Airbus A320 crashed in Southern France
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It is interesting that some posters believe the Industry would "expel" anyone suffering from stress due to life pressures. However, surely if a person cannot cope with a divorce, financial pressures etc they probably can't cope with the stress they might encounter on a flight deck.
I am not unsympathetic to mental illness but I certainly would not like to board an aircraft if I knew one the pilots had recently suffered a mental breakdown.
In my view suffering from such a condition should be a licence terminating event. Period. It's harsh but I see no alternative.
I am not unsympathetic to mental illness but I certainly would not like to board an aircraft if I knew one the pilots had recently suffered a mental breakdown.
In my view suffering from such a condition should be a licence terminating event. Period. It's harsh but I see no alternative.
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Q
Agreed the security industry have become a huge Multi Billion Dollar industry and will forever be looking at expanding that industry so that their main motivation is profit sadly 9/11 was the birth of that industry which attached itself to Aviation and not to other equally vulnerable modes of transport
uote:
Like most reactive responses to safety and security from knee jerk US-led mono cultural organisations, strengthened cockpit doors and granular inspections of 100ml bottles of shampoo are nothing to do with real safety - they're about the patronising reassurance of passengers assumed to be too thick to understand the futility of these charades, and the interests of companies who sell 'security solutions' to aid the official window dressing.
Let's face it, in a world of ever cheaper fares and screwed-down salary structures, passengers get treated like prisoners on remand and aircrew like jailers with trays. Where's the dignity in that?
Superb
Like most reactive responses to safety and security from knee jerk US-led mono cultural organisations, strengthened cockpit doors and granular inspections of 100ml bottles of shampoo are nothing to do with real safety - they're about the patronising reassurance of passengers assumed to be too thick to understand the futility of these charades, and the interests of companies who sell 'security solutions' to aid the official window dressing.
Let's face it, in a world of ever cheaper fares and screwed-down salary structures, passengers get treated like prisoners on remand and aircrew like jailers with trays. Where's the dignity in that?
Superb
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reasonable doubt
emjanssen: How do they know the FO started the descent without data from the FDR?
This is one thing that is troubling me as well.
I will not argue that there are many elements to argue in support of conclusion that this was murder/suicide by the co-pilot, however I am not sure the case is beyond all reasonable doubt, and the blogs, boards and news media seem to be locking down on that conclusion.
It strikes me as odd that someone intentionally headed into a suicide crash would have "normal" or "steady" breathing, and I believe there are states of incapacitation under which breathing may sound "steady". The gradual descent also seems possibly inconsistent with an intentional suicide crash.
I know that we want to know, and we want resolution, but I believe there is some ambiguity here, and perhaps we should accept that we don't, and may not, really know what happened here.
emjanssen: How do they know the FO started the descent without data from the FDR?
This is one thing that is troubling me as well.
I will not argue that there are many elements to argue in support of conclusion that this was murder/suicide by the co-pilot, however I am not sure the case is beyond all reasonable doubt, and the blogs, boards and news media seem to be locking down on that conclusion.
It strikes me as odd that someone intentionally headed into a suicide crash would have "normal" or "steady" breathing, and I believe there are states of incapacitation under which breathing may sound "steady". The gradual descent also seems possibly inconsistent with an intentional suicide crash.
I know that we want to know, and we want resolution, but I believe there is some ambiguity here, and perhaps we should accept that we don't, and may not, really know what happened here.
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@zeddb
This is nonsense, previous pilot suicides haven't been by 'cadet' low-hours pilots, and in the instance of the first possible suicide by a low-houred pilot, therefore it must simply be a result of him being a cadet with little experience. Did you think that comment through at all?
It's a consequence of the pay to fly culture that has taken root in Europe. Airlines, especially budget airlines, will not recruit anyone with experience preferring so called cadets out of whom they make money. Hence we get co pilots with less than the hours required to get a U.S. licence flying passenger jets., up to now the public have not given a stuff as they only want cheap tickets. This will hopefully change but I'm not holding my breath. With 600 hours I and most of my peers were flying turboprops under close supervision and knew just enough to realise what we did not know.
We reap what we sow.
We reap what we sow.
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Quote:
Like most reactive responses to safety and security from knee jerk US-led mono cultural organisations, strengthened cockpit doors and granular inspections of 100ml bottles of shampoo are nothing to do with real safety - they're about the patronising reassurance of passengers assumed to be too thick to understand the futility of these charades, and the interests of companies who sell 'security solutions' to aid the official window dressing.
Let's face it, in a world of ever cheaper fares and screwed-down salary structures, passengers get treated like prisoners on remand and aircrew like jailers with trays. Where's the dignity in that?
Superb
I'm wondering what the knee jerk reaction will be.
Like most reactive responses to safety and security from knee jerk US-led mono cultural organisations, strengthened cockpit doors and granular inspections of 100ml bottles of shampoo are nothing to do with real safety - they're about the patronising reassurance of passengers assumed to be too thick to understand the futility of these charades, and the interests of companies who sell 'security solutions' to aid the official window dressing.
Let's face it, in a world of ever cheaper fares and screwed-down salary structures, passengers get treated like prisoners on remand and aircrew like jailers with trays. Where's the dignity in that?
Superb
I'm wondering what the knee jerk reaction will be.
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May I second that sir.
Yes the travelling public like cheap tickets but: we have never been offered the choice - if you will permit the hyperbole - between the risk of getting flown into the ground versus paying more to have a pilot who won't kill us (exaggeration deliberately for effect).
It doesn't seem likely that this result is a function of either inexperience or low pay. Most of us get paid far less than the co-pilot is said to have been paid; many professionals with student loans are paying more than 40% of their present job's salary for their training; and it further appears to me a disservice to the overwhelming majority of professional pilots with integrity, to imply that being disgruntled with pay and conditions could instigate such a murderous outcome.
Yes the travelling public like cheap tickets but: we have never been offered the choice - if you will permit the hyperbole - between the risk of getting flown into the ground versus paying more to have a pilot who won't kill us (exaggeration deliberately for effect).
It doesn't seem likely that this result is a function of either inexperience or low pay. Most of us get paid far less than the co-pilot is said to have been paid; many professionals with student loans are paying more than 40% of their present job's salary for their training; and it further appears to me a disservice to the overwhelming majority of professional pilots with integrity, to imply that being disgruntled with pay and conditions could instigate such a murderous outcome.
Is it common practice for commercial pilots to see a private doctor secretly if they want treatment for a condition which could threaten their flight status? I'm told this was typical in the RAF in the '80s. A good friend of mine who was a Phantom instructor told me he had gone to Harley Street to get his varicose veins fixed. He said 'everybody does it.' I would think that if a commercial pilot needed help with depression he would be tempted to get a private prescription on the quiet. In a terrible case like this one when the co-pilot's remains may not yield blood for testing, how will we ever know what medication he was taking?
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It doesn't seem likely that this result is a function of either inexperience or low pay. Most of us get paid far less than the co-pilot is said to have been paid; many professionals with student loans are paying more than 40% of their present job's salary for their training; and it further appears to me a disservice to the overwhelming majority of professional pilots with integrity, to imply that being disgruntled with pay and conditions could instigate such a murderous outcome.
They do have squitter data, as linked to above, which clearly shows intentional reprogramming of the autopilot from 38000 to 96 ft.
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Quite, it seems rediculous to imagine that someone who has probably wanted to fly jets for a very very long time would go through all of the training, get the job and then a couple of moths later do this because of his contract or his pay and debts. I remember the first few months of jet flying and I am sure like most of you I was over the moon, couldn't wipe the smile off my face!
Exactly. No one on this forum has the info to speculate about the guys mind.
It is no more likely to about his finances than an argument with his life long best friend.
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630 hours is low but no unusual for Europe Ryanair European largest airline has co-pilots flying there jets with much less hours than 630.
I asked if any such recordings, on SD cards etc, would survive the impact, and one reply came back saying yes.
This was Erebus so the CFIT profile might be similar.
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Air Traffic Control can see whatever altitude?
Air Traffic Control can see whatever altitude is set in the window from the ground (Mode-S?) and apparently, they would have seen it changed from 38,000ft (the cleared altitude) to 100ft.
My understanding anyway, if an ATCO want's to clear that up, be my guest.
My understanding anyway, if an ATCO want's to clear that up, be my guest.
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Risk can't be eliminated, but can be mitigated
It's true that we can't eliminate all risks completely, but that doesn't mean that some risks can't be eliminated, and the remaining risks reduced to the bare minimum. The simple step of requiring two crew members in the cockpit at all times (with appropriate procedures and training) is an example. Can be immediately implemented at an insignificant cost, and it would greatly complicate perpetrating this sort of thing.
