Afriqiyah Airbus 330 Crash
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I remember (I think it was in response to the TK Schipol accident) that one of the experienced folks here made a remark that stayed with me. Automation and interface improvements aren't necessarily the answer. The pilot already has the tools at his/her disposal that provide all the clues; it is a human matter rather than trying to build in more failsafes.
The pprune accident threads tend to involve into these discussions about systems / pilot interaction. They're pretty fascinating. Looks like much work still to be done in an area where pilots & aircraft have already come so far in 50 years.
The pprune accident threads tend to involve into these discussions about systems / pilot interaction. They're pretty fascinating. Looks like much work still to be done in an area where pilots & aircraft have already come so far in 50 years.
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Automatication
Automation and interface improvements aren't necessarily the answer,I think that the only way to have a safe system is to remove the human factor,that wont happen thats why its safe to say that having ppl in a system will always generate errors
How you detect and react to those (e.g TRAINING TRAINING) that the key
How you detect and react to those (e.g TRAINING TRAINING) that the key
Gentlemen, having an AFCS of one sort or another is a good thing. Try flying for three hours SAS off in a Blackhawk or Seahawk, and any of us will appreciate automated flight control systems and assistance even more. 
Also, the coupled SAR approach over open ocean in dodgy weather is a very, very nice feature.
As to fly by wire, which I still distrust in some forms (more than one death by auto stab programming in the Blackhawk ...) it has advanced the state of the art. Without fly by wire, the Hornet doesn't fly.
What disturbed me about the article isn't automation, it's the attitude that the robot can fix your problems.
Hence my point that the issue at hand is training. Whether you use auto waveoff or a hand flown waveoff (go around), executing a proper go around is what would have given the crew (it seems) and the pax a second chance at a safe landing.
Respectfully, training and proficiency is what leads to effective use of automation by any crew.
Indeed. Seems a matter of training and proficiency.
@ fc101 (great post, by the way, many thanks)
Training and proficiency, perhaps in the matters of CRM or even company SOP ...
@James
Training and proficiency ...
@ Hencom: agreed.
Also, the coupled SAR approach over open ocean in dodgy weather is a very, very nice feature. As to fly by wire, which I still distrust in some forms (more than one death by auto stab programming in the Blackhawk ...) it has advanced the state of the art. Without fly by wire, the Hornet doesn't fly.
What disturbed me about the article isn't automation, it's the attitude that the robot can fix your problems.
Originally Posted by ELAC
How is it that we are all still preoccupied with automation and all of its perils for modern aviation when it is becoming more and more likely that automation had nothing to do with the accident?
Automation didn't cause this accident, but it's effective use could likely have prevented it.
Originally Posted by Timothy Claypole
... the absence of pitch/power couple in the Airbus makes a hard GPWS pull-up a much easier proposition than in a Boeing. This isn't a computer error, this is failing to fly the correct vertical profile then stuffing up the GPWS escape manouvere
@ fc101 (great post, by the way, many thanks)
To me, this current A330 case is more about piloting rather than any technological issue. If as some of the posters here have stated the FO initiated a go-around and the captain countermanded resulting in the crash is correct then automation or not would have played no part in this at all.
Training and proficiency, perhaps in the matters of CRM or even company SOP ...
@James
Automation and interface improvements aren't necessarily the answer. The pilot already has the tools at his/her disposal that provide all the clues; it is a human matter rather than trying to build in more failsafes.
@ Hencom: agreed.
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In particular we could refer to the US Air Airbus accident where one of the reasons why Sully was so succesful was because he could rely on the automation is assist - by reducing certain aspects of the work-load - in getting the aircraft down. Now if, a big red button" had been present then Sully and crew would have been in the situation where they workload would have suddenly increased damatically as they would have had to manage all the aircraft's systems as well as looking for a place to land. Worse could have been that with the automation completely relinquishing control could have meant that the aircraft would have been in some unknown state (define fail-safe state here!).
To the contrary, and most probably, Sully would have had a much better flare without that intervention of additional features built into the system which attenuate pilot sidestick pitch inputs, preventing the airplane from reaching the maximum AOA.
His speed was low, but as proved by AoA + attitude data, there was ample space for touchdown improvement as requested by the pilot.
But I guess we’ll have to go back to the thread in question to further discuss that issue.
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Gentlemen:
the DFDR and the CVR have shown most of the contributors to this thread being quite far off, so please just sit back and wait for the results of the investigation being made public (and stop relying on newspaper articles)
the DFDR and the CVR have shown most of the contributors to this thread being quite far off, so please just sit back and wait for the results of the investigation being made public (and stop relying on newspaper articles)
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Respectfully CONF_iture you miss the point; the US Air accident is a good example of how automation was used to assist the pilot in such a situation - we can argue whether Sully made a good landing or not, or the specifics of the A320 control logic or whatever. The point I'm making is that - you can read Sully's own statements - the availability of automation along with its *correct* usage meant that the pilot could concentrate more on the situation at hand by leaving certain aspects to the automation - in this case planning the ditching of the aircraft in the Hudson. Saying that Sully's AOA was wrong etc etc is at this stage really with the benefit of hindsight.
But that aside, which really isn't the main point but rather that in *any* safety critical system the "big red button" is a nonsence rather than a desirable feature. Ideally, and this really is what is built into the requirements for any safety critical system is the feature that the automation remains in place until explicitly disconnected. This also assumes that the user-interface to any such system also is designed with this in account.
fc101
E145 driver
But that aside, which really isn't the main point but rather that in *any* safety critical system the "big red button" is a nonsence rather than a desirable feature. Ideally, and this really is what is built into the requirements for any safety critical system is the feature that the automation remains in place until explicitly disconnected. This also assumes that the user-interface to any such system also is designed with this in account.
fc101
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But that aside, which really isn't the main point but rather that in *any* safety critical system the "big red button" is a nonsence rather than a desirable feature.
I don't foresee Tripoli being a case for a "big red button".
Hudson was not either (I'll comment Hudson on the dedicated thread)
But QF72 clearly was : Protections are supposed to protect, not hurt !
Sitting Bull,
Haven't seen any data yet ... Have you ?
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Originally Posted by Sitting Bull
After violently hitting nose first it disintegrated with the tail separating and tumbling over
If you confirm that, can we guess Clandestino was correct here ?
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Guys , why don't you start from the begining ?
Before wondering if the aircraft touched nose or tail first (who cares , a/c is destroyed anyway), we could may be wonder why they had a GPWS warning at 1000ft ??!! Shouldn't we ? As far as I know, to get such a warning at that altitude, it need a rate of closure or inertial Vs of at least 2500ft/min
Thats is quite a lot to start with...
If at 1000ft you have such a Vs of 2500ft/min, don't expect things and landing to be "standard"
Then after, on top of it, the mess devellops...
Before wondering if the aircraft touched nose or tail first (who cares , a/c is destroyed anyway), we could may be wonder why they had a GPWS warning at 1000ft ??!! Shouldn't we ? As far as I know, to get such a warning at that altitude, it need a rate of closure or inertial Vs of at least 2500ft/min
Thats is quite a lot to start with...If at 1000ft you have such a Vs of 2500ft/min, don't expect things and landing to be "standard"
Then after, on top of it, the mess devellops...
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Sqwak7700: "That is why they come up with all these creative solutions to destroy the profession, a side effect of which is more smoking holes. So they turn to technology to bail them out, but technology only goes so far."
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If there had been no technical advances in aviation in the past (say) 20 years, would there have been fewer smoking holes ..... or more? [other things being equal]
I suspect the latter.
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If there had been no technical advances in aviation in the past (say) 20 years, would there have been fewer smoking holes ..... or more? [other things being equal]
I suspect the latter.
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SDFlyer:
I think the answer is, "It depends."
If the training is good, the line qualifications and checking are good (and honest) then for those operations technology has improved the safety margins (particularly EGPWS and TCAS).
But, if the training is bad, the line qualifications and checking are perfunctory, then it's all a wild card.
If there had been no technical advances in aviation in the past (say) 20 years, would there have been fewer smoking holes ..... or more? [other things being equal]
If the training is good, the line qualifications and checking are good (and honest) then for those operations technology has improved the safety margins (particularly EGPWS and TCAS).
But, if the training is bad, the line qualifications and checking are perfunctory, then it's all a wild card.
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Originally Posted by arc-en-ciel
we could may be wonder why they had a GPWS warning at 1000ft ??!!
A go around with full thrust on all engines is rarely practiced during simulator training and the level of sensory illusions probably not representative of the reality.
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A go around with full thrust on all engines is rarely practiced during simulator training
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GFS,
- In the simulated world, plenty of go around procedures, but usually done only on half the max avilable thrust. Heavy weight low energy scenario which is quite a different challenge than for a low weight, high energy situation with all engines pushing hard.
- In the real world, at best one go around per year, if you're lucky, or unlucky should I say, on long haul anyway.