This accident was of intense interest to me. I'd worked for Braniff for a number of years flying the South American routes. When Eastern bought them from Braniff we thought Eastern would hire Braniff pilots to fly the route, however Eastern's ALPA said "we don't need any Braniff pilots." Shortly after that Braniff went into bankruptcy and shut down. In the process of looking for a new job I wrote Frank Bormann (then president of Eastern) a letter proposing that since I was familiar with the routes his company should hire me to teach his pilots how to fly in South America, keep anyone from getting hurt, and learn the routes they could fly VFR. Bear in mind at this point Braniff had never lost an airplane in the Latin American Division. To my surprise he wrote back "good idea" and forwarded my thoughts to his VP in charge of the route startup. A week later I got a letter from said VP saying "no thanks, we have all the written notes we need from your ex-Chief Pilot." Within a year E

(Written on 10/06/2016)(Permalink)

Boeing will surely weigh in on this but I wonder if the PF engaged the autopilot during the missed approach (the article says both approaches were flown A/P off) and while the A/P tried to trim the horizontal stabilizer the PF disconnected same causing mis-trim confusion.

(Written on 15/04/2016)(Permalink)

Reminds me of a DC-8 simulator check ride I might have failed but for advance warning. The guy before me busted because he took off on a simulated runway when the vis. was below takeoff minimums. After airborne the fed failed an engine and when the checkee asked to go back to his departure point the fed advised him the field was below landing and takeoff mins. "just as it was when you took off." After that the check ride went downhill fast. Knowing what was coming I was able to refuse the takeoff for my check ride until the vis. came up... then asked for a takeoff alternate. In a simulator you really don't expect to see much so I can see how my predecessor got taken. All that said, just assume everything and everybody is trying to kill you (motto of we helicopter pilots) whether you're in the sim or real life.

(Written on 01/01/2016)(Permalink)

Although not directly related to your question about what to do I would like to weigh in on the 1500 hour rule. As stated that was because of the "inexperience" of the Colgan pilots in reacting incorrectly to a wing stall. I disagree with the NTSB finding and believe they reacted correctly to what they thought was a tail plane stall due to icing rather than what really happened which was a wing stall due to slow speed. I believe they reacted improperly because 1) they were tired, 2) they lacked cockpit discipline perhaps because of the airline's culture, and 3) the airline let a marginal pilot go on the line. Flight time had nothing to do with the errors made in my opinion.

(Written on 04/09/2015)(Permalink)

Since they didn't have an ILS to assist, I wonder if they loaded the runway end into VNAV. The accuracy is very close to that of ILS and in a visual situation does wonders for the descent rate.

(Written on 17/04/2015)(Permalink)

Sad to see this argument. As a pilot now retired for AA I used to fly into CCS and always enjoyed our layovers. This money problem with the V govt. reminds me of when, in a previous life, I flew for Braniff. The Argentine govt. wouldn't let Braniff take money out, so Braniff bought a huge amount of leather and made seats for our planes from it.

(Written on 25/06/2014)(Permalink)

Can you say "10 knot tailwind maximum. We're going to Rifle"? In our 135 operation we require either specific simulator training for Aspen, or an entry with an experienced Captain.

(Written on 14/01/2014)(Permalink)

Too true. I think growing up flying small planes and learning the aviation thought pattern through having to manually fly and navigate, plus the opportunity to scare yourself in small planes, is invaluable. I've heard that because of the military situation in Korea it's very difficult to do any private flying, thus it's possible the Asiana pilots never came up via that small plane route. There is a movement in the world to put people into the airline industry ab initio and teach them large aircraft/multi-crew methods from the start. I don't like that idea.

(Written on 06/01/2014)(Permalink)

Indeed, the auto pilot was off, however the crew didn't know it. On that plane bumping the wheel will disconnect the A/P and apparently that was what happened. The "A/P disconnected" warning was a muted affair in those days.

(Written on 05/01/2014)(Permalink)

It's come a long way since I worked a staff job in the People Express dispatch/systems control center. The automation is amazing. We probably had 22 people or so per shift and handled a fraction of the flights per person that the newer systems do. We piggy backed on the Continental flight planning system with a not-very-user-friendly backup system. The tertiary backup was to pull yesterdays flight plan out of the file.

(Written on 01/12/2013)(Permalink)