Dragon KA8348 Turned Around Mid-Flight Because Pilot Forgot His Map
 

Perhaps, as the Captain is ex -Ryanair , he forgot that KA dont use e charts and forgot to check the Jepp manuals?

Oh , but I forgot, KA do have e-charts but pilots are prohibited from using them
as their use is not sanctioned in the cockpit . Crazy but true.

Allegedly, the said ex- RYA skipper may soon be Ex KA , with a swift return to Barf a lona.

"e-charts"?

What is this sorcery you talk about?
If such a thing even existed, CXKA, the pinnacle of aviation itself, would have invented it!

Heresy! Witchcraft!

To be fair they did actually invent it,admittedly over a period of 12 years but were just very unlucky that after such endeavours it just didn't work.

iPad anyone?

FOs charts ?

iPad anyone?[/QUOTE]

HKA implementing EFB 3-4 year ago and gave new iPad every flight crew with EFB admin support !

Talk to ATC.......radar to visual?

Anyone ELSE find this difficult to fathom ?

Forget something important ? Sure--it happens from time to time. Comedy of errors; chain of events, and maybe not checking things thoroughly. But there has to be more to this.

Many folks have current charts on an iPad. Maybe not the best solution but one that can work--at least for SA.

AND you have ACARS and SATCOM. Surely you can get the pertinent data uplinked somehow and have ground staff meet you where you wind up with faxed or hard copies of what you need.

Not fun to make the call of shame, but it sure beats turning around midway and landing over something that you can probably work around (even legally).

So's I'm wondering if there's a back story here somewhere.

From what I've learnt they had an e-version of the charts but the paper charts were missing. It was decided (after ACARS consultation) that the risk of a ramp check without paper charts wasn't worth taking.

IIRC The KA A320 ACARS/printer setup is not capable of printing charts and there is no SATCOM.

"Many folks have current charts on an iPad. Maybe not the best solution but one that can work--at least for SA."

Shep , you are comparing Cathay Dragon to a modern , efficient and competently run company. As was posted earlier, iPad charts are NOT authorized for operational use in KA. Period. Even though they are the same e-charts being used operationally by Cathay Pacific across the road ! Perhaps they have better ipads lol.

The SATCOMs were de comissioned when CX transferred their ageing A330s to KA, but never fitted to the A320s .

My guess is that the usual blinker thinking prevailed and those who are paid to support and provided assistance could not think outside of their tiny boxes to create an effective solution. The irony of IOC.

iPads are not for operational use at CX either.

Don't you mean " because neither airline has professional dispatchers to research and provide a 'package' of info including charts at dispatch to a one off charter destination"
Pilots don't carry their own charts .. the airline provides 'mini jepps' specific to each route and destination on the day of departure and I can tell you NO crew looks through them predeparture to check if the arrival pages are there. We assume an airline could at least get that right!!

Rightly so; Not. My. Job.

There is some employee somewhere in CXcity that collects a salary and full benefits for this. Yet another failing task to pawn off on the only employee group in this sinking ship that gets things done. If we are meant to check charts are correct in the binders, well then you could say we need to check every possible alternate is on board as well.

Better start making all flights report 2hrs ahead of time to complete this task.

Well done to this crew for turning around. I hope they did it 10 minutes from top of drop. Only thing better would have been if they diverted into some bumblefack airport without support and then pulled the pin due to hours.

Its the only language they understand. When some little empire, useless outdated department in the big red or green circus tent drops the ball, the last thing you should do is compensate for them and pick it up. Let it fail in spectacular fashion, its the only thing that gets enough attention to actually fix things. Everything else gets promptly swept under the rug by the people that are now scrambling to keep their useless jobs.

Not trying to blame anyone here, but doesn't your checklist specifically say
AIRCRAFT LIBRARY...Check

One off charter ports are not in the port library, a specific trip kit is supposed to be generated.

How many of these cases have we had in the past?
During all my years of flying I have never experienced a crew not checking the 'package' of info including charts at dispatch to a one off charter destination, pre-departure.
The aircraft library for these flights include the 'mini jepps' specific to each route and destination on the day of departure.

I don't get it. Let's say the crew forgot to take the jepp book to the aircraft.. but they should have realised it's not there when preparing for departure from HKG?

When I used to use Jepps (we use iPads now) I used to check for destination and alternate charts in at least one set of Jepps when checking the docs.

It's not that hard.

The problem here is that they did not get a package, and that is not out of the ordinary for a charter as a lot of them go to offline ports that are in the book anyway, so the lack of a package means nothing at the dispatch stage. Part A says it's the airlines responsibility to equip the aircraft, including charts... the company systems failed the crew on that day.

Departing for a charter to offline ports and not making sure the charts are in the book onboard at pre-flight?

What about the pax?

If you didn't check the plates for your one off charter flight and only realise that you don't have them half way.....

Why not carry on to one of the other ports you frequent and send a message to Ops on the way to have the charts waiting for you on arrival. Quick top up, check the charts and off you go ( providing in hours of course )

Minor disruption for your paying passengers but at least you get them to destination.

Departing for a charter to offline ports and not making sure the charts are in the book onboard at pre-flight?

'It's the airlines responsibility..., the company system failed'.

Are we pilots not part of the airlines and the company system nowadays?

What about the poor passengers, our customers?

Did the company ever not allow for more than 10 minutes at dispatch to check all the paperwork?

How about checking the charts onboard during pre-flight?

For a professional pilot I think it's probably a better choice being a ''schmuck', report early and do the job professionally than ending up a schlemiel.

And you have hit the nail on the head - there are more schmucks than professionals nowadays. Gone are the days when the reliable chap(ess) would ensure a pad existed between leaving home, arriving at work (a work day) and 'signing on' to allow for the vagaries of travel and utilise the 'spare' time to do a bit of route study. No, we've (mostly) joined the socialist mainstream and only do what is necessary and rush to the bottom of the professional ladder. In fact, it is no longer a profession, merely a job - and you cannot blame the suits for that one.

I left my last job with 60 days leave/overtime to be converted into leave I never took and I have not one regret. Then I came here and after being screwed in every possible way I finally sadly realised this is a job. I had never said "I am going to work" before in my life, maybe "I am going to the airport" on a bad day, but then I started ! So don't give me, or many of us probably, this socialism mainstream condescending, patronising rubbish. Don't you dare implying we are not professionals or not acting likewise.
You may have come here on a different era and the company might have good to you, not to me and many of us with a number of years left in their career.
They pay the bills and that is all I am going to work for, at least for the foreseeable future.
BTW this was about what happened at KA and even though we don't know what happened the pundits are talking.

Would anyone else have just used their ipad and kept quiet, or is it just me?

No it's not just you. I think most thinking pilots (and airlines for that matter) would have figured out SOME way to get the mission done safely and even as legally as can be given the situation. You've already launched without the charts necessary to complete the intended flight so whatever rules might be there are already broken. The key next is to do what is safe and makes sense. Possibly what you said, possibly it might be get chart data airborne (which verifies what you're looking at on your iPad is correct), complete the flight and have ground staff meet you at destination with what you need. And possibly if the weather is bad where you are going it might be better to divert and get what you need or turn back. People make mistakes and sometimes a few along the line do. Pilots jobs are to figure out what comes next to best solve the problem presented -- fix the problem don't fix the blame.

To me this kinda rings of the (possibly embellished) Quantas ditch vs autoland at a field below mins story.

That's why the OP seemed kinda screwy to me. Looked more like a cover story for something else which happened. If you look at the comedy of errors that had to happen and the comedy of actions which followed it just doesn't seem all that plausible. So I think something else might have been afoot.

Was the in-flight internet an option?

To a370 on behalf of his colleagues
 

Yes I have the jumpseat APP on my personal iPad as do many others so we can HELP OUR FELLOW PILOTS AND THEIR FAMILIES.

There are many ways to demonstrate frustration or apply pressure to protect our deserved term and and conditions but missing an opportunity to help your mates in the name of punishing a faceless system who couldn't give a crap isn't one of them.

Please Mate, and anyone else adopting this stance, have a think about who you're hurting. (If you don't actually have the personal hardware, fair enough but that's not many folk these days)

LMAO! What is in-flight internet?? We barely have in-flight movies

Is this one based on an event that supposedly actually happened or is it one of those wacko interview hypotheticals that once were traditional in pilot interviews?

Does Dragonair supply their pilots with a Checklist of Plates and currency dates?
If you are required to check the plates before departure - how do you actually do it?
In other words, is there a formal and defined system, or is it just a quick flick through the book to see it the appropriate airports are somewhere in there?

The system worked successfully for 32 years, 'the worlds best regional airlines' awards.

What system?