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Slasher
#201
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by Slasher » Sat Mar 16, 2019 9:37 am
Alisoncc wrote: ↑Sat Mar 16, 2019 8:53 am
One suspects that Sully has the wrong end of the stick.
More likely to be 200 hours on type, not a total of 200 hours flying.
The FO would have needed at least 200 hours just to get a PPL far less a CPL surely.
Typical Septic assuming the rest of the world are stoopid, and just jumping in with limited knowledge.
Bear in mind it's American software engineers that have stuffed up, but since when have the facts had any relevance.
Might pay to google "MPL" - Multi Crew Licence (or Makeshift Pilot Licence as we in the airline industry more accurately know it as) and check out how much actual flying experience these monkeys have. Sullenberger is spot on the money.
Also don't write off what a highly experienced American pilot says just because you hate "Septics". There's enough of that crap in the Politics forum without dragging it in here.
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Alisoncc
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#202
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by Alisoncc » Sat Mar 16, 2019 9:38 am
As for Sully. Screed about the movie:
The story of Chesley Sullenberger, an American pilot who became a hero after landing his damaged plane on the Hudson River in order to save the flight's passengers and crew. (Tom Hanks, Aaron Eckhart, Laura Linney)
You mean he didn't get to save his own life too. One is only a hero risking one own's life to save others, when one's own life wouldn't be at risk if one did nothing. You get to be a hero when you have a choice. he didn't.
Just my observation.
Alison
Rev Mother Bene Gesserit.
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Fox3WheresMyBanana
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#203
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by Fox3WheresMyBanana » Sat Mar 16, 2019 11:49 am
In a short term temporal sense, yes; and I think I agree with what you are driving at. However, he took on the risk and responsibility when he started his career, and maintained that throughout it. Airline piloting is not accountancy. Is not every airline crew member risking their lives to potentially save others every time they get on the aircraft? Canada is very appreciative of everyone who does a risky job, whether or not circumstance requires them to exercise their skills and courage.
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Undried Plum
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#204
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by Undried Plum » Sat Mar 16, 2019 12:20 pm
Ethiopian trains its baby pilots to a very minimalist standard. Most of their training is in the sim. When they fly their first revenue sector they have only 70 hours of actual flying experience, almost all of which is day VMC. At 200 hours this guy was almost a veteran.
They are little more than checklist readers and FMS typists. The cockpit gradient is almost vertical.
Nowadays the average line pilot is little more than a button pusher. There are very few Eric Moodys or Sullenbergers or Gimli Glider pilots out there nowadays. Very very few of 'em fly a Cub for fun and most of 'em couldn't land, or even taxy, a taildragger anyway.
A nephew of mine aced his ATPLs and thinks he's a pilot. He trained on the Diamond Twinstar which is a computer with wings. I took him on a flight in a Baron and he was totally baffled by having six power levers to deal with. On 'his' aircraft the thrust levers are not mechanically connected to the engines. They are just an input parameter with an optical encoder which tells the engine management computers, on a scale of 0 to 100, what power setting is desired by the 'pilot'. He was severely puzzled and instantly overworked by the steam-gauge round dials.
I'm not a QFI, but I played that role by putting the kid into the left-hand seat of the Baron. I had to teach him simple stuff like how to set 25/25 on the levers and how to lean the engines. I took him into cloud and pulled the fuel on one engine while distracting him. Within five seconds he had the thing on its back. His way of dealing with the confusing indications on the round dials was simply to say "You have control".
He has a pilot's licence and he flies 737NGs for a living with a crappy European loco, but in my opinion he is not a pilot.
For me. the really scary thing is that the stickmonkey in the left-hand seat of his workplace is probably no better.
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Fox3WheresMyBanana
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#205
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by Fox3WheresMyBanana » Sat Mar 16, 2019 12:38 pm
The Gimli situation is an interesting one, as it was the co-pilot who suggested Gimli and worked the numbers, whilst the Captain, who was also a glider pilot, flew the airplane. Like Sully says, you need a whole crew to be good, not just the captain. I recall one Cat3 accident at Coningsby which I helped investigate, that was nearly a Cat5. The student navigator got lost in the cards and didn't provide the right advice to the pilot, though he was exonerated as the problems required the nav to look at 7 different cards, and his limitation of only having five available fingers was deemed not to be his fault...if only he'd been from Norfolk!
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ian16th
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#206
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by ian16th » Sat Mar 16, 2019 1:20 pm
Re the Gimli Glider.
At Istres circa 1957, when re-fuelling Beverley's, the a/c gauges were in pounds and known to be inaccurate, so we had to dip the tanks.
The dipsticks were calibrated in Imp Gallons.
The French bowsers that dispensed the Avgas, had gauges calibrated in Litres.
In those pre-calculator days, all calculations were literally 'back of a fag packet' ones.
We never had a Bev run out of Avgas.
Cynicism improves with age
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Fox3WheresMyBanana
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#207
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by Fox3WheresMyBanana » Sat Mar 16, 2019 1:27 pm
I recall my first stop at Sigonella, when the bowser driver turned up with a shiny new truck with a plethora of gauges and proudly said:
"How do you want your fuel; pounds, litres, US gallons or UK Gallons?"
"Kilograms"
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Undried Plum
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#208
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by Undried Plum » Sat Mar 16, 2019 1:50 pm
Funny thing is, Sullenberger's co-Joe was totally useless.
He did nothing other than bury his nose in the manual. All he had to do was press the Ditching button, but he didn't even do that. That button closes all apertures such as the pressurisation outflow valves. He played no really useful part in the proceedings.
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Pontius Navigator
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#209
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by Pontius Navigator » Sat Mar 16, 2019 1:59 pm
ian16th wrote: ↑Sat Mar 16, 2019 1:20 pm
Re the Gimli Glider.
At Istres circa 1957, when re-fuelling Beverley's, the a/c gauges were in pounds and known to be inaccurate, so we had to dip the tanks.
The dipsticks were calibrated in Imp Gallons.
The French bowsers that dispensed the Avgas, had gauges calibrated in Litres.
In those pre-calculator days, all calculations were literally 'back of a fag packet' ones.
We never had a Bev run out of Avgas.
In AFG my daughter was doing fuels. She had people coming in for kilos, pounds, gallons (both), litres and pints probably. Wrote a spreadsheet for her but Security wouldn't allow it to be installed as it might have a virus.
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Boac
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#210
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by Boac » Sat Mar 16, 2019 9:07 pm
Data from the cockpit voice recorder of crashed Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737MAX has been successfully downloaded by French BEA and returned to the Ethiopian investigation team
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Ex-Ascot
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#211
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by Ex-Ascot » Sun Mar 17, 2019 10:02 am
The wannabies here are the ones to hire. Eight hours a day hands on in the bush. Some of them have more manual landings under their belt than me. Most want to be airline pilots. They will not listen to me about what a ***** job it is.
'Yes, Madam, I am drunk, but in the morning I shall be sober and you will still be ugly.' Sir Winston Churchill.
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Slasher
#212
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by Slasher » Sun Mar 17, 2019 1:14 pm
Get them to talk to me
sah. They'll be terrified to even consider an airline job once
I'm finished with 'em.
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Alisoncc
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#213
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by Alisoncc » Sun Mar 17, 2019 3:18 pm
Ex-Ascot wrote: ↑Sun Mar 17, 2019 10:02 am
The wannabies here are the ones to hire. Eight hours a day hands on in the bush. Some of them have more manual landings under their belt than me. Most want to be airline pilots.
I was one of them once. Then discovered I could get immediate salary gratification from this new industry "computers", so jumped ship. Missed the aerieplanes but the significant extra money helped ease the pain.
Alison
Rev Mother Bene Gesserit.
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Ex-Ascot
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#215
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by Ex-Ascot » Mon Mar 18, 2019 6:33 am
21 bashes at using the thumb trim switches and still didn't take manual control until he had sea spray on the windscreen. I would have taken manual control turned it around and plonked it back on the tarmac.
Incredible that they didn't even mention the MCAS in the manual. Correction not incredible, criminal.
'Yes, Madam, I am drunk, but in the morning I shall be sober and you will still be ugly.' Sir Winston Churchill.
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Fox3WheresMyBanana
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#216
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by Fox3WheresMyBanana » Mon Mar 18, 2019 7:40 am
Thanks, Slasher.
Looks extremely damning. The main problem is classic case of managers ignoring the experts, to the extent of not even showing them the changes. I would expect now a raft of lower and a couple of senior managers to get fired, but in fact the problem is systemic. This can be seen in every industry now. Write a whole bunch of regulations to eliminate competition for the large companies, then don't police those regulations. If anyone working for the regulatory agency won't play ball, then reduce the regulatory budget so it can't be done properly, then either outsource the regulatory oversight and/or delegate it to the companies. In fact it isn't just business, it's the same in everything Governments do, like illegal immigration and enforcement thereof.
There is no justice.
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Boac
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#218
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by Boac » Mon Mar 18, 2019 11:45 am
still didn't take manual control until he had sea spray on the windscreen.
- I think that is incorrect - the whole point is that it was manual control that caused the accident. The system is not supposed to operate with A/P engaged.Turning it round and smacking it on the deck hero-fashion is the last action I would have taught with an unknown pitch control issue. Climbing to 5000ft was spot on. What happened
after that was the problem.
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ian16th
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#219
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by ian16th » Mon Mar 18, 2019 11:54 am
Reading the Seattle Times article about the FAA 'out sourcing' the certification to Boeing is close to horrific.
The a/c should be grounded until an uninterested party has done the job properly.
Isn't this the whole Idea of having the likes of the FAA and CAA?
Cynicism improves with age
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Fox3WheresMyBanana
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#220
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by Fox3WheresMyBanana » Mon Mar 18, 2019 12:09 pm
No, it's the whole idea to have regulatory authorities looking like they are doing something, not actually doing it.
For the big guys anyway, assuming their party contributions are up to date. The little guy they jump all over...unless it's somebody important's relative.
The system cannot fix itself, because the system is the problem. Everything about these two accidents is just symptoms. Boeing is just a symptom. The disease is corrupt and incompetent politics.