What Really Happened Aboard Air France 447

[URY914]

Our pilots need to read this one. Sorry if it is a repost,

Two years after the Airbus 330 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean, Air France 447's flight-data recorders finally turned up. The revelations from the pilot transcript paint a surprising picture of chaos in the cockpit, and confusion between the pilots that led to the crash.


Read more: Air France 447 Flight-Data Recorder Transcript - What Really Happened Aboard Air France 447 - Popular Mechanics

Air France 447 Flight-Data Recorder Transcript - What Really Happened Aboard Air France 447 - Popular Mechanics

[ramonesfreak]

that was a chilling read just before bed time. man i hate to fly. that situation sounded similar to the buffalo crash

damn that Bonin!

[Jrboulder]

WOW!! WTF??

That's the biggest fail EVER.

I always hated Airbusses but now "If it ain"t Boeing I ain't going"

Hmm, we're in a stall and we got a vertical descent of 10,000 fpm. What to do? Pull back of course!



Jackson

[chocolatelab]

its really erie reading their conversation. I'm not even sure what to think.....

[HardDrive]

Damn. That is sickening to read. Why the hell did the guy pull back the whole time? The guys altimeter was working. How could he not see the rapid rate of accent?

They barely seem to know how to fly a god damn airplane.

[Joeaksa]

Guys, I have bad news.

The pilots from WW2 are for the most part gone and the pilots they taught are about to retire. This means that the pilots currently in the air right now are in many ways like the above.

They learned how to fly on an airplane that was more of a computer game than a real airplane and once things get difficult up front the computer takes over and they are sunk. My issue with Airbus aircraft is that in many ways there simply is no way to disconnect all the electronic crap and "fly the jet."

Airbus feels that the pilots are stupid and that the computer needs to have the last say in controlling the airplane. Boeing on the other hand feels that the pilots know what they are doing and give them ultimate control over everything.

IMHO had this been a Boeing aircraft this would never have happened. Sure, probes ice up on any airplane but in the Boeing you can over-ride the computer systems and fly your way out of a difficult situation.

Joe A
(PS, I am biased having been a factory pilot for Boeing, McDonnell Douglas and Bombardier)

EDIT

Look also at the crash in Buffalo a couple of years ago. When the bird is stalling the last thing you do is pull back on the controls. Guess what the Captain did? The airlines are forcing pilots to stop hand flying the airplanes, instead relying on the autopilot for everything. They are trained not to hand fly! Now in many cases when an emergency occurs they have to kick the autopilot off and hand fly, something that they are not used to. There will be more and more accidents like this until they are sued for not letting the pilots do something that they need to do, fly the airplane by hand!

[Scuba Steve]

Originally Posted by Joeaksa

IMHO had this been a Boeing aircraft this would never have happened. Sure, probes ice up on any airplane but in the Boeing you can over-ride the computer systems and fly your way out of a difficult situation.

Both guys up front would've at least known where the stick was because it would've physically been back. It sounds like that would've helped tremendously in that situation.

[widgeon13]

This from another article, they (crew) didn't follow the correct procedure:

The proper thing for Bonin to have done would have been to keep the plane flying level and to have Robert refer to a relevant checklist to sort out their airspeed problems. Instead, neither man consulted a checklist and Bonin pulled back on the controls, causing the airplane to climb and lose airspeed. Soon, he had put the plane into an aerodynamic stall, which means that the wings had lost their ability to generate lift. Even with engines at full power, the Airbus began to plummet toward the ocean.

As the severity of their predicament became more and more apparent, the pilots were unable to reason through the cause of their situation. Despite numerous boldfaced clues to the nature of their problem -- including a stall-warning alarm that blared 75 times -- they were simply baffled. As Robert put it, after the captain had hurried back to the cockpit, "We've totally lost control of the plane. We don't understand at all... We've tried everything."

and this from a pilot friend:

Not mentioned here but something I've previously pointed out is that whoever is first on the Airbus control stick is the one who is the sole controller. The AF copilot would have no way to counteract the input from the IRO. He could have inputs only if the IRO had released the control stick at which point the copilot would have sole control should he make inputs. If both try to make inputs at the same time, an arrow in front of the pilot with the ineffective control stick lights up to show that the other pilot is in control.
Some system.

I agree with Joe. The pilots still need to fly the plane and rely less on electronics. These things are not just negatively effecting commercial aviation safety, this kind of benign neglect is happening to general aviation as well.

[Joeaksa]

My heartburn with Airbus is that if the pilot pulls the stick back but the computers feel that its wrong, they will over-ride the pilots input and push the controls forward. This is NOT correct as the pilots are there in person and can see/feel more than a bloody computer ever could yet Airbus continues on this "law" of theirs.

[john70t]

Drop flaps, stick forward, reverse rudder until flight airspeed regained.

Two words:glider training.

[air-cool-me]

Please be careful painting all pilots of this generation with a broad brush. Also remember airline pilots and their competency is a result of a flawed hiring and training model. The current generation of pilots isn't any less talented, just skills and training have focused on higher concepts then basic stick and rudder. (a mistake IMHO)

The problem is created in the training department..

[on2wheels52]

I thought that after the line "We don't understand at all... We've tried everything." would have been a good time for the captain to take a seat.
Jim

[recycled sixtie]

from the Airbus 320 pilots I know is that u can disconnect the autopilot and fly it like a manual aircraft. Just like the heroes who landed on the Hudson. Any 320 pilots to back this belief up? Aircraft accidents are particularly complex to diagnose especially with modern day computer systems. Cockpit resource management is a must as input from both pilots(or 3) becomes very necessary and quickly as things can get out of hand quickly in order to prevent an accident.

[rfloz]

A sad, sad case of 'The Wrong Stuff'.

If my son, daughter-in-law and grand-daughter didn't live in Singapore, I would never board another aircraft.

[patssle]

That entire read was a massive face-palm. I'm not a pilot and even common sense knows what they were doing was wrong. Jeeze.

[URY914]

And in the end, after hours and hours of training and actual flying hours of the crew the least experienced and least capable pilot was allowed to fly the plane into the ocean.

[J P Stein]

One very salient point here is the control "stick" (or what ever they call it now) doesn't move or moves very little, nor are they cross-connected side to side....none of this stick in the belly to climb nonsense. It senses the force applied and the computer responds by moving the control surfaces. The non-mobile stick was tried on the first electric jet (F-16) and discarded....the pilots demanded it be changed to a movable "stick".......and no one could look over their shoulders. I suppose one could interpret a pilot's white knuckles to see WTF he was doing. Scarebus will never admit this flaw in their system....they have studies to prove it's the way to go. I have no idea what Boeing is doing on their latest model, but I inspected many a control wheel/column on 777s.

This sad article reminds me of politicians who keep doing what doesn't work as the whole of the country crashes. The problem is obvious to a viewer from the outside looking in.

For a much more in depth discussion of the article check: PPRuNe Forums - Professional Pilots Rumour Network
Of course, some attack the messenger.

[futuresoptions]

Wow, just wow...

[URY914]

Maybe the "STALL" warning should also scream..."STALL, STALL, STALL, DON'T PULL BACK ON THE STICK, STALL, STALL, STALL, DON'T.....

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by recycled sixtie

from the Airbus 320 pilots I know is that u can disconnect the autopilot and fly it like a manual aircraft. Just like the heroes who landed on the Hudson. Any 320 pilots to back this belief up? Aircraft accidents are particularly complex to diagnose especially with modern day computer systems. Cockpit resource management is a must as input from both pilots(or 3) becomes very necessary and quickly as things can get out of hand quickly in order to prevent an accident.

Good friend of mine is an Airbus 330 training captain. He told me that to disconnect the A/P, to really get it out of his hair and be able to totally control the airplane, it would take at least 2 minutes of pulling circuit breakers WITH a checklist as a guide.

With the airplane I have flown for the last almost 20 years, its depressing ONE red button... but this is the difference between the mindset.