Hopefully the flight data recorders have the information in them and we will hear it sooner rather than later.
I can't help but wonder, as the casualty reports have now come in, how many of the serious injuries (at least 19) were caused or exacerbated by people taking the time to pull their hand luggage off the plane. Maybe none, but then again, I suppose it's hard to tell. Amazingly, I landed at SFO this morning without experiencing any delays. Others I know have not been so fortunate. It also seemed that our plane touched down well down the runway and there was greater use of reverse thrusters and brakes than usual. Perhaps that's just SOP for the alternate runway, but I couldn't help but think the pilot wanted to be sure not to fly through the G/S and end up short. You can run out of runway if you overdo it, of course, and maybe that accounts for the heavier braking/reverse thrust. Image Unavailable, Please Login
I think those are the first class passengers. They probably had some time and its not that crowded up there. Kai
It's a distant view, but video of the 777 crash has made its way to the web: Raw Video Fred Hayes Video of Asiana Flight 214 Crash on CNN - YouTube >8^) ER
Poorly, lol.... We'll wait, Really doesn't seem to be a lot to this accident though. The only thing I will speculate on is from my exp with SE Asian professionals, prolly about zero CRM. They tried to fix it once, but the culture just isn't there. Guessing the left seat was PF, and the right seat PNF just sat there, stone faced, maybe some feces dribbling down his leg as it happened....
Bob and others, I realize all you have to go by are pictures, but why did the top of the fuselage burn? Was it because the ground impact caused the top to buckle? I can't imagine that there are any fuel lines up there, but something happened.
We can only guess what caused the fire in the forward fuselage. My first thought was that the center wing tank was ruptured from the hard impact of the slap down and the fire actually started in the lower fuselage. You are correct, though, that there are no fuel lines in the upper fuselage. The only time there is anything carrying or transmitting fuel in the upper lobe is in a military tanker. I'm not the one to ask on this but Spasso works on the 777 and he has more current knowledge than I. When I quit work they were designing the support structure for the aft fuselage tanks and they were huge. This will all come out in the investigation.
That may have been started & precipitated by the electrical & wash lighting banks letting go upon the fuselage deforming during impact. Fracture those long lighting PCB's and you can end up with an electrical fire.
You know a while back I got into with a few guys here when I commented on the quality of pilots today. This crash is an example of what I was pointing out. The raw flying skills are gone from the commercial area. Best hope that they don't do this to you. Art
in some ways the reports of the crash describe a simple rookie flying error... some reports have the plane coming in with the nose increasing in height / angle... while in perspective and perception this seems to be correct thing to do... in reality it is the wrong thing to do... it slows the plane's forward motion and increases the rate of decent, leading to a stall they experienced... the proper procedure is to lower the nose to keep the speed up, increasing the distance traveled ( ground track ) in the same amount of time while lessening the rate of decent... they only needed a few extra feet forward ground track to avoid clipping the bulkhead... ultimately they did not have power available to call on to extend their flight to the runway... a second or two of good flight may have led to a landing vs the disaster happened
Exactly. Something most instructors teach their students BEFORE they sign them off to solo. These guys had ATP tickets. Bob: depends on when they figured it out. At 50 feet you are right, at 300 they had room. Art
My bet: Complacency, or no one knew who was flying the airplane. Complacency is the cancer of every profession. Before every turn to final, I physically say to myself: "Okay, *******, FOCUS. Do not shine your ass."
In the last video, even as far away as it was taken, that aircraft seemed to be awfully low. The narration mentions pulling the nose up, which was undoubtedly a last-second desperation move and what led to the stick-shaker activating. In the video, some part of the aircraft does appear to "cartwheel", which might explain the observers' use of the word. I wonder if the fire might have started with a landing gear puncturing the fuel tank, and the sudden deceleration might have sent some of that fuel forward. Based on the first photo in this thread, it took awhile for the fire to reach the roof of the cabin.
1) This could be possible. Electrical components of all types are really hot on these aircraft when in operation. 2) Another thought is fire caused by the oxygen generation canisters that are above every seat in the PSU's below the stowbins.. If activated the outer surface of the canisters get extremely hot (up to 500f) when they go off and after a crash would be in proximity to flammable materials that make up the bins. They also provide their own oxidizer to feed the flames. (Google Valuejet, flight 592, in this case they were in the cargo bay) - The alternative would be that this A/P was plumbed with gaseous oxygen in lieu of the canister system. Not that gaseous oxygen is any safer around open flame...I don't recall what system Asiana uses. 3) Fuel lines were ruptured on both sides of the airplane when the engines were torn off. Why there wasn't a pronounced explosion was simply astounding. The smoke plume was on the RH side of the A/P at first, in the vicinity of the RH engine. The fire could have come up through the floor and up the sidewall. (The blankets are fire RESISTANT, not FIREPROOF) 4) The fuel line to the APU in the tail (Auxiliary Power Unit) was ripped out with the aft cargo and 47 section. A witness mentioned a brief fireball at the back of the A/P upon impact. This may have been why. 5) The "black boxes" did not end up in the bay with the tail. They were in perfect shape in the ceiling above the aft galley, just aft of door #4 RH (forward of the pressure dome, which was still with the fuselage) Just a couple of observations...
Art, They descended below the glide path that takes them to 200' above the lights, and 50' above the threshold (the normal 3 to 1 ratio). Once below the "path" unless they had plenty of speed they need power. Nothing else is going to save them. They were 18 kts below Vref! Lowering the nose will only put them in the water or the cockpit with a direct hit into the rocks.
....seems to show a 'cartwheel' pretty clearly here.......pax looking even more lucky after seeing this....except for the one run over by an emergency vehicle.......how does that happen? And what about "signs of severe road-rash".....and pax "emerging from the water"? The water is a hella long ways from the stopping point..... The veteran "pilot in training" said to have <50 hours in type......I know we all have to start somewhere, but maybe without all those passengers till more hours flown? Image Unavailable, Please Login
More like half of one, if that. It raised up and rotated around one wing and settled. A "cartwheel" is a complete end-for-end rotation 360.
PF(left seat) was very low hours in the 777: Asiana says pilot of crashed plane was in training 43 hours in type it looks like. Another nail in the CRM coffin.
I didn't realize that the runway threshold had been relocated. Does this scenario in an AP story seem plausible? "The change in the runway line might have added an element of confusion to the landing, he said. All Boeing 777s, like most modern airliners, have cockpit computers that use GPS to create a glide slope for landing that is nearly as good as the ground-based ILS, said Bob Coffman, an American Airlines captain who formerly flew the 777. It would be standard procedure for pilots to create their own glide path before landing, but the computer's database relies on where the runway normally begins, he said. Moving the runway threshold would invalidate the computer-generated slope, he said. Without the ILS, and with information in hand that the threshold had been moved, it's likely that the pilots of the Asiana plane were landing using other instruments and a greater reliance on visual cues, Coffman said. It's standard procedure for pilots to refer to FAA notices on ILS shutdowns and movement of runway thresholds in a pre-landing briefing, so the Asiana pilots should have been aware that they were going to have to rely more heavily on visual cues, pilots said. The challenge of landing a wide-bodied airliner like the 777 using visual cues is greater than if an ILS or a computer-generated glide slope were available, pilots said. The Asiana plane was flying well below its target speed of 137 knots during the landing attempt, and in the last seconds before the crash the pilots received an automated warning that the plane was about to stall, Hersman told reporters at a briefing. Coffman said he could think of no reason why the plane would be flying that slowly unless the pilots had turned off the autopilot, which controls the aircraft's navigational systems, or the autothrottle, which controls power to the engines. That would be highly unusual, especially in a wide-bodied jet like the 777, he said."
Russ, in talking to airline pilots and others who are knowledgeable about the Asian culture and training techniques, I get the impression that a pilot is not one who has had ample hours of working their way up and earned a seat in something like a 777 by flying a lot of stuff without relying on automation. Also, the Asian pilot is a god and "you don't mess around with Kim." I feel that this pilot was not capable of seeing what was wrong with his visual approach because he had not done one. A clear day, calm winds, a good airplane, good power, and a straight in approach . How could you screw that up? Too high at the start of the glide slope, too low at the end, and engines at idle until 7.5 seconds before impact! Wasn't anyone yelling that airspeed was 109k and they were too low? Thee were signals going off and yellow lights flashing. Where was the pilot? I have flown in the jump seat on a couple of Boeing 720 production test flights in 1960. They were visual approaches to Boeing Field, clear day, light wind, and at that time no ILS. The atmosphere was intense as the pilot , Clayton Scott, concentrated on the target runway numbers, calling for power, asking for decreases in power as we scooted over the houses in Georgetown, north of the field. The landing was worked until the wheels stopped rolling. It was just another routine landing but I could see professionals working at their best. I was right seat on a flight of the old Boeing 247 with UAL pilot, Jack Leffler and on approach I was told to call out airspeed as he concentrated on " hitting the numbers", and that he did. I sort of joked with him about doing the full airline thing when we were only landing at 60MPH. Answer, " Sixty miles per hour can kill you as quick as 650 miles per hour and I had a target to hit at something less than 60." Again, it's training and attitude.
