Interesting story of an incapacitated airline pilot and...

Dan Thomas said:
Interesting, but alarming that the first officer wasn't able to fly the airplane. And had no experience taxiing it.

Dan
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See what happens when you let them in without 1500 hours :)
 
Awesome story, glad everyone made it out okay.

I bet that situation was tense! That kinda ordeal, + making it out alive...... id be on an adrenline rush for days. lol
 
Dan Thomas said:
Interesting, but alarming that the first officer wasn't able to fly the airplane. And had no experience taxiing it.

Dan
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She was able to fly the airplane. Hand flying it from 500ft AGL.....

lol, she wasnt able to taxii it though. But I wont hold that against her...:)
 
Dan Thomas said:
Interesting, but alarming that the first officer wasn't able to fly the airplane.
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Huh?

The article says the FO did a fine job flying the plane, including hand-flying the landing. She also made a wise CRM choice by recruiting a qualified pilot-passenger to assist her, rather than unnecessarily undertaking the entire workload herself (though her performance gives no reason to doubt she could have flown the plane solo if she'd needed to).
 
Maybe the only tiller is on the left and she had never sat there before.
 
Jhernandez04 said:
lol, she wasnt able to taxii it though. But I wont hold that against her...:)
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Read again. She was able to taxi by switching to the left seat. Sounds like she did a great job.
 
Hocky said:
Read again. She was able to taxi by switching to the left seat. Sounds like she did a great job.
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Exactly! Yet four different people here got the impression that the FO had been unable to fly and/or taxi the airplane, even though the article says the opposite and quotes the assisting USAF pilot as saying, "I saw nothing but the finest professionalism under pressure out of the flight attendants, the nurses and the first officer."
 
Dan Thomas said:
Interesting, but alarming that the first officer wasn't able to fly the airplane. And had no experience taxiing it.

Dan
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That isn't what I got out of it. First she asked for help. Yes she could have done it solo, but if there was someone to help that eases the stress quite a bit.

Second, there are no provisions to taxi a 737 from the right seat, other than the rudder pedals and they only allow for a limited amount of travel. That issue is a non starter.
 
I would much rather have a first officer that could land a plane safely and not be able to taxi then the other way around.
They way I read it she did fine. Plus Greg explained the switching seats part.
 
Don't the heavy iron's taxi like any other airplane? What am I missing?

I 'R' not an airline pilot ... :dunno:
 
Good story looks like she did her job,as expected.
 
Dan Thomas said:
Interesting, but alarming that the first officer wasn't able to fly the airplane. And had no experience taxiing it.

Dan
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Really?
Read the story over then post an apology.
It doesn't say she didn't know how to taxi the plane. it says she didn't know WHERE to taxi the plane.
It's a pretty safe bet she didn't have an airport diagram for that airport sitting on her lap when she landed.
Personally, I would have left it sitting in the middle of the runway and told Ground "Deal with it."
 
No one has asked the most important question:

In this situation, who can log PIC? :goofy:
 
I know I am fairly new here but the bickering especially by Hulk makes me happy I don't come here often.

To the story, glad it all turned out the way it did and kudos to the crew and USAF pilot who stepped up to help out. I would hope we would all do the same.
 
All I can say this thread is absolute proof sexism is alive and well. Because multiple people INCORRECTLY somehow read that the "lady couldn't do it and had to be saved by some guy sitting in the back".
 
The whole taxing issue is pretty simple: The FO stayed on her side of the airplane - which means she was in the FO seat. The ONLY way to taxi an airliner is from the wheel mounted only on the Captain's side. . ..

So it was not question of competency but also of physical ability - she was not going to trust the USAF pilot taxiing the 737 . . . . .
 
comanchepilot said:
The whole taxing issue is pretty simple: The FO stayed on her side of the airplane - which means she was in the FO seat. The ONLY way to taxi an airliner is from the wheel mounted only on the Captain's side. . ..

So it was not question of competency but also of physical ability - she was not going to trust the USAF pilot taxiing the 737 . . . . .
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And that was the right command decision!
 
acrophile said:
It did not say she couldn't taxi the plane. In fact, it said she did taxi the plane.
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:yesnod:
  • We know that Greg is right that there is no tiller on the FO side.
  • So after landing by hand from 500 feet
  • she asks the AF pilot/passenger if he can taxi to the gate.
  • Whatever the answer, they switched seats and she taxiied the plane.
  • This means that "she didn't know how to taxi." :no: :mad2:
Ya might think that part of training in the simulator is taxiing.
 
mikea said:
she asks the AF pilot/passenger if he can taxi to the gate.
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No, the article does not say she asked him that. She merely asked him if he knew where to taxi to (she hadn't been to that airport before).
 
I think saying "Saved the day" is going overboard with it. Crew member incapacitation isn't a rare thing. A quick search of AvHerald brings up dozens of instances not unlike this one. I'd say the F.O. saved the day by assuming command when needed, and utilizing CRM to end the event safely.
 
I did not know 737's had a tiller although I am familiar with what they are. Is that typical of most large passenger jets?
 
People seriously need to work on reading comprehension.
 
Sac Arrow said:
I did not know 737's had a tiller although I am familiar with what they are. Is that typical of most large passenger jets?
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From my couple of hours of 737 sim time, yes, the tiller's the thing. I believe other Boeings are the same.

Others? Color me, "clueless."
 
acrophile said:
Exactly! Yet four different people here got the impression that the FO had been unable to fly and/or taxi the airplane, even though the article says the opposite
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I'm convinced that most posters here will post a reply without reading an article linked in the first post of a thread.

Many won't even read the first post itself -- they'll just read the title of the thread and post a reply to nothing more than that.
 
Even some smaller (much smaller than a 737) passenger jets have tillers.
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
I'm calling BS on this whole story.

The pilot of a 737 would have a first class medical.
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Yes he would, but that does not mean he would not get ill within a week or 5 months from his last physical. It only meant he was healthy the day he took his last medical and had a high probability of making it 6 more months.
 
comanchepilot said:
not able to taxi it?? Women drivers . . .
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It's not that she COULDN'T taxi- she had never been to that airport before and didn't know WHERE to taxi to. :dunno:She just asked the B-1 pilot if he knew.

Could have consulted the book or asked for progressive, but I imagine that having had the captain incapacitated and everything else going on that she probably got a good case of wobbly legs once the plane was on the ground.
 
A few years ago I had a 14 year old girl go into an epileptic seizure. I declared a medical emergency, sent my FO back to see what he could do and asked for vectors to the nearest airport. I guarantee you that my voice probably sounded a little different on the radio but assure you I had every thing in control. The biggest problem was after I landed trying to find out where to go to meet the ambulance. After getting no response from airport ops, the ground controller made a decision and promised to get the ambulance to me. All worked out in the end.

It sounds to me that the FO did a great job. She landed the airplane in the seat she was comfortable in and then switched to the left to taxi. I know that even in the Shorts and some models of the Metroliner that I have flown had a tiller, so taxiing from the right seat wasn't possible.
 
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