OK, can anybody fully qualified to answer, explain to me what we (think to) see in the picture of the S-shaped skid marks ? These are the last 2-300 metres, so speed being quite low and then managing (surely while overcorrecting) a 90° turn onto and over the runway. As breaking action (and directional control) on the grass must have been poor, what speed would he have had when crossing the runway (from LH grass to RH grass)? And any pilot on top of the situation, wouldn't he be able keep the ac more one the runway (differential braking). My (untrained-unqualified) guess would be that during the roll on the LH grass, nosewheel steering would have overcorrected, but while on the grass without much effect, until on the concrete when the nosewheel regained grip making the plain turn sharply? The initial exit on the LH grass was only 10-20° off track, so how comes one can overcorrect so much to the right?

Facts are:
No one currently employed at SQ is going to very interested in making any critical remarks. If you don't know why you don't know Singapore. Laudatory and defensive comments will be loud and vigorous and supported. Don't expect an avalanche of information related to past very close shaves either. CFIT or otherwise.

There are no procedures for the switching of the roles from Captain to FO for an autoland. Who is doing the call-outs? Who is looking out the window? Who is calling "Flare" or "No Flare" or "Centreline"? You think the Captain is not going to be looking at the runway? Who is going to disconnect if things go awry?

In spite of this, SQ FOs were routinely landing using the autoland feature. Why? Because sometimes it was too gusty or too much crosswind (it didn't take much) and they, the Captain, or both were uncomfortable.

But, no one knows why the airplane went off the runway - it is way too early
for anyone to make accusations here. Frankly, I would like to believe the crew did a great job and saved a bad situation and I will hold that opinion until I learn otherwise.

Our operations manual, like many others, requires us to carry out at least one autoland per month. For obvious reasons most of these are practice autolands. I understand that a long haul operation may have other priorities given the very few landings per pilot. Personally I find the practice helpful, particularly as most of the autolands in the sim focus on failures and go-arounds with minimum conditions. Daylight real conditions can be very different.

The skid marks are hard to believe....I wonder how that almost ninety degree right turn felt at the back of the plane! Welcome to the Oktoberfest's newest ride.

The skid marks are hard to believe....

The aircraft's, the flight deck crew's, the cabin crew's, the passengers', or all of them?:)

Jack

In most cases with a long aircraft wheel base, the nose wheel is outside of the main gear tracks in turns. We can see the nose wheel track marks are on the inside of the turn, indicating the aircraft was swerving around for the main wheel to over take the radius of turn, like most of my simulator landings of mine.
Eisch! poor guys:bored:

another cargo wannabe
 

Hey O neil.

You joined SQC in DEC 04 if im not mistaken and recently left this year.- which means YOU COULD NEVER HAVE BEEN ON THE MAIN FLEET.!!- No point trying to convince me of that- I have been in the industry too long.
That explains your defence of Cargo j as you fall in the same category.

From my sources , all u did was complain about the rosters and the airline in the last 2 years.Would you like me to elaborate?

My Point is: that no professional Pilot and decent human being would pass judgement on another Pilot or the Training establishment- WITHOUT ALL THE FACTS AND FINDINGS.
CJ s comments were totally unacceptable.

As for "other airlines LVP training being more superior than SQ s- well thats your opinion.
What were you flying before SQC gave you the golden opportunity to fly a 747-400??- im guessing 757/767??:D

:=

Rain5,

Very well said. :ok:

I do not understand CJ being miserable in SQC, why not just pack up and leave? Go somewhere where you will find your sanity and to an airline with a top notch training/standard.

Cmon CJ, life is too short...just leave

I agree with some very experienced posters here that SIA is a fine company but I do not agree that Autoland is a useful tool for single pilot operation except in an emergency. The autoland system on any aircraft is a very delicate part of the aircraft, and even smallest deviation can lead to catastrophic outcomes - as one can easily recognize here.

Autoland - as in Cat III or Cat I weather - is maneuvring very close to ground and needs a perfect supervision by both of the crew. It is therefore a two pilots operation with fine tuned procedure. Every move of the two at the controls has to be known and trained. Because there is very little lead time and very little time to react.

Autoland, as it has been designed, is never intended to replace doubted landing skill of a junior crew member. Even training and trial autolands have to be made in the exact same crew configuration as in 75m RVR.

Autoland done by the FO is therefore a very unique procedure in SIA. I'm sure it will be removed as soon as more news are upcoming.

Dani

This is false. FOs do not PF an autoland, whether practice or actual. Therefore, there is no "switching" of roles.


This is very untrue (see above).

Oh, really? Guess again.

Just a thought (is there any data yet?)

When/if asymetrical thrust gets into this the aircraft skid marks will probably track differently.

Historically, there have been numreous events where thrust asymetry on landing has taken an aircraft off the runway.

The wierdest ones where too much thrust was present (runaway engine)

@lederhosen: you still have the requirement for practice auto lands in our manuals? I still remember it, but it was removed from ours around, hmm, 8 or 9 years ago.

Autolands done by the FO on the other is not unique. While the FO cannot do a LVP approach he is free to use an auto land whenever he feels like it in my company. Often (mis)used when too damn knackered to be bothered to land manually. EU-OPS rostering can be very very tiring indeed. With somewhere between 20 to 40 landings a month the odd auto land isn't a big concern handling wise though. The main aim is to ease the transition during command course.

Denti I cannot be sure whose manual you are speaking of. But our manual requires us to be current, defined as 3 per quarter. If you remember to do one a month you cannot go wrong. It is not at all arduous if you do 30 landings a month, although now with other activities I probably do rather less.

Flyingtheline: There is no guessing involved. It's a fact. You need to recheck your information source.

Hi rain5,

You just get more and more jumped up ("your sources"-Ha!).

Well you have me confused with someone else, because I wasn't in a position to complain about rosters before I left. I left on excellent terms and had no problem with rosters.

I just stick by my post re LVP training at SQ/SQC. It was a general comment which may or may not relate to this incident but I consider relevant to the general theme of the thread.

LVP training
 

Hi Guys,
I used to fly for a 3-world airline on long haul.
I smell a rat here.
As is usual there is no single main reason but a combination of factors, the proverbial "Swiss cheese hole allignment".
1. A company that probably saves on LVP training.
2. Bad call on behalf of the captain (most likely conducting an A/L w/o protection). Knowing the culture of the folk there, probably didn't even ask/inform ATC for an A/L.
3. Most of us know the limitations of modern A/L systems, but are these properly highlighted in a company where probably you will not shoot a real CAT II/III approach and A/L in 5 years?!
4. What about monitored approach? Did the F/O keep his head down and call any deviation from the LOC?
5. And last but not least - what about the "Playstation Generation" pilots who are brilliant on your everyday boring 12 hours flight but **** themselves every time the wx is marginal...
It's the Big Shots' times...
Watch out.
:mad:

post #68 - looks like large scrub angles on the tires...it will be interesting to see the headings, slip angles, and speeds that they occurred at. :eek:

Obviously I can't comment about the present day, but when I left SQ they had one of the best Airline training regimes going, they had ab-initio in house training and had set up an advanced training section with a fleet of Lear Jets fitted with a glass cockpit - fairly uncommon on those days - that the students would eventually graduate to when they moved to Line Training. They used instructors from a variety of the Worlds' "Legacy" carriers so gained from a variety of very experienced personnel. SQ did their best to address the problem of experience.

Unfortunately there is no experience like experience, and this can only be realistically gained on the job, and no airline is totally safe from the unexpected, first time problem as technology advances. ( the World was better off before computers ! but I don't expect anyone to agree with me ! )

This thread has drifted into personal attacks and 'knocking' SQ, can we get back to, maybe, reasoned discussion of the technical aspects of what "might" have happened - if that is what you want, which is all we can possibly do at the moment - if we can't wait for the FACTS.

Well said former BA colleague.

Looking at the tire marks, wow, those tires got a beating !

If you look at the MG (main gear) tracks before the runway crossing, the grass is heavily torn and when the MG got onto the main runway you can see the very dark lines. Also, you can see the MG tires "skipping" as the MG is going sideways on the runway.

And from the nose gear marks (relative to the MG) one can say that the back of the plane whipped around. :eek:

I'm impressed with the tire and MG design :D