video of MD-80 crash landing
 

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/68657/...sh_on_landing/

This shows how easily the tail breaks off...

The fact that there are no survivors shows just how strong the impact was. How quickly did the rescue teams get to the crash site? The aircraft was so badly deformed that it would be impossible for anyone to survive.

i'm not sure it's a good idea to put such explicit pics on here - on one of the pics I could see a passenger still strapped to seat

Glob99 wonders:

Not as far as I see yet. Let us go through some of the most significant factors.

First, the AA crew were given a change of approach, with which they were unfamiliar, and they were confused about ATC instructions (with the help of ATC saying "affirmative" to an incorrect readback).

Comparison: there is only one approach to Isparta, they would have had that plate out, and according to the tapes ATC was not involved in guiding the flight. According to what I take to be regs, I imagine the crew would have briefed that approach in pre-flight planning.

Second, the AA crew were trying to fly to an NDB which had an identical frequency and ID with another one within reception range, but at about a right angle to their intended route of flight, which is down a narrow valley in which the Cali airport is located, amongst 12,000 ft peaks. They put FREQ and ID into the FMS and the aircraft turned out of the valley.

Comparison: 1. The inquiry found a number of places in the world where this atrocious radio nav situation exists, and Isparta is not one of them. 2. The peaks aren't at multiple thousands of feet above the airport. The highest is about 3,000 ft above and is 7 nm off the final approach course.

Third, the Cali crew were rushed, and behind the airplane and nav.

Comparison: if that 18 minute gap is to be believed, the Isparta crew were not at all rushed.

Fourth, the court determined that the nav kit suppliers, Honeywell and Jeppesen, knew about the ambiguous-navaid situation and had not taken appropriate steps to mitigate it. They were held coresponsible for the event.

Comparison: as I said above, this is not one of those situations.

Fifth, the airplane impacted a peak while flying direct to the navaid (then called ROZO).

Comparison: the photos with both accident site and runway clearly show the aircraft dynamics aligned somewhat with the runway. The site has been identified as about 7 nm off the final approach course. The crew were not flying direct IPT.

Now obviously some other characteristics are similar. The aircraft was flying at night in good weather in a sparsely-lit region of what aviators designate as "mountainous terrain" and attempted an NPA; collided with terrain off-course. They also descended below MSA well away from the protected airspace of the final approach course. But in those respects it is similar to dozens of other accidents.

PBL

Visual Approaches at night in mountanous terrain is not good airmanship. Saving a few minutes of time does not warrant shortcuts.

Every charter company, that was worth a s**t I've flown for, strictly forbids night visual approaches in areas of terrain or areas the crew is unfamiliar with. Part of OM Part A is where the rule usually "lives".

Real simple, instrument approaches, if flown correctly, are foolproof. Enhances safety and takes the "guess work" out of visual approach profiles....in the dark.

Isparta Jeppesen Charts
 

For those of you who haven't already seen the charts for Isparta, here is a link to them. http://turkce.acuwings.com/LTFC_SULEYMAN_DEMIREL.pdf

to jetjackel
 

for which company do you work for now?

Jetjackel-
The 135 operator I was with ALSO had strict no visual approach rules with night mountain flying. I personally learned this lesson as trained by my primary/instrument instructor...all for the reasons already posted here. I was flying in/around California, and there are many mountain/hillsides there with wreckage strewn all over them (Porterville in particular).
Be safe!

At night, IFR or VFR, given that terrain, wouldn't you just do anyway what the VOR DME approach plate says, whether you had it or not?

The electronic misdirection is an intriguing possibility, but I don't think we would ever find out about that unless it happens there again. And the likelihood of in-aircraft interference depends on how you assess the likelihood of a dozen people clattering away on their old laptops and chattering away on their old cell phones all at the same time. Pretty unlikely, I would guess.

PBL

Electronic misdirection does not necessarily mean faulty ground equipment (VOR, DME, ILS), bad receivers or electromagnetic interference. Some years ago a Crossair Metroliner crashed after takeoff, and at the beginning of the chain of events there was a wrong entry of a new waypoint into the FMS by the PNF which led to utter confusion of the PF. Many other crashes were results of wrong autopilot mode settings.
So if the approach was not flown manually, some troubles with the flight automation equipment (whatever was installed and used in this MD-83)might also be a factor.

ctc

Md80forum,
a very close friend of mine was working that airplane as a departure controller. She mentioned that the aircraft was cleared direct Afyon VOR. She also listened to the transcripts of Ankara Control (the next controler) and the airplane was cleared direct Isparta VOR. So the airplane was not doing the STAR.

Wow.

One can suppose then that you dismiss with equal black-and-white derision, Jim Reason, Earl Weiner, Robert Helmreich, Dan Maurino, Diane Vaughan, William Starbuck, Tony Kern, Don Bateman and the Australian film crew who credits PPRuNe for the exposure work they did on the Phuket accident?

While nothing substitutes for the aviation/crew experiences which you capture in your last post such absence of same does not preclude comprehension nor expertise in accident cause/assessment and prevention nor does it diminish the value of carefully thought out contributions which intend to point rather than resolve.

BoeingMEL,

what exactly is your point?

PBL

you need to read beyond the obvious clash of personalities and rather than responding with bitterness and vitriol , simply enter in your own opinions. Some of us do read Pprune for the "right stuff" and if the wide ranging opinions become an inbred clan than where else can we get a scope on the issues?

@BoeingMEL

I totally agree with your very last post. Too bad PPRuNe is losing another pro.

Good Health and a Happy New Year to you also.

Bye

Not only that, PJ and loma, but it is somewat fanciful of BoeingMEL to think that sitting for X number of years in a commercial airplane cockpit confers on him the expertise to judge the quality of an accident investigation.

He might have that ability, of course, but if so then by virtue of his intellect and personal capabilities, not simply his profession. And given the style of his intervention I incline to doubt it.

PBL

And some feel that their large number of technical qualifications gives them the expertise to point out a likely cause of an accident from a picture. He might have that ability, of course, but if so then by virtue of his intellect and personal capabilities, but any professional accident investigator/analyst will not rush to judgement and wait for more facts.

I think you will find that statistically there are way more accidents on non-precision approaches than precision approaches.

Who should contribute to a pprune thread?
 

So some of you do not like sugestions, opinions, rumors, and contributions from non- professionals. They ask for hard facts, and coming from 10'000 hours plus captains. They would rather wait indisturbed for the final accident report which contains the truth and nothing but the truth.

Now please rainboe, hetfield and boeingmel, do not re-load your guns. As one of those guys who do not get payed for flying (nobody would probably) and set out to the skies in jeans rather than smart uniforms and four thick stripes, I would just like to explain why „outsiders“ have a right to be here.


The contributions from the professionals are important, they provide excellent knowledge of procedures, aircraft and ATC systems, SOP's and you name it. But to guess what has gone wrong, you need people outside the „pro“ community. A friend of mine was a chief accident investigator for a European country, charged also to investigate some of the big bangs. He had no ATPL, but he flew everthing from gliders to choppers as instructor. His credentials were a methodical, unbiased approach, and a vast know-how in co-related fields like software, engineering and management. Not being part of the 'pro'-club was an asset to his investigations, not a deficiency. Sadly, he passed away far too early.


My point is that for a guess, you should never ask a pro, because he's not allowed to guess. No cockpit crew gets paid for guesses, they fly the aircraft as they were trained, based on procedures that provide a good safety margin as long as you stick to them. But then an accident „happens“. Excluding the rare occasions were an accident must be regarded as an unforeseeable act of fate (e.g. a volcanic eruption), accidents in the commercial aviation nowadays do not happen, they are made. Please do not confuse errors with blame, I hope nobody acts as a judge here.


If something has gone wrong where the causes are not immediatly and completely obvious, it is often very useful to „brainstorm“ the information with outsiders. They are not bothered by professional pride, and they may have intelligent opinions based on their own experiences. It does not matter if their input is sometimes complete rubbish, so is once in a while a contribution from a pro. I personally have learned to value brainstorming in many other professions like engineering and even more in management, why not in aviation?


This forum has a mixed audience. That's what makes it worthwhile. But we could do without the „bashers“, those that go ranting about cultural issues, aircraft makes and people having different background and different views.

The one thing I keep coming back to is the location of the crash. With all the photos, you would think that google imagery would confirm the site. For the suggested locations so far, I can't seem to do that.

Reports have been made that said it was near Keciborlu, near Cukuroren, west of Kilic, 12km nw of airport, 7mi west of airport. All this doesn't zero in on a single point. All of these probably have some point of validity, if we had the original statement and the context in which it was given.

The slopes and elevations of the photos would be of great help if we had a topo map of the area. If there is such a map, I can't seem to find it.

That said, I have found one site near the halfway point between Keciborlu and Cukurroren that has many surface features like those in the crash photos. It is 7mi nw of the north end of the runway.

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a93/pls8xx/map.jpg


As can be seen below the site has a road that matches the photos, a very clear field downslope from the wing section( in white), and a clear spot for the initial strike location( in red), and many other similarities.

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a93.../crashsite.jpg

By comparing the above with the runway 50, I find the heading indicated by the strike point to wing section to be about 043 degrees, the offset being almost exactly 9km as seen below.

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a93/pls8xx/offset.jpg

I can't say how this might enlighten us as to a possible cause of the crash.

Fair enough, but do it somewhere else! airliners.net, airdisaster.com, the misc forums here (spectator's corner); places where such contributions are both welcome and solicited. But not in the flight deck forums at pprune!:ugh:

bjornhall
Bjornhall, that's like telling a guy to get lost. It's not a solution, message boards are magnets for discussion. The tighter the restrictions on them the less the discussion and suddenly all is quiet except for the moaning over deleted posts, malfeasance and administrator coverups. Of course the moderators could move the posts, but then we would all just follow them there and leave this room empty.

I'm afraid that all you can do is to bemoan the credibility of some of the arguments and yes brainstorming is used in accident investigation by trained professionals, only it's followed up by gathering facts to prove or disprove the hypothesis.

Waiting myself for the final report.
I just hope they are the true facts about what happened and what led up to this.
Honesty is not a common word in this part of the world.

Earl,
Why are you waiting for the final report, if you know for a fact that it's not going to be honest?

:rolleyes:

Lets all hope it is.
Everyone has a general idea about what happened here.
The report should tell us what factors led up to these bad decisions that were made if indeed this was the case.
Lived and worked in this part of the world for years, anything goes there.
Will save the comments for after the report is released.

Weird!
 

I find something very strange in the notion that it's useful to have non-professionals "guessing" about the cause of this or that crash or incident. The pros cannot or will not guess and we need the non-pros to do that? Well, WHY, for heaven's sake?

I always found it amusing at best but often simply annoying to be told, for instance, that "That was a bad landing," when it might have been a normal firm touch-down, flown exactly according to the book. You know, the sort of thing you do to get the WOW switches activated so that you have all that boring stuff such as ground spoilers and brakes working. Okay, you didn't "grease it on," the sort of thing some dodo down the back with a little bit of knowledge is looking for, but so what?

Nowadays, what with Microsoft Flight Simulator and all the on-line information available to the averagely-bright non-professional, there has been a great proliferation of arm-chair aviators, poised to second-guess every decision and event. To encourage this is insane, in my opinion. Far better to tell them to wind their necks in and concentrate on getting that little bag of peanuts open. "There's a good boy!"

Generally if I want to "guess" about the cause of something then I can do that myself, keeping that to myself! Sometimes, yes, there might be something urgent to discuss, some "gotcha" we have overlooked, but all this Google Earth stuff with bearings and distances and wild guesses about what a crew may have been thinking... what is the point?

Chuks,
I sometimes wonder how many paying passengers the airline-industry has lost for the overt arrogance pilots expose towards the so called "self loading freight" in a public forum like PPrune.

During my past 10 years as a TV producer, I saw a revolution bring new digital cameras and editing decks to the markets, where they became available to the general public. A knowledge and gnosis once reserved for "us" was now available to everybody. Even "average-bright" pilots started making movies and expressing opinions about how to make them. Is that an offence to me? No.

Just finished the '08 travel budget for my department. We cut back on the domestic flights this year considerably, since people appeared to favour hi-speed train travel and going by their own cars instead. As a long-necked peanut-eater, I didn't put my irrational fascination for aviation in their way.

chuks and others,
1. There are professional accident investigators participating in this thread.

2. Nobody has guessed yet about a cause of the crash, as far as I remember. (There has been some discussion about CFIT versus stall, but those are phenomena, not root causes.)

3. There have been some very perceptive contributions by people trying to locate the impact site, notably Mauersegler and more recently pls8xx. I understand neither of them are professional analysts but why should that matter? (Edit: Actually wrong, as Mauaersegler has just noted that he knows aerial photography analysis.) Are only certain people allowed to use Google Earth and say what they see, according to you?

4. I am most interested in reading perceptive contributions, and it is very, very secondary to me what the CVs look like of the people who make them. I am surprised that more people don't have a similar attitude on this forum.

5. This thread is entitled "Turkish MD-83 Crash".
Presumably people looking at it are interested in reading about, shall we imagine, a Turkish MD-83 crash. It is a little odd to find such readers complaining about people discussing, say, a Turkish MD-83 crash.

PBL

Bye, bye
 

Professionals:

well, I get the message, you should not talk in an area you don't are a professional. Good, I have done aerial photograph analysis in my studies, could I speak about it?
Oh, by the way, please pilots stop speaking about the (non-existence) of global warming, since you don't have a professional title in this area, or I'm wrong?

For me, having a pilot in the family, was a very decepting experience here.

Bye, bye

According to first results the reason is loss of orientation.
 

According to first results the crash reason is declared as loss of orientation.
Although the devices have warned about low attitude, the pilot miscalculated his position and continued on the wrong course and attitude.
As he realized his mistake he tries to pull up, therefore first the tail
then the body touched the ground.
First officer should warn the pilot but he was also confident...

Exact results will be availabe in two months.

Sorry for translation errors if there are any.
You may check the original at :
http://www.milliyet.com.tr/2007/12/11/son/sontur21.asp

can i just say:
 

air crashes are shocking and full of sorrow. it is completely right and just for people to debate and ask why, and to analyse and put forth observations... everyone has a common interest in this. we are all human, we are all capable of putting forth educated guesses - the fact that people are on pprune means they have some common interest in air travel and the safety of it.
very often if debates are left to ''only the professionals'' it can sometimes result in more simple observations being ignored or forgotten.
lets all allow each other to continue to honor the people who died or were affected by this tradegy by giving our thoughts and analysis professional or otherwise into the causes of this tradegy (superfluous to the air accident investigation team)

And now the vultures descend......
US law firm to assist families in airplane crash suits
Lawyers from the Ribbeck law offices, a famous US law firm that has handled the largest number of international aviation cases in the world, has come to Isparta to provide attorneys to relatives of people who died in a tragic airplane crash.
An Atlasjet plane recently crashed in the mountains of southwestern Turkey, killing all 57 people on board. Ribbeck's lawyers said they plan to sue the McDonnell Douglas and Boeing companies.
Monica Kelly, one of the lawyers from Ribbeck Law Offices, told the Anatolia news agency that they had launched an investigation into the airplane crash in Isparta as a preliminary step to bringing an action for damages.
Kelly said their aim was to find the cause of the crash and provide the right to compensation for the relatives of people who perished in the crash. She said she and her assistant would meet with the relatives and provide legal advice for suing for physical and emotional damage incurred during and after the accident, explaining, "After we complete all these processes, we will bring an action for damages against companies and persons involved, in particular the McDonnell Douglas and Boeing companies, in Chicago." She also added that an expert from the US would come to carry out a technical investigation of the wreck.
11.12.2007
Business
Today's Zaman

EARL
If by that you mean S Carolina then I have to agree with you.

Like you I eagerly await the final, hopefully 'unbiased', final report and will leave the speculative analysis to others. Like you I have lived and worked in both Turkey and the USA and would say that both places have an equal proportion of liars and bigotted a$$holes.

Regards,
rts

the value of speculation
 

There is a feeling of unease that comes from the wild and not so wild speculation after an accident. Maybe the guesses act to trivialize the large loss of life and disrespect the grief of family and friends. One could make a good case for waiting for the official report, and many have.

If the point of speculation is to find the one true cause, then it is a useless endeavor. But if speculation should uncover an incorrect cause, is that not also beneficial?

The official report serves to guide us to prevent a re-occurrence. But what about an incorrect cause that could have happened. Must we wait until it does happen before we act to prevent another? One thing I have learned in life is, that if something can happen, sooner or later it will happen. And speculation is more likely to be fruitful before the true cause be known. There is nothing like the official report to suppress the imagination.

Then there is the financial aspects to be considered. Let's just say that where there are large sums of money at stake, there can be pressure to slant the the truth a bit. This tends to be offset by an independent inspection by a large number of interested parties who have studied the facts. Isn't that what's happening here?

Quote:rodthesod
If by that you mean S Carolina then I have to agree with you.
Like you I eagerly await the final, hopefully 'unbiased', final report and will leave the speculative analysis to others. Like you I have lived and worked in both Turkey and the USA and would say that both places have an equal proportion of liars and bigotted a$$holes.
Regards,
rts
Earl:
Doubt you will find this in South Carolina.
Door must have hurt on your departure from there as your post states.
Take it to JB or the pub dude, dont post it here.

black box
 

Turkish media reports that the 'black box' (CVR, DFDR) has been - quote -'faulty'

Could it been damaged by the impact or was it not working at all?
The caa director didn't confirm this rumour but admitted that they do have problems with it.

If this thing really didn't work - I'm affraid we'll never find out what happend.

black box
Oh, and just what critical question did you expect to get answered only from the black box:confused:

Oh, and just what critical question did you expect to get answered only from the black box ?
......................

Media talks about 'pilot disorientation'. I thought that a good readout of the CVR/FDR could sched more light into this.

I'm not an investigator but sure enough believe that the recorders could prove any major sys malfunctions. Correct me if I'm wrong.

It still bugs me that they reported 'runway insight & established inbound' (might have been 'airport insight') and than end up where they eventually did.

But than again, radio transcripts have 'only' been published in a Turkish newspaper.

Report: 30 Degree Error
 

http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/3...im4bdk3.th.gif

http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/1...im5blc7.th.gif


30 derecelik sapma Türbetepe’ye çakti
www.hurriyet.com.tr 12 Aralik 2007

Türbetepe’ye çakilan uçakla ilgili ilk incelemeler, kazaya 30 derecelik bir sapmanin yol açtigini ortaya çikardi. Buna göre alçalmada fazladan 30 derecelik hatayla dönen uçak, Burdur Gölü yerine daglara yöneldi. Inis irtifasinda gelen ’Çarpma sinyali’ üzerine pilotlar motorlara tam güç verse de, uçak ve yolculari kurtulamadi.


Tolga Özbek yaziyor

ISPARTA’da düsen, World Focus Havayollari’nin AtlasJet’e kiraladigi uçagin kara kutu kayitlarinda yapilan ilk inceleme, uçagin 30 derecelik bir hatayla yanlis yöne döndügü ve Burdur Gölü yerine Türbetepe’ye yöneldigini ortaya çikardi. Çarpma sinyali üzerine son anda levyeye asilan Kaptan Pilot Serhat Özdemir ve Ikinci Pilot, emekli Tuggeneral Tahir Aksoy’un kiçtaki motorlara güç vermesiyle alçalan kuyruk dikmesinin yere çarptigi anlasildi. Bu arada, uçagin kara kutu olarak bilinen ve iki ayri kayit sisteminden olusan CVR (Cockpit Voice Recorder-Kokpit Ses Kayit Cihazi) ile tüm uçus verilerini dijital olarak kaydeden FDR (Flight Data Recorder-Uçus Veri Kayit Cihazi), kaza kirim heyetince Almanya’ya götürüldü. Federal Uçak Kaza Arastirma Bürosu’nda yapilan ilk incelemede, kara kutu kayitlarinda her hangi bir bozukluga rastlanmadi.

GÖL ÜZERINDEYIZ SANDILAR

Devlet Hava Meydanlari Isletmesi radar kayitlarindan olusturulan bilgilere göre, MD83 tipi uçak, Isparta’ya inmek üzere yaklasma haritalarina uygun olarak 8 bin feet (2 bin 600 metre) yükseklige alçaldi. Önce Isparta meydanindaki VOR üzerine gelen uçak, yaklasma planina göre pistin üzerinden geçerek Burdur Gölü istikametine 12 mil uzaklasip /_newsimages/4606141.jpggeri dönecek ve piste inecekti. Ancak, bunun için VOR üzerinden 223 dereceye dönmesi gereken uçak, fazladan 30 derece daha saga dönüp 12 mil ilerledi. Bu açi da uçagi göl degil daglarin üzerine getirdi. Göl üzerinde olduklarini sanarak yaklasma haritasini takip eden pilotlar tekrar saga döndüler ve uçagin yönünü piste çevirdiklerini düsünerek devam ettiler. Plana göre 43 derece basla 05 numarali piste yaklasacak pilotlar, ilk dönüsteki 30 derecelik kaymanin üzerine, ikinci dönüste de açilarini genis tuttular. Bu da uçagi olmasi gereken uçus hattindan tam 50 derece saptirdi. Böylece 43 derece yerine 93 derece ile piste dogru uçan MD-83, daglarin üzerinde alçaliyordu. Mehtap olmasi, görüsün gece sartlarina ragmen 10 kilometre ve üzerinde olmasi pilotlari psikolojik açidan rahatlatmisti.

’PULL UP’ IKAZI YETMEDI

Pilotlar, daha sonra uçus planina göre piste 9 bin 250 metre kala, irtifalarini 1500 metreye indirmek için alçalmaya /_newsimages/4606142.jpgbasladi. Bu irtifada pisti karsilayacaklarini sanan pilotlar, 1951 metre yüksekligindeki Türbetepe’ye yaklasirken Kara Yakinligi Uyari Sistemi (GPWS) ’Çarpma uyarisi’ vermeye basladi. Önce ’mania’ diye pilotlari uyarin sistem, ardindan sesli ’pull-up (lövyeyi çek)’ ikazi vermeye basladi. Kaptan Pilot Özdemir yere birkaç metre kala gaz açarak yükselmek için lövyeyi kendine dogru çekti. Ancak MD83’lerin motorlari kuyrukta oldugu için, gazla birlikte uçagin kiç tarafi asagi çöktü. Kuyrugu yere degen uçak, Türbetepe’ye çarpti. Uzmanlar, kesin degerlendirmenin FDR kayitlarinin analizinden sonra bulunacagina dikkat çekerek sorunun pilotaj mi yoksa uçus göstergeleri arizasi kaynaklimi oldugunun belirlenecegine dikkat çektiler.

Enkaz kaldirildi

Isparta’da, 30 Kasim Cuma sabaha karsi, 7’si mürettebat 57 kisinin hayatini kaybetmesiyle sonuçlanan kazada düsen uçagin enkazini kaldirma çalismalari tamamlandi. Enkaz parçalari Isparta Organize Sanayi Bölgesi’nde kiralanan bir depoya götürüldü.

=============

Translation anyone?

-=MachacA=-

Report: FDR data poor, CVR inop
 

http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/7...cvr2cc5.th.jpg

http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/5...cvr1jl9.th.jpgAnd now this:-=MachacA=-

Food for Thought
 

The following excerpts are from an AA Flight Safety article about results found in their Aviation Safety Action Program (ASAP).


ASAP Turns Five and a Half
Prominenet Trends and Observations
Tom Chidester, Ph.D., Manager Human Factors & Safety Training
AA Flight Safety First Quarter 2000


...

The [heading deviations] increase was associated with decommissioning of the Omega Navigation System (ONS) and its delayed replacement with GFMS on MD-80s. Heading deviations on these aircraft rose sharply as the decommissioning began. The decline from the peak rate may be attributed to pilots on these aircraft re-establishing habit patterns for enroute navigation by ground based facilities or to increasing numbers of aircraft having GFMS installed, but overall, heading deviations remain significantly more frequent than 3 years ago.

...

Distraction from primary duties to other tasks (13% of randomly sampled reports). Distractions at a critical point in flight have produced altitude deviations, navigation errors, and runway incursions. The word “distraction” usually implies that attention is drawn from critical tasks to irrelevant factors in the situation. That is rarely the case in these reports. While distractions include factors within the pilots’ control such as timing of cabin communications and PA’s, most are inherent in the operation, such as weather, ACARS messages, distractions related to autoflight systems, and minor mechanical problems. Most of these events have occurred at a point of flight where more than one duty must be accomplished – pilots must set priorities between primary and secondary tasks.

...

NAV tuning, course selection, or altitude selection not coordinated between pilots (11%). A number of reports describe navigation to a fix or course other than intended. This re-emphasizes the need for both pilots to communicate their intentions for radio navigation. Frequency of these reports increased sharply following decommission of ONS, and most involve MD-80 crews. No comparable trend has been reported on the B-727, most of which have GPS replacing ONS navigation. These deviations have included early turns on airways where a turn point was defined by adding several DME segments, tracking a wrong (and unidentified) VOR, and failing to change course on station passage. All of these were potentially automated using ONS and all could at least be cross-checked with ONS information when the system was operative. Perhaps more importantly, MD-80 crews had frequently been using ONS-direct clearances, reducing their enroute radio navigation. Without this tool, MD-80 crews must revert to more basic IFR navigation, and that is something of a challenge to habit. Greater vigilance in navigation is necessary.

...

MEL noncompliance (7%). Crews have misinterpreted, not read, not signed, or flown with open items in the E-6 logbook resulting in deviations from the MEL.

...

Selection of wrong mode on mode control panel or autopilot interface, or entry of incorrect data into FMS (2%).

...

Autopilot or FMC anomaly – autoflight did not perform as expected (2%). These reports involved a failure of the autopilot to capture and hold an altitude, heading, target speed, course, or ILS as expected.

...

Checklist errors. Over the past six months, the ERT has observed a number of events where failure to complete items on a normal checklist led to a deviation or unsual situation. For example, events have resulted or been associated with failure to capture localizer due to NAV/RAD switch not reset to RAD, failure to set hydraulic pumps to high on the MD-80, and failing to verify final landing configuration. Many of these events are associated with distractions, but others are associated with low time in type by one or more crewmembers.

...


-=MachacA=-