Boeing 737 carrying 132 passengers crashes in China

[conVINCEd 21469]

10 minutes ago, austingirl said:

This made me nauseated. The annotated transcript is incredible, especially where it documents the sheer human error that contributed to the crash. I didn't fly till I was 18 and had a couple of bad experiences early on, and until a couple of years ago I needed Xanax every time I flew. Whenever we hit turbulence I have to run through a list of reminders in my head to stay calm - the plane is more than equipped to handle bumps, this is really common, I'm more likely to die in a car crash, we'll be back to smooth skies in a few minutes, the flight crew is skilled and knows exactly what they're doing, etc. Obviously shit happens and pilots are human, but reading that play-by-play in stark detail is a tough reminder that sometimes things just go wrong.

I'm going to Germany this summer on an A330. Probably gonna have to renew that Xanax prescription.

I don’t like flying very much.  I used to take a Xanax to deal with it.  Now I take a Xanax to deal with the other passengers.

[statsman 5470]

To me, the worst part was the auto system blaring, “Stall!     Stall!      Stall!” and the crew (at least, the one with primary control) still not clueing in that they were stalling. 

Edited March 24, 2022 by statsman

[Bobby_Batronic 1994]

The sad thing is that the A330 was likely trying to pitch its nose down the entire time, but was unable to because it was in alternate law. In that flight logic regime the high and low speed protections become “stabilities” that the pilot can override with load factor protection being the only remaining operative protection from the normal law flight logic. 
 

The other thing is that pitch and power is taught in the bus. At least for level flight. But confusion reigned supreme. 

[Bobby_Batronic 1994]

4 minutes ago, statsman said:

To me, the worst part was the auto system blaring, “Stall!     Stall!      Stall!” and the crew (at least, the one with primary control) still not clueing in that they were stalling. 

The initial airspeed indication discrepancy led them to believe that their instrumentation was wrong so they disregarded the warning. 

[DalTxHornFan 3101]

2 minutes ago, Bobby_Batronic said:

The initial airspeed indication discrepancy led them to believe that their instrumentation was wrong so they disregarded the warning. 

And to think that Charles Lindbergh made it all the way to Paris with none of that stuff! 

[Bobby_Batronic 1994]

4 minutes ago, DalTxHornFan said:

And to think that Charles Lindbergh made it all the way to Paris with none of that stuff! 

He had a lot of French and German pipe to lay and was motivated. 

[statsman 5470]

Su

7 minutes ago, Bobby_Batronic said:

The initial airspeed indication discrepancy led them to believe that their instrumentation was wrong so they disregarded the warning. 

Sure, but this was several minutes in. Every other indication (altitude, attitude, velocity) indicated a stall. The system was shouting “Stall!” at them. And yet, the one guy with control couldn’t figure out what was going on. It would be funny if it wasn’t tragic. 

[RPM 26320]

7 minutes ago, DalTxHornFan said:

And to think that Charles Lindbergh made it all the way to Paris with none of that stuff! 

He didn't even have a windshield.

[Bobby_Batronic 1994]

7 minutes ago, statsman said:

Su

Sure, but this was several minutes in. Every other indication (altitude, attitude, velocity) indicated a stall. The system was shouting “Stall!” at them. And yet, the one guy with control couldn’t figure out what was going on. It would be funny if it wasn’t tragic. 

I know.  Not absolving them. But it’s interesting where the mind will go or what initial bias it will accept when under duress despite all indications to the contrary.

 Sounds like at least two of the three were poorly rested as well. 

[Pato del Muerto 52498]

30 minutes ago, Bobby_Batronic said:

The initial airspeed indication discrepancy led them to believe that their instrumentation was wrong so they disregarded the warning. 

The plane figured out that the airspeed indicators began matching up again. (The pilots didn’t, or chose to continue disbelieving them) But that didn’t/doesn’t kick it back into normal law?

or by that time was the stall driving the alternate law regime?

Edited March 24, 2022 by Pato del Muerto

[Incredulity 11671]

Quote

Dubois was said to have gotten just one hour of sleep before boarding flight 447.

from the Air France story.

 

That's fucked up.

[Cheeseweasel 26438]

29 minutes ago, statsman said:

Sure, but this was several minutes in. Every other indication (altitude, attitude, velocity) indicated a stall. The system was shouting “Stall!” at them. And yet, the one guy with control couldn’t figure out what was going on. It would be funny if it wasn’t tragic. 

[Bobby_Batronic 1994]

8 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

The plane figured out that the airspeed indicators began matching up again. (The pilots didn’t, or chose to continue disbelieving them) But that didn’t/doesn’t kick it back into normal law?

or by that time was the stall driving the alternate law regime?

All the buses think a little differently. Even within the same family.  
 

The 320 series can go back to normal law if the pilots intentionally degrade it. But not  if it degrades on its own. Basically, in the case of an airspeed or AOA issue, the plane knows there’s bad data and doesn’t want it reintroduced into the system. 
 

Having said that, they were pretty continually in a stall condition with large bank angles in addition to having an initial speed discrepancy which probably had them In the A330 version of abnormal attitude law which is alternate law for unusual attitude recovery. That’s a guess based on my understanding of A320 family logic.

So, to answer your question, no, I don’t think the plane reverted to normal law. And probably wouldn’t have even if they exited the stall condition. There are multiple indications on the primary flight display and the ECAM display telling the pilots they are not in normal law. I’m not sure any of them noticed. 
 

In the perfect Monday morning  QB saves the day scenario they realize the discrepancy and the stall they created, complete the high altitude upset procedure described above and set pitch and power for level flight at a safe speed. In an A320 family plane 85% N1 and 2-3 degrees of pitch is level and 245 knots indicated speed at 35,000 feet for example. Then figure out what happened, check on the cabin, change underwear and RTB. 

[Incredulity 11671]

Now a smell of ozone started to seep into the cockpit, a not unusual phenomenon when flying through highly charged thunder clouds. But Bonin didn’t seem to recognize it, and it was making him nervous. The ozone, the Saint Elmo’s fire, the storms — none of it was out of the ordinary for a transatlantic crossing, but for some reason it was starting to get to him.

 

also,

 

At this point Captain Dubois decided it was time to turn in for the night. He rang the call button to summon First Officer Robert from the bunk room. To Bonin, he said, “Er, who’s doing the landing, is it you? Well, he’s going to take my place. You’re a PL, right?”

 

 

What an asshole.

[smuggs 9353]

1 minute ago, Incredulity said:

Now a smell of ozone started to seep into the cockpit, a not unusual phenomenon when flying through highly charged thunder clouds. But Bonin didn’t seem to recognize it, and it was making him nervous. The ozone, the Saint Elmo’s fire, the storms — none of it was out of the ordinary for a transatlantic crossing, but for some reason it was starting to get to him.

 

[Gatorubet 30238]

1 hour ago, Incredulity said:

from the Air France story.

“Dubois was said to have gotten just one hour of sleep before boarding flight 447.“

That's fucked up.

[HiggyBaby 2529]

SIAP but the dive to 10,000’ could also be the result of an emergency descent hence the attempted level out. If the situation was unrecoverable due to a major control system it would explain the continued dive.

[gmr548 16580]

I have no idea. I didn’t even bring up Max (and have no idea why he did) and have literally zero idea what either he is talking about nor what you are talking about, so… the only thing I was interested in was this particular incident and if he thought it was intentional or not. Thought people here might be interested (and it matches what other pilots on here seem to say- which I would have no idea of knowing if they are right or not). 
I’m also pretty sure that he knows way more about flying an airplane than you do and way less than some other people do. I’m not particularly interested in having a super star nba player coach my team, nor a baseball HOF’er as my general manager as being in an industry doesn’t make you an expert in all the goings on in said industry, but in a scenario where I know nothing and someone else knows something I’m not against asking for their POV. 
And with that I will bow out of this conversation as I know less than nothing about any of this shit and thought I’d pass along something from someone the board might be interested in. 

lol relax, no one said your brother wasn’t knowledgeable or that you shouldn’t have shared. The Max bit, unprompted as you mentioned, was funny. That’s it.

There's a reason they put "do not eat" on those silicone / charcoal packages they use to reduce humidity in packaging.

[Wulaw Horn 19070]

36 minutes ago, gmr548 said:

lol relax, no one said your brother wasn’t knowledgeable or that you shouldn’t have shared. The Max bit, unprompted as you mentioned, was funny. That’s it.

I'd never even heard of the Max thing.  After he said "definitely intentional" I said- you sure- they grounded all those planes like maybe there was a defect (this was above where I got that screen shot), and then he went on, what I thought was a complete non-sequitar, about foreign pilots, "and that max thing". Then you responded with the Boeing thing and I became even more confused, and wondered if he was full of shit as that seemed to be what you were implying.  So I googled, the first article I read was that longcat NYT article (which was really fascinating) and I was like- OK- I see why that's his take on it.  Seems like Boeing believes in pilots and their skills and Air Bus thinks they are all a bunch of monkeys to be overcome- so I could see why as a pilot who values his own skills he could come down on that side of the fence.  Crashes and catastrophes are almost always fascinating to read about b/c for a big fuck up it usually reads like- here are the 10 things that went wrong, all of them had to go wrong, or we would have never had the catastrophe.  And that probably makes sense if you think about it b/c we don't see planes crashing all the time, or even often at all, so you have to get a large confluence of events to synch up in just the right way for that kind of thing to happen. 

[Hanrahan 1306]

Do you even manually trim, bro?

[Guest]

So after 4-5 days there's still no better idea of what might have happened? Feel like about now you start to get some sort of direction that the evidence is pointing.

[JesusSweatDuck 17781]

3 minutes ago, FirstTimeCaller said:

So after 4-5 days there's still no better idea of what might have happened? Feel like about now you start to get some sort of direction that the evidence is pointing.

One word, China

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, JesusSweatDuck said:

One word, China

Actually it has crossed my mind of what if this is pilot suicide? Is that something that would ever be admitted there?

[Cheeseweasel 26438]

32 minutes ago, FirstTimeCaller said:

Actually it has crossed my mind of what if this is pilot suicide? Is that something that would ever be admitted there?

Taiwan's fault.

[smuggs 9353]

53 minutes ago, Hanrahan said:

Do you even manually trim, bro?

Nah, I switched to an electric scrote shaver with modern avionics.

[babysdaddy 2724]

the black box is going to reveal the Chinese pilots were cool calm and collected and it was the American manufactured plane that was the problem.  It will also hold the actual physical bat that started Covid 19 however they destroyed it.

[austingirl 2191]

10 hours ago, conVINCEd said:

I don’t like flying very much.  I used to take a Xanax to deal with it.  Now I take a Xanax to deal with the other passengers.

Yeah, I'm going on an exchange trip with a bunch of 4th and 5th graders and their parents so that prescription was going to get renewed anyway.

[conVINCEd 21469]

11 minutes ago, austingirl said:

Yeah, I'm going on an exchange trip with a bunch of 4th and 5th graders and their parents so that prescription was going to get renewed anyway.

Bless you.  My wife’s an elementary school teacher.  I couldn’t do it any younger than high school, and it’s still not something I would sign up for if I had better options.  I go and read to my wife’s class every so often, and that is enough for me.  No idea how she does it on a daily basis.

[Brisketexan 105139]

Bless you.  My wife’s an elementary school teacher.  I couldn’t do it any younger than high school, and it’s still not something I would sign up for if I had better options.  I go and read to my wife’s class every so often, and that is enough for me.  No idea how she does it on a daily basis.

She has a man who helps her work out her frustrations.
That man is not you.

[austingirl 2191]

28 minutes ago, conVINCEd said:

Bless you.  My wife’s an elementary school teacher.  I couldn’t do it any younger than high school, and it’s still not something I would sign up for if I had better options.  I go and read to my wife’s class every so often, and that is enough for me.  No idea how she does it on a daily basis.

Oh blessed Christ, I'm not a teacher - AISD has a sister city in Germany and my son's elementary does an exchange with a school in Koblenz. He and I worked hard on his application and he was one the kids picked to go, so that's why I'm going. I do marketing for a tech company and would be an awful teacher. I know this because my husband is a teacher and once, years ago, I was unhappy with my job and considered a career change, so he got me to help chaperone a field trip to the TX capitol, knowing I'd get over that really quickly. He was correct.

[conVINCEd 21469]

25 minutes ago, austingirl said:

Oh blessed Christ, I'm not a teacher - AISD has a sister city in Germany and my son's elementary does an exchange with a school in Koblenz. He and I worked hard on his application and he was one the kids picked to go, so that's why I'm going. I do marketing for a tech company and would be an awful teacher. I know this because my husband is a teacher and once, years ago, I was unhappy with my job and considered a career change, so he got me to help chaperone a field trip to the TX capitol, knowing I'd get over that really quickly. He was correct.

Your still a brave soul to chaperone a field trip to Germany.

48 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

She has a man who helps her work out her frustrations.
That man is not you.

If I wasn’t busy making sure a bunch of possums are relocated from my house to somewhere other than my house in a humane way I would come up with a longer, more witty response.

Imagine we are having a few drinks, shooting the shit, and generally having a good time when you drop that.

🖕

 

[dcar00 14208]

6 hours ago, FirstTimeCaller said:

Actually it has crossed my mind of what if this is pilot suicide? Is that something that would ever be admitted there?

pretty much nope. but if Boeing is blamed they are going to want to get all the data.

[NotActuallyALonghorn 4976]

12 hours ago, Wulaw Horn said:

I'd never even heard of the Max thing.  After he said "definitely intentional" I said- you sure- they grounded all those planes like maybe there was a defect (this was above where I got that screen shot), and then he went on, what I thought was a complete non-sequitar, about foreign pilots, "and that max thing". Then you responded with the Boeing thing and I became even more confused, and wondered if he was full of shit as that seemed to be what you were implying.  So I googled, the first article I read was that longcat NYT article (which was really fascinating) and I was like- OK- I see why that's his take on it.  Seems like Boeing believes in pilots and their skills and Air Bus thinks they are all a bunch of monkeys to be overcome- so I could see why as a pilot who values his own skills he could come down on that side of the fence.  Crashes and catastrophes are almost always fascinating to read about b/c for a big fuck up it usually reads like- here are the 10 things that went wrong, all of them had to go wrong, or we would have never had the catastrophe.  And that probably makes sense if you think about it b/c we don't see planes crashing all the time, or even often at all, so you have to get a large confluence of events to synch up in just the right way for that kind of thing to happen. 

Swiss cheese, yo!

[nedtugent 28]

I got the substack paywall blues.....

anyone? anyone?

https://quoththeraven.substack.com/p/boeings-bizarre-reaction-to-the-mysterious

[austingirl 2191]

Boeing 737 crash in southern China was among the fastest jetliner descents ever recorded

[gsoda3 3261]

I saw earlier today they found a piece of the plane six miles from the crash site which could mean it experienced a mechanical failure instead of pilot sabotage.

[DalTxHornFan 3101]

9 minutes ago, gsoda3 said:

I saw earlier today they found a piece of the plane six miles from the crash site which could mean it experienced a mechanical failure instead of pilot sabotage.

Look at the video.  There is clearly some stuff that broke off once the plane was at terminal velocity.  A plume following the plane.  And the story I read said that it was 6 kilometers, not miles. 

[Steel Shank 9425]

On 3/24/2022 at 9:15 AM, Bobby_Batronic said:

He had a lot of French and German pipe to lay and was motivated. 

fuckin' a

[Judge Roybeanbag 11819]

5 minutes ago, DalTxHornFan said:

Look at the video.  There is clearly some stuff that broke off once the plane was at terminal velocity.  A plume following the plane.  And the story I read said that it was 6 kilometers, not miles. 

6 kilometers?  That’s like 3.3 pounds, two rods and a stone, right? So forty seven yards?

Edited March 26, 2022 by Judge Roybeanbag

[Macanudo 12978]

On 3/24/2022 at 9:19 AM, RPM said:

He didn't even have a windshield.

Oh, I bet he had some protection with him.

[futureman 22462]

8 minutes ago, DalTxHornFan said:

Look at the video.  There is clearly some stuff that broke off once the plane was at terminal velocity.  A plume following the plane.  And the story I read said that it was 6 kilometers, not miles. 

kilometers, miles… it’s still far enough way, if it’s true. 

[gsoda3 3261]

Look at the video.  There is clearly some stuff that broke off once the plane was at terminal velocity.  A plume following the plane.  And the story I read said that it was 6 kilometers, not miles. 

Oh it could have been kms.

What video was it? There was one circulating a couple days after the crash of a plane going straight down to the ground without its stabilizer but that was an old video from another instance.

[DalTxHornFan 3101]

16 minutes ago, gsoda3 said:

Oh it could have been kms.

What video was it? There was one circulating a couple days after the crash of a plane going straight down to the ground without its stabilizer but that was an old video from another instance.

No. The one that I posted up thread.  Titled final seconds of #MU5735.  Look at around 12-14 seconds.  Definitely some debris following that plane.

 

[bschoolprof 6254]

Parts of the plane would be breaking off even if the descent was pilot commanded (which is sounding increasingly likely). All sorts of shit is gonna start coming off when you exceed the speed it was designed for. 

[Your Mom 4806]

The NTSB has been invited to participate in the investigation. They are typically very candid in their findings and their recommendations are often at odds with the FAA and industry groups. It’ll be interesting to see what kind of access they actually get here. 

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/1-china-invites-ntsb-participate-190138914.html

[52-80 19157]

On 3/24/2022 at 3:00 PM, statsman said:

To me, the worst part was the auto system blaring, “Stall!     Stall!      Stall!” and the crew (at least, the one with primary control) still not clueing in that they were stalling. 

this is why they've changed the audio warning on newer airplanes

 

[ClubWhatever 12144]

Tired of waiting on the Chinese.  I plotted the position and altitude data from flightradar24 (I don't trust the vertical speed data).  It appears to show a sudden heading change (yaw event) before the loss in altitude, then another one immediately before the descent, then a third one just after the descent began.  So we have a guy stomping on the rudder pedals?  What else could do this?

[Captainant 27667]

4 minutes ago, ClubWhatever said:

So we have a guy stomping on the rudder pedals?  What else could do this?

Looking like either that, a mechanical failure, or a new """Boeing safety feature""" like MCAS that they didn't tell anyone about until it broke. Very interested to see the FAA/NTSB investigation findings

[Bobby_Batronic 1994]

There are no “new Boeing safety features” on an -800. 

[Captainant 27667]

There sure aren't, but then again there "weren't any new safety features" on the MAX either until Boeing notified everyone about MCAS.

 

My point is - I don't trust MacDouglas/Boeing or any of their own investigation team or cheerleaders. I'd rather see the actual investigation results before discussing across 4 pages how stupid and inept non-American pilots are - especially after we've already done this before in the MAX thread