Intense read! What Really Happened Aboard Air France 447

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Reading this will stress you out. I can't believe these two pilots did this. I won't spoil it for you, just read it.

I'd like to hear Wayne's thoughts, since he's a pilot who has flown heavy metal on long hauls before.

http://forum.talknightlife.com/viewtopi ... ce#p135606

Captain picked a wrong time to take a nap..

These guys screwed-up, but they really had the deck stacked against them for a number of reasons...

1.) It was at night.

2.) The Relief Pilot was just coming off break and the first thing he noticed was that the Radar Scope was in the wrong mode, which made the thunderstorm activity look much less threatening that it actually was. This alone is a very distracting occurrence.

3.) Pilots that fly long-haul routes like these guys were doing get very little hands-on stick time and their basic flying skills suffer greatly over the years. The Relief Pilots often have to go back to recurrent simulator training due to not meeting the minimum number of take-offs and landings per 90-day period, which they HATE to do because it costs them 2 of their days off. In the U.S., allowing the aircraft to do an "AutoLand" allows all 3 (or for longer flights, 4 pilots) to get credit for a take-off & landing to meet the 3-in-90 requirement, but they get no actual stick time in the process.

4.) That model Airbus has a history of unreliable airspeed indication incidents. Note the entry "Then the sound of slipstream suddenly becomes louder." That's one of the most basic seat-of-the-pants indications that the aircraft's speed is increasing. The B-777 I flew would throw up an alert on the ICAS screen saying "Airspeed unreliable" to let you know that something was screwy with the Pitot system and you shouldn't rely completely on the airspeed indicator. Many airplanes still won't do that. So, when you couple the increasing slipstream noise AT NIGHT with no visual cues available, and the fact that a failing airspeed indicator will show a slowly INCREASING airspeed that looks completely reliable with no other indications of a problem, it's easy the see how the guy could misread the situation and think the aircraft was moving toward an overspeed, when actually it was headed for a stall.

5.) Stall Warning. What most people don't realize is that an airplane can stall because it's going too slow OR because it's going too fast. Those guys were apparently flying in the "coffin corner" where the margin between high-speed stall and low-speed stall is only 20kts or so. Airlines generally want you to fly as high as possible for fuel economy, but the downside is that any amount of turbulence will cause the aircraft to bust either the high-speed or low-speed stall buffet boundary. If the turbulence is bad enough, the aircraft will alternate between busting BOTH the high and low speed boundary every few seconds. That's why you NEVER want to be at your max altitude if you anticipate ANY bumps at all. Going to Tokyo I always made sure I was back in the cockpit early before the Relief guys made the final climb to 41,000 for this very reason. The margin for error gets progressively slimmer the higher you fly.

6.) There have actually been a number of "jet upsets" as the FAA refers to them, due to this very thing, but the pilots usually get control of the aircraft before the situation gets serious. Northwest had a similar problem as Air France going to Tokyo just last year in the same type aircraft, but they got the problem figured out before things got out of control.

The last actual crash I recall due to an unreliable airspeed indicator was Northwest Airlines Flight 6231 where crew was ferrying a B-727 with no passengers on board. They jumped in and didn't run the proper checklists, and missed turning on the Pitot Heat. They took off and had the same thing happen --the Airspeed Indicator was showing a slowly increasing airspeed, so they reduced power and pulled the nose up to keep the plane from overspeeding, so they thought. But, that was the exact opposite of what they should have done. Result was a big hole in the ground.

But the bottom line is, it was ruled pilot error, the insurance pays off, and everyone is happy.

Why wouldn't Airbus program that into their aircraft? If I was a pilot I would kind of like to know if my sensor systems were compromised...

Keep in mind that I don't know squat about that model Airbus and it may very well have the same warning on it just like the B-777, I just don't know. I flew an A300 for 7 years (and loved it), but the A330 is a completely different airplane.

Wouldn't manufacturers tend to keep elements common in their contemporary designs though? For example, I know an E430 Mercedes of the same model year (or close to it), despite having a bigger engine than my E320 and a slightly longer wheelbase, will have the same interface and features overall. And the little warning icons are the same for all Mercedes.

Or in computer terms, my Macbook has the same interface as Tech's Macbook Pro, despite different processors and hard drives, and so on. They're both Macs and the interface and warnings and so on are the same.

So, if you A300 lacked those warnings, wouldn't it stand that an A330 lacked them as well?

Too far back for me to remember now. Last time I flew an A300 was 1995. The older generation airplanes had lights to warn you if SWITCHES were in the wrong position, but I don't recall an "Airspeed Unreliable" airborne warning.

Something else I noticed though. The co-pilot asked the Relief guy about turning on the Anti-Ice System, so apparently it isn't automatic on the A330.

AF447 passed into clouds associated with a large system of thunderstorms, its speed sensors became iced over, and the autopilot disengaged...

and

"Let's go for the anti-icing system. It's better than nothing."

Because they are flying through clouds, the pilots turn on the anti-icing system to try to keep ice off the flight surfaces; ice reduces the plane's aerodynamic efficiency, weighs it down, and in extreme cases, can cause it to crash.

On the B-777 I flew, my airline literally bought every Boeing option available including an Ice Detector System which would automatically turn on the Wing Anti-Ice if it sensed any accumulation at all. And the Engine Anti-Ice was automatic on the 777 anyway, so we never moved the switches from the day the aircraft was picked up at the factory. Sometimes we'd find them in the "Off" position during preflight because the mechanics had be running some checks and left them in the wrong position, but that's it.

I guess much like in cars, some safety automations are optional.