Vietjet runway excursion VVTS Saigon
 

Vietjet Air (A pay to fly airline) A320 VN-A657 flight PQC-SGN was involved in a runway excursion today at 12.24 local time. Airline statement blames rainy weather for the accident.

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It would appear that the (Pay to Fly) Pilot got confused by the location of the airstairs in the field.

(Not sure why Pay to Fly is relevant at this point).

VVTS 140530Z 30010G26KT 230V340 7000 2000E +SHRA SCT013 SCT015CB 26/26 Q1007 BECMG TL0550 3000 TSRA RMK CB OVER RWY=

Weather was not that great...

Just in time for tea and biscuits with the training department!

In my part of the world, we're required to carry holding fuel or alternate fuel when TS are on the TAF.

So it’s confirmed the plane landed because it did not have fuel to divert ? Or you assuming he landed because he had no fuel to divert ?

No, but in some parts of the world we have properly paid pilots, and not self paying interns in the right seat, clue less. Sign of the times.

Someone mentioned 10 knots gusting 26 knots. Well, that's nothing in this region. Not a place for noobs and single pilot ops.

Got an FR24 alert that EVA air was holding for 4 hours as a result of runway closure- what’s with that? 4 hours of holding??

My guess... likely he was tankering ...

Learning to wait
 

Thunderstorms in the VVTS, VDPP and VDSR region are severe but short in duration. You just need 2 things: Extra fuel and patience. Most of the time, within 30 mins you will be able to continue the approach. Thankfully no one was seriously hurt

Did the burst main gear tire, cause the excursion or was it caused by the excursion?

Except if you are caught right when the show starts! Not a nice place to be ! You are then required airmanship, and that can't be bought

Recency may have been a factor, 3 months on the ground doesn’t do much for your handling skills.

Recency shouldn't problem for a decent crew. A decent, non-current crew would have briefed at the beginning of the day that they were not recent and therefore should fly with an abundance of caution. Landing on a very wet runway with a thunderstorm overhead is clearly not the wisest option for a crew that is out of recency.

We're all going to be rusty and will need to re-build our skills gradually. Attacking a thunderstorm in an A320 is a foolish endeavor at the best of times, let alone if it's your first flight in 3 months. This is simply no excuse for failure or mistake. A decent pilot should realise their limits and stay on the right side of them.

Threat
Error
Mitigation

The CRM tools are there empower pilots to stop this kind of cock-up, failure to utilise those tools is simply the difference between a professional pilot, and an ameteur.

If lack of recency is the reason for this accident, then the captain should hang his head in shame and hand over his license.

I'll end with making it clear I have no idea what the crews recency actually was - that will come out in the wash - but if it was a serious factor; they might have considered excercising a little more caution!

I’m still surprised they did not have a fatal accident yet. Vietjet is famous to recruit pilots who have failed in other airlines. Most of the direct entry captains who have been fired during training in our company due to poor flying skills ended in Vietjet within few weeks.

What I'm inferring to is that if they had holding fuel, then they could have had the option to wait it out until the TS had passed the airport.

Thankfully a survivable event.
Do we actually know what the crews flying experience was in the last 7/28/90 days?

Given the met information available before departure, good old fashioned AIRMANSHIP would have dictated that sufficient extra fuel would be sensible course of action to take.

It is evident that the THREAT ERROR MANAGEMENT process was not successfully utilised, and only lip service was paid to the SOPs.

“Pony Express” mentality is never a sensible style to adopt.

As ever the buck stops with the crew, or should I say the aircraft commander. The CRM aspects, crew interface as PF/PM, together with the airlines culture needs to be explored.

Unless there were technical faults with the aircraft, this has all the hallmarks of a wholly avoidable accident.

Will this event concentrate the minds of management, and the Regulator?
Hopefully not a habitual style where accidents are regarded an occupation hazard.....

Airmanship and Pay to Fly it’s an oxymoron....

There have been previous incidents with faults in the nose wheel steering of the A320 and I'm sure we've all seen the video of Jet Blue. In this case I would be leaning towards weather and lack of recency rather than a technical issue, though their long list of events include plenty of those. Airmanship obviously called into question as well.

The Aviation Herald

Is there evidence that a technical fault existed in this accident?

Non sequitur aka. ‘ a red herring ‘ ?