AC Lining Up with a Taxiway SFO...?

[crazyaviator]

I am 110% in favour of a non- punitive investigative structure , it has LONG been known to increase aviation safety as compared to a 3rd world knee jerk reaction of finding blame and closing the books !!!!
What I am NOT in favour is having investigators going out of their way to find fault with everything and anything and not include the pilot as part of the problem! Another thing and I call bullshit on rockie, is that there have been MANY accidents in which the pilot has been found to be incompetent, a liar, an accident waiting to happen and the SYSTEM kept on pushing him or her through ( The unions have been proven to cover up these cases ) Perhaps you are a little too naïve to understand that every group has their own "old boys club" take a look at the cops and how they cover up another cops incompetence after a shooting etc !

[Cliff Jumper]

there have been MANY accidents in which the pilot has been found to be incompetent, a liar, an accident waiting to happen and the SYSTEM kept on pushing him or her through

Can you provide a few examples of this? where the report found the pilot to be a 'liar' or 'an accident waiting to happen', and the 'system' kept pushing him through?

I personally have never seen such a report. Doesn't mean it doesn't exist, just that I've never read one.

But, I'm eager to, once you provide the links.

[Rockie]

Since you know this for a fact you should have no problem proving your accusations crazyaviator. Let's hear it...

[55+]

I am 110% in favour of a non- punitive investigative structure , it has LONG been known to increase aviation safety as compared to a 3rd world knee jerk reaction of finding blame and closing the books !!!!
What I am NOT in favour is having investigators going out of their way to find fault with everything and anything and not include the pilot as part of the problem! Another thing and I call bullshit on rockie, is that there have been MANY accidents in which the pilot has been found to be incompetent, a liar, an accident waiting to happen and the SYSTEM kept on pushing him or her through ( The unions have been proven to cover up these cases ) Perhaps you are a little too naïve to understand that every group has their own "old boys club" take a look at the cops and how they cover up another cops incompetence after a shooting etc !

As one who had many dealings with TSB, I find the above quite startling, more to the point grossly misinformed with an appalling lack of knowledge let alone understanding of the processes. Seeing this kind of commentary as above is why I seldom view/post on this site.

[crazyaviator]

There are tens of thousands of cases where poor, lazy, incompetent employees in VARIOUS industries are kept on the job BECAUSE unions have gone to bat for them !! Aviation is NO different !!!

[Cliff Jumper]

Well, several words in that response were in ALL-CAPS, so I guess that proves his point.

Case closed.

[Cat Driver]

This accident seems to support crazy's thoughts I would say.

June 2010 THE CRASH OF A COLGAN Air regional twin turboprop at Buffalo, New York, in February 2009, in which 50 people died, received an unusual amount of media scrutiny, in part because of what the National Transportation Safety Board’s report revealed about the captain’s history of failed flight checks and about the seemingly bizarre lifestyle of the first officer, who lived in Seattle, commuted across the country for work, slept when and where she could and was paid a bit more than $15,000 a year for her pains. But news reports and even an hourlong Frontline documentary aired by PBS on Feb. 9 did nothing to explain how a professional pilot could have made the amateurish mistake that caused the crash.
By now we have grown accustomed to the banality of the causes of most accidents. Rather than highly technical failures of incomprehensible electronic or aerodynamic systems, many of them involve extremely basic errors of judgment or airmanship on the part of flight crews. The crashes of a Singapore Airlines 747 in 2000 and of a regional jet at Lexington, Kentucky, in 2006 were due to pilots trying to take off from the wrong runway, a blunder so fundamental and seemingly obvious that no technical means are in place to guard against it. The immediate cause of the Colgan Air 3407 crash was an error equally elementary. When the stick shaker warned of an impending stall, the captain did exactly the wrong thing: He pulled the control yoke back and kept holding it back all the way to the ground.

Fifty people would be alive today if he had been fired or demoted.

[Rockie]

This Colgan case of a pilot escaping training and checking scrutiny is an anomaly, not the norm. And certainly not the "thousands" of cases crazyaviator claims. The FO's unusual lifestyle also isn't that unusual. Junior people get based in places they have no choice over and couldn't possibly afford. Commuting in this business is completely normal for all kinds of reasons, ever see the pilot trailer slum beside 25L at LAX?

Still waiting for a shred of proof to your claims crazyaviator...

[7ECA]

And yet people keep overlooking the glaring issue with the Colgan crash - and what may very well be a contributing factor to this Air Canada incident... Fatigue!

Read the bloody CVR transcripts for the Colgan crash, especially all the parts where the crew was discussing their lives.

[rookiepilot]

And yet people keep overlooking the glaring issue with the Colgan crash - and what may very well be a contributing factor to this Air Canada incident... Fatigue!

Read the bloody CVR transcripts for the Colgan crash, especially all the parts where the crew was discussing their lives.

Really? How many checkrides did that Colgan captain fail?

If fatigue is the problem for someone, I suggest they stand down and refuse the flight.

[confusedalot]

I'm sure you guys could drum up 24 more pages...

Looks like the population is responding big time.

I am sooo confused, poor poor little me.

[Cat Driver]

If fatigue is the problem for someone, I suggest they stand down and refuse the flight.

That is just to logical a suggestion, you wouldn't want pilots refusing to take flights even though they are not physically fit would you?

They might lose their job working for that great company.

[Rockie]

Yeah, sounds simple doesn't it, why would anybody fly fatigued? I can think of plenty of reasons starting with we are sometimes lousy judges on whether or not we are fatigued. Judgement after all is one of the first things to go. Next is you felt fine at the beginning of the flight and didn't know you would get fatigued four hours later. Should we land at Vegas because we're starting to feel tired?

Fatigue recognition and management is a learned skill some of us are better at than others. Statements like "stand down if you're fatigued" are easy to spout, not so easy to do in practice.

[rookiepilot]

Yeah, sounds simple doesn't it, why would anybody fly fatigued? I can think of plenty of reasons starting with we are sometimes lousy judges on whether or not we are fatigued. Judgement after all is one of the first things to go. Next is you felt fine at the beginning of the flight and didn't know you would get fatigued four hours later. Should we land at Vegas because we're starting to feel tired?

Fatigue recognition and management is a learned skill some of us are better at than others. Statements like "stand down if you're fatigued" are easy to spout, not so easy to do in practice.

Unbelievable.......

You're a professional. ie. You are supposed to know this stuff, and ground yourself if physically incompetent. Not make excuses that communicate such a causal attitude towards risk.

Speechless.

[Cat Driver]

Pilot fatigue is more common than one may think.

Here is another example of pilots not understanding the basics of flight combined with fatigue.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... ealed.html

[crazyaviator]

There is an old saying that goes something like this : "Those that are not capable, competent AME s become management " but what if there are no positions for the AME in management or the incompetent pilot after a third failed test and co-pilots telling the chief pilot that he is incompetent? Without hard evidence like a big crash, what union is going to throw their card carrying, union dues paying "brother" under the bus ???

[Old fella]

Yeah, sounds simple doesn't it, why would anybody fly fatigued? I can think of plenty of reasons starting with we are sometimes lousy judges on whether or not we are fatigued. Judgement after all is one of the first things to go. Next is you felt fine at the beginning of the flight and didn't know you would get fatigued four hours later. Should we land at Vegas because we're starting to feel tired?

Fatigue recognition and management is a learned skill some of us are better at than others. Statements like "stand down if you're fatigued" are easy to spout, not so easy to do in practice.

Unbelievable.......

You're a professional. ie. You are supposed to know this stuff, and ground yourself if physically incompetent. Not make excuses that communicate such a causal attitude towards risk.

Speechless.

In my view there is an element of truth in Rockie's commentary. From my own experience covering Air Ambulance years back getting a call 2.00am in the morning to do a quick turn around short duration first trip was a lot more fatiguing than the end of a 14 hr duty day starting at 8.00am doing executive transportation. The 2.00 am trip was the start of my duty day and I couldn't plead fatigue if another trip came up a later in the duty time frame, simple as that. When covering Air Ambulance duties I took day time naps when covering night time operations. Aircraft utilized BE 100 and 200 with plenty of snow/wind/RDF especially at YYT with the winds. It was demanding flying.

Share your flying background with us Rookie, tell us what types, experiences aka Air Ambulance or on demand charter/executive, airline perhaps.What were your fatigue experiences in the course of your duties

[crazyaviator]

The . Sisto affair: Defending dangerous pilots

In October, 1947, American Airlines Captain Charles Sisto hitched a ride on an AAL DC-4 cockpit jumpseat, from Dallas to Los Angeles. For reasons beyond the comprehension of rational minds, he thought it would be a great joke to engage the controls gust lock, without telling the pilots. [1]


American Airlines DC-4


C-54 military version of the DC-4

Captain Jack Beck, who was flying that DC-4, began to gradually roll in more and more trim for the elevators, which seemed to be resisting the normal pilot inputs on the control wheel, required to maintain the assigned altitude.

Trimming, to relieve excessive pressure by the pilot on the controls, was accomplished by moving a small tab on the trailing edge of the elevators, which are panels hinged to the aft side of the horizontal stabilizer. When the trim tabs were moved upward, that in turn put downward pressure on the elevators. Downward pressure on the elevators would lift the tail of the airplane, and that in turn would lower the nose of the plane, causing it to descend.

However, with the gust lock on, the elevators did not respond to that input from the trim tabs. The trim tabs moved upward, as the trim control was changed by Captain Beck. That would have normally caused the elevators to move down, but because the controls were locked, they did not. As Captain Beck continued to roll in more and more elevator trim (moving that tab upward), it caused the plane to respond in the opposite manner, to which the pilot was commanding. As long as that gust lock was on, the trim tab being moved upwards would tend to make the plane climb. But with the gust lock off, the same action would tend to make the plane descend.

Additional trimming of that tab, while the gust lock was on, had the effect of winding a spring up tight, ready to suddenly release its pent up energy, whenever the gust lock might be moved back to the unlocked position.


Elevator up--plane nose up Elevator down--plane nose down


Trim tab moves up, elevator moves down


And, that is precisely what happened when Captain Sisto finally decided his prank had gone far enough: He moved the gust lock lever back to the unlocked position, without telling the pilots what he had done.

That DC-4 responded immediately by plunging towards the New Mexico desert floor.

Because neither Captain Beck or Captain Sisto had their seat belts on, they were slammed into the cockpit ceiling with the force of that sudden and unexpected maneuver. Their heads collided with three of the four engine propeller feather buttons. The result was that the plane was spared a full-power dive, which would have undoubtedly led to the loss of the plane and all souls on board.

Had they not lost 75 % of the engine power, as the plane entered the dive towards the desert floor, that plane would probably have come apart before hitting the ground.

Fortunately, Captain Logan (flying the First Officer position) did have his seat belt fastened securely in place. As the plane reached the inverted portion of the unplanned outside loop, only about 400 feet above the desert floor, he rolled it upright with the ailerons and managed to regain control until they could slow below the redline speed and limp to an emergency landing, which saved all 54 lives on board.

"The aircraft was placed under lock and key in a hanger at El Paso until a complete and thorough examination could be made by the Board's investigators. The day following the accident the crew made preliminary statements which indicated that there might have been some difficulty with the automatic pilot, which all three pilots stated had been engaged just prior to the maneuver previously described. For this reason tests were made of the automatic pilot which included its operation in this aircraft in actual flight. No evidence was found of any structural failure or mechanical malfunctioning of the automatic pilot or any other component of the aircraft.

Supplemental statements made by the three pilots on October 15, 1947, indicated that the automatic pilot was not engaged at any time during the flight but that Captain Sisto, sitting on the jump seat, engaged the gust lock while the aircraft was in level flight. Captains Beck and Logan further stated they were not aware of his action at the time. The aircraft started to climb and when rolling the elevator trim tab control nose-down did not return the plane to level flight, Captain Beck turned to Captain Sisto and asked, "Is the automatic pilot on?" Upon receiving a negative reply, he thought of the possibility of the gust lock having become engaged in flight and reached for the trim tab control to neutralize it. Before this could be accomplished, however, Sisto released the gust lock lever, and it being spring loaded permitted the gust lock to return to the unlocked position. The elevator was then free to be moved by the trim tab which had been placed in an extreme upward or airplane nose-down position. The sudden and violent movement of the elevator surfaces to a down position, upon release of the gust lock, caused the aircraft to pitch down violently as previously described."

The passengers and stewardesses (yes, that was the correct nomenclature, in those days......), who did not have their seat belts fastened, were also thrown up against the ceiling. Fortunately, their injuries were only minor.

Of course that ended the pilot career of Captain . Sisto----but only because American Airlines management and the CAB rejected the ludicrous defense of Sisto, by Dave Behncke, the President and founder of the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA).

Dave Behncke defended Sisto to the bitter end, by arguing that

"This incident could have been averted had the DC-4 been equipped with a properly designed gust lock system."

There you have it in a nutshell, what the original purpose of ALPA----the purpose which the founder of ALPA, Dave Behncke, saw as more important than all other considerations in the airline industry. More important than the safety of the trusting passengers who purchased their tickets with the full confidence and trust that the pilots would operate their plane with the highest of standards. Trusting passengers who believed their pilots had the kind of sound and rational judgment, which could fairly be expected of anyone who even aspired to be an airline pilot.

It was clear, from this and other bizarre behaviors of Dave Behncke, that ALPA was founded by a mental case who was incapable of discerning what was rationally and morally required of any person who would be hired to pilot airliners full of trusting passengers. Behncke only cared about power----the power to deny airline managements the right and ability to get rid of dangerous pilots.

Behncke set a horrible example with that case. Effectively, he told his ALPA member pilots that their jobs were more important than safety itself. He set the standard, that no matter how unprofessional or incompetent their conduct, they deserved the right to continue in their jobs. The safety of the flying public took a back seat to Behncke's agenda of preserving the jobs of dues-paying members of ALPA.

Behncke had been fired from Northwest Airlines, before being hired at United where he formed ALPA. He also was turned down by the Army, three different times, for the commission he so desperately sought. One could easily suspect that his dismissal from NWA and his failure to achieve the military career he wanted so badly, had an awful lot to do with the irrational driving force in his life.

Proving that all airline pilots deserved to hang on to their jobs, no matter how incompetent they might be, seemed to be the golden chalice for Behncke. Of course, that only applied to white pilots, since the racist Dave Behncke did not permit blacks to become ALPA members. I don't know if ALPA bylaws at that time also prohibited women, but it sure wouldn't surprise me if that was also the case.

Usually, those whose "thinking" arises from the swamp of bigotry and prejudice, also have a very strong bias against allowing women to compete with men----especially for the jobs which men deem the most desirable.

I pick on Dave Behncke, not only because he was founder of ALPA and its first deranged president for many years, but also because he set the tone of hatred and bigotry which is seen so often in the thinking of militant union members today.

To justify in one's own mind, the policies of hate, threats of violence and actual violence, which is a dominant tool of American unionism, one must rule out reason, fair play and the right of each individual to think thru the issues and comment on them and to make his own decision as he sees fit, without being attacked verbally or physically, for exercising that First Amendment right to free thinking, speaking and association.

In other words, to be a good union member today, one must justify in his own mind the hatred of groups which might undercut one's quest for monopoly control of the commodity of labor. That is why most union members favor the Davis-Bacon law, which was conceived in a racist time, for racist reasons, and which continues to harm minority groups in this country today.

If a union member is so devoid of rationality that he thinks it is right to hate all "scabs" (persons willing to give honest work to an employer, as well as ones who believe they have the right to negotiate individually with any prospective employers), simply because they amount to economic competition, then it is no stretch at all to equally hate those of a different race or gender, who also might be a competitive threat, in the minds of such bigots.

The idea that union members are entitled to their jobs, even when they refuse to work in them; the idea that union members should never be fired, no matter how incompetent they might be; the idea that it is proper to preach hatred against and use violence against any and all competing groups----those are the ideas which spring from minds filled with bigotry and fear, from minds which do not recognize that all have the equal right not to be attacked and assaulted, even if they are not a member of a particular tribe.

In short, I see no real difference between the fundamental mindset of a Dave Behncke, a Jeff Danziger, a Ted Rall, an Orval Faubus, or a George Wallace. They all start from a faulty premise that only those in their tribe have any right to rights. The entire concept of equal rights for all individuals, is entirely alien to their bigoted way of thinking.

They are opposed to the kinds of freedom and liberty which our Founding Fathers had in mind, as they wrote the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.

==================

[crazyaviator]

Which union group can you think of that behaves the same way as in the article above? Hint,,, they have guns and wear badges,,,,,,

[crazyaviator]

Since you know this for a fact you should have no problem proving your accusations crazyaviator. Let's hear it...

Do I need to find a dozen more?