Polish Government Tu154M crash

[jsypilot]

ARRAKIS

This is the correct URL:

Smolensk (air base) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(your URL got slightly confused by the parentheses!)

[Right Way Up]

All Aviation history is written on blood, sorry but this is true. I hope this lesson will and must be learnt by all professionals reading this very sad story..

This blood was spilled many times years ago. To think this is even being considered at this time is both frustrating & disquieting.

[Pugilistic Animus]

Once the new old ideas start to flow in.... we go right back to the original classic TO and LDG accidents

[djp]

Silly question

would this flight ( civil ) had a locked cockpit door ?

[Rollingthunder]

Reports have indicated this aircraft was owned and operated by the Polish Air Force. (not civil)

[hetfield]

With the President in the back it wouldn't matter anyway.

[AnthonyGA]

"It was known that Mr Kaczynski once fired a flight crew when they refused to land at Tbilisi - and flew to another airport"

I don't know whether this is true or not, but it makes me wonder. Why would anyone in his right mind try to override a pilot who prefers to err on the side of safety? Even if you're a 10,000-hour pilot yourself, doesn't it make sense that if either of you has a doubt, you should do whatever seems safest? If the pilot dies, so does everyone else … so what kind of reasoning (if it can be called that) would lead anyone to second-guess the pilot?

It's like the old saying goes: If you have to ask yourself whether or not it's safe, it's not.

And of course it's all the more true if the passenger pressuring the pilot knows nothing about aviation himself.

Unfortunately it seems that there will always be crashes arising from this type of pressure. I hope that wasn't the case here, but it sure looks that way so far.

[criss]

Data shows rising terrain on approach path, according to Russian pilots it's a known local trap if you're unaware and try to get low to attain a visual contact.

[RatherBeFlying]

There are a number of pilots who bust NDB minima and get away with it -- until they hit something. In the interim they believe themselves a cut above their fellow aviators. Often with their employers' acclaim

There was one accident in Sioux Lookout where the crew hit the NDB mast -- a classic illustration of skill exceeding judgement.

In whitewater canoeing, I am quite willing to run a rapid with an 99% probability of success. If I fail, I get wet and the lifejacket bumps my odds of survival to well over 99.9%

But a 99% probability of success busting minima in an approach gives you a 1% probability of incurring an event with at best a 5% survival rate.

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

<<Why would anyone in his right mind try to override a pilot who prefers to err on the side of safety?>>

Possibly because they have absolutely no clue about aviation operations.

A British Prime Minister flying out of Heathrow once made it clear to the crew that there were to be no delays. Once the PM was aboard the aircraft was to taxy out and take off immediately. Unfortunately, there was a 30 minute ATC delay... so we had the pilot taxy all around the airport for 30 mins and then take off as soon as he reached the runway. The VIP was most impressed with the expeditious service, despite wasting tons of fuel...

Remember - a lot of VIPs are brainless.

[peter we]

I don't know whether this is true or not, but it makes me wonder.

Please try and read the few posts before yours before commenting. And no its not true - he attempted to overide the pilot and the pilot stood his ground and was decorated for doing so,

[ARRAKIS]

There are a number of pilots who bust NDB minima and get away with it -- until they hit something

Given the terrain profile - see my post 393, the airfield starts on the right side around 1,8 km mark - at Smolensk it's quite easy to hit something in case of poor visibility.

Arrakis

[Fair_Weather_Flyer]

"It was known that Mr Kaczynski once fired a flight crew when they refused to land at Tbilisi - and flew to another airport"

I very briefly did executive charter flying and it was the VIP mentality that scared me away from it. On one occasion I did a flight into an airport with no approach aid of any description. The VIP told me that he had flown with Netjets, a few days earlier and the crew diverted to another airport due to weather. He told me that because of this he would not be using Netjets again.

On another occasion I was at a holding point waiting for a helicopter to do it's thing. The VIP tapped me on the shoulder and shouted "go, go" thinking that I had just stopped at my own convenience.

This is the mentality of some of these people, they just don't understand what is going on. I can't think that the crew wanted to attempt the approach; they must have been under a lot of pressure.

[Yeah]

Another fact from todays interviews:
Former president, Lech Walesa said that, when he was flying Tupolev, and there was some dobuds about flight or some delays, the captain of aircraft was leaving cockpit and walking to cabin to get some "compromise" about rest of flight and cosulting decissions with president.
If in this case was thesame situation, the CVR probably won't bring any new informations for investigators who speculates "president fluence".

And a little piece of knowledge about Crew, cause we forget about them.
The story of my friend, RIP
Google T?umacz

[wessel_words]

Fair_Weather_Flyer

Yes I can relate to that.

It is not easy to stand up to pressure, especially when it's the boss exerting it. The ground rules must be established early on. It does require experience to stand up to this and a lot of experience in some cases. "Given them an inch and they will take a mile". "Help them out" once and they will expect it every time and then you become their whore.

I have been subject to commercial pressure right from the beginning of my career. The worst is a privately owned aircraft with a boss or bosses who are out of touch with reality. In civil aviation commercial pressure is an absolute killer if you allow yourself to be pushed.

When things do go wrong, these people will be the first to put blame on the pilot, if they are able. "Why did you do that Captain?"

As far as I am concerned, the most important person on the aircraft is me and be damned if I am going to be ordered by some imbecile to fly the aircraft into the ground.



Be polite but firm. At times I find hard to stay polite.

[flash8]

YouTube - Jak dosz?o do katastrofy prezydenckiego samolotu - symulacja wydarze?

Possibly interesting, unfortunately my polish is non-existent though.

Apologies I don't know how to embed the video.

[cockpitvisit]

I am wondering why Russia is leading the investigation.

This was not a civilian plane, so ICAO rules for accident investigations probably don't apply. Since it was the President's plane, wouldn't the plane be exterritorial and off-limits to Russian authorities, similar to an embassy or an ambassador's car? And wouldn't the same principle apply to its wreckage?

Can the Russians get any secret NATO equipment from the wreckage?

[Avegnon]

conspircay theories?

I have read the following speculation:
ac had a problem with one of the engines. A amateur movie of the ac taking of at Warsaw supposedly showed a flash on one of the engines.
Fuel was dumped. the only possibility was to land in Smolensk.

On the tv pictures it looked like there was no fuel left for fire. There were no signs of burnt trees etc.

Any opinions on that.....?

[criss]

Flash8, this youtube clip is full of nonsense, like "they circled the aerodrome 3 times, according to experts to learn local topography and runway track, which they then enter into autopilot". Unfortunately, we have a pair of self-proclaimed experts that run a well-known aviation monthly, and are often invited to TV and newspapers to sell their theories.

One can only wonder how you can learn local topography not seing a thing...

Avegnon - if they had time to dump fuel (which btw, is impossible on T154), they would have time to go to another airport, international aerodromes were only 15-30 minutes flying time away. And there's no information about any engine failure so far. The amateur movie showed a flashing beacon. And they wouldn't fly for 90 minutes with a known failure to end up at an aerodrome below minima, having a possibility to land at their homebase which was cavok. My colleague was working when they departed, and there was nothing unusual.

[brak]

What kind of "secret NATO equipment" can be on a Russian-made plane that was overhauled in Russia a few months ago?

This thread is beginning to quickly deteriorate in level of discourse.