My dear friend. First of all, I didn't suggest that at all. I thought the tongue-in-cheek nature of that comment would be so plainly obvious that most anyone would see the intended humour. If I've offended you, or any Singaporean, please accept my humble apologies.

By the way, HUMOR me a little; what part of the States are you from? Singaporean (and Brits) would spell it, Humour.

Please! Can we now get back to the thread?

PappyJ - feel free to use the private message facility.

The Truth about SilkAir MI 185
 

Thank you very much Parabellum

And thank you too Centaurus - there was an Empire class flying boat of that name once - thank you for your post on DG and P Reporting Points on the Axe Man of Apia which is relevant to all readers of this SilkAir MI 185 thread.

I apologise if it was insensitive to mention cross cultures but all I intended was to suggest that the difficult situation of a co-pilot drawing the captain's attention to a concern, would be even more difficult when the co-pilot was from a cuture and a training that emphasised equality while the Asian ex-military captain could culturally have expected to be treated with some deference.

Regardless, the initial incident led to other incidents, CVR pulling either to preserve evidence or to talk off-the-record, demotion, loss of some income, etc. Nothing to commit suicide or murder over, but nevertheless a slippery slope of unanticipated misfortune.

The individual events are well recorded but the inter-relationship of the sequence is not recognised. Nor is the relationship between the captain and the two co-pilots yet explored adequately.

Logically, when the captain deactivated the CVR on the final tragic flight, something that following the Ansett disaster in the co-pilots training area in NZ was recognised as justified in some circumstances, it was for the captain to say something, off-the-record, to the co-pilot.

,

Notwinds,as aviators we all know assumptions are the biggest mother to all %$*&ups!!!! as we know the fact is the CVR break tripped... however the was no evidence of how it tripped.. electrical failure, or either pilot tripping it. however ever there was only as assumption made.. hence the assumption that the captain tripped the breaker is flawed. however the x-cultural argument is a valid one and might yield some light. albiet Tsu is not your "normal" sporean pilot and does have a 'colourful" personality and pass. I maintain that this isnt an open shut case....

The Truth about SilkAir MI 185
 

Slayerdude, thank you and I do try not to assume but to work with facts which I prefer to have in writing in front of me.

It certainly has been assumed, as a criticism, that the captain pulled the CVR, but I do tend to agree with that on the basis of the virtual impossibility of a mechanical failure of the CVR coinciding with the other events.

The current thread on the main forum "NTSB recommends airlines routinely monitor CVR's" suggests that manual deactivation is not unknown - and the SilkAir MI 185 captain was indeed recorded as having done so before with those two copilots.

I do accept that the captain had a colourful personality - which could have increased the effect of the cockpit gradient in any difference of professional opinion.

However the big outstanding point of the jigsaw is still how the copilots' flying school selected its graduates for the coveted airline entry positions. One of the very few known facts is that the students selected were not necessarily the students who achieved the better accademic or flight training grades.

Dear Nortwinds,

It appears to me that you have an axe to grind with this particular flying school and that seems to be the agenda you are pushing here.

With regard to the accident I think we have explored most possibilities in the realms of technical, cultural and administrative.

The fact of the matter regarding the FO's training is that his flying school basic training is irrelevant. I don't know what airline you fly for, your experience level or if you are in this industry at all. What I do know is that I've been in this for 30+ years and hold many licenses I can tell you that all ATPL's are a waste of money and that we all learnt by watching others and being guided by trainers on the line. If we survived our single engine and and light twins days.

The training of any airline will weed out those found unfit or without potential to fly as FO's and have some potential to be upgraded at a suitable date commensurate with experience. Any Captain will tell you that.

Regards,

Wooblah.

Nortwinds,

From the information available to all , it is quite clear that this crash was caused by a deliberate input by a pilot.Which pilot did it is the question.And if you go by the circumstances , you don't have to be very smart to figure that is was Tsu.Even the NTSB's report says this.

Now if you are going on your line of investigation I would assume that you have some information on Duncan's background.If you do , you might as well spell it out.Did he have an inherent weakness in his flying ability ?Did you at anytime fly with him ?Your inputs may help close this case.

If I were you the question I would be asking is why were the Indonesian authorities so hesitant in calling it pilot suicide ?Why did the Singaporean authorities pressure the Indonesians in keeping the conclusion open.Does anyone have an answer to this.In their final report they never even mentioned the possibility of pilot suicide.

We live in a selfish world.Business interests,money and politics are the underlying factors that help decide matters.You must remember that years after this crash the Egypt Air crash took place.Another case of pilot suicide covered up.

No body wants to rock the boat but in the end it's innocent lives that are lost.You must remember that one day it could be your family on board an aircraft in a similar situation.

So I would advise you to get to the root of the real problem and not chase a far fetched theory mooted by some misinformed person..:ok:

The Truth about SilkAir MI 185
 

Thank you Captain Wooblah but I do not have any axe to grind with the copilots' particular flying school. I am, nevertheless, well aware of threads such as the two currently active on DG and P General Aviation and Questions:
Massey University Selection Requirements; and
Massey University Flying School.

My axe, which is very much a safety axe, is about recognising the whole system from initial virtual self selection (see the first DG and P thread above); through the flying school training (see the second DG and P thread above); to the selection of particular students for a first airline position.

We all agree that any captain and airline training should weed out those found unfit or requiring more experience - and perhaps this was the very thing that the SilkAir MI 185 captain was doing with particular copilots who had been nurtured to see their own ability rather differently.

Sky Dancer, again thank you too very much and we again generally agree both philosophically and professionally. We just disagree that it was the captain to blame, and that is because we are considering, as NTSB did, different circumstances.

The case of SilkAir MI 185 was left unresolved and inconclusive simply because the background and interaction of the copilots was closed off. When it is looked at openly, as we are now trying to do, the parameters change significantly; and the opportunity starts to open for passenger safety, including our own families, to start to balance out against the business, money and political interests.

M in total agreement Notwinds!!!Always two sides to a coin.

Quote:

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The case of SilkAir MI 185 was left unresolved and inconclusive

---

Bollocks!


SilkAir Flight 185, a Boeing 737-36N, registration 9V-TRF, was a scheduled passenger flight from Jakarta to Singapore, which crashed on 19 December 1997 after abruptly plunging into the Musi River from its 35,000 feet cruise altitude, killing all 97 passengers and 7 crew on board.

Remarkably, the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder stopped recording, at different times and for no apparent reason, minutes before the aircraft departed level flight and entered a steep vertical dive.

The crash was investigated by various groups, with different results. The Indonesian NTSC, who were lead investigators, were unable to determine the cause, while the U.S. NTSB concluded that the crash resulted from an intentional act by a pilot, most likely the captain.

Seems perfectly clear to anyone, except maybe, a Singaporean!

The Truth about Silkair MI 185
 

Thank you very much Slayerdude. Those who have an open mind, or even generally agree, tend to be a silent majority, whilst those who disagree tend to be more proactive in putting their own case.

Thank you too Adrian, but "most likely the captain" - the old blame of "pilot error" so that everyone else can walk away from it, is too simplistic - and ignores the other half of the pilots' backgrounds.

You also concede that the "....lead investigators, were unable to determine the cause". To their credit, they had the integrity not to deviate from the facts into fantasy.

It is fact that there were initially unrecognised problems with the copilots' initial selection, training, assessment, and oversight. The final remaining piece of the jigsaw is their selection for direct entry airline positions.

All that my research has been able to unearth to date is that:

1. Both the students and the ordinary staff at the flying school were unaware of what the selection process for the airline positions was.

2. The selection process was not primarily one of academic and flying ability. Known good students were not selected; while some students of relatively modest academic and flying ability were selected.

3. Selection software developed for the aviation industry, such as the Selector Program from a local Feilding company, was available but was not used.

4. Students who complained were apparently not selected. The list of complaints about their training of 13 June 1994 was signed by 34 trainee pilots; and known good students on the list were not selected while conversely the SilkAir copilots' names do not appear on the list of signatures.

5. One complaint on the list was the ban on discussion of East Timor, prior to the Australian led intervention, where "all present understood the school's stance to be that anyone who raised the matter with the Indonesians in the future would be sent packing". Without debating the rights or wrongs, or practicalities, of the policy, this was the only known example of any guidance on selection policy.

It is unusual for pilots that, to date, no selected copilot has spoken about their selection.

I didn't concede a damn thing. I just assumed that everyone was smart enough to realize that the American NTSB doesn't suffer from the "Saving Face" virus!

US NTSB just call things the way they are. If someone looses some face or pride, so be it!

F**k's sake nortwinds, you really are as mad as a box of frogs.

You know there were in fact a great number of sub-standard students with practically zero aptitude at Massey, back in the day. They were called the Chinese cadets :rolleyes:

But let's give you enough rope to hang yourself with, and for the purposes of argument, hypothetically assume that Massey has an open door policy of allowing any and all talentless muppets to train there. What exactly would that prove? It doesn't mean that all graduates are sub standard, at the worst it might just mean that there was a mix of some excellent graduates and some not-excellent ones. Well blow me down if you haven't just described the typical output of every flying school on this earth, and you have proved absolutely nothing about any individual person.

And furthermore even if you COULD somehow dig some dirt about Duncan Ward's ab initio training, which you clearly can't, despite all your mysterious pronouncements and posturing, it still wouldn't even count as 0.01% of enough to exonerate your murdering mate Tsu from the overwhelming weight of evidence against him.

You need to get over this ridiculous obsession with ab initio training, let alone "admittance criteria" to flying schools, because you're only making yourself look foolish. Captain Wooblah had it right, ALL ab initio licence training is b*llocks, all you get at the end is a licence to learn your trade properly on the job. I don't know if you are being wilfully stupid or really are that ignorant, but anyone who actually flies professionally could tell you in a second how pointless you are being with this ridiculous crusade against the guy's flying school. It's so stupid it's hard to even know how to rebut you. If Lance Armstrong fell off his bike on the tour de france, would you blame his parents for not teaching him how to ride his tricycle properly?

There isn't actually all that much mystery about this plane crash at all to be honest, it's perfectly obvious what happened to anyone who spends 5 minutes reading the intro to the NTSB report let alone the conclusion. What you are trying to achieve of course with all this pot stirring, is to distract people's attention away from the vast amount of simple, hard evidence pointing towards Tsu as the guilty party.

Nortwinds will no doubt continue to postulate and make mysterious pronouncements and allegations against Duncan / Massey forever until the thread is eventually locked but if anyone has any doubt about what actually happened I do urge you to google the NTSB report, it's pretty clear and damning.

Dead right about that. It sickens me to read the the cold faced drivel by username Nortwinds who doesn't have a clue about the facts of that day. One only has to be in involved, as I was in the MI 185 court case in Singapore, to be convinced as to what actually happened to MI 185.

I really wish the Moderator would lock this this Pprune thread once and for all. I remain horrified that the well known Loss of Face syndrome is again displayed in these Pprune pages by some characters such as username Nortwinds whose ethnic and cultural beliefs transcend the facts stated in the NTSB report.
Moderator - my dear chap - please call it a day and stop this further nonsense by locking the thread.

As someone who was flying for SQ at the time and since working for EK, let me conclude with the following - he suicided and took a plane load of passengers with him. No-one inside believed anything else, but like all things controversial or reflecting negatively on any aspect of the highly censored Nanny State, its wise if you'd prefer to remain welcomed to keep your trap shut.

Agreed!

and lock it with the conclusion...

The Truth about Silkair MI 185
 

Some pretty heavy responses there, gentlemen/women, considering that, even though we are looking at mass murder, the debate is generally a lot more moderate and professional than on many other PPRuNe threads.

Also double standards where you feel free to abuse me, the SilkAir MI 185 captain, Singapore, and the Chinese generally, yet take exception to even exploring the previously neglected background facts of the tragedy.

There is a lot of emotion in your responses which suggests some personal involvement so perhaps it is time for me to ask you what your own motives are for not digging deeper.

You have clearly stated your beliefs on the cause of the tragedy. Now let me state my belief which I recognise has to merge from fact into presumption.

The two pilots both boarded the flight without either having any thought whatsoever of premeditated murder or suicide.

There were significant cultural and professional differences in their background which had led to disagreement and an escalating dispute including the captain pulling the CVR to talk off the record. This accords well with the views that copilots have to learn/be taught on the job. There was background stress on both pilots, but not enough to kill for.

On the fatal flight the captain again pulled the CVR and was presumably therefore the first person to speak, probably saying something that to him was innocuous. Somehow that rapidly lead to one of the pilots over-reacting for the split second that turned everything into unrecoverable disaster.

Given the emotion of our own debate on this thread (including calls to end it all), and given some of the insensitive comments made, there is ample reason to consider this probability and to explore what must inevitably be the sensitive areas of background.

Lets face the facts, Genghis Khan did get around a little, so most on the little island are probably related.

So, you're saying that a single "Split Second" action at 35,000 feet will cause a jet to crash? What f***king planet are you from? Or, are you suggesting that Asian pilots are that bloody incapable?

Gents,

Give Nortwinds a break............he's obviously got his, or her, reasons for casting suspicion on events of the day, albeit misplaced

If you look at the time line when Nortwinds started appearing here with tales of doubt into what has, for many, been the reasons for the crash, you'll likely figure that Nortwinds is closely related to Capt. Tsu.

A family member perhaps, who has finally grown up enough to know about the facts and trying hard to find an alternative explanation that may be easier to accept.

close relative or lover
 

that is the only explanation i can see why he is so unwilling to let go and accept the findings of NTSB. you have to get on with your life now, nortwinds.