UPS MD-11 crash at SDF

ERfly said:
It's slightly more pessimistic here. Let's put it this way, I know for a fact that I now have the rest of the month off.
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Enjoy it and let management figure it out. Folks on our forums are trying to piece together solutions for a MD replacement. X amount of 767’s or 777’s. That ship has sailed! My stance is “🤬 em”. They’ve had years to figure this out and years of pilots and MX discovering issues with these birds and complaining about their condition, even on the day of the accident. As beautiful as the MD is she’s a MX nightmare. My uneducated opinion is they’re going to find a lot more stuff they don’t like outside of the pylon.

It’s all a sad and angering reminder that 121 aviation is allowed to be archaic and reactive for some reason.
 
phill1174 said:
Enjoy it and let management figure it out. Folks on our forums are trying to piece together solutions for a MD replacement. X amount of 767’s or 777’s. That ship has sailed! My stance is “🤬 em”. They’ve had years to figure this out and years of pilots and MX discovering issues with these birds and complaining about their condition, even on the day of the accident. As beautiful as the MD is she’s a MX nightmare. My uneducated opinion is they’re going to find a lot more stuff they don’t like outside of the pylon.

It’s all a sad and angering reminder that 121 aviation is allowed to be archaic and reactive for some reason.
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They provide the airplanes. We fly 'em. That is how it is.

But your comment provides a specific, and uncomfortable parallel to the U.S. Merchant Marine, here.
 
phill1174 said:
It’s all a sad and angering reminder that 121 aviation is allowed to be archaic and reactive for some reason.
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Especially 121 cargo. I saw the push back against TCAS, even, early in my career. Later in my career the part 117 is optional for cargo and UPS chose to not opt.
 
DE727UPS said:
Especially 121 cargo. I saw the push back against TCAS, even, early in my career. Later in my career the part 117 is optional for cargo and UPS chose to not opt.
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I have an uncle who was killed while jumpseating because, back in the 'day,' 121 cargo airliners didn't have to have three attitude indicating systems. A pilot with two attitude indicators is never terribly sure what his attitude is; a pilot with three can confidently disqualify a faulty instrument. At the time of the accident, Part 121 passenger airplanes had to have three attitude indicating systems, but 121 cargo airliners did not.

A third attitude indicator in a transport category airplane is a ridiculous thing to get killed for not having.
 
Maybe should be a different thread but - what happens if C-checks are mandated and FedEx/UPS mothball the fleets? What happens to the pilots? That has to screw up lots of fleets across the system with rebidding, training, etc. how big of a feces show is it going to be? And how long will it take to get everyone requalified on new equip? Do they just draw the guarantee and not work in the meantime?
 
WacoFan said:
Maybe should be a different thread but - what happens if C-checks are mandated and FedEx/UPS mothball the fleets? What happens to the pilots? That has to screw up lots of fleets across the system with rebidding, training, etc. how big of a feces show is it going to be? And how long will it take to get everyone requalified on new equip? Do they just draw the guarantee and not work in the meantime?
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I wonder what sort of profit margins the cargo companies operating MD-11s are seeing? Even in my limited time working for UPS as a contractor we knew what "peak season" was just based on the amount of stuff we were loading on the airplanes. Now both major US cargo carriers are heading into "peak season" and a portion of both companies fleets are grounded. Can either of them afford to lose that capacity and maintain all of their contracts during the busiest part of the year? Big questions and I'm dumb so I have no answers. It's probably too late to drag some things out of the boneyard and resuscitate them enough for reliable ops in this current time frame. But I don't know what Boeing is going to require their customers to do before the airplanes can back to flying so take everything I just wrote with a grain of salt.
 
Polymox said:
This actually seems relevant on an airplane with a centerline engine like the Falcon or MD-11. If power was set and then nobody looked at the engine instruments again during the takeoff roll, with no asymmetric thrust it would be conceivable to be unaware of thrust loss in the center engine. Especially true if it was partial loss for some reason instead of a sudden and complete failure.
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It's the same in the 2000LXS / EasyII planes, we have initial at brake release, followed by 80kt value. If either doesn't pass muster, it's an RTO. While we will notice loss of thrust on a twin, degradation due to runway contamination, mechanical issues, or even mass/performance calculations, in theory, should be caught. It's also a bit of a windshear check - if airspeed is rapidly increasing, but accel G = 0... then something bad is going on.
 
WacoFan said:
Maybe should be a different thread but - what happens if C-checks are mandated and FedEx/UPS mothball the fleets? What happens to the pilots? That has to screw up lots of fleets across the system with rebidding, training, etc. how big of a feces show is it going to be? And how long will it take to get everyone requalified on new equip? Do they just draw the guarantee and not work in the meantime?
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Lots of questions. Most answered in the CBA at the relevant companies. If it's not in the CBA it will need to be negotiated.
 
WacoFan said:
Maybe should be a different thread but - what happens if C-checks are mandated and FedEx/UPS mothball the fleets? What happens to the pilots? That has to screw up lots of fleets across the system with rebidding, training, etc. how big of a feces show is it going to be? And how long will it take to get everyone requalified on new equip? Do they just draw the guarantee and not work in the meantime?
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The pilot at brown are pay protected. They shut down the DC-8 fleet overnight, not an FAA issue but company convienence, way back in the day. There were senior F/E's on it that had a year off with pay until they got around to being retrained. This will stop hiring for a time but somebody posted 64 mandatory retirements in 2026. You can retrain a guy in a month plus line training but it's a matter of training capacity. I could see some contract training being used with other airline sims. I think the biggest problem is going to be replacing the lift. UPS has the post office contracts Fedex used to have. Will be interesting to see but the contract carriers that are allowed to boost UPS capacity over peak could be used longer term. Will be a dicey issue as it's a contract violation to use the extra lift outside of peak. UPS can do it if they declare an emergency outside their control. I could see them pushing for that.
 
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With the AD being extended to the DC-10, that unfortunately grounds 10 Tanker Air Carrier’s fleet of firefighting VLAT air tankers. As well as Omega’s KDC-10 air refueling tankers. I don’t believe any MD-10s are flying anywhere, but all in storage wouldn’t be able to be currently brought back to service either. The USAF retired their last KC-10 fleet to the boneyard in Tucson about 6 months ago, but ironically the KC-10 fleet had the best safety record of any aircraft MDS in the entire USAF fleet. Hopefully, this is temporary, but who knows. It’s a wait and see.
 
MikeD said:
With the AD being extended to the DC-10, that unfortunately grounds 10 Tanker Air Carrier’s fleet of firefighting VLAT air tankers. As well as Omega’s KDC-10 air refueling tankers. I don’t believe any MD-10s are flying anywhere, but all in storage wouldn’t be able to be currently brought back to service either. The USAF retired their last KC-10 fleet to the boneyard in Tucson about 6 months ago, but ironically the KC-10 fleet had the best safety record of any aircraft MDS in the entire USAF fleet. Hopefully, this is temporary, but who knows. It’s a wait and see.
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There's some former purple MD10s in South America, also ORBIS is affected.
 
ChasenSFO said:
Don't worry, Boeing didn't care. Boeing only had to pretend to care for long enough to eventually self regulate 737MAX assembly again. Which they do. Murikeh.
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The system is set that way. Besides, why would you work for the FAA as an inspector when Boeing pays more lucrative for the same thing internally? Most people will take the higher pay option.
 
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