Alice025

There was a hop-in into Smolensk blog, I'll find it, Singaporecanac, of what looks very much like another flight controller, as he was quoting flight controller book extracts naturally, and compared the actions of Northern flight controller with "the book".
I would not say I got an impression (from that) of a very friendly controller service provided, but of very experienced one and knowing the rules and his duties way (too) :o) well a man.
It followed he was covering his eh rear end very classy, and very methodically. One would say, an ace! of a controller :o) in action. nd of not a very optimistic disposition, re the decision to try it down to 100 meters.
Or as min that what followed from that chancy interruption into the forum by a visitor (not a daily person we speak with there)

Kulverstukas

wetbehindear, thanks God, Polish President is not Royal person and this visit was private, 3 days after official ceremony attended by Prime Ministers of two country.

criss

Sure, and Crossair never crashed on Vor Dme approach into Zurich...

BOAC

327 posts and we are still talking about 'ATC involvement'.

To make it clear:

In my opinion, the crew 'arrived' and commenced their own internally monitored approach. ATC, trying to be helpful. monitored and reported on the nominal profile being achieved using PAR. At some point, for reasons unknown, the PF flew the a/c into a valley from which they could not recover. The ATC man watched helplessly (probably thinking they were 'visual' or 'scud-running') until he realised they were aiming far too short and were too low and ordered a g/a which was ignored.

P2 did his job, albeit with some understandable reticence in view of the content of the cockpit, in calling for a G/A but again for understandable reasons did not enforce this.

Can we sort out for once and for all what 'service' the crew were given and accepted? PtKay (#160) links to a ?Polish? CVR transcript which has not been translated for the period from 500m UP TO top of 'glidepath'. Can someone oblige please and perhaps we can then leave the ATC side alone?

dukof

Ignored? As I detailed here, their height is indicated to 5m at the moment ATC calls "Horizon 101". The plane has already leveled out before this.. So how can you say it was ignored? It was "too late", that is the the correct words.

ARRAKIS

Alice, could you give me the page number of the Smolensk forum thread this information was published. I've seen it, but can't remember where exactly.
One more thing Alice.
As I saw, there is some kind of debate about the distance readouts by the ATC.
The 2 km redout is at 10:40:38
The beacon sound is at 10:40:56
Which gives around 53 m/s speed (190 km/h). Impossible.
If you look at the time difference between the far beacon sound and the 4 km readout (23 s), you will get a speed around 91 m/s (around 330 km/h). Again impossible. Assuming around 75-77 m/s speed, the time difference between 4-3-2 km readouts are correct.
It means that ATC distance readouts were about 5 seconds to early.

The 6 km readout was also to early, but as I don't know exactly, what was the time difference between the far beacon sound and the moment the aircraft flew above it (could someone check the technical data of those beacons) I can't estimate exactly the time advance on the 6 km readout.

Arrakis

BOAC

Dukof - do you have a different CVR recording to the one posted in #194?

dukof

BOAC,
"50" is the terrain height, not relative to runway, considering he is reading RA. Unless of course; you don't believe this profile to be (currently) the best assumption..? But you "can not" disagree with that profile much IMO, as it will be physically impossible to have much deviation from this.. At least in terms of being much higher than indicated in the last seconds of flight, from 10:40:48 to 10:40:55, as we know point of first bush-clip just after that.

dukof

Btw, this video from Polish TVN 24 gives a good sense/visualization of the time domain of the transcript. With the last minute also plotting the profile as of above chart.

Tak wygl?da?y ostatnie minuty lotu Tupolewa - Polska - Informacje - portal TVN24.pl - 03.06.2010

Same video on youtube

EDIT: The clock is a bit out of sync, but graphic timeline is correct.

Alice025

Arrakis, I am looking through the forum, will complete in the evening if not now. So far foun link to fixer's page of RSP-6M2 (locator system), Volgograd factory (defence ministry sub-division)
????????????? ????? ????????????????? ???????????? ?????? ???????????????? ?????? ???????: ???-6?2, ???-10??1 google first paragraph into English and you'll see it is intended for "consequitive bringing airplanes (without ground visibility) to the aerodrrome runway and control after their descend to the height 150-200m in complex meteorological conditions by means of giving commands to the airplanes' crews through radiostations of connection". Forum is awful swollen hard to look at but surely for natives in Russian it's quicker than for you :o)

Alice025

Arrakis, link to the page describing No 7 which is said to be close relatives to No 6.

Ðàäèîëîêàöèîííàÿ ñèñòåìà ïîñàäêè ñàìîëåòîâ ÐÑÏ-7 - Ìóçåé íåáûòîâîé ýëåêòðîíèêè
What confises me is after the photos and graphs explaining how it works and more photos there are given characteristics of the locator. Split into 2 parts: "Despatcher locator" and "Landing locator". Which one is meaningful I don't know.

"Despatcher locator" says

Exactness:
— by distance - 1% of the scale of the indicator
- by "azimut" 1% (likely error)

Recognition of planes
— in passive regime - by automatic radiopelengator;
— in active regime - by automatic radiopelengator and by the signals of recognition of the plane's auto-replier.

"Landing locator" says

Radiolocator can work in 3 regimes:
— landing;
— defining;
— round scope glance.

Max distance by plane IL-14 at flight height 1,000m:
— in passive work no lesser than 30 km;
— in active work no lesser than 40 km.

Обзор в горизонтальной плоскости:
— в режиме посадки ±15°, —20° - +10°; +20° - -10°;
— в режиме кругового обзора 360°. Обзор в вертикальной плоскости:
— в режиме посадки —1° - +8°;
— в режиме определения высоты —1° - +22°.
Ширина диаграммы направленности курсовой антенны:
— в горизонтальной плоскости 0,7°;
— в вертикальной плоскости 3,5°.
Ширина диаграммы направленности глиссадной антенны:
— в горизонтальной плоскости 3,8°;
— в вертикальной плоскости 0,7°. Коэффициент усиления:
— курсовой антенны ~ 8000;
— глиссадной антенны ~ 8200.
Уровень боковых лепестков по отношению к основному лучу по мощности 1 %.
Угол перемещения антенны курса в вертикальной плоскости 22°; угол перемещения антенны глиссады в горизонтальной плоскости 30°.
Мощность передатчика в импульсе не менее 70 кВт.
Чувствительность приемника не менее 120 дб.
Разрешающая способность в пассивном режиме:
— по дальности 1,2%
Exactness:

by distance:
— at round around glance and definition of height - 1% of the scale of the distance of indicator;

by "azimut":
— at round around glance 2 o (degrees);
by height:
— in regime of landing at plane's flight at constant height - 100 м;
— at defining the height - 300 м.

Q-ty of fixed frequencies 6, of these 2 are operative. (alarm? back up)
Minimum height of bringing the planes to aerodrome runway - 50m
________________

Now, I'll find eventually where the forum quoted, but looks it quoted 100 and 300 meters from this link. And as it is split into 2 parts - "dispatcher" and "landing" locators - it seems to me I am not sure can it be the "landing" one is not on the ground but is in the aiplane? And theses errors 100 and 300 are then for airplane, not for ground control at all. Sorry by looking at the scheme I can't undertsnad for the life of me :o) where are those locators installed.

Alice025

Self-correction. I am silly. Both "despatcher" and "landing" locators, acc. to the photos, are perched onto some sheds and trucks on the ground. Not for airplanes. "Despatcher" is said to "work in decimetere range" and the "Landing" one - in "3-centimetre range".

Ptkay

It doesn't look particularly good:

In 20km scale the distance precision is just 200m.
And the height precision 100-300m ???

Alice025

Arrakis, re how far in advance the controller was telling things to the plane. No idea, but someone in the forum there pointed out usually they do tell in advance, so by the time one says the other hears - the plane is where it is said to be.

We've got an example in the record:

10:39:49.9 - 10:39:52.3 Controller: You're coming to the Far, on course, on glideslope, distance 6.
10:39:50.2 - 10:39:58.0 Sound signal, frequency 845 Hz, Far Beacon.

The man who commented on controller work said it's good, he told them where they are and right after was the beep in the cabin proving where they are.
Either ground control gets a signal when a plane enters the Far Beacon zone? Or it can define the plane's position quite exact on his screen.

Alice025

Ptkay, 100 and 300 error nobody likes. Because the very flight btw Beacons goes between 300 metres and 70 metres there. And what's the point then.
However people comment nevermind what's written in stupid manuals :o), a decent controller in their experience in this equipment tells the plane's position up to 10 metres height. In spite of his manuals, or according to them - that's what is expected of ground control by pilots.

Alice025

To me it seems this:
equipment was made in USSR, no buyers-sellers, producer didn't have to advertise it, could allow himself to write honestly what it is. And wrote quite pessimistically error by height 100 or 300 metres.
In reality trained controllers found their way with it, won't tell the plane its height, but will have a good idea where happens what in air and can see when a plane deviates from glideslope (with a mistake of 10 metres).

A military pilot there said he was in the habit in complex meteo-conditions to chirrup with the ground non-stop, initiating the talks himself, as every time he was telling the ground his height - the ground responded by distance and info type (you are) 20 metres to the left, and keeping this kind of short talk - number here - 2 numbers backwards helped him to get oriented where he is.

BOAC

Alice - it seems to me you are talking there about what is known as an SRA, not a PAR. NO glidepath information visible to the controller. A proper PAR is accurate to less than a metre in both elevation and azimuth inside 5km, and NO response is required from the a/c.

Can ANYONE offer a translation of the bit before descent as I requested?

Kulverstukas

I take Slavic recognized file from Smolensk Forum, add English translation from pprune and make it in form

1 column) Talks in cabin in original language
2) Radio same way
3) Full russian translation
4) Full polish translation (+ comments)
5) Full english translation

Стенограмма борта №101 10.04.2010, версия 1 от 02.05.2010.xls

LeClercus

To BOAC.
Are you asking for full translation of CVR transcript?
I posted link earlier.
Here it is again, Google Docs, can be viewed online or downloaded to Excel.
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?...WMjdnY3c&hl=en

Link for sharing: http://bit.ly/92Jb76

See the second tab at the bottom.

Alice025

BOAC, about "a metre" no one mentioned never in 1,300 pages in wild dreams :o(