Air Astana flight serious problems over Lisbon

[Raul Oprita]

giggitygiggity;

The EGPS will not work without information from the IRS, so that they had NAV info, but looks like they really lost control. First they had to fly the airplane and after to navigate. I assume that in the high stress environment they had, was easier to ask vectors than to look for some FMS settings or for MAPS.

[wideman]

Originally Posted by meleagertoo

Bloody hell!
That recording is terrifying!

The second part is out and is every bit as amazing. As I'm listening to the pilot sounding more and more disoriented, I'm thinking there's no way on earth this man is going to put this plane on the ground in one piece:

You Tube

[ORICHETTI]

With all my respects (i am a pilot myself) does Air Astana have CRM principles on their cockpits? or is the old russian school?

[Airbus2012]

Yes, Air Astana practices CRM, its no longer old Russian school.

[spoon84]

Originally Posted by wideman

The second part is out and is every bit as amazing. As I'm listening to the pilot sounding more and more disoriented, I'm thinking there's no way on earth this man is going to put this plane on the ground in one piece:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evYLkhxoP3U

It is amazing all the effort put to help the pilots in this situation. well done to everyone! I think that the pilots sound very disorientated and resigned to ditch the aircraft, but at the end they solve it. From what it can be hear in the registration, I think they also had instrument problems, they couldn't really fly heading (they always ask if heading was good) and in IMC they had more trouble keeping control of the plane.

[Porky Speedpig]

Originally Posted by wideman

The second part is out and is every bit as amazing. As I'm listening to the pilot sounding more and more disoriented, I'm thinking there's no way on earth this man is going to put this plane on the ground in one piece:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evYLkhxoP3U

Chilling. Not the afternoon the Astana guys, the ATCO or the F16 crews were expecting. Hats off.

[txl]

Some pieces of information from local news sources: Cockpit crew are Russian/Kazakh. Also on board was a British engineer, 54, who along with 37yo Kazakh required medical assistance due to stress symptoms after the incident, both have been released from hospital after a few hours. Other crew consisted of four airline engineers or three engineers, one additional pilot, according to varying reports. Successful landing on third attempt. Two go-arounds because of banking and sudden altitude loss on finals.

Local news station has some shaky footage of aborted landing and go-around:

You Tube

While initial reports say the aircraft had been in Alverca for its C-Check, local sources now report the aircraft's electronics had displayed erratic behaviour before. Airline says aircraft was in Portugal for C-Check. Flight said to be ferry to home base after repair job in Portugal.

[WHBM]

Both the UK's immediate postwar 4-engined prototypes were lost shortly after takeoff on test flights due to controls being misassembled.

The Handley Page Hermes prototype crashed on its maiden flight in December 1945, killing the key Handley Page test pilot team, due to the elevators being misconnected.

The Avro Tudor prototype crashed in August 1947, killing among others the Avro chief designer, Roy Chadwick, who had designed the Lancaster, the Tudor itself, and various other Avro types. The aileron cables had been reversed following overnight work.

[Onceapilot]

Originally Posted by WHBM

Both the UK's immediate postwar 4-engined prototypes were lost shortly after takeoff on test flights due to controls being misassembled.

The Handley Page Hermes prototype crashed on its maiden flight in December 1945, killing the key Handley Page test pilot team, due to the elevators being misconnected.

The Avro Tudor prototype crashed in August 1947, killing among others the Avro chief designer, Roy Chadwick, who had designed the Lancaster, the Tudor itself, and various other Avro types. The aileron cables had been reversed following overnight work.

Unfortunately, Murphy's Law states that those who do not check that their controls work in the correct sense are the ones who have incorrectly functioning controls.

OAP

[Perrin]

Well done

All my engineering life as a LAE I used to kid pilots saying if flying was hard engineers would do it. After listening to the radio recording and reading the story I bow my head to these involved in this event.

very very well done.
Peter

[Alpine Flyer]

Scary stuff.

Originally Posted by SigWit

There are two modes: Normal mode, where the Flight Control Modules process the flight control inputs and provides the processed inputs to the Actuator Control Electronics.
And then there is Direct mode, where the FCM's are left out of the equation and the flight control inputs are send unprocessed to the ACE's

At least on the SIM there's not much of a difference to be felt between the two modes flying around in the pattern.
On the SIM the A/C is demonstrated to be flyable without any aileron input at all, just using elevator and rudders.

According to lore the aircraft was originally supposed to have three-axis FBW but a deadline for delivery to JetBlue could only be met by using conventional ailerons. Aileron control quadrants are rather prominently placed inside the main gear wheel wells with the aileron servo just forward of the left wheel well.

As for the control check, you always try to be vigilant but with a little distraction ailerons moving the opposite way could escape detection.

Will be very interesting to learn what happened.

[netra]

Originally Posted by txl

Some pieces of information from local news sources: Cockpit crew are a Brit, 54, and a Kazakh, 37. Both required medical assistance due to stress symptoms after the incident, but have been released from hospital after a few hours. Other crew consisted of four airline engineers or three engineers, one additional pilot, according to varying reports.

nope. according Kazakh news (unfortunately I can't provide source due to post restriction) the flightcrew was 40 y/c Captain (he looks more Russian than Kazakh to me) and two Kazakh FOs. the Brit was one of 4 engineers on board.

[ORICHETTI]

Originally Posted by giggitygiggity

They said they were IMC for a long time, if they had no attitude information they wouldn't know what was going on at all, once they became visual, perhaps they managed to stabilise the flight reasonably then and come up with a plan to get it down.

There is always a compass and an auxiliar attitude indicator on all paxs commercial plane. Once i had a totally screen failure and i flew with those two.

[b1lanc]

Decent write-up on AVH. Erratic roll control, even up to touchdown. Intended rwy was 19R but couldn't correct drift enough and wound up on 19L.

[fox niner]

This photo is of the contol yoke, full right turn. On the synoptic page the flight contols deflection is shown. Ailerons show to be wrongly deflected. (Up/down on the wrong side) Thanks to the avHerald site for this photo. I hope the six on board will be able to recover from this experience.

[pattern_is_full]

Indeed - but the roll spoilers are operating in the correct direction?

[cappt]

Not an Embraer pilot, disconnecting the FCM and flying in direct mode as they did, would that have taken the spoilerons out of the loop leaving with them with just the reversed ailerons? Wow, what a fantastic flying job by this crew! I'm sure we will be studying this for years to come as an example of exceptional decision making and CRM.

[SteinarN]

I suppose this picture is taken on the ground after the landing?

[SigWit]

Originally Posted by pattern_is_full

Indeed - but the roll spoilers are operating in the correct direction?

Roll spoilers are fbw, ailerons are cables. Might be they connected the cables the wrong way.

[Machinbird]

In the configuration pictured in the synoptic page, the spoilers would be creating adverse yaw, while the ailerons would be rolling the aircraft (the wrong way). On instruments, I suspect the adverse yaw would play with your mind and make it even harder to keep the wings level.
Good thing they didn't crash right after rotation and were thus able to eventually work out their problems sufficiently to calm down a bit and land the aircraft.