RJ drags wingtip on landing

PhilosopherPilot said:
In my case, we pulled the data, and the FDR showed 12.5 degrees bank, and we didn't strike the runway. The pitch was relatively low though, and the main hit the runway just as the bank angle was at its maximum. We got lucky, no matter how you look at it.

Things can happen to anyone.
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WTF? Why would the union let the company pull the FDR on a flight that nothing happened on? @ATN_Pilot , @Seggy am I going crazy or is this borderline setting a bad precedent?
 
Disclaimer: I was not smart enough to dream them up, they were sent to me. I share them for make benefit glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.


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Gonzo said:
WTF? Why would the union let the company pull the FDR on a flight that nothing happened on? @ATN_Pilot , @Seggy am I going crazy or is this borderline setting a bad precedent?
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If the crew wrote the plane up as a potential hard landing, pulling the FDR (or more likely the QAR if equipped) would probably be normal. Normally a contract would have all kinds of protections about what the data could be used for, beyond maintenance purposes.
 
Butters Stotch said:
I am still embarrassed, but i want (and need) to get over with. Any motivational stories to share?
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There are a lot of people with black marks on their records who have moved on to perfectly fruitful careers in aviation. From a professional perspective, learn from it and move on. Be prepared to own it, talk about what mistakes you made, and what you learned from it in the future. You WILL have to discuss it with your peers, with interviewers, and many more in the future. The more comfortable you are with that story, the better.

From an emotional/mental perspective, you have to accept what happened and get over it. For better or worse, own it. I'll tell you this from personal experience: a hard, confidence-shattering kick in the gonads will make you a better aviator in the long tun. Take it from someone -- me -- who probably has a lot more experience than you (20-year career as a USAF fighter pilot and instructor) and who also has had a similar crack in the beans, and had to figure out how to get through it as an aviator and an individual. As a result of the honest soul-searching I was forced to do after what I went through, I am a much more thoughtful, careful, safe, insightful aviator than I was before. I wish I didn't have to go through the doors I did to become that way, but I did, and I learned from it.

Trust me, nobody cares as much about your situation as you. It is okay to be hard on yourself, but at some point you just have to stop dwelling on it and move on. You can write every story as a comedy or a drama or a horror movie, and it is up to you to decide which one your story is.
 
Tsk tsk. Y'all are makin' jokes, when everyone should be knocking on the closest piece of wood.

As the man said: "Any given Sunday". Sometimes you're a half second too early or too late. Sometimes you're a couple inches too far or too short. The inches we need are all around us.

And sometimes they're not. We should be thanking these guys for reminding us we're all human.

Richman
 
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Butters Stotch said:
OK, let me use this post to ask you guys something:

How do you re-motivate yourself to this profession when something like that happens to you?

A few months ago i bent metal. Nothing high profile, nothing that hasn´t happened before on the fleet, and it will certainly happen again. It was a truly honest error. Poor flying technique 5 seconds prior to touchdown after a perfectly stable approach. The airline had ops and foqa to look at the flight, and after interviewing myself and the other pilot, we were released back to line (no need of additional training but the event was put on our employee files). The plane went back to the line 30 hours after the event after only minor maintenance. I don´t think i ever had overconfidence, but mine has gone to the ground since then. Even though i am slowly building confidence on myself, flying has never been the same again. I can´t stop thinking how worse it could have been (for my career and for the airline). I still like the job and the employer, but i just can´t grow enthusiasm again.

I am still embarrassed, but i want (and need) to get over with. Any motivational stories to share?
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I think the people who have the hardest time going back to the line after an event are those who think that as long as they follow procedure and fly "right" nothing will ever happen to them. Those who understand that even on your best day bad things can happen have an easier time with it. No matter what, it sucks.

So take your time, do your best, and get back in the saddle. Hopefully that was the worst day of your career.
 
Gonzo said:
WTF? Why would the union let the company pull the FDR on a flight that nothing happened on? @ATN_Pilot , @Seggy am I going crazy or is this borderline setting a bad precedent?
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Because:

1. I was the manager in charge of these types of investigations at the time and the FO agreed to the data pull (encouraged it in fact).

2. Our data use policy allowed investigations if a crew reported something, even if there was no bad outcome. Remember, the outcome is irrelevant. The action/event is what counts. The only reason we didn't hit the wing was luck.

3. You're probably confusing FOQA and investigations. FOQA is de identified, and investigations (by definition) are not.

4. Not all airlines have the same data use policies.

There was no threat of discipline. It was simply done to learn from. We used the animation in presentations and for line check airman training.
 
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BobDDuck said:
If the crew wrote the plane up as a potential hard landing, pulling the FDR (or more likely the QAR if equipped) would probably be normal. Normally a contract would have all kinds of protections about what the data could be used for, beyond maintenance purposes.
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This was a unique situation in that I was the captain of a flight that I wanted to investigate. That being said, any crew could report an event and we would get a download if it seemed significant.

The contract allowed for investigations of this type, and ALPA was aware of our procedures. We kept the CASC in the loop with all investigations, including this one.
 
Butters Stotch said:
OK, let me use this post to ask you guys something:

How do you re-motivate yourself to this profession when something like that happens to you?

A few months ago i bent metal. Nothing high profile, nothing that hasn´t happened before on the fleet, and it will certainly happen again. It was a truly honest error. Poor flying technique 5 seconds prior to touchdown after a perfectly stable approach. The airline had ops and foqa to look at the flight, and after interviewing myself and the other pilot, we were released back to line (no need of additional training but the event was put on our employee files). The plane went back to the line 30 hours after the event after only minor maintenance. I don´t think i ever had overconfidence, but mine has gone to the ground since then. Even though i am slowly building confidence on myself, flying has never been the same again. I can´t stop thinking how worse it could have been (for my career and for the airline). I still like the job and the employer, but i just can´t grow enthusiasm again.

I am still embarrassed, but i want (and need) to get over with. Any motivational stories to share?
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Get back on the horse and ride it. Enough said.

 
PhilosopherPilot said:
There was no threat of discipline. It was simply done to learn from. We used the animation in presentations and for line check airman training.
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Well it is nice to know at least one RJ operator, has a real safety culture. My guess is this way of looking at things in the RJ world is rare, it would never happen at Eagle.
 
Gonzo said:
Well it is nice to know at least one RJ operator, has a real safety culture. My guess is this way of looking at things in the RJ world is rare, it would never happen at Eagle.
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I can't speak to other regional airlines. ASA/XJT had/has one of the best safety cultures out there.

Hopefully Mesa has one too, for those guy's sakes.
 
Gonzo said:
Well it is nice to know at least one RJ operator, has a real safety culture. My guess is this way of looking at things in the RJ world is rare, it would never happen at Eagle.
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As stated, the company can at their discretion pull a FDR to look at for anything if they want to. Most only pull it for investigations. In the specific case mentioned it probably would have shown up soon anyway when the FOQA Gatekeeper sat down to review events and they probably would need to see if it was written up due to the roll exceedance.

The key is the protection for what they find and that is governed in the CBA.
 
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Butters Stotch said:
OK, let me use this post to ask you guys something:

How do you re-motivate yourself to this profession when something like that happens to you?

A few months ago i bent metal. Nothing high profile, nothing that hasn´t happened before on the fleet, and it will certainly happen again. It was a truly honest error. Poor flying technique 5 seconds prior to touchdown after a perfectly stable approach. The airline had ops and foqa to look at the flight, and after interviewing myself and the other pilot, we were released back to line (no need of additional training but the event was put on our employee files). The plane went back to the line 30 hours after the event after only minor maintenance. I don´t think i ever had overconfidence, but mine has gone to the ground since then. Even though i am slowly building confidence on myself, flying has never been the same again. I can´t stop thinking how worse it could have been (for my career and for the airline). I still like the job and the employer, but i just can´t grow enthusiasm again.

I am still embarrassed, but i want (and need) to get over with. Any motivational stories to share?
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@Butters Stotch

Everybody hamburgers something up at some point. We're human. No matter how diligent, how aware, how in control, how decent our judgement is, or how competent we are, we also have lapses here and there. Part of being an F/O (and this is not to say that Captains also don't make their share of mistakes, because they do) is the learning process that you go through and the new experiences and new conditions that you will be having and need to learn to handle.

You know what you did wrong and why. That is more than half the battle. What you have to do now and I mean now, is move on. It could have been much worse. It's one thing to analyze and understand what happened and why, but don't beat yourself up, keep re-living it/playing it over and over in your mind, and over think it. When you catch yourself doing that, just stop yourself. This accomplishes nothing except to make you question, doubt and undermine yourself.

You know you're a decent pilot. You have been for some time. Otherwise you wouldn't be flying for a living and being paid to do so. That hasn't changed because of one minor event. You are going to need that confidence and that knowledge that you already possess for when something goes tits up or something of some difficulty arises, that you have to overcome.You need to be ready and know that you can handle yourself, your aircraft and that you can trust yourself.

Don't let one incident spoil your attitude or your proficiently and all the hard work, effort, money and time that you have put into this career. Don't give away the joy you felt when you were hired and the excitement you felt on your first trip. Shake it the hell off. Take a serious deep breath. Go to work renewed, and motivated to do a better job. Be the damn pilot that you are capable of being. Look at and remember all the things that you enjoyed about this job.......... the aircraft, the crews, the locations, the views, the overnights, meeting new people, eating at new places, all the things large and small that made you smile, made you happy and made you realize that you had chosen the right career because this was what you were meant to do.

Your employer thought enough of you and trusted you enough to put your butt back on the line. Time for you to feel the same way. You won't assume or take anything for granted now. You'll be a better pilot. You'll be fine.
 
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