American Airlines Flight 742 "flight control system" problems
 

Any details about this?

American Airlines Flight 742 from Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, TX (DFW) to New York-La Guardia Airport, NY (LGA) reprortedly suffered "flight control system" problems on approach to LaGuardia's runway 31.

ASN Aircraft accident 17-FEB-2013 McDonnell Douglas MD-83 (DC-9-83) N9627R

Aviation Herald says: "...intermittent loss of the right hand electrical busses and associated systems including the loss of the first officer's flight instruments as well as loss of autopilot and autothrottle."

Looks as if the automatics had gone on vacation and pilots were forced to actually fly MANUALLY. :{

Lions and tigers and bears... oh my!!!:eek:

whooh...
 

then again, if i were flying one of those, i'd be concerned even when everything worked.

They had to fly manually? I still don't understand why this would make any news. Can't we all fly manually?????

The last AA pilot class was cancelled after 9/11/ 2001 when new hires could fly without automation. I watched them turn in their books. Very sad. The MD80 is easy to hand fly. So are all the airliners. AF 447 pilots couldn't hand fly so all died but that is the new generation of button pushers. What happened with AA should have been a simple maintenance write up and not news worthy.

"Flight control system problems" are generally overcome the old fashioned way in a Mad Dog.

Confusion reigns!! Glueball - you are quoting AvHerald for a different incident. This one has not appeared on AH.

Everything on the ASN page looks like bull****. Confusion about phase of flight, destination etc. And the pax comments... give me a break :ugh:

Any AA pilot can see the mx writeup. The drama of the report linked above is hysterically, and wildly, wrong. :ugh:

Idiot light on approach. Went around to trouble shoot. Light went out. Ops normal. Landed. :D

And the eyewitness reported that the F/A thought it was over for them? :rolleyes:
Next we'll have lawsuits for millions for the near death emotional trama the passengers had to endure based on internet, or the last row of the airplane, analysis. :=

The last paragraph is sensationalist BS probably written by a Brit aviation reporter visiting the colonies on holiday :E

The first part sounds a little more accurate, but of course limited in detail. No AA pilot is going to stuff a jet with control problems into LGA when a large hub at JFK with gates and full maintenance is available 2 minutes east. It's been the standard brief for probably 50 years, "...any problems, go to 13R at JFK"

A hysterical crying FA? Maybe from hot flashes or her trip was cancelled and her 3 cats won't get fed, but not from the flight.

"Strong words with Maintenance"? GMAFB. They didn't touch the jet, it came from DFW. Not only would AA pilots not do that, they know how good the guys are and are professionals, no pilot would start getting in the face of a NY mechanic without knowing they would get smacked down like a dog if it was unwarranted.

Too bad 411A isn't still around. He could tell us it was another example of poor flying by AA pilots.

WSL, sounds about right to me. Those poor cats all alone and unfed. Sounds like the pilots had no pressing problems but she did. I was in an MD80 one day in moderate chop at 300 ft on a cat 1 approach and everything disconnected and lights were flashing still in the clouds so nudged the controls to the localizer a bit and glide slope and broke out and landed adding a little power. I didn't have a cat so just needed to land a perfectly good MD80 that needed some manual assistance. We didn't even write it up because we never trusted the autoland anyway. It only works when it feels like it, at least in my days.

The press can make up a lot of drama over nothing. I guess we could have gone around but what was the point? Just hand fly the :mad: airplane. That is what you are paid for.

It's just a big DC-9. As in "Direct Cable."

"Can't we all fly manually????? "
 

Sadly only those outside EU with the capacity can do that - over this side of the atlantic we are reducing experience requirements for actual aviating whilst everyone else is demanding more....... You can get an EASA MPL with just 70h of real aeroplane flying although most schools say 100 or a few more before immersion into automated flight deck in SIMs.

But it's OK cause the pax don't know - they just like the low fares!

Good one GlueBall!
 

Which in the case of the Mad Dog, is manual in nearly every sense of the word.

The Mad Dog flies quite well in manual mode. It has no laws to abide by just pull up to go up and push down to go down. We all know that if you keep pulling up the houses start getting bigger again but that is basic airmanship.

My 17 year old kid is taking lessons in an old Citabria right now. I may be wrong, but from what he tells me I think he flies manually or not at all.

I know it's different, but please....

As a Brit who is a huge fan of Americans and their great nation, I would not want to seem to be too critical of some of their comments on here. However, I would have to disagree with bubbers44 and his analysis of AF447. It is way too simple to say that the pilots of that flight 'couldn't hand fly'. There is no doubt there was some significant inadequacies in their training, but that characterisation is a gross over-simplification of the problems they faced and their subsequent failure to deal with them. The Airbus is a magic machine, and overall it has done way more for flight safety than many of our American cousins may care to concede. It will save you way more times than a Boeing, but a lack of respect or understanding can lead to serious issues.

I taught aerobatics for Art Scholl in his aerobatics school in a Citabria. What a great airplane to learn in. He will learn a lot with the tail dragger experience. Then learn spin and unusual attitude training. It might save his and his passengers lives one day. I saw a Bonanza take off from Burbank one day, lost his engine at 200 ft and tried to skid back for a landing, rolled over and went straight into the ground. Of course all were killed because of lack of pilot skills.

adm, so it is ok for your pilots to lose airspeed and pull up into an 11 degree pitch up attitude at FL350 which we all know will result in a full stall and that is ok with you? It is not possible for us to even consider this because it is impossible. No pilot here would consider exceding 3 degrees nose up because at that altitude if you exceed it you will for sure stall. AOA can be held at 2 degrees by merely holding 2 degrees nose up attitude and holding altitude. Remember, their altimiters worked just fine so level flight AOA would be nose attitude. Quite simple. Why try to make these pilots who couldn't handfly look like they are not the problem? They definately were.