28 Seconds to Survive

Darwin Award candidates
 
Wild. Fired up an ATR-42 and had it off the runway in less time than it takes me to get even halfway through my preflight on a freaking Skyhawk. Sad that they took so many down with them.
 
From the simulated terrain it also looked like they did not really take control of the situation once terrain became visible.
 
I have zero expert with jets or big iron but isn’t this the exact situation those commercial maneuvers come into play. They just tried to climb and ran right into a mountain?


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Peter Anderson said:
I have zero expert with jets or big iron but isn’t this the exact situation those commercial maneuvers come into play. They just tried to climb and ran right into a mountain?
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Scary, huh? The FO was begging for the captain (who had taken the controls) to turn to the right toward a saddle in the ridge. It looked to me like the captain had fixated on the ridge line and was trying to determine if the flight path would clear it. He ran out of time. That seems to be the real problem with mountain flying, IMO. Your horizon is obscured by irregular terrain and you just can't tell whether you can clear it, especially the lower you are.
 
Good video, but too fast. Could not read it fast enough.
 
Kritchlow said:
Good video, but too fast. Could not read it fast enough.
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It only said about 3 things. 50 times each. But I assume you’re being sarcastic.
 
I think an important concept only partially raised at the end of the video is that when you deviate from normal procedures, it can have a negative effect on other aspects of the flight that you normally don't have to worry about. One of the reasons why you don't cut corners is because it can have additional implications, in some circumstances, that weren't obvious.

I recall telling myself I never have to worry about getting near a bravo shelf because of how I fly in and out of that area. One day not too long ago, I was practicing maneuvers under unusual circumstances and suddenly I found myself in a situation where if I didn't turn around I would be about to go in to the bravo (although a part that wasn't typically used, but nevertheless). If you tell yourself "I don't have to worry about B because of A" then you can't skip A without considering B, and since you usually skip A suddenly while in a rush, it's very easy to forget about B. This is all the more reason why I hear alarm bells going off in my head whenever some external pressure is rushing me during preflight or while flying.
 
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The video is a little misleadig at the end…the implication is that if they had sat on the runway for another 28 seconds, they’d have AHRS…more likely they’d have to sit for the full 3 minutes it takes to align.

obviously this wasn’t the first time this happened…and the crew was blaming the equipment.
 
While it's hard to say from the video and the transcripts I've been able to find are missing time stamps, it appears that the flight sat for a bit waiting for departure clearance. The FO calls in that he needs the clearance and the TWR says they're still waiting for it.
 
flyingron said:
While it's hard to say from the video and the transcripts I've been able to find are missing time stamps, it appears that the flight sat for a bit waiting for departure clearance. The FO calls in that he needs the clearance and the TWR says they're still waiting for it.
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So they coincidentally sat at the end of the runway for the exact same time they sat before taxi?
 
you can always get away with something until you don't

the fact that they were flying through the clouds without an ahrs looking at just their compass (and presumably VS?) is crazy
 
Tantalum said:
Infuriating
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exactly how I felt watching that. Sad for the lives lost. But so ****ed off at the stupidity of that flight crew. I'm not one to yell at the TV (or monitor in this case), but I think I said J.F.C. about ten times before that aircraft even took off. Just plain stupid. What a waste of life.
 
Kinda reminds me of the Black Knight in Monty Python.
 
Tantalum said:
you can always get away with something until you don't

the fact that they were flying through the clouds without an ahrs looking at just their compass (and presumably VS?) is crazy
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It’s very possible that they had attitude, just not heading…or at least a mechanical standby attitude indicator.
 
Tantalum said:
you can always get away with something until you don't

the fact that they were flying through the clouds without an ahrs looking at just their compass (and presumably VS?) is crazy
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Clearly they weren't taking magnetic dip into account if they were only using the whiskey compass. If they were actually using the compass on the AHRS that hadn't gotten itself sorted yet, and they KNEW that... I don't know. Just a giant bowl of utter incompetency that unfortunately killed a bunch of people besides themselves.
 
If you're VMC why do you need a compass to not hit a big ass rock in front of you?
 
dtuuri said:
Scary, huh? The FO was begging for the captain (who had taken the controls) to turn to the right toward a saddle in the ridge. It looked to me like the captain had fixated on the ridge line and was trying to determine if the flight path would clear it. He ran out of time. That seems to be the real problem with mountain flying, IMO. Your horizon is obscured by irregular terrain and you just can't tell whether you can clear it, especially the lower you are.
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I don't know if I'd put too much credence in what the video was showing versus what real world terrain looked like out the window (re: saddle to the right).
 
FlightChannel makes some sleek videos but the narration is largely plagiarized.

MauleSkinner said:
The video is a little misleadig at the end…the implication is that if they had sat on the runway for another 28 seconds, they’d have AHRS…more likely they’d have to sit for the full 3 minutes it takes to align.
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Just poorly worded...the extra 28 seconds would have been before taxi, not takeoff.

MauleSkinner said:
It’s very possible that they had attitude, just not heading…or at least a mechanical standby attitude indicator.
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Maybe they had a standby attitude indicator but I doubt there was attitude on the PFD. AHRS is usually all or nothing.
 
schmookeeg said:
That vid makes me want to try chandelles under foggles.
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You joke, but in Air Force pilot training, in the instrument phase, an instrument aileron roll and instrument wing-over were required maneuvers.
 
The very first hop a student did in advanced in the A4, he got the controls ON the deck at 80 kts, UNDER THE BAG!! Check rights and check lefts were very unnerving!

That hop included a full squirrel cage on instruments. Wing overs, barrel rolls, aileron rolls, loop, split s, Immelmann, half Cuban 8.

Kinda fun.
 
455 Bravo Uniform said:
All the animation and perspectives and such? I don’t know how to do any of that, and it seems like it would take a LONG time plus editing and overlaying voice and text.
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All they did was recreate the flight in MS Flight Sim or possible X-plane and then add captions. Probably took less than a day for the whole production.
 
RingLaserGyroSandwich said:
I think an important concept only partially raised at the end of the video is that when you deviate from normal procedures, it can have a negative effect on other aspects of the flight that you normally don't have to worry about. One of the reasons why you don't cut corners is because it can have additional implications, in some circumstances, that weren't obvious.
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Excellent point.

My one beef with the video is that they imply that the accident was caused by rushing through the checklist and missing critical steps.

The decision to start taxiing and depart without allowing the AHRS to fully initialize was an INTENTIONAL decision by the captain.

Because the flight crew lost track of time and were late getting to the aircraft, they were rushing to depart before they were stuck on the ground due to approaching night. The knew the AHRS wasn’t ready and in the interest of time he intended to depart in that condition and reset it once they were in cruise. Chances are he had done that many times and gotten away with it. But on this flight he didn’t factor in the possibility that they’d be in IMC on the climb out.

Like RLGS said, if you are thinking about cutting corners, you really have to consider the potential downstream implications.
 
Fearless Tower said:
Like RLGS said, if you are thinking about cutting corners, you really have to consider the potential downstream implications.
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Yes indeed, but you also have to consider this loss of both side flight instruments might happen even when you don't cut corners. My brother turned on the radar one night and both EFIS tubes suddenly turned black. American Airlines had promised the pilots that could never be possible. It was a non-event in that after awhile they came back online, but you wouldn't want something like that happening during an ODP in a place like the video. Having steam gages as backup and a plan for using them would be a good idea I think.
 
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