No take off and landings for Lion Air F/O's?
 

Understand Lion Air has issued a notice to pilots that all take off and landings and operations below 5000 ft must be conducted by the captain. This in response to many incidents such as tail-strikes caused by inexperienced first officers. The F/O's are allowed to handle the aircraft only above 5000 ft.

Maybe more concentrated simulator training on take off and landings are needed before line training?

Jolly good.

How on earth is the f/o going to fly a sector if he isn't allowed to touch the controls below 5,000Ft?? How is he/she going to learn to be a Captain??

gotta be kidding

then wad's the use of the FO then, might as well dock his pay

Hopefully that no landing only applies to P2F crowd. Let the locals who intend to stay long term with Lion learn the biz.

At Lion Air, the term F/O refers to 'flap operator', not First Officer. The problem is that many of their F/Os are pay-to-fly jocks. Who cares whether they meet the standards expected of an F/O and second in command, as long as they pay their $45000 (or whatever the ridiculous amount is these days).

The real danger is what happens in the event of captain incapacitation? You have a situation whereby the second in command has never flown below 5000ft, nor has he ever conducted an approach in that case, and nor has he ever landed the airplane. Scary or what?

And you wonder what sort of experience the P2Fs come out with after logging their 500 hours or so with Lion Air? How would future prospective employers value such experience (or should that be 'inexperience'). Sure, they have 500 hours on type, but what use is that when they have zero time conducting an approach (visual nor instrument), and zero landings in their logbook? They may as well just be a passenger and enjoy the scenery from the best window seat in the plane.

Easy! Aim the jet for Jakarta and auto land the jet. The new procedure will be added to the Non Normal Procedures with the next revision.:E

Sounds like the rule in India... First Officers as a rule not allowed to takeoff and land.

Basically an unqualified seat warmer...

A rule established by the anti-aviationists at the DGCA... not the choice of the airlines:mad:

Hey come on Lion Air has a over run at least once a month somewhere.

Maybe it's a good thing they just operate the flaps.

You pay peanuts you get monkeys!

Or in Lion Scare's case a expensive flap operator :D

Mach92 states In this case you have monkeys paying for their peanuts er I mean Mommy and Daddy paying for their little monkey's peanuts:{

Why are we talking about Indian DGCA? because of PT6A's post in reply #8 :ouch: (which by the way is not accurate)

The Lion air ban is not like what the Indian DGCA has done. The Indian DGCA rule basically calls for minimum experience of the captain in order to allow the FO to conduct approach and landing. However in Lion air the FO is completely banned from pilot flying duties below 5000ft. :rolleyes:

I am sorry to say, the Captain's of the landing incident aircraft should be at fault, for allowing the situation to deteriorate to the extent there been incidents. Sure you have to be selective, in the sectors you delegate.

Any Captain, worth his/her salt should take responsibility. Or are they quite happy just to sit and watch it all go wrong? If a Captain is unable to take over at the appropriate time and blame the f/o for everything, should not be occupying the LHS! If the hat fits, wear it!

Oh I've flown with ropey f/o's alright. I was one myself. Instead of trying to put the skids under them I gave them as much flying as I could. My thinking was, could they get the thing down should I be incapacitated?

no worries ..the P2F f/o will in future be allowed to actually land the a/c ...just a question of how much he will have to pay for the privilege. this is the latest advancement in the flying industry:P2L.:ugh:

Gear Monkeys
 

They p2f guys should be called gear monkeys. And it's an apt name, because they were monkeys to participate in a pay to play scheme. No sympathy for them. Sorry.

If you operate two crew aircraft, you should employ two crew, simple.

That means paying for two suitably qualified crew. If that costs you money, tough! Guess what? Safety comes at a cost.

DGCA in Indonesia and India need to improve .

I don't recall anyone questioning the F/O's qualifications. Their competency maybe. That would also be applicable to a few of the Captains at Lion air, would it not??

Maybe the Capt's flying skills are in question and need the practice.

It sounds like everyone's at fault.

My line training on the 737 many moons ago originally as an FO involved mainly four sector days with my invariably doing three of the landings. We have always shared the flying equally since then unless auto landing which I am required to do in low vis (but hardly counts towards handling skills).

However this enlightened approach is clearly not the norm in many parts of the world. But then again in the good old days it wasn't either. The FO put the gear up and shut up for the most part if we are to believe authoritative books like Trust me I'm the pilot about training in BEA or North Star over my shoulder describing the early days of TWA.

So really this is a return to how things were. From a management point of view there is a logic. The likelihood of your FO damaging an aircraft when regularly landing is somewhat higher than them not managing some sort of landing in the rare case of incapacitation. From a job enrichment and people development point of view it is of course a retrograde step.

To add fuel to the fire, it is my understanding that one mainland China operator using A330's has banned all take and landings by first officers until they have completed five years on the aircraft. They then switch to the A320 to get the hang of take off and landings and only then transfer back to the A330 and are allowed to have a go at a take off and landing during line flying.

Same story at Skymark. :cool:

Is that an Indonesian airline? As far as I know, only Lion Air has this ridiculous ruling. All other airlines in Indonesia operate as standard with Captains and First Officers sharing the roles of PF and PNF (or PM, whichever term you use in your company). In my view, if a pilot can not take off or land the aircraft he/she is flying, then he/she has not reached the standard required of an F/O and therefore shouldn't be in a control seat at all.

Skymark is the Japanese LCC.

If the FO doesn't have any chance to T/O or land the aircraft..... what difference will there be( in terms of the F/O handling ability) after sitting on the right seat for 5 years without any handling sectors?

you can't just learn handling by watching.

on rare occasions where the captain F*** up, will the FO notices it early enough? if the FO does notice the problem(no flare, short flare, long flare.., pilot incap at 50ft agl.. etc..etc..), does he know how to Take Over? even if he manages to perform a GA, can he bring the aircraft safely back on the ground?

Just to be clear I think it is a terrible idea. But the management line is you can save $X by putting cheap (effectively) pilot's assistants in the right hand seat. They can practice landing in the sim, which they have to do by law anyway. We will take the risk that they cannot manage an autoland in the rare case of incapacitation. The real risk of teaching them to land is eliminated (at least until they become captains).

This is very much going in the direction of O'Leary's desire for single pilot operation. Frankly if management thought they could automate us totally out of the cockpit, most of them would if it saved money. There are already plenty of SOs in big companies that are not allowed to handle the controls for landing (KLM long haul for example).

Isn't there a 90 day/3 take-off and landings rule to keep the rating valid on your licence? I can't imagine such a low cost outfit would put every F/O in the sim to give them their required landings.

Yes, that's correct. From the Indonesian CASR (part 121);

121.439 Pilot Qualification: Recent Experience

And where is the Chief Pilot/DFO in all this? Surely he/she has the cods to stand up and say no to this ridiculous idea?

Oh of course............he/she allowed P2F in the first place.

Methinks the regulator should be asking lots of hard questions here. Should, but probably won't.