Germanwings A320 crashed in France :(
Discussion
LittleEnus said:
Ok no more on this. If I offended you I'm sorry. Let's be friends ok? But my point does stand, we will agree to disagree.
Back on topic. Why do the press keep saying the passengers would have had no idea until the last moments? Surely this is to try and make people feel better? I would imagine that it was 8 mins of absolute terror on board that stricken jet.
Still can't quite get over it.
My understanding is the co-pilot began the 8-minute descent pretty much as soon as the pilot left the cockpit. So take away two minutes for the pilot to do his business and another minute for the pilot to knock on the door in the normal way before he starts thinking that something is drastically wrong. Then probably another minute or so while the pilot gets more agitated and animated. At this point you’re left with three or four minutes. Back on topic. Why do the press keep saying the passengers would have had no idea until the last moments? Surely this is to try and make people feel better? I would imagine that it was 8 mins of absolute terror on board that stricken jet.
Still can't quite get over it.
I doubt that the passengers knew what was going on for as long as eight minutes. Either way, it’s pretty horrible.
A few years ago my eldest brother was killed in a motorcycle accident. It takes a long time to get out of your head the thoughts about what he went through in his final moments even though the evidence suggests that he died almost instantly.
RIP to all those on board.
Moonhawk said:
Indeed. Like I said - no ideal solution.
I'd think the ideal solution is a redesign of planes so that the flight crew don't need to be behind a locked door at any point. Give them their own loo, own galley, and own sleeping area for the 3rd pilot if it's a long haul type plane.Have a fixed "hatch" that's only for emergency access to the passenger area, should the pilot need access to investigate issues with the plane. The Pilot leaving takes that with them so they/cabin crew can get in should the need arise. Chances of an issue that needs a Pilot to look at it, which can't be done using description or video taken by trained cabin crew, AND a terrorist awaiting their opportunity to rush the flight deck at the same time, have got to be really slim.
Munter said:
I'd think the ideal solution is a redesign of planes so that the flight crew don't need to be behind a locked door at any point. Give them their own loo, own galley, and own sleeping area for the 3rd pilot if it's a long haul type plane.
Perhaps - but it's not an easy solution to retrofit into current aircraft. We could be 20 years away from such a solution becoming mainstream.nyxster said:
Few people would argue that members of the SAS aren't some of the most mentally resilient individuals on the planet, they have to be to pass Selection. Yet suicide rates amongst former SAS guys is appallingly high.
If you take someone who is completely mentally fit and apply enough stress to them, many will break. Pilots and ATC staff are known to suffer from depression caused by work place stress.
It's not just about the stress of flying the plane. The rush to get to the airport on time, pressure to make up delays caused by tech issues or congestion, the constant threat of terrorism. Irregular shift patterns, night work, effects of timezone changes, vitamin b deficiencies from extended night flying. Irregular meal times.
I spent several months doing long haul travel and it was enough to trigger depressive bouts. modern air travel is stressful. And the constant turn and burn of low cost short haul is even worse.
Throw in a relationship break up, death of a family member, personal debt problems or insecurity over job prospects in a competitive industry and you are looking at the trigger conditions for a mental/nervous breakdown.
This isn't the first case; the investigation into the jet blue pilot who went berserk mid flight highlighted how much stress low cost carrier pilots are put under.
The correct course of action isn't to lock them up as CG suggested, its to accept this could happen to anyone of them and put in place proper support services like monitoring, counselling and mental wellbeing clinics to ensure they don't feel the need to hide it for fear of losing their jobs.
The very attitudes displayed here by the alpha male sorts suggesting mental breakdown is something to be dealt with like a crime, no doubt contributes to a culture where men feel unable to seek professional help.
Clearly if the airline was aware he was suffering long term issues, then there has been a clear failure in duty of care to him and the passengers to put him in a position where he can do harm. He should have been confined to ground duties and no doubt hard questions need to be asked by all airlines of what they can do to manage the risk. A simple call to his bosses from the fiance suggesting all wasn't well might have prevented this.
I don’t want to trivialise this but even James Bonds suffers mental exhaustion and stress in Skyfall. He lost the plot and although complete fiction the character of Bond is that of a fit, mentally stable man who has composure and clarity under extreme pressure but he loses it.If you take someone who is completely mentally fit and apply enough stress to them, many will break. Pilots and ATC staff are known to suffer from depression caused by work place stress.
It's not just about the stress of flying the plane. The rush to get to the airport on time, pressure to make up delays caused by tech issues or congestion, the constant threat of terrorism. Irregular shift patterns, night work, effects of timezone changes, vitamin b deficiencies from extended night flying. Irregular meal times.
I spent several months doing long haul travel and it was enough to trigger depressive bouts. modern air travel is stressful. And the constant turn and burn of low cost short haul is even worse.
Throw in a relationship break up, death of a family member, personal debt problems or insecurity over job prospects in a competitive industry and you are looking at the trigger conditions for a mental/nervous breakdown.
This isn't the first case; the investigation into the jet blue pilot who went berserk mid flight highlighted how much stress low cost carrier pilots are put under.
The correct course of action isn't to lock them up as CG suggested, its to accept this could happen to anyone of them and put in place proper support services like monitoring, counselling and mental wellbeing clinics to ensure they don't feel the need to hide it for fear of losing their jobs.
The very attitudes displayed here by the alpha male sorts suggesting mental breakdown is something to be dealt with like a crime, no doubt contributes to a culture where men feel unable to seek professional help.
Clearly if the airline was aware he was suffering long term issues, then there has been a clear failure in duty of care to him and the passengers to put him in a position where he can do harm. He should have been confined to ground duties and no doubt hard questions need to be asked by all airlines of what they can do to manage the risk. A simple call to his bosses from the fiance suggesting all wasn't well might have prevented this.
We as humans are all fallible but most of us have de-stress activities. We fondle our cars, we do sport or we don’t, we play video games, hang out with the kids, get drunk or drink tea, read a book watch a movie, what most of us don’t do is hurt others.
The co-pilot who may or may not have been suffering performed a most selfish act, cowardly and horrid, mentally ill or not, he was a t
t.SilverSixer said:
Someone else said it already. Pissbottles. Pilot/co-pilot not to leave cockpit.
The Captain's job is to have overall responsibility for the aircraft - not just to manage what happens in the cockpit.There are numerous exceptional circumstances where the Captain or FO might be called on to inspect/deal with a situation outside the cockpit that couldn't be dealt with by the cabon crew.
Moonhawk said:
Munter said:
I'd think the ideal solution is a redesign of planes so that the flight crew don't need to be behind a locked door at any point. Give them their own loo, own galley, and own sleeping area for the 3rd pilot if it's a long haul type plane.
Perhaps - but it's not an easy solution to retrofit into current aircraft. We could be 20 years away from such a solution becoming mainstream.We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
Munter said:
Well yes. But if we'd made the call after 9/11 we'd be looking at something ~6 years away based on your time estimate.
We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
What do you do with the fleet in service? New aircraft just delivered with their 20+ year lifespan?We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
2 yrs to redesign (at least) if it was structural changes. Certification, testing, etc. Call it 5 years before the first delivery as the production lines have commitments. So at least 30 years before all the European fleets were changed.
Munter said:
Moonhawk said:
Munter said:
I'd think the ideal solution is a redesign of planes so that the flight crew don't need to be behind a locked door at any point. Give them their own loo, own galley, and own sleeping area for the 3rd pilot if it's a long haul type plane.
Perhaps - but it's not an easy solution to retrofit into current aircraft. We could be 20 years away from such a solution becoming mainstream.We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
Munter said:
Well yes. But if we'd made the call after 9/11 we'd be looking at something ~6 years away based on your time estimate.
We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
Right but this crash isn't about locks or design of cockpit doors, it's all about mental health. We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
nyxster said:
Few people would argue that members of the SAS aren't some of the most mentally resilient individuals on the planet, they have to be to pass Selection. Yet suicide rates amongst former SAS guys is appallingly high.
Mostly attributed to being made to sh!t into carrier bags in the workplace? Joking apart, I see (and agree) the point you're making, but I don't think the two professions are in any way comparable in terms of stress levels.
One would imagine that SAS veterans see a lot more issues likely to cause PTSD etc than the average 28yo FO doing city hops.
Averages being a figure of speech of course - none of us is 'average'
Vaud said:
Munter said:
Well yes. But if we'd made the call after 9/11 we'd be looking at something ~6 years away based on your time estimate.
We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
What do you do with the fleet in service? New aircraft just delivered with their 20+ year lifespan?We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
2 yrs to redesign (at least) if it was structural changes. Certification, testing, etc. Call it 5 years before the first delivery as the production lines have commitments. So at least 30 years before all the European fleets were changed.
ABS in new cars is now mandatory. We don't insist it's retrofitted to every car.
Edited by Munter on Friday 27th March 11:08
el stovey said:
Right but this crash isn't about locks or design of cockpit doors, it's all about mental health.
I guess whatever measures are put in place have to be commensurate with the risk. This event is a tragedy to be sure - but what is the risk of this occurring again?How many commercial passenger aircraft have been crashed intentionally by a pilot or co-pilot?
The only thing I've ever flown is a kite. That's not aviation slang for something, just a childs toy.
Now that I've flagged the ignorance that follows, I shall begin....
Is it not possible to fit a GPS, Altimeter, and some control software that prevent a plane crashing into the ground by having the autopilot override the controls?
"Sorry Dave, I can't let you fly any lower, there's a mountain in the way."
I get that while planes only usually land at specific places, emergency landings are required from time to time so some team based override should be possible. Or the program would relinquish control once it could no longer make height.
Feasible or just dumb?
Now that I've flagged the ignorance that follows, I shall begin....
Is it not possible to fit a GPS, Altimeter, and some control software that prevent a plane crashing into the ground by having the autopilot override the controls?
"Sorry Dave, I can't let you fly any lower, there's a mountain in the way."
I get that while planes only usually land at specific places, emergency landings are required from time to time so some team based override should be possible. Or the program would relinquish control once it could no longer make height.
Feasible or just dumb?
Timmy40 said:
Munter said:
Moonhawk said:
Munter said:
I'd think the ideal solution is a redesign of planes so that the flight crew don't need to be behind a locked door at any point. Give them their own loo, own galley, and own sleeping area for the 3rd pilot if it's a long haul type plane.
Perhaps - but it's not an easy solution to retrofit into current aircraft. We could be 20 years away from such a solution becoming mainstream.We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
The current design is fine for the thousands of flights a day where the pilot takes a comfort break and the cockpit isn't stormed by terrorists/locked out by a single rogue pilot.
LucreLout said:
The only thing I've ever flown is a kite. That's not aviation slang for something, just a childs toy.
Now that I've flagged the ignorance that follows, I shall begin....
Is it not possible to fit a GPS, Altimeter, and some control software that prevent a plane crashing into the ground by having the autopilot override the controls?
"Sorry Dave, I can't let you fly any lower, there's a mountain in the way."
This is called flight envelope protection, and exists to some extent, but then if you had unpleasant intentions, you would just sabotage the flight in some other way. Then you might say, well the computers could be designed to prevent that too, which is all well & good until a plane crashes primarily because it ignores a human intervention that might have saved the day.Now that I've flagged the ignorance that follows, I shall begin....
Is it not possible to fit a GPS, Altimeter, and some control software that prevent a plane crashing into the ground by having the autopilot override the controls?
"Sorry Dave, I can't let you fly any lower, there's a mountain in the way."
Mandatory group input is out too - plenty of genuine emergencies when one of the crew was incapacitated.
There is no way out. You're always going to have problems, it's just about reducing them to the lowest probability.
el stovey said:
Munter said:
Well yes. But if we'd made the call after 9/11 we'd be looking at something ~6 years away based on your time estimate.
We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
Right but this crash isn't about locks or design of cockpit doors, it's all about mental health. We took what was shown to be a bad design and tweeked it. Rather than starting from scratch and having fundamentally better design.
Moonhawk said:
el stovey said:
Right but this crash isn't about locks or design of cockpit doors, it's all about mental health.
I guess whatever measures are put in place have to be commensurate with the risk. This event is a tragedy to be sure - but what is the risk of this occurring again?How many commercial passenger aircraft have been crashed intentionally by a pilot or co-pilot?
As tragic as this is, what were the chances of this happening or indeed ever happening again. This must be the first situation of it's kind in European airspace. How many flights are there every day, month, year or decade?
Any reaction will be a kneejerk reaction to just appease the masses.
Many on PH have bemoaned the 'kneejerk' reaction of the government banning pistols because one individual, with a firearms licence, fell through the safety nets in place and killed loads of little kids in a school in Scotland
Any reaction will be a kneejerk reaction to just appease the masses.
Many on PH have bemoaned the 'kneejerk' reaction of the government banning pistols because one individual, with a firearms licence, fell through the safety nets in place and killed loads of little kids in a school in Scotland
LucreLout said:
The only thing I've ever flown is a kite. That's not aviation slang for something, just a childs toy.
Now that I've flagged the ignorance that follows, I shall begin....
Is it not possible to fit a GPS, Altimeter, and some control software that prevent a plane crashing into the ground by having the autopilot override the controls?
"Sorry Dave, I can't let you fly any lower, there's a mountain in the way."
I get that while planes only usually land at specific places, emergency landings are required from time to time so some team based override should be possible. Or the program would relinquish control once it could no longer make height.
Feasible or just dumb?
I suggested that a few pages ago Now that I've flagged the ignorance that follows, I shall begin....
Is it not possible to fit a GPS, Altimeter, and some control software that prevent a plane crashing into the ground by having the autopilot override the controls?
"Sorry Dave, I can't let you fly any lower, there's a mountain in the way."
I get that while planes only usually land at specific places, emergency landings are required from time to time so some team based override should be possible. Or the program would relinquish control once it could no longer make height.
Feasible or just dumb?
An anti-CFID systemVarious newspapers now reporting that airlines are moving to make it mandatory that a member of the cabin crew goes into the cockpit if one of the pilots needs to leave it
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