you did the right thing
 

Having flown the ERJ for several thousand hours i am fairly certain its not cold soak fuel that is causing the misting seen in your photo, it could be condensation or frost.

Some years ago i was travelling from ABZ on a BA Jetstream and due to a BA computer fault the flight was delayed by 2 hours it was early April clear sky and around 6pm, the crew had been on the aircraft with ducted air keeping them nice and warm, it was clear from my seat towards the rear that frost had formed on the wings, i wasn't sure if they were planning to be de-iced or not, anyway the door closed, so i showed the CC my ID and asked to speak to the Captain before he started the engines re a flight safety issue. I advised him of what i could see and he contacted the ground engineer who did finger tactile test on the wings and then told the Captain it would need to be de-iced!!

When i sat down the pax next to me enquired as to what had taken place and asked what i would have done if it hadn't been checked or de-iced, i told him i would have got off.

I have no problem with any passenger raising a safety concern, yes 9 times out of ten they will be wrong, but there have been cases where spolier pannel have detached in flight, at the end of the day its another pair of fresh eyes and not some that are half a sleep and seeing what they expect to see.

BBG

Yes, I can also see where he's coming from and I can understand that he resents a passenger asking a question of a pilot. I did take the steps to report it to the airline and yes there was an immediate response from the flight safety dept. The only reason that I reported it to the airline is that I genuinely believe it was frost & the pilot response to the CC (relayed to me) was to confirm it as frost but he chose to take off anyway. Why didn't he confirm it as condensation if that's what it was?

do the right thing
 

matblack i think youve found the crew on that flight :hmm:

inkjet with frost you get an more even spread over the wing. Cold soak does not affect the metal, meaning the spar and stringers across the chord. Looks like cold soak to me.

Just because things don't go wrong doesn't mean that everything was alright. Snobby passengers who know it all are not appreciated but a genuine question relating to a safety concern is always welcome. Any 'professional' not being able to deal with that is your true amateur.

new competition
 

ok here it is the one and only guess the contamination quiz for the oh so educated on this forum :ugh:

fingers on the buzzers and fastest finger gets nothing.

would you dispatch with this on your wing??

DSC00039 on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

here it is from seat 12A

DSC00037 on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

i'll let you know what it is after a few have had a go.

big hint......its the same stuf as in matblack...( i know more about flying/met/airlaw/performance than any pilot because i went to university and also read pprune)'s photo earlier on!

Well, if it's the same stuff as a PIC told a CC (and then told a pax) was frost, then on the assumption that he conducted a thorough inspection, as required, then logically it's frost.

Without even looking at the photos.

arrr but the pic never told the cc it was frost. . he (matblack) wanted to hear frost and got it. or so he thought. gotta love confirmation bias......maybe he tell us all about that too :}

The incident has been investigated by the airline concerned. I feel satisfied that I did the right thing in reporting it. No upgrades, just a letter thanking me for my report. Just as it should be. On a seperate note I was flying back from GOT a couple of days ago and noticed that the crew came and checked the wing for ice after we had been waiting for 20 minutes in freezing conditions for some transit passengers. Very reassuring. Different airline different airport to the previous incident. Same aircraft, similar weather.

good for the airline concerned......the crew were indeed interviewed and frankly you now look like a muppet. if you really were sure that was ice you would have ensured, like anyone who knows having ice in the wing is a bad thing, that the aircraft did not take-off......but wait you did'nt. Whist i wasn't a crew member concerned and close frend was. hence why i took the photos to how what condensation on the wing surface loks like. and they were taken at DUS at a sinilar time as your flight and having seen the atis for the time your flight left and ours did they are very nearly identical.....okay QNH 2 hpa higher and wind 5 knots more but still the same direction. and temp identcal.so there you have it matblack look and learn....no not frost......condensation. good for the GOT crew they were in freezing conditions and did a separate check. but then we are taking into account a passengers idea of freezing conditions. a nippy wind isn't freezing conditions. would you like to personally see the tech log each flight?.....make sure you are happy with all the ADD's

I've told my friend he should look into a lawsuit for deformation of character. as you did post it for all on pprune and its not difficult to see who flys the route and who has what equiptment on it. But then i freely admit i'm not a lawer and have'nt the slightest clue what i'm talking about. oh and being told you are under investigation by your airline....even if it is by a passenger getting the wrong end of the stick is a rather stressful time. thankfully now the airline knows both pilots did their job and met all safety requirements and they are free to carry on with their careers.

@ BUGS/BEARINGS/BOXES - I really hope I never get on a plane you're the pilot of - Frightening.

Edit - I am a lawyer (not a pilot) and it's defamation not deformation!

Sometimes nervous passengers see something they don't like the look of and come up with some utter garbage when they relay their concerns to crew.

As could be said of any of us in circumstances outside our competence.

Surely the main aim should be to encourage the cabin folk to pass on the concern, have it evaluated and then, most importantly, provide feedback to the passengers to allay the fears. Consider that, if one passenger saw whatever, others did also .. a PA is probably the best way to put it to bed.

I am reminded of an example years ago on a flight to a holiday destination. The majority of the passengers were first timers (this via cabin crew feedback along the way). At destination, the weather was probably going to require a diversion from the minima. As the workload during the latter part of cruise was low, I made a descriptive PA, including what would happen during a missed approach and what the folk would hear, etc. As it turned out we got in OK but there was a fair bit of positive feedback via the cabin crew in respect of passenger calmed nerves.

So BBB, now we know it was XXX.....

from your Flicker pics we can tell that you took the pics on a Sony Ericsson W910i at 1855 on 22/02/09 (Flickr: More detail about DSC00039).

Using ogimet (Formulario para peticion de mensajes aeronauticos) we can compare for ourselves the met at 1850z on the 12th and the 22nd:

SA 12/02/2009 18:50-> METAR EDDL 121850Z 29006KT CAVOK 01/M02 Q1020 NOSIG=

SA 22/02/2009 18:50-> METAR EDDL 221850Z 30007KT 9999 SCT011 BKN040 07/06 Q1021
NOSIG=

Well, well!

to quote BBB

"they were taken at XXX at a sinilar time as your flight and having seen the atis for the time your flight left and ours did they are very nearly identical.....okay QNH 2 hpa higher and wind 5 knots more but still the same direction. and temp identcal.so there you have it matblack look and learn....no not frost......condensation."

Anyone spot the significant difference? Temp on 12th 1 deg C, temp on 22nd 7 deg C. Frost not possible on the 22nd, frost quite likely on the 12th.....

You say you work for the same company that treated Mat with respect, yet you yourself show him no respect whatsoever. Your tone and lack of integrity are disgraceful.

Perhaps Mat could tell us the name of the carrier so that someone can figure out the relationship between Howflytrg, BBB and the crew involved. Anyone care to put any money on them all being the same chap/chappess?

Prefer no airline/airport identification, please .. not really necessary to the thread's progress - JT

delay
 

id rather depart late and have pax come up to me and tell me what their issue is than departing on time and missing something for whatever reason.
this 'we are all pros' bs is such a load of crap. every instance where pilot error was a factor was handled by 'pros'. calling yourself a pro in a serious context (ie not the bar) is just sad.
catch me if you can was a movie playing in the 60s. get real.

I personally feel as though this thread has run its course now. The original post in the Tech Forum was to ask a question about something I was concerned about. Following advice from this forum I then contacted the airline. At all stages on pprune I was very careful not to state the airline or the airport as I did not feel it was relevant as you can see in my posts. I also feel that the airline involved were very professional and prompt in their reply to me. I think its now time the moderator closed down this particular thread.

Well done MatBlack for having the courage to bring this up at the time and on here and to the airline. Please do the same if you ever have a doubt in future.

and as for BBB and his BBBBull about the weather. SHAME ON YOU!!