seafuryfan

One can judge the wingtip clearence from the cockpit, that's probably why he didn't hit the ground, but one can easily be mistaken...

I realy thing he had a bad performance, to do that manouver he should have pulled before he rolled, and then bleed off some energy during the roll, that's the beautiful and safe way to do it. But he had no excess of energy, rolled first and was hanging on the engines during the turn. It wasn't beautiful, and it was dangerous, and I don't believe it went as trained in the sim. It's a pitty, he is capable of a better display, I don't know what got into him.

Since this is a site for rumors:

The acft was called in by maintenance for a rudder inspection, as result of the dutch roll in another of the low passes, as it as suffered abrupt rudder deflections. This story still has a lot to be told...

There's another bit of footage where the a/c is seen yawing noticeably.
This can have to do with the need for rudder inspection as mentioned above.
In your opinion, even this manouver was unsafe or not to perform ?

It is clear that there was no safety margin in the maneuver, specially for an airline pilot that normally operates within the company's SOP.
But if you want to see a really fly by, check the last guy on this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJGVXpunZ_4

:}
Pira

Gulp!! :eek:

Pira, how can you make a statement like that? For all you know, that pilot could have been flying that lowest fast jet in your Utube video.:confused:

I'd like to think that that manouver was unintentional and clumsy. Flying uncoordinated near the ground poses risks in every airplane, but those risks are unacceptable in a high momentum aircraft.

Looked like a normal approach - followed by missed approach with just a slight turn executed just a bit early.

A what about camera angle? emm.

This is getting a bit boring. I wonder how this thread would have developed if instead of the original title of "near disaster", it would have been named "great flying display by A320 at airshow"? Lemmings?

It was safe!
 

Only to say that Portuguese pilots are the BEST!!!

The thing that struck me was the lines of aeroplanes alongside the runway - one slip to the right for anyone departing from that runway and you have a 40 aeroplane pile up!

See here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYfhC9ft_hk

Phew! Thank god. What a relief....I was rrrreallllly waiting for someone to tell me that.:hmm:
Never mind the fact that you have posted only ONCE in your entire life! You must be an expert.

(On topic)

There must be someone able to tell what the rules were at this airshow.
How low were airplanes allowed to go?

Come on, Portugese aviators, some of you guys were there at Evora. What were the rules? Tell us, because this information blackout is harming the Portugese aviation community.

Hmmm, that really does look way too low. Is there any WIGE (Wing In Ground Effect) "helping" to keep this manouevre margainally less lunatic than it looks. Not that WIGE is going to help much if he over reacts with the controls!

Plowing up the tarmac with the wing tip, taking out 40 light aircraft with a slip to the right, etc. How many more hypothetic IFs are forth coming? IF frogs had wings they wouldn't bump their ass!

Think Chuck said it all.
The maneuver itself is not dangerous if you know what you're doing. But the pilots are pushing the limits and it takes less and less "unexpected" to cause a crash. And next time some other pilot will try better... that's the danger.
It's more difficult to say "stop" when reaching the limits, then to continue to prove something can be done on that tiny edge. The first type of guys are pilots, the latter are cowboys. These pilots are cowboys cause they like to proove they can work on the edge. Why turn so low?
We're all pilots, I'm sure 90% of us would be able to fly like this. Unfortunately some would like to show it to the public to...

The poll is now closed. In summary, out of 2,291 professional pilots who expressed an opinion, 81.4% believed that the pilot was acting dangerously and 18.6% didn't.

Out of the remaining 1,335 people who had an opinion, 76.7% thought the pilot was acting dangerously and 23.3% didn't.

Besides the vigourous debate going on, the poll shows that overall, most people believed that the pilot was acting dangerously. Whilst not a scientific poll, it does give an idea as to how the majority of people felt watching the display.

No doubt TAP hierarchy and shareholders will be making their views felt within the company. Hopefully, lessons will be learnt and the pedants on the thread can feel satisfied that they aired their views. :bored:

Sorry but with MY ALL KIND RESPECT I CANNOT AGREE NOR UNDERSTAND a single piece of what you wrote....!!!!!:=:=:confused::confused::confused:
How can you be so sure that among those 2291 Professional Pilots they are indeed Professional pilots and not any single Aviation Amateur, a Typical Net Foruns Surfer or any also other kind of Simulator "Crazy" Kid, behind the common mask of Internet/PC Chair...!!????:confused:
For sure at least 2290 were Prof. Pilots, cause one of them its my Lovely 12 Years Old Niece who joined this Board stating in her profile that she is a 744 Captain...:)
But we are positively sure that all the others are not lying....aren't we..??:cool:
Kisses to Everyone here...:ok:

From a statistical point of view, there's very little difference between the self-described "Professional Pilots" - 81.4%/18.6% - and the "non pilots" - 76.7%/23.3% - which would tend to suggest that even if a significant number of the self-described professionals are not, they would not greatly skew the results.

For example, suppose that of the 1931 "professionals", half are really not. Based on the "honest" non-professionals, that 1931/2=965 people should have split 0.767/0.233, or 740 "unsafe" and 225 "safe". Eliminating those from the sample on that basis gives:

"real professionals": 831 "unsafe" and 135 "safe" - a 86%/14% split.

In fact, as you can see, the more "fake professionals" you assume, the worse the resulting opinions of professionals ends up being....

Besides, does it really matter if they are pretend pilots like your niece, or real ones? 75-80% of the people who voted in the poll think its dangerous, whether they are pilots or burger flppers. The stats have spoken.

My Friends....I still respect all your critics and points of view as long as they are not offensive, wich fortunately its not the case....:)
But what i cannot tolerate at all its the fact that i got banned without using any bad or offensive words at all, and all who called this Crew such Offensive words as CRIMINAL, CLOWN or IDIOT are still here, AFAIK...:sad:
And No, Mike, im not Married..:O

On the matter of poll votes coming from Pilots or pretending trolls: perhaps one useful improvement to pprune, that would also set the tone of many threads, is to reflect tis status under nickname after one is verified (don't ask me how).

Can I beg to ask again: is also the tailswagging considered dangerous ?

747 Lax Lhr
 

Janspeed,
I f you read the CAA report on this incident the BA crew were deemed to have carried out a safe operation. A B744 on three engines loses no systems, and is still Cat111C for landing. Flys a bit lower and slower, and as long as route has no implications if another engine shut down ,then no problem. The only reason the a/c diverted to Manchester was finger trouble on the crews part with fuel crossfeeding, leading them to believe they had unusable fuel. They in fact had ample fuel for Lhr.
A B744 on three engines has more redundancy than a fully serviceable Twin!!

Would that be the grassy knoll just below the wingtip in the videos? ;)

I'm pretty sure this thread has run out of steam until/if the results of any internal TAP investigation are published and/or someone can enlighten us as to the minimums allocated by INAC for the day in question but can I just make a request for anyone thinking of posting a video?

FFS please, please, please make sure it's not one of those from the preceding pages that we've seen half a dozen times (each) already. If you can't be arsed to read the whole thread before posting "OMG!! OMG!! LOOK AT THIS!!!:eek:" then do us all a favour and don't bother.

Is it just my eyes, or do the various videos seem to show that the A310 rolls off some of his initial angle of bank during the turn, whilst maintaining (or even increasing) the pitch attitude?

This would suggest to me that internally they thought they'd overcooked the initial roll input.

As a military pilot and QFI, I've always taught and been taught that roll off the bank and keep the pitch was the most efficient and quickest way to avoid the ground. Just out of interest, I've a fair amount of time flying large aircraft (about 310 size) at low level and unless I was going over a big (1000') ridge, I'd always pitch before roll. I'd never initiate a turn with less than 100' on the rad alt and my ball park figure was 250' was the min for 45 degrees. Not saying this was right or wrong, but just some figures for those who would crucify from their MS FlightSim experience!

Is this a dangerous manoevre? Probably yes, as I suspect they overcooked it.

Did they get it wrong? Yes, IMHO.

Are the crew/airline/country reckless and negligent (although I appreciate they've already been hung by this 'professional' forum)? It's a bit difficult to tell for definite isn't it?

There but for the grace of God...

For my first post I'm not sure if this thread is the best place to start, but here goes. I've always enjoyed seeing large aircraft doing things they normally don't - it is more interesting than fast jets traveling fast! However when said aircraft is this low then it's time to call a halt. I am quite sure that just an extra 100ft of altitude would have meant this thread never reached 348 posts, regardless of how the PIC handled the turn (or not). I believe the laws of aerodynamics apply to airliners in much the same way as to my 365kg microlight: stalling speed increases in a turn. As the A310 had gear and a fair amount of flap down in the pictures and video, I assume it wouldn't (couldn't?) have been flying particularly quickly, and a sudden wind gust (as noted by many posters observing the clouds) could have easily reduced the wing tip clearance to zero. For this reason alone the turning pass was far more risky than any of the low level "clean & fast" passes referred to. I also agree with the comments regarding the proximity to parked aircraft and the effects of wake vortices, something I have to constantly watch for. Before I get shot down in flames I'm not perfect, and like most pilots have got it wrong on occasion, but doing something like this in full view of thousands of camera wielding spectators is pretty dumb.

The Guest Speaker due to appear at next week's UK Aviation Club lunch is none other than Mr. Fernando Pinto, TAP's CEO.

Now, shall I ask a question or two in front of a very distinguished audience?? :E

Go ahead and ask. You all should know the Latin culture by now.

dont know about you folks , but that was lousy flying even for an airshow.

That's a brilliant idea, and I sugest that after that, you come here and let us know how he managed to make you look like an idiot. Or do you think that Fernando Pinto will be intimmidated by your questions? If so, I believe you'll be the next one to be appointed as CEO of a national airline.

Good luck

ah don't even bother 3ten... :ugh:

Answering Mike Jenvey's reasonable questions with another question hardly moves the debate forward.

The similarities at least in terms of potential ground contact, due to overestimating the capabilities of your aircraft remind me strongly of the tragic A320 crash at Habsheim. Senior pilots wanting to give an impressive airshow display, they almost went out with the kind of bang they were not intending! Fortunately they got away with it.

Fair enough to defend your colleagues or maybe even yourself, I personally am concerned by what the replies from apparent TAP insiders suggest about company culture and attitudes towards safety.

It can be difficult to spot the difference between sixteen year old spotters and real pilots. But whoever is posting some of this macho stuff is doing TAP no favours.

My take-away: TAP = T ake A nother P lane:sad:

Frank

Mike Jenvey wrote:
Yes, you're right. Don't really know where you're pointing at, since, if you also read my previous posts, you could see that I strongly disaprove 2 of the maneuvers performed that day.

I also know Fernando Pinto, and additionally, I know the proper places to take care of things.

lederhosen wrote:
The problem with this forums is that, if someone comes here to the last pages without reading from the begining, may grab a totally wrong idea based on this inconsequent statements.

I'm not TAP, I don't aprove the display, I voted "YES, dangerous", and I don't see many insiders here. But I'm a professional, unlike many here.

We even see a swiss guy here saying "take another plane". Did it strike you that it's very easy to interpret a swiss motivation against TAP?

3ten you imply that many people may not have read previous posts, which suggests it is you making assumptions. The vast majority of ppruners, including by your own admission yourself, think this was poor flying.

I am having trouble understanding what point you are trying to make. Previous posts have named the pilots and their roles at TAP. You say you know them and Mr Pinto.

You go on to say that the trouble with Pprune is that people may get the wrong idea ´based on this inconsequent statements´(sic). This implies that my points were not logical and indeed incorrect.

I can't believe you have not seen the video of Capt. Asseline's low pass and crash at the Habsheim airshow on the 26 June 1988. I do not think further commentary on that sad episode is necessary.

If our chief pilot did something like this which reflected badly on the company he would be in pretty deep water. I fail to see a lack of logic in pointing out that this episode reflects badly on TAP.

We can all resort to name calling. Let us just stick to the facts.

However as an airline captain and long time pprune lurker I can reveal that it was JFA's timeless prose which finally drove me to contribute an opinion. "Perverted minds of evil keypunchers can continue to pounder the display" really is a classic even by pprune standards.

lederhosen, we seem to agree in general terms. My point is mainly to refresh information, and leave clearly stated that I don't aprove what happened, and I'm not an insider. This facts have been challanged in the last posts.

No organization is exempted of having one of it's members performing against it's culture. Lack of safety is not a recurrent issue with TAP or portuguese airlines, but this topic has become a insulting ground. We even have here considerations about Latin culture.

Gi'me a break

I am glad we seem to be in agreement, at least mostly, and am happy to give your intentions the benefit of the doubt, if that is what you meant by "Gi'me a break".

By the way just for the sake of clarity, "company culture" is a general term used to describe attitudes and behaviours within an organisation and has no automatic connotations of racial stereotyping. I am pretty sure you were not suggesting my post was denigrating Latin culture, but just wanted to be sure any non english native speakers were not confused.

What I think is important to understand is that when respected senior pilots provide a poor example there is a danger that others may follow. TAP in my opinion has always had an excellent reputation for safety and I would suggest a robust statement by the company, if it has not already done so, could only help matters.

I fully agree with this, although I hope there is enough silent criticism inside the company to prevent followers, but I believe the company position must become explicit.

Latin culture issues had nothing to do with your post, it was a previous one, and "Gi'me a break" is really oriented to uncivillized posts, not yours.