New WSJ article on awful Pilot Pay in Colgan crash

[tailhookah]

She was "out to lunch", and the CA should have been weeded out a long time ago. The end.

Yes I agree... just trying to point out that raising the flaps was a rookie move and stupid... he was balled up as well... he was as usefull as a fur lined sink.

Tailhookah

 

[fam62c]

This whole thing is a shame but it seems like the root cause was simply lack of situational awareness by allowing the plane to get very slow. Icing conditions at low altitudes in a turboprop are a good time to be extra careful. This is the third major Part 121 crash I can think of with a turboprop in icing conditions in the great lakes area. Two of these crashes (this one and a Brasilia in the Detroit area) had very similiar circumstances. It almost sounds like if they had just added power, left the configuration alone and let the pusher shove the nose down that the plane would have kept flying. I haven't looked at the specifics all that closely so my opinion could be incorrect.

Having said that, I (and I'll bet most of us who are honest and have enough hours in the left seat to have been around the block a time or two) can think of a few times during my career where I was not paying attention or did something I should not have. Most of us have done things we later realized were less than safe but got away with them and leaned from the experience. This crew was in the wrong place at the wrong time and did the wrong thing and didn't get away with it. The job can get so routine sometimes that it's easy to get complacent; we must all make an effort to guard against that and this is an unfortunate reminder. It's a tragedy and I feel terrible for the people who lost their lives and their families.

 

[firstthird]

. just trying to point out that raising the flaps was a rookie move and stupid.

so was throwing down gear, flaps, changing the prop condition levers, all w/o adding power.

you are stuck on saying she made a mistake. yes, she did. she was a rookie. he was supposed to be the experienced one in the cockpit but of all the mistakes in this chain, hers was the least important.

As is the case in most significant accidents, there was a chain of events. she was a link but of all the lessons to come out of this "don't move the flaps when you're at 90 aob and 50 knots below Vref" probably won't be in the top 5. Stuff like Colgan should really do a PRIA check to see if applicants are lying when they apply. fatigue. training. I'm sure there will be something about tailplane icing indicators need to be drilled as much if not more than what you do if you suspect you have it. there are many lessons in this tragedy. but this flap thing isn't one of the big ones.

 

[j3driver]

firstthird wrote:



Look at the video of the NTSB recreation off the black box Chuck Yeager. You'll see that he got them into the stall... he was keeping the plane shiny side up and fighting it but it all went to hell went she put the flaps up at around 95 kias... he was screwed after that...

He got them into it... she killed them all. Just my opinion. I'll wait until the final report in about 8 months to tell you I told you so.

Tailhookah

I hope your kidding!

 

[Dizel8]

Seems to me, that the failure to maintain appropiate airspeed from the point they lowered the gear was the major cause.

The question becomes why, was it due to lack of SA due to fattigue or just lack of SA?

In a previous company, we discussed the Connie Kalitta crash at Gitmo, which was mostly caused by fattigue. Even though the other crewmembers, FO and FE, was telling the CA that he was getting slow, he stated that he was tired and wasn't paying attention to what they were saying or what the a/c was doing.

In this case, it would seem that fattigue may have been a factor as would lack of experience.

As the saying goes, in this bussiness, one starts out with two buckets, one low on experience, one full of luck, hopefully neither will ever become empty.

 

[jonjuan]

I hope your kidding!

No he's not kidding. He's so convinced that the retraction of the flaps doomed them, it's scary. CRM with him/her must be fun.

 

[Lear70]

I agree in spirit, 'Hooker, that hers was the final mistake in the chain of events with yanking the flaps. However, at the end of the day, I don't think that's what killed them. I'm pretty sure they were done when he got the pusher, sadly enough.

It almost sounds like if they had just added power, left the configuration alone and let the pusher shove the nose down that the plane would have kept flying. I haven't looked at the specifics all that closely so my opinion could be incorrect.

The problem was their low altitude. At 2,500 AGL I don't think I'd have let the pusher shove the nose FULL over, either. Probably would have mashed the disconnect about the time I was passing through nose-level, rather than let the thing start descending at 4,000-6,000 fpm with 10-12 degrees nose-down (which is about what the pusher will push to - seen it in the sim on other Bombardier products doing high altitude stall recovery after 3701 at PCL).

Once he got the pusher, he had a very narrow window of recovery. If you let the pusher activate fully and wait for it to stop pushing, you hit the ground in 20 seconds unless you override it sometime before you hit and pull it out, hopefully with enough airspeed to fly out,,, or,,,

You override the pusher at 2-3 degrees nose-up (not 20) and hope it flies out of the stall as you're losing 1,500-2,000 fpm and have about 40-50 seconds before impact for the plane to get enough airspeed to level out.

At that altitude, you'd better be Chuck Yeager when the pusher actuates. What was that someone posted earlier about "experience hopefully keeps us out of situations where we are called upon to demonstrate exceptional flying skills"...?

 

[Linedriver]

I have never flown this airplane but I can guarantee you guys the glaring problem isn't the retraction of the flaps. The most alarming thing to me is that this captain's reaction to an iminent stall is to pitch 20+ degrees in an effort to correct it. This is basic aviation and stall recovery should be second nature.

If anyone encounters this in the future, simple gouge here: Cram the throttles up to the stops and give up 2-3 degrees. Worry about the trashed engines when you get on the ground.

If this captain had used the correct procedure the flap retraction would have been inconseqential.

 

[Superpilot92]

I have never flown this airplane but I can guarantee you guys the glaring problem isn't the retraction of the flaps. The most alarming thing to me is that this captain's reaction to an iminent stall is to pitch 20+ degrees in an effort to correct it. This is basic aviation and stall recovery should be second nature.

If anyone encounters this in the future, simple gouge here: Cram the throttles up into the instrument panel and give up 2-3 degrees. Worry about the trashed engines when you get on the ground.

If this captain had used the correct procedure the flap retraction would have been inconseqential.

Agreed, nose level, full power and clean up on schedule followed by an asap and end of story.

 

[ACL65PILOT]

The only time I can ever imagine "Pulling on a Pusher" is in wind shear with ground contact imminent, but only slightly. Not like this.
Also many operators show you how to turn off the pusher if you are getting it incorrectly. Nowhere is there training to react like this.

 

[ACL65PILOT]

Super that was my thought. She was reacting to a Go-around or a recovery after being in the stall. They were nowhere near either of those.

 

[tailhookah]

The flap retraction killed them... if the flaps had been left down the plane wouldn't have departed so violently and they would've had a pretty good chance to pull it out. Right wing down, nose down and airspeed rapidly increasing, they would've had the knots to transition to a nose low unusual attitude... but w/ the flaps coming up all bets were off. The plane rapidly departed and fliped over which doomed them to a bad outcome. When you stall an airplane you don't change configuration until you are coming out of it... end of post.

Tailhookah

PS- I never have said that the CA didn't get them into it... the FO didn't help out and probably doomed the flight to a heinous ending.

 

[Lear70]

http://ntsb.gov/Events/2009/Buffalo-NY/AnimationDescription.htm

Right now the server must be flooded or down, I can't even ping the site,,,

Waiting to take a closer look of the exact timing of the flaps and the roll excursion.

 

[Linedriver]

http://ntsb.gov/Events/2009/Buffalo-NY/AnimationDescription.htm

Right now the server must be flooded or down, I can't even ping the site,,,

Waiting to take a closer look of the exact timing of the flaps and the roll excursion.

It's on Youtube.com as well.

 

[Linedriver]

The flap retraction killed them... if the flaps had been left down the plane wouldn't have departed so violently and they would've had a pretty good chance to pull it out. Right wing down, nose down and airspeed rapidly increasing, they would've had the knots to transition to a nose low unusual attitude... but w/ the flaps coming up all bets were off. The plane rapidly departed and fliped over which doomed them to a bad outcome. When you stall an airplane you don't change configuration until you are coming out of it... end of post.

Tailhookah

PS- I never have said that the CA didn't get them into it... the FO didn't help out and probably doomed the flight to a heinous ending.

I looked at the animation again. I don't disagree in that the flap retraction lost them a few knots of stall protection but the captain pitched, at one point, to 32 degrees and his airspeed was momentarily in the 70's. He wasn't stopping.

I will bet that while the flap retraction may have aggravated the condition, the investigation will show his technique to be the proximate cause of this accident.

 

[Lear70]

Thanks, just took a closer look at it.

There's a moment where, at 2,000', the airplane goes wings level at a little over 100 kts. There's a SLIM possibility, IF the flaps had still been at 10 (they never got to 15 as commanded, she stopped them at 10 as the shaker actuated just as she put in the flaps), they MIGHT have flown out of it at that point with the pitch and roll angle.

However, with flaps up, 102 kts just wasn't going to stay shiny side up.

I'm sure some Colgan guys are in the sim right this second testing the theory. Duplicate every step including the 90 degree rollover, but leave the flaps at 10 and see if it's recoverable... Even so, real life might have made him overcorrect again or yank it back into a stall even if she'd left the flaps at 10.

We'll just never know, and it's his fault for not powering up after he put the condition levers full forward with the gear down. Thing slowed like a lead sled as soon as he did that and directly caused the dramatic airspeed falloff and stall.

 

[firstthird]

http://ntsb.gov/Events/2009/Buffalo-NY/AnimationDescription.htm
Waiting to take a closer look of the exact timing of the flaps and the roll excursion.

on the youtube version, it shows flaps up at 22:16:36 and the final roll excursion was at :48.

they were in an over 90 aob to the right as the flaps came up, went back 45 to the left, to the right again.

the thing that really sticks out if you watch it a few times is how much nose up pitch the captain held throughout most of the event. 20 and 30 degrees. against the pusher much of the time.

not really sure about the full rudder pedal swings either. they seem to be aggravating the turns.

scary video to watch. not sure this 'flaps up' was the problem discussion is helpful but I think it was tangential to this mishap.

 

[puddlejumper101]

We all know his recovery, or lack of, caused the crash. However, I believe the real culprit here is fatigue. Both of them where dead tired. F/O and Capt. commuted in, and neither of them had any sleep. Compound that with Colgan's horrible QOL and scheduling practices. A long duty day, tricky approach and any one of us would be completely out of it. SA caused this accident. Their lack of SA also crashed this airplane. I hate that it happened but like someone said earlier finally the whole world will see what some of these Regionals put these guys through (Colgan, Mesa, Gulfstream, Great Lakes). I was at ASA and I thought their QOL was pretty bad. To think they were on the higher end of the QOL spectrum when it comes to Regionals. Lack of experience componded with lack of SA will cause an accident. Being tired and experienced (which we have all done at some point) saves our rears sometimes. Inexperienced and tired? This accident has been in the making for years.

 

[BrickTop]

Hopefully all this sh** comes to a head. The gov't wants more experienced pilots at the controls? Force minimum compensation to attract more experienced talent. Continue to pay $17-25K a year and all that talent is going to go overseas (Middle East, Asia, etc...)

Until the FAA mandates hiring minimumns of 3000-4000hrs at regionals and the only way to attain that type of experience is compensation, nothing is going to change.

 

[BrickTop]

I have never flown this airplane but I can guarantee you guys the glaring problem isn't the retraction of the flaps. The most alarming thing to me is that this captain's reaction to an iminent stall is to pitch 20+ degrees in an effort to correct it. This is basic aviation and stall recovery should be second nature.

If anyone encounters this in the future, simple gouge here: Cram the throttles up to the stops and give up 2-3 degrees. Worry about the trashed engines when you get on the ground.

If this captain had used the correct procedure the flap retraction would have been inconseqential.

They misinterpreted this as an icing tail-plane stall which would have been the correct procedure. After the conversation of heavy icing what would your initial response be.......