Most Difficult Sim Senario at the Airlines

No, they're not trying to make you crash because if you do, you've failed the program and probably have to spend a lot of time resetting the simulator.

Basically, it's a look at a 'real time' scenario. Trust me, anyone can handle a V1 "Go" in the simulator. But when it happens in real life, the situation, sensations and recognition is a lot different because the psychology is different.

In the sim, you're thinking "Ok, 5000 RVR, it's going to be an engine failure because that's on the syllabus and we'll just make a pattern and return".

On the line, you're probably thinking what type of food options SEA has, how you're going to grub on a 45 minute turn, "just what was that departure again" and then the plane starts yawing to one side as you approach VR and you hear a generator cross tie.
 
falconvalley said:
At AirNet we were told to never, ever do a missed off an ILS, single engine. In fact, our LOFT involved losing an engine just outside the marker. It was tricky going from configed for ILS full-stop to clean and secure and then to SE ILS full-stop! Do any other companies follow that?
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We also never go missed off a single engine approach, you don't have the performance to do so. I mean MAYBE you could pull it off if you had no cargo and you were light on gas, but it's probably still a bad idea. Though we fly completely different profiles than ya'll from what I understand.
 
Yeah, I don't know what you guys fly, but AirNet does seem to have that ballsy, in your face, right on blue line approach to the profiles.
 
My worst one was dual engine fires at 25,000 feet. We pulled both fire handles, put out both fires. The instructor (a helluva guy BTW, but a real tough sonofabitch) said, "OK, geniuses, that last engine was producing power, and you f'n shut it down! Now what??"
So I said, "Well, we got about a 20 to 1 glide ratio, and I'm guessing this sim FMS has current airport info. I'm gonna start the APU, set George to speed hold-Vfs, and hope to hell and gone that there's a long enough runway within 80-or-so miles. Beats burning up!"
The guy grinned, punched a bunch of buttons on the sim to show all the airports on-screen, and we started gliding. We set it up right, got the runway, glided down, but came in too fast and crashed. Red screen. Laughter from the back.

Ah, well, ces't sim!
 
cime_sp said:
My hardest sim scenario was in icing condition in a CRJ with a deferred APU....(think unpressurized TO/Ldg). Inbound to ATL the captains filght director failed so now I'm flying. Autopilot won't stay engaged either. Left engine starts having oil-pressure problems, and it's since it's intermittent, it's basically a captains call. He decides to keep it running. This of course tells the sim instructor to fail it at the worst possible time imaginable on you. So, we're now flying along in icing conditions, descending into ATL with an iffy engine that has the throttle pulled back on it quite a bit due to the oil pressure problem, which isn't helping our icing problem. The F/A keeps calling up front for one thing or another....I'm still hand-flying. Approach decides to turn around the airport, so now we're trying to change approches and re-brief. I'm getting configured and turning final while the captain is taking care of the unpressurzed landing procedure and of course....about 4 mile final the engine finally quits and catches on fire. What does the captain do???? Instead of just landing, he calls for a go-around. If you've ever done a single-engine go-around while you were already configured for a full-flaps landing, it turns into a goat-rope or VMC demo really quick!!!So now, in this unpressurized, icing, hand-flown, on fire, single-engine go-around the captain messes up the checklist and never opens the 14th stage isolation valve and I'm so busy I don't catch it. The left wing, now unprotected, starts to accumulate large amounts of ice. The airplane is flying VERY squirelly, but we do manage to get it on the ground.....barely! I've never been so task-saturated before! I was spent when we got out of there! Definately the hardest sim session I'd ever had.
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Whew, that was a nightmare...Tough call for the Capt though he could be crucified for either decisions if it doesn't work out. My last pax airline always taught the go around to clean up the problem, re breif, and get mentally ready to fly a single engine approach... Of course if you don't make it back around what's the point...That's why the Capt's are paid the "BIG" money to make those decisions.

My hardest sim session to date was during my initial 727. Max gross takeoff at mins with a V1 cut. Once on downwind while dumping fuel a second engine failure. Followed by a single engine ILS to mins. It wasn't fun or pretty to fly (hit pretty darn hard) but I would have hated to have been the engineer. He was working his arse off with the capt trying to get all the QRH items completed while dumping and balancing the fuel.
 
The Metro has a V1 cut scenario that is kind of dicy where you have a Left Essential Bus failure at the same time as your engine failure at V1.

One engine fails, simultaneously your flight instruments/left side of the panel goes dark (all sims are night flights), and you have to reach behind you and flip a bus transfer switch just to get the gear up. All while manhandling the thing with both hands to keep it on centerline and climbing (which it doesn't do very well on one engine at gross). :insane:

I suppose it's not very likely to ever happen in the real world, but its nice to know you can survive one if it does (in the sim at least).
 
CapnJim said:
My worst one was dual engine fires at 25,000 feet. We pulled both fire handles, put out both fires. The instructor (a helluva guy BTW, but a real tough sonofabitch) said, "OK, geniuses, that last engine was producing power, and you f'n shut it down! Now what??"
So I said, "Well, we got about a 20 to 1 glide ratio, and I'm guessing this sim FMS has current airport info. I'm gonna start the APU, set George to speed hold-Vfs, and hope to hell and gone that there's a long enough runway within 80-or-so miles. Beats burning up!"
The guy grinned, punched a bunch of buttons on the sim to show all the airports on-screen, and we started gliding. We set it up right, got the runway, glided down, but came in too fast and crashed. Red screen. Laughter from the back.

Ah, well, ces't sim!
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That's some of the best flying I have seen....right up to the point you got yourself killed!
 
For some reason, I struggled initially with manual reversion. On a loft, we did a deadtick landing from 10,000ft into MEM. It was more fun than difficult though. We took off and landed on the 2500' runway at a typical weight (41,000lbs) for some out of the box experience.
 
Ouch. Yeah, it's been a while. I just can't let myself watch that movie anymore. You understand...
 
I do..

Kris said the other night we should watch it again and I just groaned...
 
Well, I do love that Slider... so sexy!:sarcasm:

Naw... just seen it too many times... and the more I watched it, the cheesier it became. It was good in the day though! Now I think it is best served as a source for quotes.

Oh, and the occasional drinking game. :)
 
ChinookDriver said:
Well, I do love that Slider... so sexy!:sarcasm:

Naw... just seen it too many times... and the more I watched it, the cheesier it became. It was good in the day though! Now I think it is best served as a source for quotes.

Oh, and the occasional drinking game. :)
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The wife and I watch it at least once every year as it was our first date! LOL.
 
When I eat BAD Mexican food for lunch before the sim ride and I need to pass some gas. Not good for ANYONE in that box....



:)

















Max takeoff weight, flaps 17, negative autofeather, good luck on that one!
 
Your o2 masks don't work for real in the sim?

Honestly, I think the hardest I've seen in the sim was the LDA19 into DCA single engine/flaps 20/no anti skid. LOTS of step down fixes and REALLY REALLY fast ref. We got it down but ended up swimming in the Potomac at the end of the runway.
 
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