Crossair Bassersdorf Report
Few Cloudy, but this is my point. The call was ‘ground contact’ but exactly what the Captain had seen is not known. Furthermore, there is a small subpara in JAR-OPS and the operator’s procedures that allows for a something other than the runway or approach lights to qualify as the required visual reference. I understand that the operator, with authority agreement, uses this alternative definition for approaches to at least one airport in their route structure. Hence there is room for ambiguity.
If the Captain had called ‘lights’ instead of ‘ground contact’ there would be little debate that the descent was continuing i.a.w. SOPs, but actually we still would not know what the Captain had seen; could the lights have been the village or a road?
Deliberation is a mental process, thus until we get a recorder for the brain, we are only guessing about judgment and decisions taken at a particular time. When adding fatigue, experiences, and personality it would be even more difficult to conclude with certainty that the Captain deliberately took a course of action.
If the Captain had called ‘lights’ instead of ‘ground contact’ there would be little debate that the descent was continuing i.a.w. SOPs, but actually we still would not know what the Captain had seen; could the lights have been the village or a road?
Deliberation is a mental process, thus until we get a recorder for the brain, we are only guessing about judgment and decisions taken at a particular time. When adding fatigue, experiences, and personality it would be even more difficult to conclude with certainty that the Captain deliberately took a course of action.
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: hamble
Posts: 28
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
A Dose of...
A Dose has resigned as CEO of Swiss. About time too as he and several other former Crossair managers are directly responsible for three of the worst kind of aviation accident: CFIT. (Nassenwil, Bassersdorf, and I include the Saab 2000 that wiped off its undercarriage near Berlin as CFIT). Hopefully they will now all be brought to justice.
Clap!
Clap!
Last edited by 694c; 11th Mar 2004 at 03:56.
, although I doubt that they can keep the momentum going... ex-Tanker
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Luton Beds UK
Posts: 907
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Why he went
The reason Dose has officially given for his resignation is that the board has discerned that some legal action may be taken against him relating to just this crash. Up until now no charges have been levelled by the authorities but it seems to be expected.
The board feels that the stress would be detrimental to his continuing in the post and he agrees.
The big Dutchman now has two jobs until a new CEO is found...
The board feels that the stress would be detrimental to his continuing in the post and he agrees.
The big Dutchman now has two jobs until a new CEO is found...
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: in my house
Posts: 42
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Swiss to lose its CEO, Andre Dose
Just heard last night on TV that, Andre dose gave his resignation as Swiss's CEO!
It seams to me that he was pushed to take this decision. Now is it good or bad for the company itself, this is the question!
-They still don't have their credit.
-They will face big problems soon due to the negotiations for a new CLA for its pilots.
-And there is a big problem for the trainning for the charter A320. For info the charter is to be flown by ex- Crossair pilots(with ex-CRX salaries...) but the trainning is done in-house by ex-Swissair instructors! See the point?
Any comment from the pilots involved would be great.
D-71
It seams to me that he was pushed to take this decision. Now is it good or bad for the company itself, this is the question!
-They still don't have their credit.
-They will face big problems soon due to the negotiations for a new CLA for its pilots.
-And there is a big problem for the trainning for the charter A320. For info the charter is to be flown by ex- Crossair pilots(with ex-CRX salaries...) but the trainning is done in-house by ex-Swissair instructors! See the point?
Any comment from the pilots involved would be great.
D-71
Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: Embedded in a pocket of resistance
Posts: 269
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
The accident report is just a tool. Behind the screens it's all politics. The 'coup d'etat' is is now complete. Soon (guess who the new CEO will be ) Swissair/Aeropers will be in complete control of Crossair.
Let's hope that they can enjoy it before it goes bankrupt again!
) Swissair/Aeropers will be in complete control of Crossair.Let's hope that they can enjoy it before it goes bankrupt again!
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Arroyo
Posts: 262
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Indeed, Robert, the Bassedorf crash is an excuse for Dose dismissal. The fact is that the famous credit facility he so often announced as being « almost undersigned » will not come. His credibility comes to zero not because security but because of the Swiss business going down the drain.
Swiss cannot achieve a turnaround alone. Since no money will come from the banks nor from the government, the only option left open is to have a foreign airline buying a stake and refinancing the business. And, I swear, this is going to happen.
Why ?
A. - SWISS is relatively fit for a takeover :
A1. -Swiss restructuring is not good enough for a turn-around but is doing well above budget, making Swiss cheaper to invest in,
A2. Loss making « Political routes » are now flown on ACMI by third parties a new Swiss could drop anytime,
A3. Code-sharing on other important routes, such as GVA-LDN, grants more flexibility as to a further restructuring,
A4. Always more internal services are being outsourced both to reduce fix-costs and gain more flexibility,
A5. Five Saab 2000 are also externalised to Crossair Europe (EQ), a full subsidiary of Swiss flying with a French AOC which could very well and easily be spun-off,
A6. financing for existing A/C orders is secured, leaving little room for bad surprises and encouraging builders and lessors to keep Swiss flying.
B. - SWISS has no other choice but to open its equity to another airline :
B1. As mentionned before, Swiss has nothing more left to garantee a new credit.
B2. As seen in January, existing share holders are not ready to invest a penny more,
B3. The Swiss governement said again it will not pay again for Swiss,
B4. Share holders (including the State, the main one) agreed not to sell their shares until August 31st. Among them, the private industries will drop their Swiss shares on Sept. 1st.
B5. The very result is that Swiss can and must open its capital to a foreign company/holder before.
C. - There are Majors out there interested in keeping Swiss flying :
C1. AA has invested so much management capacity and money in reaching and preserving through the Swissair grounding a very good code-share agreement with the former Swissir that it won’t let it go like that,
C2. BA made a very good deal with Swiss in granting it a 50m loan in exchange of 8 paires of slots in Heathrow and, a.o., the GVA-LDN route, that it would be foolish to leave this protected market share open to any rival.
C3. Star Alliance controls most of the East european market. Oneworld’s members AA and BA are interested in keeping a small hub as far East as possible to get their share of the cake.
C4. AF is too busy with KLM to undertake anything else and can only hope that Aeroflot will land, as expected, with SkyTeam. But Af and SkyTeam are certainly not unhappy if oneworld, together with Swiss, can contain Lufthansa and Star Alliance on an already highly competitive continental market.
Wishfull thinking ? I’m ready to bet a deal will be struck until August 31st.
Swiss cannot achieve a turnaround alone. Since no money will come from the banks nor from the government, the only option left open is to have a foreign airline buying a stake and refinancing the business. And, I swear, this is going to happen.
Why ?
A. - SWISS is relatively fit for a takeover :
A1. -Swiss restructuring is not good enough for a turn-around but is doing well above budget, making Swiss cheaper to invest in,
A2. Loss making « Political routes » are now flown on ACMI by third parties a new Swiss could drop anytime,
A3. Code-sharing on other important routes, such as GVA-LDN, grants more flexibility as to a further restructuring,
A4. Always more internal services are being outsourced both to reduce fix-costs and gain more flexibility,
A5. Five Saab 2000 are also externalised to Crossair Europe (EQ), a full subsidiary of Swiss flying with a French AOC which could very well and easily be spun-off,
A6. financing for existing A/C orders is secured, leaving little room for bad surprises and encouraging builders and lessors to keep Swiss flying.
B. - SWISS has no other choice but to open its equity to another airline :
B1. As mentionned before, Swiss has nothing more left to garantee a new credit.
B2. As seen in January, existing share holders are not ready to invest a penny more,
B3. The Swiss governement said again it will not pay again for Swiss,
B4. Share holders (including the State, the main one) agreed not to sell their shares until August 31st. Among them, the private industries will drop their Swiss shares on Sept. 1st.
B5. The very result is that Swiss can and must open its capital to a foreign company/holder before.
C. - There are Majors out there interested in keeping Swiss flying :
C1. AA has invested so much management capacity and money in reaching and preserving through the Swissair grounding a very good code-share agreement with the former Swissir that it won’t let it go like that,
C2. BA made a very good deal with Swiss in granting it a 50m loan in exchange of 8 paires of slots in Heathrow and, a.o., the GVA-LDN route, that it would be foolish to leave this protected market share open to any rival.
C3. Star Alliance controls most of the East european market. Oneworld’s members AA and BA are interested in keeping a small hub as far East as possible to get their share of the cake.
C4. AF is too busy with KLM to undertake anything else and can only hope that Aeroflot will land, as expected, with SkyTeam. But Af and SkyTeam are certainly not unhappy if oneworld, together with Swiss, can contain Lufthansa and Star Alliance on an already highly competitive continental market.
Wishfull thinking ? I’m ready to bet a deal will be struck until August 31st.
Those who criticize the CEO should reflect that like he, they too are only human. Are you working in a blame free (a ‘just’ or tolerant) environment? Whilst at the workface we have CRM (cockpit/crew resource management), but at the management level CRM is corporate resource management. Would those in today’s operating ranks who aspire to become senior management have done any better? For those who criticize from within the airline or industry; what did you do to prevent the accident, what did you know of the underlying circumstances, what safety reports were filed, etc, etc. This was an ‘industry’ accident, the result of which identified many issues that we must all learn from.
New people in an organisation, airline, national authority, or government, would not necessarily provide an instant resolution to the problems, particularly if the core issues are systemic or cultural (organisation). It is the individuals within an airline / organisation that form the organisation, and they create and operate their system. If the CEOs departure was due to the accident, then what other resignations can we expect from the authority or the governments involved?
New people in an organisation, airline, national authority, or government, would not necessarily provide an instant resolution to the problems, particularly if the core issues are systemic or cultural (organisation). It is the individuals within an airline / organisation that form the organisation, and they create and operate their system. If the CEOs departure was due to the accident, then what other resignations can we expect from the authority or the governments involved?
please wait
Join Date: May 2001
Location: miami and other nice places
Age: 63
Posts: 35
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Dosé's last flight
Long overdue step!!! In good old days, where people took personal responsibility especially when people got killed, Dose and his gang were ready to step down already after the first CRX accident. His further continued regime and later becoming CEO of what was left of SWISSAIR was constantly built on lies, inside the company and to the public. History teaches: such people are dangerous, if they are in power! - Regardless if they are politicians or running safety sensitive businesses like an airline.
I know from many conversation I had in the past with ex-CRX pilots and staff that they constantly raised their concerns about the safety culture in the company. May I remind everybody here that there have been many, for my taste ‘too many’ pilots, who courageously formulated what was wrong among the company culture under Mr. Dose’s and Mr. Moritz Suter’s (sorry, you have to call it
l’etat ce moi - rulings. These colleagues of yours did thereby practiced their responsibility for the lives of others, and let’s not forget the ones of their other crewmembers and other entrusted lives. – The very same people, - and I know quite some of them personally now for years -, who were responsible enough to speak out loud were heavily bashed by exactly this Mr. Dose and his 'praetorians' (strategically placed into all key positions of former CROSSAIR). They were threatened, de-ranked, suspended, killed at simulator-sessions, and fired. Remember that in nice and clean Swiss even a president of the union and his speaker can get fired, because they dare to speak out loud what everybody saw would sooner or later lead into a disaster, were you loose a perfectly fine airplane and a bunch of innocent people. Nevertheless they stood up, even in public when all other ways of communication did fail, and clearly spoke out their warnings about another imminent, hopefully not fatal, event. Two fatal accidents followed.The sad thing is that Dose was a pilot himself and knows what it means to have at least human conditions while mastering a serious task on a day by day basis: safety.
The good thing is that he now might face for the first time a serious investigation and there is a chance the outcome might even lead to a conviction. Some more heads may hopefully roll in the wake of this.
The second sad thing is that we face similar discrepancies and other negative communalities with situations such as within old CROSSAIR and SWISSAIR with many other companies out there, and with too many its right 11’59’59. Everybody should watch out there, and specially if safety-culture is merely a synonym within the small print
of the corporate id.
Last edited by TvB; 12th Mar 2004 at 20:24.
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: in my house
Posts: 42
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
A.D.'s departure is more politically than a safety problem, as he was one last ex-CRX with some kind of power. He even tried to please Aeropers, but they wanted his head since the first day of Swiss. Actually Aeropers and Kapers started a while ago a petition to request the resignation of Dose, which was finally cancelled after a few days. But there was already plenty of signatures on it! The crash of the ARJ was just a good excuse at the right time. The failure rate of the charter A320 was brought to the media at the very same time. Once more politics!!! But those who play this game, should be carefull by not sawing off the branch they are sitting on!
D_71
D_71
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Arroyo
Posts: 262
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Tim,
There are thousand grounds to be upset at the CRX management for the way they endangered the life of their staff and customers, not to mention people on the ground.
But Danou_71 is right: Andre Dose has been eventually fired on totally different issues. Sad to say, but he has not even been fired for the worse he did.
Interestingly, former CRX-President Moritz Suter remains out of reach of the Swiss justice, since (up to now) no causality link have been shown between his policy and the two fatal CRX-crashes in 2000 and 2001.
There are thousand grounds to be upset at the CRX management for the way they endangered the life of their staff and customers, not to mention people on the ground.
But Danou_71 is right: Andre Dose has been eventually fired on totally different issues. Sad to say, but he has not even been fired for the worse he did.
Interestingly, former CRX-President Moritz Suter remains out of reach of the Swiss justice, since (up to now) no causality link have been shown between his policy and the two fatal CRX-crashes in 2000 and 2001.
please wait
Join Date: May 2001
Location: miami and other nice places
Age: 63
Posts: 35
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Dosé's last flight
Ettore,
name it what you want. He was not fired. It is merely a coordinated "step down" in the light of what is happening. Of course Aeropers and others were trying to kick him out of this position. I'm well aware of this. But without this investigation he would be still on the throttles, though his qualifications for flying this bird are more than doubtful. Again, in good old days where moral and ethics were high among this industry and society in general he would have been out already, shortly after Nassenwiel
In regards to MS: well that's what I mean with "clean and nice Switzerland". But maybe if a prosecutor really gets his head into all the mess of 1999 - 2001, Moritz will be called in for questioning as well and depending how many powerful "buddies" of his may or may not protect him further, they might go for him as well.
Unfortunately the prosecution only focusses on the Bassersdorf accident, not on Nassenwiel (Saab 340). - For now... Let's see when they will have sorted it out.
On the other hand I doubt that anybody in CH will really dig out the s
t and go for the big shots, who tolerated the situation and are therefore as much responsible as others.
The Swiss have a problem with thruth, especially when it's not a nice one.
I'm aware of last Sonnatgszeitung and other articles, but already back in 2002 I lost my trust into the Swiss media, so what you may read there is only what the public should think. There are no knowledgable and independent investigative journalists in Heidiland, nor will they ever be printed.
name it what you want. He was not fired. It is merely a coordinated "step down" in the light of what is happening. Of course Aeropers and others were trying to kick him out of this position. I'm well aware of this. But without this investigation he would be still on the throttles, though his qualifications for flying this bird are more than doubtful. Again, in good old days where moral and ethics were high among this industry and society in general he would have been out already, shortly after Nassenwiel
In regards to MS: well that's what I mean with "clean and nice Switzerland". But maybe if a prosecutor really gets his head into all the mess of 1999 - 2001, Moritz will be called in for questioning as well and depending how many powerful "buddies" of his may or may not protect him further, they might go for him as well.
Unfortunately the prosecution only focusses on the Bassersdorf accident, not on Nassenwiel (Saab 340). - For now... Let's see when they will have sorted it out.
On the other hand I doubt that anybody in CH will really dig out the s
t and go for the big shots, who tolerated the situation and are therefore as much responsible as others. The Swiss have a problem with thruth, especially when it's not a nice one.
I'm aware of last Sonnatgszeitung and other articles, but already back in 2002 I lost my trust into the Swiss media, so what you may read there is only what the public should think. There are no knowledgable and independent investigative journalists in Heidiland, nor will they ever be printed.
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Arroyo
Posts: 262
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Let's hope that the FOCA will take a close look at Moritz Suter new project "Hello Airways" he is intending to start in Basel...
As a matter of improving control and supervision, FOCA will hire 60 more people. Just guess where they'll most probably come from... Its starts with an S and ends with an R
Suter might be well inspired to ask for a French AOC
As a matter of improving control and supervision, FOCA will hire 60 more people. Just guess where they'll most probably come from... Its starts with an S and ends with an R
Suter might be well inspired to ask for a French AOC
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: uk
Posts: 36
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
just remember all of you perfect pilots that are ex swissair that moritz suter was a product of your system and indeed of the swiss military machine. dose was a protege of suter's.
therefore have a good long hard think about critisizing everything and everyone to do with crossair.
if the swissair system was so fantastic and it's managers so squeaky clean and so good then the rest of the show wouldn't be on it's knees today.
i'm not a great fan of dose but he was given mission impossible to try to fix the situation when the rest of your perfect ex swissair employees were constantly working against him.
stop blaming the crossair people for your demise. switzerland cannot afford your existance. you simply do not make enough money as a company and are too expensive to run.
that is the bottom line my friends.
therefore have a good long hard think about critisizing everything and everyone to do with crossair.
if the swissair system was so fantastic and it's managers so squeaky clean and so good then the rest of the show wouldn't be on it's knees today.
i'm not a great fan of dose but he was given mission impossible to try to fix the situation when the rest of your perfect ex swissair employees were constantly working against him.
stop blaming the crossair people for your demise. switzerland cannot afford your existance. you simply do not make enough money as a company and are too expensive to run.
that is the bottom line my friends.
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: europe
Posts: 311
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
swiss ceo
why did the swiss ceo had to go alone for the cause of accident now only? can anyone shed light, why not the ops director,chief training pilot and so on whoever is directly linked to the cause.
