Colgan Air

[B1900 Mech]

What ever happened to the Captain that didn't set the parking breaks in the Saab?

 

[Thurman Merman]

Holy ********************! Are you kidding me? Well other than pushing the wrong buttons and not knowing how to fly their plane, things are great? Are you ********************ing serious? Don't the captains have type ratings? Maintenance reliability is better once people know which buttons to push? I am speechless

Have you ever flown the Q400? no. Do you understand the logic in the software? no. Flight Safety, the folks doing our training, has had the same issue. Most of these guys have not flown the Q400 but have flown the 100, 200, 300 which are different beasts. Also complicating the matter is the logic in the software has changed and the batch that Colgan has been getting are initial aircraft with this change. As Flight Safety has become more aware of these paticular issues, these nuiscance problems have gone away because Captains are not having to be taught on the fly. Flight Safety is finally doing their job.

These issues would be mostly non existent if Colgan was conducting in house training, but with every aircraft purchase comes free type ratings. Another thing to take into account, most guys transitioning to the Q have 3000+ hours in the Saab where a computer wasn't watching their every move. Our guys have been doing a great job moving airplanes, and the minor issues are going away.

I'm not sure of your experience, but in our case we are transitioning to a completely different type of airplane. It's not like going from a ERJ to a CRJ. We are going from 80's technology to turn of the century technology. The issues I have mentioned are not safety issues but more of annoyances. They are shut down the system and reboot issues which, if I'm not mistaken, happened to the E170 when it first came online.

 

[Thurman Merman]

...and we are starting the engines properly. The GPU can power the whole system with the batteries off and there is really no cue to the pilot except battery position or the annunciator panel which is a complete mess if you have ever sat in a Dash. It is common practice to turn off the batts at the gate because occasionally there is a discharge with a weak GPU. In the saab we could sit on batts for an hour plus, in this thing it's more like 15-20 min.

So the issues cropping up are common among all the new Q400 operators. When I was in Toronto at the delivery center other operators voiced the same problems.

If you were at XJT as a Captain when they transitioned from ATR's to ERJ's I'm sure there were similiar issues.

 

[suupah]

the Q is like a young gf. One lil mistake and you are going to be grounded.....for a while. Oh, and it never forgets. It doesn't note anything you do well or right but when you screw even the smallest thing up, it goes into long term memory and the incident may be used against you when you least expect it. The only way out of your screw up in the short term is to send her to the spa (MX). Before every flight you have to do all these things to get her ready. She demands all this attention and other people want to fly her. What a pain in the A$$.

The saab was like the no frills cougar. Almost nothing would get in the way of a good flight. She may not have some of the whiz bang features of the younger model but she is ready to fly on a moments notice with minimal set up, doesn't complain and can keep a secret.

 

[Turtlesfly]

...and we are starting the engines properly. The GPU can power the whole system with the batteries off and there is really no cue to the pilot except battery position or the annunciator panel which is a complete mess if you have ever sat in a Dash. It is common practice to turn off the batts at the gate because occasionally there is a discharge with a weak GPU. In the saab we could sit on batts for an hour plus, in this thing it's more like 15-20 min.

So the issues cropping up are common among all the new Q400 operators. When I was in Toronto at the delivery center other operators voiced the same problems.

If you were at XJT as a Captain when they transitioned from ATR's to ERJ's I'm sure there were similiar issues.

well okay, but that wasn't what you said in the original post. You said that crews are ********************ing up by not hitting the right buttons or knowing what to do in the right order. To then say it's the airplane's fault because it's complicated is to change the topic. I was just amazed at your own initial description of why the reliability problem.

 

[Snaab]

the Q is like a young gf. One lil mistake and you are going to be grounded.....for a while. Oh, and it never forgets. It doesn't note anything you do well or right but when you screw even the smallest thing up, it goes into long term memory and the incident may be used against you when you least expect it. The only way out of your screw up in the short term is to send her to the spa (MX). Before every flight you have to do all these things to get her ready. She demands all this attention and other people want to fly her. What a pain in the A$$.

The saab was like the no frills cougar. Almost nothing would get in the way of a good flight. She may not have some of the whiz bang features of the younger model but she is ready to fly on a moments notice with minimal set up, doesn't complain and can keep a secret.

Ditto what he said!!! That's dead-on right. Long live COUGARS!! Meow!

 

[Thurman Merman]

well okay, but that wasn't what you said in the original post. You said that crews are ********************ing up by not hitting the right buttons or knowing what to do in the right order. To then say it's the airplane's fault because it's complicated is to change the topic. I was just amazed at your own initial description of why the reliability problem.

My first post and that post are intertwined. Crews were not given the proper information in Flight Safety training. The first time they heard about it was IOE, so the muscle memory wasn't ingrained in them during training.

 

[ShyFlyGuy]

What ever happened to the Captain that didn't set the parking breaks in the Saab?

Are you talking about the old grouch who couldn't set the breaks because he was weak? The same guy who would "set" the breaks (even though the "PARK BREAK" light never illuminated) while behind a CO 737 who was holding short of 22 in LGA? The guy who, when the CO 737 was told to expedite across 22, didn't anticipate the thrust made by the 737 and got blown back at an uncomfortable speed toward the AirTran 717 behind him and sent the nose airborne when he slammed on the breaks to arrest the negative progress that the Saab was making? THAT Captain?

Never heard of him.

Shy

 

[TheAlchemist]

Yes, because the aircraft was crap because Embraer was near BK when we purchased them - and our ops engineering department saved them and that airplane. This is why we still have patents on the plane. The engines were shutting down on us - and not because we were pushing all the wrong buttons, thank you very much. Not knowing how to start an engine properly is far from "never making a mistake."

I think the only E-145 operators to have this "minor" problem was ExpressJet and if I'm not mistaking it was for not following "reset then alternate" after engine start.

 

[Mr Wu]

"PARK BREAK" light

There's the problem. He was probably looking for the parking brake light.