pull back in response to stall warning?
 

It is looking like major pilot error in the Continental Crash in Buffalo

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g4lPW3fYLQUuKXRHOdPO5BfBQc_gD984VF0G0

Now I'm not a licensed pilot but I have flown a bit and have many hours in computer simulators. In any case of a stall warning it is appropriate to pull back on the stick?

Normally you'd push forward. To gather airspeed and correct attitude. That's what we were taught.

That's what I was taught too - nose down, increase power. They talk about retracting flaps potentially causing a secondary stall, but regardless of that I always though that nose down, throttle up was the automatic first response.

Another reason I avoid "Cap'n Biff & co-pilot Muffy" who are busy building time dreaming of doing something other than milk runs. Sorry, I don't trust young 'uns with less hours than me.

This is being discussed heatedly on the flightinfo.com message boards, regional section. Todd, you are correct, and I am alarmed at the total lack of basic airmanship demonstrated by this guy on so many levels.

Pretty damn scary how much incompetency was in that cockpit. One is playing the experienced pro, but in reality had to re-test repeatedly to fly and is now trying to lift a stalling airline. The other is screaming and having a hissy fit while compounding the problem with further deadly mistakes.

I don't fully blame these pilots. How could Continental allow them in the cabin together?

When a stall warning goes off, isn't the air speed indicator the first thing you would look at?

I'm not a pilot, but it sounds like the pilots simply were not familiar with the aircraft, and flew the plane so slowly that it began to stall, then had no idea what the planes stall warning was telling them, THEN did exactly the wrong thing in reaction to the situation. They crashed a perfectly functional plane.

This pilot was from the Tampa area so it's getting a lot of press here. The media covered his memorial service and all the nice things were said, ie., loved to fly, loved his job, etc, etc.

Now the rest of the story...

How do you blame a pilot if he is not trained properly by the company he works for?

Yep, heavy stall training and actual spin entry was in the training regime years ago(that's how old I am). Once you do that deal, you definitely remember how to recover from a stall. The way I was trained was point the nose up, then add power to make it an accelerated stall(even more violent reaction) then the instructor kicks the rudder pedal right or left. The immediate outcome was stall horn bleating, all hell breaks loose and the nose up becomes instantly wing over and pointing about 60 degrees down and rotating quickly around a point on the ground! You are now facing down to the ground and accelerating toward the earth like a brick in a free fall, with no forward airspeed. What next? Cut the power, relax backpressure on the stick and recover from the dive(quickly, but not too quickly or you will break the tail off!). It is easy to lose 2000' in a few seconds. This is why a stall near the ground (like during landing) is normally fatal in all instances.
The fact that the airplane had a stick shaker pushing the nose over in this story and the pilot fought against it. leading to the crash, is simply astounding to me. How could he have had that reaction? He was 5 miles out and at least 4000' above the ground, so he had plenty of room to recover from the stall!
I was a flight instructor for many years and we continued to teach this manuever(accelerated stall to a half turn spin) well after the FAA said we didn't need to (too many students were killed learning it, along with engine out manuevers on light twins), but we always figured if you started the maneuver high enough(say 5000' above ground level) you could always recover. Believe me, our students knew what to do in a spin or stall entry!! Power off, neutralize rudder (or a little opposite rudder, depending on the aircraft type)! Nose over!! Recover!! We even did this with the hood on, simulating instrument conditions. We only did half spins because some aircraft like to spin and will resist recovery, as in a "flat spin" Once the rotation starts, a certain inertia can set up in some aircraft and make recovery impossible.
How could Colgan have turned this crew loose without this experience? To Buffalo??
I spent my entire flying career in the northeast US and Canada and there is normally icing in the winter. No big deal, just training and knowledge and how to react to the situation.

Fingpilot and I had a small misunderstanding talking about that crash. He was gracious enough to apologize, but what struck me the most was what he had to say about the accident (link)

Sounds like the captain shouldn't have been flying.

Neil

That's certainly what you do in every flight simulator i've ever played. Drop the nose for airspeed to increase airflow over the wings.

Pulling back would only exacerbate the situation...afaik.

Of course, i'm not a pilot.

those poor passengers. besides being eaten by a shark, this is my worst nightmare

You airline pilots, do you think the economic struggles of the airline industry, or other factors, are resulting in more poorly trained, inexperienced, tired, or otherwise less capable flight crews flying commercial flights? Or do you think the quality of the typical commercial pilot is the same as it was 10, 20, 30 years ago?

Simply unbelievable that the airline allowed this to happen. How does someone become a commercial rated pilot without knowing how to recover from a stall?!

I'm no airline pilot, but I know there is a huge amount of demand out there for pilots. Quite simply, there's more pilots retiring than there are joining the field. That demand may be putting pilots in the cockpit a bit too soon, which is disturbing.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. It's a heated discussion between unions and management, and my bloodpressure goes up, just thinking about it.

As for the stall...he overrode the stickpusher. Period.

However, not all stalls require you to push the stick forward, ie: tailplane icing. In a tailplane icing situation, you'd actually pull back on the yoke. NASA's done studies on this, and I believe it was mentioned in the previous thread.


I hate to see the loss of life in this accident. As a Check Airman though, this is the kind of stuff that gets my skin crawl. When I bust somebody out of a PC, I know it's for the best. This guy had failed 5 checkrides. Some people should just not be pilots....

Last year, our airline was so famished for pilots that we were taking 250 hour wonders that went from Zero-to-Hero in 120 days. 250 hour pilots flying 76 seat metal tubes at Mach .78 at FL390. I'm not saying that a 250 hour pilot can't be good (for example...guys that go through military training.) But the average 250 hour pilot is nowhere ready to fly pax. I busted guys left and right during their initial training, not because I wanted to be a jerk, but just because I wanted to prevent a smoking hole.

This has calmed WAY down since last summer. With the bump up to age 65, and the economy, it's really slowed. When we start hiring again, our mins will go up to easily 2500-3000 hours.

A lot less time required for the regionals and airlines. Fresh flight school grads are finding right seat jobs under 500 hours total time. The more modern planes are doing more work the pilots less work. Basic airman ship is suffering very badly with the new generation pilots. In the 80's we would stall every thing we flew on empty legs just to see how the airplane would react. The plane would give you tell tail signs of what was going to happen. ( Like steering feed back on the 911 right before it swaps ends) These sensations never felt like the airplane in the simulator IMO. I have been gone along time from professional flying, however I think this type of training is key to preventing these type of accidents.

I may get flamed but spin training should be mandatory for the private licensee.

It's like ABS and stability control in the cars, your missing something. I want to know the full range of the machine.

Ah yes, fond training memories of hanging on the prop of a 152 honking the horn as long as possible before pushing over.

This should cost the airline dearly, like $100 million in fines and restitution.

I had a engineering colleague who was an enthusiastic private pilot but he was blind in one eye - he had the depth perception of a fish. He's now flying for Southwest.:eek:

educate me about turboprops. In this animation there is a power and condition indicator. Is the condition the blade pitch?

Were they flying along, an alarm went off, and the auto pilot kicked off? Is the auto pilot coupled to the localizer?

http://www.ntsb.gov/events/2009/buffalo-ny/animationdescription.htm