Pinnacle family members sue NWA!

[DetoXJ]

Having been through my share of regional ground schools, I can say one thing is for sure: the most knowledgeble pilots don't teach ground schools. Ground school is a sanctuary for expecting mothers, recovering drunks, and most other forms of medical issues. I cringe at the idea of going back to several more weeks of ground school, and I nearly faint at the idea of having to teach one. One place I worked had INTERNS who didn't have enough flight time to fly the line teaching ground schools. The blind leading the nearly blind.

Face it. These guys were screwing around at 410 because they didn't even know enough that they didnt know. Whos fault is that? Pinnacles, and every other cost cutting regional airline out there.

Sue their asses off.

p.s. they lost thier sons, now you wish them to be broke as well. geeezzz.

Ground School is to teach book stuff. Indoc, Systems, Limitations. You don't need to be Chuck Yeager to be an effective ground school instructor. Ground school isn't intended to teach airmanship and common sense. Those atributes are a prerequisite to the professional pilot position. Plain and simple, these guys were just clueless. geeezzz!

 

["GO AROUND"]

Noone should be found at fault except the pilots in this case. I doubt GE ever tested the engines at 410, 30 degrees nose up and 75 KIAS. Of course they're gonna flame out and lock with no airflow through them and ITT's of 1250 degrees. The whole reason for the checklist having you maintain a min airspeed of 240 KIAS is to keep the engines rotating not for best glide. They didn't do that and the engines stopped rotating. Fastest they got was 235 KIAS for the windmill start, but mostly it was 170-200 KIAS. Never even got close to 300-330 KIAS for windmill start.

PILOT ERROR is all this was. Maybe Pinnacle training dept. has a little fault but not GE or Bombardier. They are going for the deepest pockets and what their lawyers are telling them. $$$$$$$$$$'s

 

[mesaba2425]

Face it. These guys were screwing around at 410 because they didn't even know enough that they didnt know. Whos fault is that?

You're trying to tell us that they didn't know the Captain sits in the left seat and the FO sits in the right seat????? It's pilot error. Period. There are only two people to blame for this crash.

 

["GO AROUND"]

The NTSB has determined that the turbofan jet engines (General Electric CF34-3B1) were operating at 600F above maximum redline temperature (1600F) at 41,000ft, and that the high speed compressor blades melted, which then dripped onto the low speed compressor. After the flameout, the low speed compressor became welded to the rest of the engine. Intially, it was thought that a core lock had occurred in the engines, however this more serious condition in fact occurred.

For all you that think it was core lock. Melted motors don't turn. No N2 is right.

 

[dbert]

The NTSB has determined that the turbofan jet engines (General Electric CF34-3B1) were operating at 600F above maximum redline temperature (1600F) at 41,000ft, and that the high speed compressor blades melted, which then dripped onto the low speed compressor. After the flameout, the low speed compressor became welded to the rest of the engine. Intially, it was thought that a core lock had occurred in the engines, however this more serious condition in fact occurred.

For all you that think it was core lock. Melted motors don't turn. No N2 is right.

While I know what you are trying to say, there is no high speed/low speed compressor on a CF-34. Perhaps you meant high pressure/low pressure turbine?

 

[urflyingme?!]

I agree, that is the only place in the engine where you have the high pressure BEFORE the low pressure.

Does anyone think that they knew they had welded the engines?

 

[Nancy Pryor]

That dastardly Brayton cycle again!

I agree, that is the only place in the engine where you have the high pressure BEFORE the low pressure.

Um, isn't the pressure at the outlet of the combustor higher than at the high pressure turbine? Work is extracted by expanding the combustion gases and working mass through the turbines.

Does anyone think that they knew they had welded the engines?

Hard to know what they knew, but the engine instrumentation showing a serious overtemp ITT might have given them a clue had they bothered to look at it between swapping seats, trips to the galley, overriding the stickshaker and chanting "4-1-0 it dude!".

 

[urflyingme?!]

Sorry, I meant to say high pressure turbine or compressor. Meaning on the crj it goes as follows:
N1 1 Stage Compressor
N2 14 stage compressor
Combustion Chamber
N2 High Pressure Turnine
N1 Low Pressure Turbine

So reading what the FAA said I'm thinking they meant the High Pressure Turbine melted onto the low pressure turbine?

 

[Nancy Pryor]

Sorry, I meant to say high pressure turbine or compressor. Meaning on the crj it goes as follows:
N1 1 Stage Compressor
N2 14 stage compressor
Combustion Chamber
N2 High Pressure Turnine
N1 Low Pressure Turbine

Agreed, N1 is fan speed, but the inner part of the fan also functions as a single stage compressor feeding the engine core.

So reading what the FAA said I'm thinking they meant the High Pressure Turbine melted onto the low pressure turbine?

This sounds right. The temperature at the inlet to the high pressure turbine (combustor outlet, where heat is added to the working mass at constant pressure) is the highest encountered in the engine and is normally several hundred degrees higher than the melting point of the alloys used in the turbine blades, though the normal gas flow is arranged to provide cooling in the boundary layer of the turbine blades to prevent thermal failure. Our heroes neatly starved the engines of normal gas flow, and the cooling gas flow over the turbine blades was lost, resulting in melting and physical failure of the high pressure turbine blades. The low pressure turbine is downstream of that, so presumably the melted blade material ended up there.

 

["GO AROUND"]

That was a quote from an article. High speed = hi pressure, low speed = low pressure.

They melted the engine!

 

[flatspin7]

I was talking this over last night with my fiance who is a social worker... she has a bit of an outsiders view of this... as a future pilots wife she knows what people do die in airplanes. I think just about every one with any experiance in aviation knows someone who has died in an airplane somewhere along the way. Thats just the nature of the business. Its sad, and can be very difficult to go through.

As I explaing the accident to her (in simplistic terms-- nothing can make a non-pilot's eyes glaze over than words like N1 and core lock) I thinks it agreed that these guys screwed up massiviely-- they threw their SOP out the window and really pushed that airplane beyond its limits and paid the ultimate price.

My Fiance looked at me and mentioned that if I were to go down in an airplane she would really want to know that I did everything right... That I did everything in my power to prevent the accident (i.e. break the chain for you guys with CRM training). It is always difficult to lose a family member but it makes it worse to know that they died doing something stupid.

It explains the lawsuits in that they are in denial, the desperately want to be able to assign some blame somewhere else so they can sleep at night.

I am not defending the lawsuits but It is probably more than just money grabing.

I have not flown the CRJ but looking at the NTSB there has only been 3 fatal accidents with those airplanes (Pinacle, one in France where the crew failed to go around, and one in China) so its a good airplane...any airplane will fail when flown outside the flight envelope.. .thats why we have limitations and training.

I'm sorry that these 2 died, but we all should learn a lesson from them.
They have limitations on these aircraft for a reason... Abide by them.

 

[pilotdiscretion]

I've been working on the 3701 investigation since two hours after impact. I have no idea what the lawyers or you guys are talking about.

 

[FN FAL]

...My Fiance looked at me and mentioned that if I were to go down in an airplane she would really want to know that I did everything right... That I did everything in my power to prevent the accident...

There is no such thing as an accident...only negligent acts.

 

[FN FAL]

I've been working on the 3701 investigation since two hours after impact. I have no idea what the lawyers or you guys are talking about.

A college education might help you out, have you considered off campus learning arrangements? They are convenient.

 

[flatspin7]

There is no such thing as an accident...only negligent acts.

My goal isn't to flame the deceased... According to the NTSB it was an accident... now yes the cause fo the accident was gross negligence...

95% of the blame goes on the flight crew no doubt... but did PCL ever train their pilots about high altitude aerodynamics, the Gulfstream 600 hour FO probably didnt know enough and he thought he was "just having fun" The Capt should have known better...

But at the same time I am not the type to sit there and curse the deceased memory by berating their charecter... Im sure there is some one around from PCL who can attest... Probably "good guys" who did something amazingly, tragically, stupid.

But I guess one act and define a lifetime, unfortunatly.

 

[FN FAL]

My goal isn't to flame the deceased... According to the NTSB it was an accident... now yes the cause fo the accident was gross negligence...

Who's flaming the deceased? If you analytically look at any "accident", you will see that a negligent act was the cause, regardless of what the NTSB wants to call the report.

 

[POWDERFINGER]

Originally Posted by pilotdiscretion:I've been working on the 3701 investigation since two hours after impact. I have no idea what the lawyers or you guys are talking about.

These guys don't know either...They're having a party pissing on gravestones, fellating both Bombardier and GE, and engaging in pilot cannibalism.



May the dead rest peacefully in the next world - they've left the bullcrap behind in this one.

 

[CA1900]

These guys don't know either...They're having a party pissing on gravestones, fellating both Bombardier and GE, and engaging in pilot cannibalism.

That's bull, and you know it. You don't have to be "fellating" the manufacturer (nice visual, thanks) to believe that these guys were solely responsible for the crash. You sound just like Bush -- "You're either with us or against us." That's an asinine position.

Trying to extort money from someone else for something that isn't their fault--at all--is a perversion of our legal system.

If I kill myself in an airplane and it's clearly my own stupid fault, I've already let my family know that I don't want them suing anybody. That's why I have life insurance.