Landing Incident @ SFO

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MikeD said:
Maybe, maybe not. Like anything Mark, "it depends" applies to what information is revealed publicly and when. While fuel may not even be a factor here in this accident, the fact that it wasn't commented on specifically doesn't necessarily mean anything one way or another. Like any investigation, the revelation of information to the press in the conferences is very measured, and for good reason.
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Notice how the NTSB ruled out mechanical error? The NTSB is pretty antsy to calm the flying public (and rightfully so) about the airplanes being safe when they are involved in an accident. They ruled out the Q400 not being able to fly and remove ice REALLY quickly in the 3407 accident as they didn't want the flying public to be scared to fly on planes in the winter, in ice.

Let me break it down a little more.

If it was a loss of thrust, such as British Airways 38, we would probably see an emergency AD for inspections NOW on Boeing 777 models. Boeing would know before the aircraft hit the ground that it was a loss of thrust.

If it was a fuel starvation issue, Boeing, once again, would know about it before it hit the ground, the NTSB would have mentioned it to rule out something mechanical with the aircraft to calm the flying publics fear as that points more to a crew related systemic failure.
 
MikeD said:
Would be interesting to know indeed, and should be easy to figure out. Curiously, for the airline you're referring to, what operational challenges are there landing on a 11,000+ ft runway, or even the 8000' cross runways, that require more than 100 hours in type to master? Especially for someone who is at an air carrier and likely has a good amount of experience in general under their belt already? Am curious as to the reasoning the particular airline uses for that, by singling out one (or more) airfields. It's not like we're talking Kai Tak here with SFO.
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I was a little surprised, at first, it was there as well, but it is in the OPSPEC as a 'Special Qualification Airport' so the restrictions were followed.

After going in there, I can VERY easily see why the restrictions were in there. Not so much a pavement issue, but it can be operationally challenging flying in there due to ATC Airspace constraints, side steps at the last minute, PRM Approaches, 'slam dunk' approaches, etc. Not the hardest airport to fly in and out of, but it was nice to see it a few times in the new aircraft.
 
Seggy said:
If it was a loss of thrust, such as British Airways 38, we would probably see an emergency AD for inspections NOW on Boeing 777 models. Boeing would know before the aircraft hit the ground that it was a loss of thrust.
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I'm sure Boeing has some great engineers, but... even they need some time to figure out what to inspect and what to look for. You would need to know what failed first, and then why, and then if it is even likely to happen elsewhere.

But hey, my management has no problem telling me to design a fix before finding out if it was broken first, I'm sure this is no different.
 
Seggy said:
Notice how the NTSB ruled out mechanical error? The NTSB is pretty antsy to calm the flying public (and rightfully so) about the airplanes being safe when they are involved in an accident. They ruled out the Q400 not being able to fly and remove ice REALLY quickly in the 3407 accident as they didn't want the flying public to be scared to fly on planes in the winter, in ice.

Let me break it down a little more.

If it was a loss of thrust, such as British Airways 38, we would probably see an emergency AD for inspections NOW on Boeing 777 models. Boeing would know before the aircraft hit the ground that it was a loss of thrust.

If it was a fuel starvation issue, Boeing, once again, would know about it before it hit the ground, the NTSB would have mentioned it to rule out something mechanical with the aircraft to calm the flying publics fear as that points more to a crew related systemic failure.
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It probably would be known, but you're missing my point regarding the bigger picture assumptions. And those are that the lack of revelation of something, doesn't necessarily indicate that its not a factor to some degree, or not. That's all Im saying. No matter how much the NTSB feels they need to calm any potential public fears, they're not going to show all their cards all the time, especially to the press; so my only contention is that as a general rule , don't necessarily apply the logic across the board that just because something isn't mentioned, that it isn't being looked at or isn't a factor to some degree, whatever it may be that we're talking about here. I also don't think fuel is necessarily a factor in terms of any starvation, at first glance; am just saying, don't expect all information to always be revealed immediately. Especially in this one where it involves a foreign carrier, and political toes could be stepped upon easily for a variety of reasons.
 
drunkenbeagle said:
I'm sure Boeing has some great engineers, but... even they need some time to figure out what to inspect and what to look for. You would need to know what failed first, and then why, and then if it is even likely to happen elsewhere.

But hey, my management has no problem telling me to design a fix before finding out if it was broken first, I'm sure this is no different.
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The don't need time to see what failed as the plane tells them in real time.
 
Seggy said:
I was a little surprised, at first, it was there as well, but it is in the OPSPEC as a 'Special Qualification Airport' so the restrictions were followed.

After going in there, I can VERY easily see why the restrictions were in there. Not so much a pavement issue, but it can be operationally challenging flying in there due to ATC Airspace constraints, side steps at the last minute, PRM Approaches, 'slam dunk' approaches, etc. Not the hardest airport to fly in and out of, but it was nice to see it a few times in the new aircraft.
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Which I can see the logic there to a fair degree....particular airport and airspace nuances and the like. That makes me wonder why more airlines don't apply that restriction.
 
drunkenbeagle said:
Do autothrottles typically work below 100' ? Because it looks like they were a good ways from the threshold.

I would think it would be normal for them to be disengaged low on a visual anyway, any Boeing drivers care to enlighten stupid me about how they work/are used?
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In the 777 it is optional to turn them off for landing. At my carrier it is SOP to leave them on for landing. The 747 was the opposite, they were turned off when the autopilot was turned off. That was mainly due to the fact that while hand flying they caused more trouble than they helped. The 777 autothrottle is very good though.

At 25' RA they come back to idle in the 777 just as they would in an autoland scenario. They may have already been that low by the time they decided to go around. They do have a wake up mode in certain situations depending on what was programmed into the FMC. However, in certain scenarios once on approach they won't and the crew may have expected them to.
 
89-LX said:
Could a factor have been that it was coming in so slow, that it actually did help save lifes with less energy impacting the ground than say if it was coming in at 150 kts?
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Freshman year physics answer - no. The reduction in momentum is not huge. And they were moving plenty fast enough for it to be fatal.

Sliding for 1000' or so feet without gear is what dissipated the energy.
 
Seggy said:
The don't need time to see what failed as the plane tells them in real time.
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I get plenty of realtime data about failures at my day job. Trust me, I can't draw conclusions about why or when things fail in real time :) Usually involves looking at lots of other data. There isn't a daq sensor on every possible part on everything, and even then, they don't sample fast enough to always be useful. It depends.

Fine for letting someone know "replace me, I'm broken." But not enough for things that aren't monitored, or don't fail in an expected way.
 
MikeD said:
Which I can see the logic there to a fair degree....particular airport and airspace nuances and the like. That makes me wonder why more airlines don't apply that restriction.
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We do something similar. SFO is one of the airports with the F/O needing 100 in type or with a check airman. Like Seggy mentioned, with SFO or places like LAX it's not the runway, it is the complex nature of the operation that creates the issue. I've been going in there for years and SFO has a lion's share of variables: ILS and PRM approaches, aircraft departing the intersecting runway, while landings occur on the other; high volume of traffic landing on 28R and L, occasionally right next to each other and it is the closest you will ever get to formation flying in an airliner. Noise abatement visual approaches and it is typical to get 30 knot winds in from the Pacific on most afternoons. Some terrain issues during aborted landings, and they have a propensity to clear you for visual approaches when you are still a bit on the high side.



Some airports are restricted for reasons like those I listed others are more obvious, such as terrain, high density altitudes, short runways, complex approaches and missed approaches or a combination of all of them (Aspen and Sun Valley would be two great examples here).

 
Anyway they may have been fatigued? I know hundreds of planes on that same route make it without issue but perhaps the beginning of this chain started off with inadequate rest. Do Korean pilots endure the same rest constraints we do in the US? What's the time change on a flight like that? Seems like it would be a pretty brutal adjustment.
 
Getting my updates via CNN twitter. I'm taking this as unconfirmed but FO was flying as it was his first landing in 777 and had 40 some hours? I'm assuming this is in type, not total? Wow.


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nocturnalaviator said:
Getting my updates via CNN twitter. I'm taking this as unconfirmed but FO was flying as it was his first landing in 777 and had 40 some hours? I'm assuming this is in type, not total? Wow.


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Check out my post on page 29. It's sounding like it was the captain and not the FO, that had 43 hours in type.
 
Also for many of the "special" airports, the rule, at least for us, comes from the FAA. I don't know if that is specific to us, or similar for other US carriers. I suspect we are not alone with this type of restriction. In addition, the company requires special check outs to some of the more complicated fields.
 
SeanD said:
Anyway they may have been fatigued? I know hundreds of planes on that same route make it without issue but perhaps the beginning of this chain started off with inadequate rest. Do Korean pilots endure the same rest constraints we do in the US? What's the time change on a flight like that? Seems like it would be a pretty brutal adjustment.
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I'd heard a rumor that they started their day in PVG, but I'm not 100% on that. Either way, an 11 hour overnight leg from ICN could very well be fatiguing; some of the worst fatigue I've felt while flying have been eastbound legs from Asia back to the US, landing just after dawn. Circadian rhythm is all screwy, particularly if you'd been doing multiple dateline crossings.
 
dasleben said:
I'd heard a rumor that they started their day in PVG, but I'm not 100% on that. Either way, an 11 hour overnight leg from ICN could very well be fatiguing; some of the worst fatigue I've felt while flying have been eastbound legs from Asia back to the US, landing just after dawn. Circadian rhythm is all screwy, particularly if you'd been doing multiple dateline crossings.
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What is a normal rest break?
 
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