In reading this report I noted the autopilot was on till 2 or 3 hundred feet. I have found over the years in many different a/c that hand flying from say 1000 ft gives me better performance and results. Many a/p systems just can't keep up in such strong winds.

This is only my personal opinion, but-

- I think it was a good crew in NRT.

- I think they were very very tired.

- The first bounce was very survivable, 1.7 g or something like that.

- I think the pilot flying thought he was on the ground and wanted to get the nose down, when in fact he was in mid-bounce. Too late he realized his error.

- Training since then has focused more on basic skills, no doubt about that. FX has developed a bounce recovery curriculum that is becoming the industry standard. Some of the simulator exercises are interesting - we turn off the auto-spoilers, make a VFR approach and then attempt to make multiple touch-and-goes by slightly adding power after touchdown. I could make four in one pass - the record is eleven. All to teach finesse and stability in the flare.

My philosophy exactly. If you're going to play piano or guitar, you want to warm up a little first. I cannot comprehend why pilots want to grab the controls at 200 feet.

Huck, Are you sure this is a good technique to teach for a bounced landing?

It's not a recovery technique.

The recovery technique is to hold 7.5 degrees of pitch and hit the TOGA button.

The touch and go exercise just gives pilots more time in the backside of the flare, to develop muscle memory for that last crucial few seconds. We learn by doing - and this gives pilots more time very close to the ground.

Just SLF but this is a bit relevant - the transcript did not show any cockpit sound other than impact related.

caiman 27

When I saw my first 747 climbing out of Honolulu in 1970, I said to myself, That a/c is going to crash, it is moving too slowly.

The MD11 is also a massive a/c, and watching it land in Narita, I had to remind myself, "Imagine the accelerations the Pilots are feeling." Slow is relative, and small things move "faster".

After twenty years of operation, the handling qualities of the MD11 are still a hot topic. There's really only two posiblities; you either love this aircraft or you hate it. For some reason people with experience on previous Long Beach products seem to have less problems with this airplane.
Huck I think you're dead right. :ok:
The secret to making decent landings in an MD11 is to disconnect the AP & AT at 10000' and FLY & FEEL the airplane. That way, even if things go south due to reasons beyond your control, you're in the loop and you have time correct the situation; e.a. 7.5 pitch & TOGA, get the hell out of dodge.
However, If the prospect of hand flying an approach in this airplane scares you, please put in a bid to go on airbus....

Wow this was a weird bit of flying. The PF reminds of a trick a captain showed me many years ago when just before touchdown, he slammed the yoke forward! Scared the crap out of me but the airplane made a smooth touchdown.

So this idiot at Fedex does the same thing. Look at the dfdr data where he pushes the yoke forward at 4 feet RA.

How the hell is anyone supposed to recover from that? he tries desperately moving the yoke fore and aft but doesn't know what to do and PIO blamo. Piss poor flying. Lucky he didn't take out any innocent bystanders.

And yes I flew and loved the md-11. It had nice handling qualities, landed very smoothly. Only thing I disliked was the 158 knot ref speeds. Took a lot of runway even on a good day.

BFD

BigFootDriver,

Very disrespectful:=:ugh::mad:

filejw and executive chauffeur, I agree. Too much automation these days. Get it out early and get the feel. Boeing recently amended our FCOM to recommend that, on a good day, the AP be taken out at 500ft AGL and the aircraft hand-flown. Keeps you current (well, more current than you would have been had you always disconnected at 100ft).

If it's VFR, it's off at the marker for me. Can't come up with a reason not to, save laziness.

Can't help but noticing Huck, the report says the captain had ca 8000 hours total time, the F/O something similar, at 54 years old. Normally, at this age the flying experience should be in the mid to high teens, what's up with that?

Single seat fighter guys?

What was their previous experience?

Flight hours and age are not the only indicator for experience.

It greatly depends on

- What equipment are the hours flown on.
- How much training has been given to the pilot, sim and real time.
- What are the sop's of the companies. Are they the a$$ covering as much
automatics as possible and AP off at minimum, or something more hands on
- How many hours on what seat

8000 hours don't seem few, but not many either. Give it for example 5000 as FO, thereof 4000 on a RJ, then 1500 on a RJ again as Captain, suddenly it doesn't look bright.
Or give it a ME career for locals, 6000h as long range FO with 1 landing every 20 days, then a guaranteed upgrade to long range again, the cycle experience is very dim.

Going along with all your age and flight hours, you need cycles and exposure to all the different environments and experience on similar types of airframe if you want to be called "experienced".
You also need a adequate syllabus of training and retraining within the company (rare these days where the only worship is for the doe).

Incident reports rarely give us the total information.

Bugg I think its the nature of flying at Fed EX. They start with just domestic flts and would fly only 3 hrs a night.

Attitude...Attitude/ Pitch and on wheel spin-up bring the nose down firmly. If you bounce, attitude/pitch let it touch again and bring the nose down. As in most A/C a stable approach generaly ends up with a good landing. Don't forget a lot of company's use A/T till touch down in this plane it retards/idle at 50'. The spin up creates a nose up attitude hence the nose/pitch control.

MPH,

Please consider the quote below before "firmly bringing the nose down on wheel spinup":

Yes, the nosewheel should be on the ground and chances are that you will need a nose-down input for that on the MD-11. You may even need a nose-down input just to maintain the landing pitch attitude after main gear touchdown.
However, one of the common factors coming out of the seminars on MD-11 landing incidents/accidents is a too-aggressive derotation after main gear touchdown. This has resulted in the recommendation to maintain the landing pitch attitude for one or two seconds ('momentarily') after main gear touchdown and thén starting a controlled derotation.
Your TM will have all the information from the seminars.

lenderhisen
 

Many airlines have operated this aircraft sucussfully, no need for above average skills. Just a respect for the aircraft. FDX operates the largest fleet of type. A pilot's job is to know how his/her aircraft fly's. FDX performs more takeoff's and landings in the MD-11 every day than any other airline. Hope I have drilled the fact home that any complacent pilot is subject to disaster and that odd's are that "!!!! happens"!

A large contributing factor to pilot error with the MD-11 is pilot's who expect it to perform like others they have flown, the main one here was a pilot who did NOT respect his aircraft and pushed it's limits over the edge......

Huck
 

This statement negates the sentements preceding, W/S in a bounce. PF was determined to land the aircraft, it was later that he realized his erorr.

I think that both were not aware how high the bouce was and over derotated. It didn't look like a hard landing to begin with.

Back to the Physics involved. From the video alone, one is shown remarkable accelerations up and down @ the flight deck.

Can one eliminate the possibility that one or the other or both of these pilots were unconscious, and depending on shoulder restraint fit, may have been pummeling the column with body slams that had no relationship to formal input?

We're looking at transits of 70-80 feet in less than one second. Hands on column throughout?

bear