Byrd reporting point, before military aircraft began their easterly dog leg descent down the chute to McMurdo. That would have always placed the flight upon arrival in the area at MSA and firmly on the USN ATC radar. No communication/radar line of sight issues, and no overflying of an active volcano. The AINS was accurate enough, even if ideally one would want a ground navigation aid as the waypoint.

Once the USN ATC picked up the incoming sightseeing flight on its radar at the Byrd Reporting Point waypoint, the PIC of the DC10 could seek his clearance from USN ATC to descend VFR provided the DC10 never left the USN's radar scope without permission (or at all?).

Mahon produced an excellent ground breaking report, way ahead of its time, and dealing with systemic/organisational failure. In those days, systemic failure not overcome by the pilots was just misleadingly classified as "pilot error". But not what NZ PM Robert Muldoon wanted to hear, as the shareholder of the state national carrier! The AirNZ planning and CAD oversight of the Antarctic flights was poor (waypoints, nav track, whiteout, prior flight experience, route clearance, survival equipment). There was an administrative malaise within the airline, particularly within flight operations and sub-sections such as navigation and the RCU. Communication in particular. The consumer pressure facing the pilots, Ross Island being the star attraction. The flight crew were programmed to fly down McMurdo Sound and the aircraft itself was programmed to overfly Ross Island, never a happy scenario. Even NZALPA joined in, with the flights treated as a Buggins' turn perk for senior captains rather than sensibly training, say, 3 permanent crews for this route. I recall some ICAO official getting into trouble after the Mahon report was published, for saying something like "What's going on down there, it's like a Third World country?"). Reading the planning of those Antarctic flights makes grim reading. The US District Judge Greene later wrote "Were it not for the tragic outcome, the planning phase of Flight 901 could be described as a comedy of errors; some of these errors were perpetrated by Air New Zealand, others by members of the flight crew."

But Mahon made two mistakes.

Firstly, he overstepped the mark in relation to AirNZ with his "orchestrated litany of lies" angle, no doubt clearly unhappy about their post-accident behaviour and (rightly?) exacerbated by their witnesses behaviour towards his Royal Commission but, fatally breaching the rules of natural justice. This judicial finding by the NZ Courts and the Privy Council reduced the focus on their pre-flight behaviour and failings, ironically the very last thing he would have wanted.

Secondly, this probably also contributed towards Mahon feeling sympathy for the pilots and their families, enough to exonerate them and which was going too far for many. This was, after all, a CFIT at FLT 015 into a FLT 130 mountain with a fully functioning DC10. See the later comments of Air Marshal Rochford Hughes, technical adviser to counsel for the Royal Commission. There are aspects of that flight that are troubling, e.g. descent without a permanent fix and without a radar let down, even if the majority of the blame lies elsewhere. The complete exoneration was as controversial as the initial attempt to lay nearly all the blame on the pilots, as this was Antarctica and a "clean flight" configuration at FLT 015 in a wide bodied commercial passenger airliner is not something to enter into lightly in proximity to high terrain.

The failure to divert to the dry valleys? The sudden orbiting descent to get under the cloud cover ahead? Missing Beaufort Island on the wrong side of the INS nav track? Failing to grasp an obvious non-meteorological explanation for the VHF and TACAN issues (intervening high ground)? Failing to plot the nav track entered in the INS during the actual flight, on the run south from Auckland to the Bellany Islands (surely a job for F/O Cassin?)? Failing to check and plot the entered McMurdo waypoint in the INS before descending? Failing to check and plot the current position in the INS, before descending? Obviously the lack of whiteout training, and the presence of sector whiteout, ultimately misled the flight crew although its interesting that Capt Collins elected a left climb in the last seconds of his life (had the penny finally dropped...?).

This incident unfortunately became contentiously black v white in New Zealand, and still is, with no shades of grey. That was unhelpful. The flight crew made mistakes that day, others made far bigger mistakes in the chain of causation.

Trust this helps.

[prospector]

This incident unhelpfully became contentiously black v white in New Zealand, and still is, with no shades of grey. That was unhelpful. The flight crew made mistakes, others made far bigger mistakes in the chain of causation.

That may be your opinion, many think by far the greater mistakes were made by the crew. No matter what mistakes had been made by other people the decision to break all standing orders, such as no descent below 16,000ft unless specific requirements were met, none of which were complied with. As stated by


p

unkalouver It appears that descents below 16,000 feet were only allowed in a sector to the true south of McMurdo. Why were they descending even if VMC north of McMurdo?

Missing Beaufort Island on the wrong side of the INS nav track?

The Island was, as was shown by pictures recovered from camera's of Pax, was very visible, if attention was being paid by any of the crew to the actual position of the aircraft, rather than "following the magenta line" it should have been obvious that something was not as it should be.

[Welsh Wingman]

2015

Prospector,

The SOPs were a bit of a red herring. I think the judge painstakingly proved the "real" SOP was "give the passengers a good sightseeing time". Retired Capt Wilson (RCU) effectively conceded that, as I recall. Everybody knew what the punters were being given, thanks to AirNZs own publicity machine.

If AirNZ had programmed the INS McMurdo arrival waypoint as the Byrd reporting point, nicely always on USN ATC radars, it's difficult for any pilot action to break the safety of the overall system.

Flight crew mistakes were made, and I forgot to additionally add reliance upon INS track at all at FLT 015.

WW

[prospector]

I think the judge painstakingly proved the "real" SOP was "give the passengers a good sightseeing time".

I do not agree with that at all.
The judge by painstakingly trying to establish the only purpose of the flight was to "give the passengers a good sightseeing time". It was obvious the judge had absolutely no knowledge on how an aircraft cockpit routine should be managed.

All the details have been thrashed out in this thread many times, but the most important object of the exercise was to sightsee if weather conditions allowed, they did not at the nominated position, there was an alternative, Dry Valley area that was clear, this option was not chosen. In the end I am quite certain the passengers would willingly have given up the "sightseeing" if they knew what the consequences of the actions of the crew to give them that sightseeing opportunity meant breaking all the safety requirements that had been built into these flights to ensure what happened would never happen.

The judge would appear to have placed little credence on that fact.

[Welsh Wingman]

2015

Prospector,

I think you take us to exactly the sort of systemically unsafe issues that I have alluded to.

Say 3 Captains were designated in 1977 to be the specialist PIC for all the Antarctic flights PIC (Gemmell? Grundy? Vette?). 28 November 1979 would have been about the 5th individual trip, unless they had commanded the 1 previous diversion to the South Pole and the 1 previous diversion to the dry valleys.

With a plane full of punters wanting to see Mt Erebus, McMurdo and Scott as the highlight of their trip, do you think these PICs would have been more inclined to sooner divert to the dry valleys (if marginal), than any PIC making his only trip (claiming his perk) to the Antarctic...?

Systemic safety, which was singularly missing from these flights. A nav track that approaches out of radar/VHF coverage until overflying an active volcano just before your waypoint for low level sightseeing? Seriously?

Get on the USN ATC radar at the Byrd reporting point, and stay on it until you head back to Christchurch, and what can go wrong? If a PIC strays too close to high terrain, or falls for any optical illusion, USN ATC can warn him.

WW

[prospector]

than any PIC making his only trip (claiming his perk) to the Antarctic...?

And that would be it in a nutshell. Re the radar, that was one of the requirements, to be positively identified, along with VHF contact with the radar operator, that were mandatory requirements before descent below 16,000ft could be commenced.

As we now know not one of the requirements for descent were met.

[Welsh Wingman]

Prospector,

Then why have an INS nav track that means the DC10 will be practically overhead the radar before it picks up the aircraft and VHF contact is possible...? The Byrd reporting point was the logical waypoint.

The entire Antarctic sightseeing flights were ill thought out. One of my former colleagues nearly lost his 742 over Indonesia, and he had about 30,000 ft clearance to an active volcano.

The descent without radar coverage was ill-considered, in my opinion, if not objected to by USN ATC.

PIC thought he had VMC - did he?

WW