Airbus A320 crashed in Southern France

[oldoberon]

Ident.: DSC-25-11-20-00001007.0001001 / 10 DEC 09
Applicable to: ALL
The Cockpit Door Locking System (CDLS) provides a means of electrically locking and unlocking the
cockpit door. This system is mainly composed of :
‐ A keypad, located in the forward cabin, near the cockpit door,
‐ A toggle switch, located in the center pedestal’s Cockpit Door panel,
‐ A control unit and its CKPT DOOR CONT normal panel, located on the overhead panel,
‐ A buzzer.
The keypad enables the cabin crew to request access to the cockpit. There are two different access
request types : “Routine” and “Emergency” access request (Refer to PRO-SUP-25 Cockpit Door
Operation - General).
The toggle switch enables the flight crew to lock or unlock the cockpit door, following an access
request, thereby allowing or denying the entry to the cockpit.
The cockpit door control unit is the system controller, in charge of :
‐ Locking or unlocking the door latches, upon flight crew action.
‐ Unlocking the door, in case of cockpit decompression (the door then opens towards the cockpit
under differential pressure).
‐ Indicating system failures of electrical latches and pressure sensors.
‐ Activating the access request buzzer and turning on the keypad LEDs.
The buzzer sounds in the cockpit for 1 to 9 s to indicate that a routine access request has been
made, or sounds continuously if an emergency access procedure has been initiated.

There have been a number of posts suggesting depressurising the aircraft, the above text from the manual says COCKPIT decompression (see bold txt), so does this mean depressurising the cabin would not unlock the door until the FD had slowly reduced via panels etc, and even then as the flight deck would only reduce to the same lower cabin pressure there would not be a negative differential in the cabin so would it work?

It also says with a cabin dperessure the door would open inwards due to pressure differential, I take it it cannot open in the outwards direction even manually.

[Krautwald]

Total time when he joined Lufthansa in september2013 of just 650 hours? That does not make sense.... Thats an average of some 40 hours per month?

Newly licensed Lufthansa pilots from their cadet program have been on waiting lists for the last years. Maybe his employment there started with some months refresher / ops training / type rating...?

[donpizmeov2]

Did GermanWing pilots have to pass DLR?

[abgd]

This wouldn't have prevented the incident.

Well, presumably you'd make it so that if the second door is closed, the cabin door can't be locked.

Whether Airbus envelope protection is sufficiently robust that there would be no way to break the plane whilst the other pilot is in the toilet, I don't know.

[vanHorck]

Hi Krautwald,

Any hours including training and type ratings count towards the total number of hours.

[Diver-BR]

What a difference this affair shows regarding the Air Safety culture in Europe re some other parts of the world.
AirAsia have had the CVR and FDR info for a month or two now, and yet not a word of a preliminary report of the fatal A320 accident off Indonesia, again seemingly crew related.

I would guess that the distinct nature of the accidents force that approach. Once it became evident that the GermanWings crash was intentional, the kind of inquires going on would be different, so it would eventually leak to the press. Better control the information flow turning it public ASAP.

[AirResearcher]

The BBC reported at 12:24 today:


"Brice Robin said the responses of the co-pilot, named as Andreas Lubitz, 28, were initially courteous but became "curt" when the captain began to give a mid-flight briefing, about the planned landing of the Germanwings flight"


Germanwings crash latest updates - BBC News


Maybe relevant, maybe not - but thought I'd raise it any case anyone hadn't seen it...

[G-ARVH]

A 28yr old with 600TT and 100 A320SIC...has no business being in the cockpit of the germanwings 320...when I got to his position at a US airline I had well over 10,000 hours and pushing 40+. Heard ryanair had a 18yr old f/o...ladies and gentlemen we need mature, experienced, stable people flying this type of aircraft PERIOD.

Indeed, however the Airlines don't want 10,000 hour experienced pilots, they want crews who will work for reduced terms and conditions. This is the problem, as someone correctly pointed out previously, the industry needs to be fixed before worrying about the cockpit door.

[silvertate]

. For that reason, in Europe we've mostly had to rely on pilot selection by raw aptitude, especially in the last 10-15 years or so, rather than the ability to recruit seasoned experts for their first airline positions.

Correction. We rely on pilot selection by raw ability to pay the training fees - a different kettle of fish entirely. No aptitude selection whatsoever, in my experience.

[Dingo63]

You cannot automate out the human flying the plane. If you cannot trust the pilots it just doesn't matter what you come up with. In my opinion, ( 30 year ATC retired) that whenever the counters try to come up with ways to automate out the human factor, you lose something because invariably the skill set subsequently required is lowered.

Now the bean-counters can argue that because of a new program they no longer need to pay for experience. Human factor issues are what they are. I don't know the answer, but somehow trust has to be restored and professionalism.

And too, try to stop the reflexive "fixes" when vulnerabilities are determined, ie, the 9/11 stuff. More than one of those planes had hijackers already sitting in the jump seat, no?... the cockpit door, the banning of knives, shoes, et all, is so knee-jerk. Understandable for sure, but frustrating in practice because they don't address the real causation.

[T250]

Why are the media saying that most of the pax were unaware of the situation until the last moments.

The Captain was said to be trying to force entry to the flight deck... This act creates much noise and would have alerted many pax towards front of aircraft what was going on!

[DirtyProp]

Correction. We rely on pilot selection by raw ability to pay the training fees - a different kettle of fish entirely. No aptitude selection whatsoever, in my experience.

Good point.
But then again, a civilian flight school is a business where the primary purpose is to make money.

[Krautwald]

Did GermanWing pilots have to pass DLR?

I am not sure about ready entry FOs. But this guy was from the Lufthansa cadet program and this is assessed through DLR preselection and then company selection.

[Krautwald]

Hi Krautwald,

Any hours including training and type ratings count towards the total number of hours.

True, but they will add up slower during training/rating/familiarization months than in full daily flight duty. Add some waiting time for stuff like evac drill asf, and the low hours might be explained.

[cgwhitemonk11]

Simple.

I am currently 26 and have been flying since I was 18, I will most likely move on to flying an A320 or similar when I am 29, not too dissimilar to this FO. Now by that time I will have more than 4000 TT and flown in no particular order:

C208b bush flying
GA8 para dropping
DHC6 airline
Q400 airline

I will have worked my socks off and sacrificed to get there, have two kids and a beautiful wife at home and been around the world.

Who do you want sitting in the RHS of your positioning flight? Me or the 200 hr cadet who's daddy paid for his TR? I highly doubt this guy has been radicalised or we would have heard someone claim responsibility, he is simply a selfish individual who has ruined thousands of lives.

Bring in the 1500 TT FAA rule and we can start fixing our industry.

[Krautwald]

Lufthansa paid for his training after assessing him on aptitude. One of the few cadet programs left where no money is needed up front...

All your other points are valid, though...

[Reluctant Bus Driver]

What bothers me here is that this was leaked or presented to the press and public before the investigation is even remotely complete. Granted, this appears to be common practice in the age of instant information demand. How convenient it is to always blame two dead pilots, or in this case, one dead pilot.. Can't we wait for the official report to be released from the investigative authorities before the world lynches this poor guy!? Think of what his family must be going through now. In addition, based on what I know of Lufthansa's selection criteria for pilots which can easily be said to be one of the toughest in the world, I'm just not buying this. Not until all the facts are out.

[LadyL2013]

If this was suicide on his part due to mental health I think this just furthers the fact that attitudes towards mental health HAVE to change in the aviation industry. You shouldn't have to have a black mark against your name for the simple reason of being human and becoming unwell. As long as you are able to perform your duties safely, I cannot see any reason why it should be treated any differently to say diabetes controlled with insulin. And even if it affects ones ability to fly, then fine take them off them the line for a while, but I can't see why they can't return to work when fit and capable again.

Pilots are human, which often seems to get forgotten about it seems.

[ciderman]

Time for those like me who have flown aircraft for over 40 years but who were forced to retire to dust off the old uniforms? We might not be legally entitled to fly the aircraft but from any jump seat even now I could tell you when things ain't right on the flight deck of any make of aircraft. What's more I am unlikely to have whatever demons drove this young man to do what he apparently did.

[kungfu panda]

It is so convenient for the LCC's, the regulators and the training organisations to blame this on suicide rather than the more likely negligence due to insufficient experience.