Ground the Q400

[N813CA]

I have flown the Dash 8 100-300. It was the best airplane I have flown in icing conditions. For what it is worth.

 

[Lynxman]

If lynx is flying them in Denver safely what does that say? Well I shouldn't just say Denver but all over that area. Mind you the northeast is a hell of a bad area in the winter time, but still things happen to the best of people it was just their time. Their forever flying in a way better place than we are in now. It's obvious they worked until the end if they were pulling the gear and flaps up. If I had to put money on it the minute it started to pitch and roll that gear and flaps were coming back up. Props to a good crew that probably didn't know exactly how much ice they had on them and followed sop with the gear and flaps coming down when appropriate and trying to correct the problem instantly. Unfortunatly it was too late. Don't deny they did their best.

 

[Captain Morgan]

Fellow boilermaker,

Hows about we let the NTSB do their job before we start proclaiming for an entire airframe to be scrapped, eh?

But since you're talking about grounding airplanes, Let's ground the CRJ while we're at it. It has a long history of flap problems, one of which nearly killed a whole bunch of Jazz passengers a couple years ago. Well...that and the whole "engines core-locking" thing.

And 737s...their rudders have this nasty habit of "hardover" in flight causing loss of control; its killed a whole bunch of people too.

And Airbusses...their composite tails snap off in light wake turbulence.

And Beechjets...they turn into gliders with large power reductions from high altitude, resulting in at least one deadstick landing.

Yes, tail stalls are scary...they are insidious in their occurance, and even when demonstrated in the simulator are terrifying. But let's not throw the perverboal baby out with the bathwater before we know more about this...after all, Horizon and Lynx have been flying megawhackers for a long time and haven't had any crash yet.

Let the experts do their job.

I agree. Isn't flying inherently dangerous anyways? There isn't any reason for purdue pilot guy to point fingers at gross negligence on the part of the manufacturer. Getting into bad ice happens, you just have to know when to get out. Sometimes you don't have a way out, and sometimes you do the best you can. If you want a 100% safe environment, stay on the ground and push some paper for a living.

 

[FO 4 Life]

Yeah, that was Eagle. COEX flew them out of EWR, DEN and CLE for years without any problems. LOF was flying them out of STL...lots of snow and ice there.
EGF TEMPORARILY moved a/c while things were being straightened out. The ATR was back at ORD as soon as they were allowed back into IMC. NO ATR was permitted to fly in icing conditions during this time. I remember being rerouted on a GSO-GSP flight back in DEC of '95 because it was cold, rainy and the flight was an ATR-42 (COEX). The flight was canceled.
Get your facts straight.

Just so I get my facts straight, I should've said ATR 72. What did COEX have, 3 of them?

How's this,
"In the years following this accident, AMR Corporation stopped using its American Eagle ATRs out of its northern hubs and moved them to their southern and Caribbean hubs in Dallas, Texas; Miami, Florida and San Juan, Puerto Rico to alleviate potential icing problems in the future. Other U.S. former ATR operators, particularly the SkyWest, Inc. subsidiary and Delta Connection operator Atlantic Southeast Airlines, operated ATR-72 aircraft in areas where icing conditions were not common."

or

"After a period of mandatory grounding, American Eagle and Delta Connection permanently stopped using the plane on temperate routes."

What else would you like Alice?

 

[LowlyPropCapt]

Just so I get my facts straight, I should've said ATR 72. What did COEX have, 3 of them?

How's this,
"In the years following this accident, AMR Corporation stopped using its American Eagle ATRs out of its northern hubs and moved them to their southern and Caribbean hubs in Dallas, Texas; Miami, Florida and San Juan, Puerto Rico to alleviate potential icing problems in the future. Other U.S. former ATR operators, particularly the SkyWest, Inc. subsidiary and Delta Connection operator Atlantic Southeast Airlines, operated ATR-72 aircraft in areas where icing conditions were not common."

or

"After a period of mandatory grounding, American Eagle and Delta Connection permanently stopped using the plane on temperate routes."

What else would you like Alice?

...And in 1999 and 2000 I was trucking around in both the ATR42 and ATR72 in the midwest and Great Lakes regions with Trans States. The amazing thing is, I am still alive to tell the tail. I saw alot of ice in those airplanes and I never had one misbehave.

Also recall that the NTSB determined that the ATR72 accident in Roselawn involved a crew that ignored guidence on the use of flaps in icing conditions while holding, as well as SLD that was far in excess of ANY certification requirement then or now. In short, that crew might well have been dead in any type of airplane.

Ya might want to get your facts straight, chief. The move of the ATRs to the warm south was a PR thing. Note they are now back in the contiguous 48 as Saab replacements at AE.

The NTSB will get all of this hashed out. For now it is a good idea to enhance your icing knowlege. I know I will.

 

[LowlyPropCapt]

double post sorry

 

[Balou]

http://aircrafticing.grc.nasa.gov/courses.html

Heres a link to a free course on icing if anyone is interested.

 

[belchfire]

If what people are saying is true, then this airplane is unsafe and needs to be grounded immediately.

What people?

You? Ahhhyeah...Purdue has the highest number of astronauts of any college. You're an expert. You got a well rounded liberal education. Trained as a reactionary alarmist with excellent kneejerk reaction time! Too bad you have to wait another nearly four years to vote for a different kind of "change"!

The talking heads on CNN? Yeah, they're experts just like you ...

An NTSB guy that's talking out of turn? Sheesh, he of all people should know better. I hope he ends up having to eat some of Obama's government cheese while he looks for a new job...


I haven't even heard if all the de/anti icing equipment was fully functional or if the crew was using it properly!

Why don't you just pissoff and wait for the NTSB to finish their investigation?

BTW, wasn't it Colgan (along with Mesa) that dumped a 1900 because of a mis-rigged pitch trim system? Not saying that was the case, I'm saying there are a lot of other things that could be in play here...

Q-400 has been running around for quite some time and I'm not aware of another thing like this happening. Couple of main gear issues-particularly in Europe, but nothing like this. The best icing conditions in the world are found in Western Washington where Horizon flies the heck out of these things!

But no, the experts (like you) here on flyfo know better...

uke:

I'm sorry if any of the friends or families of the passengers or crew end up reading this. All y'all have my condolences and I apologize for Flypurdue's breach of common sense.

 

[RJP]

Let's take a look at Q400 operators that just probably fly in crap/icy weather before we jump on this stupid grounding bandwagon.

Q400 Operators:
Air Baltic
Windroe (Norway)
Austrian
ANA
Croatia
Fly Baboo (Swiss)
FlyBe (UK)
Hydro Quebec
Porter (Canada)

There's more and some are fun and sun only locations but these guys fly in some rubbish weather and continue to do so safely like Lynx and Horizon.

This was an ACCIDENT. Not a reason to ground an airframe.

 

[RJP]

www.q400.com