Thai low EDDF
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Thai low EDDF
Thai A359 at Frankfurt on Jan 1st 2020, about 800 feet AGL about 7nm from touch down
Four pilots on the flight deck.
668 ft AGL
Four pilots on the flight deck.
668 ft AGL
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A very poor report indeed, illustrating again, if we needed it, that the habit of publishing ‘facts’ (and in this case very selective facts - ‘It has to be noted that in the background on the channels of the PIC and the co-pilot the on-board entertainment music can quietly be heard’) without any analysis is harmful. The BFU should also know better than to use ‘minimum altitude’ as they did, to confuse ‘descent’ with ‘descend’ and that ‘head towards 340(deg)’ and the crucial ‘speed up the descent’ (their words, not a quote) is highly ambiguous and has no place in a State publication. If their English can’t be better (and I know it can), they should stick to German.
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However, perhaps the most worrying thing is that this is another case of a major European airport’s ATC vectoring an aircraft towards the localiser, well above the glideslope.
Clearly, the lessons of TK1951 and others have not been learned.
Let’s hope that the BFU are not setting the crew up for a fall here, as seems to be indicated. The final report needs to focus extensively on ATC aspects.
Clearly, the lessons of TK1951 and others have not been learned.
Let’s hope that the BFU are not setting the crew up for a fall here, as seems to be indicated. The final report needs to focus extensively on ATC aspects.
A very poor report indeed, illustrating again, if we needed it, that the habit of publishing ‘facts’ (and in this case very selective facts - ‘It has to be noted that in the background on the channels of the PIC and the co-pilot the on-board entertainment music can quietly be heard’) without any analysis is harmful. The BFU should also know better than to use ‘minimum altitude’ as they did, to confuse ‘descent’ with ‘descend’ and that ‘head towards 340(deg)’ and the crucial ‘speed up the descent’ (their words, not a quote) is highly ambiguous and has no place in a State publication. If their English can’t be better (and I know it can), they should stick to German.
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Could someone enlighten a non-native English speaker, what is wrong with "instruction to ... and descend to 3,000 ft", "to speed up the descent", "the rate of descent", which are the only cases (1x verb / 2x noun) of descent/d I can find??
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I'm saying that, in 2020, it should not be so, and this is a particularly bad example. There is enough there to begin an analysis and share it, rather than waiting months on end; there is enough to focus on areas of interest, which are plain from the report to an expert eye but should be exposed. 'The investigation continues, examining in particular:...' would be the very least one might hope for.
The 'safety investigation' world is locked into behaviour which is not relevant in this modern age, but it never changes. It is not the excellent and respectable community that many take it for, and I believe we should all get to grips with its failings.
In this case does "bad example" mean that the example itself is a bad one (ie unsuitable or misleading) one, or that it is an example of bad practice giving cause for concern.
It could be taken either way.
Cave!
As they say in Latin!
It’s just a rubbish interim report. A graph of altitude versus time with the runway on it isn’t really very useful. Altitude versus DME? Position clearances were given?
This crew were clearly high and cocked it up. No hint is given as to how/why that occurred in this report.
This crew were clearly high and cocked it up. No hint is given as to how/why that occurred in this report.
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It’s just a rubbish interim report. A graph of altitude versus time with the runway on it isn’t really very useful. Altitude versus DME? Position clearances were given?
This crew were clearly high and cocked it up. No hint is given as to how/why that occurred in this report.
This crew were clearly high and cocked it up. No hint is given as to how/why that occurred in this report.
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JW, those images show that the radar vectored approach was significantly above the glideslope, in contravention of ICAO etc. The BFU note the ‘on-board entertainment music’ and show us the dimensions of an A350, as if we needed them, and say nothing at all about the ATC aspects. I also found the ‘seizing’ of the recorders unnecessarily dramatic.
But to look at that and say the crew ‘cocked it up’ is to be as bad as the BFU.
Deeply incompetent, at best.
But to look at that and say the crew ‘cocked it up’ is to be as bad as the BFU.
Deeply incompetent, at best.
JW, those images show that the radar vectored approach was significantly above the glideslope, in contravention of ICAO etc. The BFU note the ‘on-board entertainment music’ and show us the dimensions of an A350, as if we needed them, and say nothing at all about the ATC aspects. I also found the ‘seizing’ of the recorders unnecessarily dramatic.
But to look at that and say the crew ‘cocked it up’ is to be as bad as the BFU.
Deeply incompetent, at best.
But to look at that and say the crew ‘cocked it up’ is to be as bad as the BFU.
Deeply incompetent, at best.
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Yes, the aircraft was above the glideslope, but from the report it is unclear who is responsible for that. They were assigned 3000' and told to expedite descend, so maybe the crew had been slow to descend earlier or maybe the altitude assignment had been late. Impossible to tell with the info we have.
As already mentioned, there are completely irrelevant facts in the report, like dimensions of the plane, blah, blah, but this isn*t unusuale.
It’s just a rubbish interim report. A graph of altitude versus time with the runway on it isn’t really very useful. Altitude versus DME? Position clearances were given?
This crew were clearly high and cocked it up. No hint is given as to how/why that occurred in this report.
This crew were clearly high and cocked it up. No hint is given as to how/why that occurred in this report.
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JW, those images show that the radar vectored approach was significantly above the glideslope, in contravention of ICAO etc. The BFU note the ‘on-board entertainment music’ and show us the dimensions of an A350, as if we needed them, and say nothing at all about the ATC aspects. I also found the ‘seizing’ of the recorders unnecessarily dramatic.
But to look at that and say the crew ‘cocked it up’ is to be as bad as the BFU.
Deeply incompetent, at best.
But to look at that and say the crew ‘cocked it up’ is to be as bad as the BFU.
Deeply incompetent, at best.
ATC can definitely be a contributing factor, but it is very unlikely to be the root cause.
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Ah, the fallacy of the 'root cause'... https://www.safetydifferently.com/wp...Processing.pdf
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Ah, the fallacy of the 'root cause'... https://www.safetydifferently.com/wp...Processing.pdf