Oh, I dunno Zarg, YPKG (OCTA) was a good altn for many a jet RPT, in dem good ole days......as were many other locations OCTA...
Meeka was an INTL Altn.... Imagine the looks on the faces at the many windows looking at '****-all' @ that!
:p

Met is a lot like horse racing. Sometimes the nag at 100:1 comes through. Just because PROB05 isn't on the forecast doesn't mean it isn't there.

**** happens occasionally and the low odds come up trumps. You could make the BOM put PROB01 on the TAF and it would still go wrong 1% of the time.

Which is exactly why this third world country should align itself with the majority of other third world countries and have the infrastructure and necessary equipment to function under these conditions! :ugh:

Zarg,

I think the point that's being made is that in times past, there would have been a much closer operational watch and much more support well before the aircraft departed "controlled airspace".

Affordable safety?????

For probs less than 30, I only discovered recently that there are Aerodrome Briefings available from BoM/ ASA for ml, sy, ph, bn and ad that include a plain text decode of the taf as well as listing chances of ts, fog, etc, that are considered less than 30%. It's quite a handy bit of extra information and worth checking out.

Having said that, I have no idea what it happened to say on the day of this fog.

Sorry, I missed that bit.
One other thing not mentioned for ops control, was that ATC could look at the actual wx and put their own requirement on it that was contrary to the forecast. I don't remember TTFs being in operation prior to ops control closing down.

"Adelaide requires alternate due unforecast fog, ATC operational requirement, Perth, Alice Springs suitable, advise alternate, endurance remaining etc"

I can see one ATSB recommendation that companies beef up their flight following/operational control capability significantly to make sure the PIC is adequately resourced in flight.

ACARS should be mandatory for all high capacity operations.

Common sense (remember that)? should be mandatory for all high capacity operations, but it isn't! :ugh:

Flew out the window the moment "affordable safety" became the paradigm.

Thanks Dick for the memories.:mad:

If memory serves and without going back to the prelim report one of the airlines sat on the changed weather report for 45 minutes prior to sending an ACARS because of sterile cockpit procedures.

Brian, that in itself is interesting. From a crew POV, there are two types of ACARS, a message with a ding dong, and another "silent" type that is pushed directly to the ACARS printer. Sometimes new weather updates are pushed in he second method by the dispatchers. So the sterile argument loses credibility - why not send a silent update as soon as it is know and the message later?

Sterile procedures does not mean silence. It means only communication pertinent to the aircraft operation is to be utilised. I should think critical information about airport availability due fog is falls into the allowable operating procedure for the sterile cockpit environment.

I would not think that an update on weather is in the same category as discussing nappy changing at 2 am.

Or put it another way:-

Sterile means nothing other than essential duties. I would have thought that weather updates would fall into "essential duties"

And I am sure a 737 does not take 45 minutes from push-back to above 10,000 ft.

The ACARS thing is a red herring. The QF crew got the message at 2148, just after they got to top of climb out of Sydney, plenty of time to cogitate on it before getting near ADL.

I agree with the sterile cockpit policy re ACARS. Dings or buzzing printers during the takeoff are not good. If the company has a critical message to pass, they can do it thru ATC.

The system has got to allow all A/C inbound to a fog shrouded drome especially when it wasn't forecast initially to be informed asap. It seems insane with all the technology, the huge costs to run our sad aviation industry with poor infrastructure that we can have in this modern day & age an Airliner that could have ended up a smoking hulk at some uncontrolled basic drome or worse some farmers paddock!!!
Flying is only as safe as it's weakest link. The Plane manufacturers go to extraordinary lengths to make their planes safe for us yet we might as well be flying wooden bi-planes as in some ways we haven't learnt a damned thing since the first recorded plane crash!

'601'....45 mins from push back to 10K is fast sometimes from some of our madhouse dromes!:)


Wmk2

Virgin Aircraft 'Emergency' Landing
 

it is in Brisbane..

What was the content of the weather report QF got at 2148?

On page 9 of the report. :cool:

Last time I looked "affordable safety" didn't change the all-important CAR. Neither has common-sense changed.

"Affordable safety" might not have changed the CAR, but the support mechanisms in the context of what ATC provides now compared to past times certainly have.

Common sense is a different issue - no doubt there will be judgements made by the ATSB/CASA hindsight committee sitting in cosy offices as to whether common sense prevailed in this instance.

Correct! He who shall not be named ripped half the guts out of the system without replacing it to maintain safety levels. Classic example, removal of Flight Service Units with no mandating of Unicoms to ensure radio operation. Beep Backs had to be dreamed up.

Removal of "government-provided" Operational Control was not replaced with mandatory company operational control. In addition, AsA do not fulfill their ICAO obligations when it only provides hazard info within 1 hour of arrival.

Quote:

---

Operator’s Flight Dispatch



1. Flight Dispatch did not proactively provide timely and
comprehensive weather information to the crew about the deteriorating weather conditions at Brisbane.

---

Substitute the destination as Mildura and its easy to see that nothing has changed in the last 12 years.

Quote:

---

5. The operator advised that its flight dispatch department was in the process of updating the operator’s Flight Administration Manual (FAM) to reflect the flight dispatch active operational control support role to flight crews.

---

That section might need further updating.

Not too sure what you're on about? QF Ops (whatever they are called) ACARSd the new ADL TAF to the crew around TOC out of Sydney, long before they got to a PNR. As for the MIA Metars and TAF, nothing had changed until the aircraft were already diverting to MIA.

Looks to me like QF Ops did the right thing.

Bloggs, in what way do you consider Airservices non-compliant?

The specified time for most non-routine Met products and Hazard alerting is delegated to regional air navigation agreements.

But what happened after that? What happened to the active operational control? Was there no communication about where they would divert to? If the crew advised FD that they would continue and use MIA as a back up what monitoring of the weather situation did FD have? I don't think that its as straightforward as simply acarsing ( a new verb!) an updated TAF.

AsA doesn't comply with ICAO Annex 11 Chapter 4 (my old version, at least). There is no "one hour" criteria in there.

Somebody (AsA or CASA) has created the "within one hour" requirement. If a regional air nav agreement has that in it, so be it. AsA is still non-compliant with the basic ICAO reg.

I don't fly for QF. I don't know whether QF FD (I assume Flight Despatch?) "operationally controls" QF aircraft, or whether it merely provides timely information (which it did in this case) and then lets the crew do the "operational controlling".

Does it really matter though? Would QF FD have made the aircraft go somewhere else based on the available info and the current rules (and previous weather incidents?)? I doubt it. But at least the crew had the latest weather for ADL at their fingertips pretty quickly and certainly well before any PNR.

I absolutely agree. I have never suggested that the situation would not have occurred had both crews been given any info earlier (perhaps the MIA AWIS, which was U/S, would have helped re the relative humidity).

Hey Bloggs.

The ammended TAF was issued at 2100Z. QF pushed back at 2109Z.

Why wasnt that information passed on at that stage from dispatch or indeed from ATC?

Bearing in mind that the Flight Tracker info may not be accurate.

In any event I agree that the outcome in all probability would not have been any different given the TTF's that did not change until both aircraft were essentially on descent into ADL.

How would I know?! :)

Things happen. I can understand a TAF not making it to the cockpit within 9 minutes of issue.

What then does Annex 11 Ch. 4 specify?

Doc 4444 Ch.9 specifies 1 hour for SIGMETs, yet Airservices stipulates 2 hours for these. Beyond the minimum requirements.

I say again, "there is no 'one hour' criteria there". Nor is there any other time specification. Don't worry, I would have stated it if there was one. :cool:

ICAO Doc 4444 Chapter 9 Flight Informtation and Alerting Service
Para 9.1.3.5.2 The passing of amended aerodrome forecasts to aircraft on the initiative of the appropriate air traffic services unit should be limited to that portion of the flight where the aircraft is within a specified time from the aerodrome of destination, such time being established on the basis of regional air navigation agreements.

Thanks Top Drop. I can't get access to the curent regs. Can't find them. I think we would all be in agreement that, unless CASA mandates company operational control/flight following, 1 hour prior to ETA that your destination has an amended TAF for fog is not enough?

I remember when ATC ops control was disbanded, we were told that operational control would be the responsibility of operating companies, who in many cases would delegate it to the pilot. I don't know where that responsibility is written in the regs.

I found this from 1988 Regs.

(2) (a) is very similar to the wording for ops control when it was done by ATC.

CAR 224 Pilot in command
(1)For each flight the operator shall designate one pilot to act as pilot in command.
Penalty: 5 penalty units.
(1A) An offence against subregulation (1) is an offence of strict liability.
Note: For strict liability, see section 6.1 of the Criminal Code.


(2)A pilot in command of an aircraft is responsible for:
(a) the start, continuation, diversion and end of a flight by the aircraft; and
(b) the operation and safety of the aircraft during flight time; and
(c) the safety of persons and cargo carried on the aircraft; and
(d) the conduct and safety of members of the crew on the aircraft.

the penny drops...the PIC is LEGALLY responsible for the safety of the people onboard the aircraft. End of legal story. Want to test it in a Courtroom? So you have three choices, keep tossing the dice (and hope that in the meantime enough buck passing might start to carry enough weight to change the Law), put on enough fuel to carry a 'suitable' alt in anything under 8/8ths of blue, or drive a bus.

But the PIC is not the only person legally responsible for the safety of POB. Get ATC to give instructions that cause a mid-air, and test that in Courtroom …

If BOM is ‘all care but no responsibility’, might as well shut it down.

Who'd thought! :uhoh:

I worked on the principal that there was only one person on board that I was responsible for.

That was moi. If I arrived safely in one piece with the aircraft in one piece then everyone else on board would arrive safely.

I've said the same thing many times when people have asked how I feel flying around with everyone in the back.

Of course the PIC is legally responsible for the safe conduct of the flight but in order for him/her to conduct that flight safely he/she needs to be provided with all the information relevant to the flight by those who actually have the information! It also needs to be provided as soon as it becomes available either from ATC or the airlines Ops Centre or whatever it is called. That doesn't remove the responsibility from the PIC for the ultimate outcome of the flight but it makes the decision making process a whole lot easier when the G part of GRADE is a complete picture in real time of what is happening with the weather. If the weather that has been provided states that there are no requirements particularly for the alternate then its not too much to ask for the crew to be updated when that is no longer the case, or are the crew expected to ask every five minutes for the latest update?