Pinnacle NTSB Update

[100LL... Again!]

It's really tragic that a hiring boom at a carrier like PCL led to so many marginally qualified pilots getting hired.

When those 500hr wonders finally upgrade, look out.

 

[enigma]

Hopefully the upgrade bust rate will go way up.

100LL. The upgrade bust rate can go all the way to 100% and it won't help out until the Feds change what is checked on a PC.

I've taken three jet type rides, and countless PC's. I've never been checked on anything closely or even remotely related to high altitude operations. The normal type ride/pc consists of: a bunch of low altitude, low speed, IFR work; some middle altitude airwork like steep turns and stall series; a windshear or terrain event; a V1 cutt; and one reposition to altitude so that they can give you a high dive. Up until now, the Feds have considered those to be the most necessary items to check. Performing long climbs to altitude are too time consuming and the rides would cost too much money, so we don't do it. The carriers expect that pilots will get the normal climb like stuff in OE.
enigma

 

[searching]

This PFT argument is an absolute joke. Almost every single airline in the 90's WAS PFT. Thousands and thousands of pilots PFT'ed in the 90's, and ,many many are doing it now. Not just at Pinnacle/Gullfstream. You can include ASA (Flightsafety) and Air Wisonsin (RAA) COEX (RAA) in the current times

All you guys who think you are superior pilots because you did not PFT, are the most arogant/ignorant (stupid beyond belief) "people" I have ever come in contact with. And I am not a PFTer, never have, never will. (because I'm already broke with bad credit)

Turning an accident/tragedy with loss of life into a PFT argument is disgusting. The accident is obviously (or at least primarily) due to poor company ops specs, and a poor/crap training department. Which has nothing to do with PFT. I have a NWA furlough friend at 9E, who has not ever PFTed, and he said the training was incredibly poor. He even complemented the low time GIA guys for being able to succeed all on self study.

My respect goes to the departed, and I wish nothing but the best to their families and friends.

 

[center]

I do not believe the rubish being talked about on this forum thread. People have lost their lives. And some can only fathom that having paid for their training must have been a contributing factor.

I offer my thoughts and prayers to the family at Pinnacle, as I myself have a family member with you who was mates with Captain Rhodes.

 

[efiscompmon]

The accident is obviously (or at least primarily) due to poor company ops specs, and a poor/crap training department. Which has nothing to do with PFT. I have a NWA furlough friend at 9E, who has not ever PFTed, and he said the training was incredibly poor. He even complemented the low time GIA guys for being able to succeed all on self study.

Bingo! For more insight into the company's "philosophy" check this sh!t out:

6. Recurrent Training – Contributed by Mike Piazza, CRJ Program Manager

You will notice a few changes in Recurrent Training over the next few months. We are in the process of reducing the number of hours you will be required to spend in the classroom and moving the classrooms out to the bases. These changes will not only maximize efficiency of our crews, but will also provide our pilot group with an added measure of convenience.

Currently, our Recurrent Ground Training is 29 programmed hours. With the implementation of home study, our classroom-programmed hours will be reduced to 21 effectively removing one full day from the current four days of training. The remaining eight hours will be presented to the pilot group via a Recurrent Home Study Guide. This Guide will be made available to the pilot before his/ her scheduled date to begin recurrent ground. The contents will include various curriculum segments that are normally covered in class. All of those areas not covered will be reviewed upon attending the ground portion of training. For example, of the fifteen systems that are currently covered, five will be reviewed in the guide and ten in the class. At the conclusion of the Guide will be a multiple-choice test for the pilot’s review. During the first day of class, the student will take a written exam comprised from these questions.

Also, we are in the process of preparing classrooms in Detroit and Minneapolis for recurrent at the bases. We plan on having multiple recurrent classes running throughout the month at each base. Not only will recurrent classes be held in new classrooms at MSP and DTW, but MEM recurrent class will now be held in the new CEC classrooms. These classrooms are located next door to the existing Corporate Offices.

Development and approval will take several weeks. We expect to have the first Recurrent Home Study Course and Recurrent Training at the bases in effect sometime in early January 2005. Please let me know if I can answer any questions you may have concerning these changes, 901-348-xxxx

or: we can spend 1 less day paying the ramper to teach you, spare hotel and per diem costs and having to deadhead you to memphis. Hey, it's just recurrent. You guys all know this stuff, right?

 

[TIS]

Speaking from experience...

I do not believe the rubish being talked about on this forum thread. People have lost their lives. And some can only fathom that having paid for their training must have been a contributing factor.

I can say that it's quite possible that it was indeed a contributing factor. IN fact, saying that there is no possibility that PFT contibuted in any way to this accident is absurd as saying that it was wholly reaponsible for it.

Not that I'm suggesting that it was you understand, but I've been a CA at a PFT airline and I know that I dragged more than a few trainees through a lot of stuff they were ill prepared to deal with. The only reason quite a few were there was because they could write the check when others couldn't or wouldn't, and the only reason they passed was because they had SERIOUS help. It wasn't because they had the experience to be where they found themselves drinking from the company fire hose.

Some, on the other hand were also VERY good!

Under the correct circumstances PFT situations can indeed be a recipe for disaster. What happened here seems to have been the result of too little experience with the theory and reality of high altitude operations in a swept wing jet. I don't care how much turboprop time you have - a turboprop is NOT a jet. Now, does that mean that you can't be taught to fly a jet? Of course not but the transition from a prop to a jet is about a lot more than the fact that the propellers were left on the cutting room floor.

They STALLED it guys, and that probably had something to do with the flamed out engines that they couldn't get restarted. That didn't happen because everything was done properly. Think about it - when have you EVER heard of an airliner being stalled by the crew at high cruise altitude?

This one happened because someone did something they shouldn't have, whether it had to do with an autopilot mode, or excessively rough control manipulation, or whatever. It is also a fact that it probably wouldn't have happened in much thicker air - say around FL330 - air that both pilots were MUCH more experienced at dealing with on a routine basis.

Oh and so you know, I was hired at startup as a CA and, no, I didn't have to pay for the "privilege" of flying a J31.

TIS

 

[Gulfstream 200]

I do not believe the rubish being talked about on this forum thread. People have lost their lives. And some can only fathom that having paid for their training must have been a contributing factor.

I offer my thoughts and prayers to the family at Pinnacle, as I myself have a family member with you who was mates with Captain Rhodes.

If you read the posts you can see that people are being very sensitive to the fact that lives were lost.

The point is that my (OR YOUR) families lives could have been lost also.

Would you be as sympathetic then? I wouldn't. Id be pi$$ed.

The prelim. reports posted here and the responses about flying technique from current RJ pilots are truly disturbing.

 

[surplus1]

The prelim. reports posted here and the responses about flying technique from current RJ pilots are truly disturbing.

I can only agree completely with that statement. However, I don't think this is in any way related to PFT. From what we know at this point it appears that the probable cause is lack of experience and inadequate training. Sadly, that is an extremely dangerous combination.

Based on the remarks I've read in this thread that appear to becoming from the affected airline, the lack of experience and knowledge is no less than amazing. I don't blame any pilot for lack of experience, we weren't born with it. There is however no excuse for inadequate training.

I doubt that whomever is running this operation has chosen to deliberately neglect to provide what is necessary. My guess is (again based on what has been written here) that it's more a classic case of the blind leading the blind, from the top down.

It's really tragic that young airmen have to pay such a high price for the failures of their leaders. God bless them.

S1

No matter how interested individual employees might be, or what assistance a manufacturer offers, or how insistent a certificating authority might be -- none of these factors will have a significant effect on safety without support from top management.

— John O'Brian, ALPA's Engineering and Air Safety Department.​

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Corporate culture has a very real influence on the attitudes and performance of the people within an organization; there is no question in my mind that management decisions and actions, or more frequently, indecision's and inaction's, cause accidents.

— John Lauber, NTSB.​

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[Ty Webb]

At my 121 carrier, during my initial training, we also did a couple of high-altitude stalls, both a coordinated one, and then an intentionally uncoordinated one, with the yaw damper failed . . . . and recovered from the ensuing snap-roll/ spin, which started at FL370 and recovery was about FL340. The instructor I had was an extremely grizzled DC9 instructor, with about 20 years of Check Airman and Sim Instructor experience. Maybe that is why he made sure to teach that scenario.

It was a real eye-opener, to be in a stalled condition, with the airspeed indicating near 340 knots!
Unfortunately, though, it seems like training at some 121 airlines is more about "checking" and a lot less about "training".

 

[Oakum_Boy]

Deleted.

 

[T-Gates]

Now my question to those of you who bring PFT into the equation as a cause of this accident: You act as if the First Officer was the only one in the cockpit. In the left seat you had a relatively new captain with substantial 121 PIC experience with over 1500 hours in the CRJ as an FO. I don't see how PFT should play any role in this at all, seeing that you had a very experienced captain in the left hand seat. PFT is just being used as a scapegoat by some of you.

I do agree with the above that PCL has piss-poor training when it comes to high-altitude operations. My Jet Upset class was taught by a couple AA Videotapes and an DAL-furloughee that was more bent on telling you that he was the best pilot in the world than teaching you the finer aspects of swept wing jet aerodynamics. In the simulator, my instructor, who spent most of the session talking on his cellphone, blew through the part of the curriculum where we were supposed to delve into Jet Upset. He took us up high, had us jerk the controls around a little at FL370 and that was pretty much it. They focus sooo much on low-altitude intentional stalls that happen at a snails pace, you enter the airplane unaware of the high-altitude stalls that can happen faster than you can blink. And I can't count how many times I had to hear SAAB comparison stories in the sim. "Well In the SAAB....."

Once you reach the line at PCL standardization is virtually non-existant among some Captains. You had Captain A refuse to let you do speedmode descents, Captain B that would yell if you got below 215 and did not extend Flaps 20, and the aforementioned Captain C that would say "Your landing is not good unless you get the stick-shaker".... I could go on.... But talking to other colleagues at other airlines this seems to be a disturbing trend. You have vigilante pilots who belive that they should re-write the SOP's to fit thier flying style.
In fact I got bad marks on a probationary evaluation at PCL for not flying profile when I religiously would fly profile.

The real underlying probelm are the pilots that have theese attitudes are becoming Captains, and Check Airmen, and Examiners... And they in turn corrupt the FNG First Officer who doesn't know any better. And so the cycle continues. If a new FO sees bad habits all day on the line he/she will most likely adopt theese habits and carry them with them for a long time until they get a reality check from someone wiser.

The other factor that I can speak from personal experience of are the Probationary Evaluations that PCL captains do. Some people are so petrified to speak up because they never know when they are being evaluated. It is the most anti-safety device they could have possibly implimented. You have theese same anti-SOP captains that now have the power to basically end someone's employment. How would you like that over your head? Do you think you would be as inclined to say "Hey, thats wrong!"? I know I did, and got burned.... In turn, most of my friends became utterly nervous about speaking up in the cockpit. To the point that some of them were letting some of the PIC's do absolutely assenine things.

The point I'm trying to make in a very roundabout way is that there are many factors that played a role in this accident. Stop trying to focus on one thing and take a look at the whole picture.



I know I'm drifting here, but I'm just venting.

 

[SkyBoy1981]

Excellent point, T-Gates. There's nothing more frustrating to a new hire FO than having a different Captain on every trip teaching you to do things completely different from the last guy you flew with or the way you learned to do it in training. Consistancy is the key when it comes to training, and what is being taught should be FACTS, not opinions.

 

[acaTerry]

Excellent post T Gates. I can not tell you how many times I hear about the "cool" CA's who blow off checklists, or how good the ground school was b/c they didn't "waste time" teaching the plane and / or aerodynamics. Sooner or later these things kill people. And until the newbies understand that standards exist for a reason, it will continue. And you CA's (you know who you are) who think it's cool doing some of the stupid things you do, blood on your hands sooner or later.

 

[TIS]

T-Gates,

Your points are all well taken. Which is why I hope you'll agree that it all has to start somewhere.

Creating a well seasoned and wise pilot begins with the proper raw ingredients - much like making a good beer or wine. With wine, if yo want the finished product to have any alcohol in it, you have to start out with grapes that have enough sugar in them so that the little yeasties have something to eat and convert into alcohol. Pull the fruit too early from the vine and you'll end up with an inferior product.

Likewise, when you put a pilot in a position that he's not adequately trained for the result is a less than superior product. PFT is one way that can happen because PFT does indeed weed out a good many people who either cannot, or will not, pay to ply their trade. One undeniable side effect of this weed out is that some of the good ones get away and you are left with not necessarily the bad ones, just not the most appropriate ones.

On down the line, as you point out, without nurturing and education, these victims or their own ignorance become captains, check airmen and examiners thus, not only perpetuating their ignorance, but also breeding it anew. The cycle continues because, as others have already mentioned, the FAA's oversight is abysmal. But THAT is another topic altogether.

Good points though! Seriously!

TIS

 

[CarjCapt]

Excellent point, T-Gates. There's nothing more frustrating to a new hire FO than having a different Captain on every trip teaching you to do things completely different from the last guy you flew with or the way you learned to do it in training. Consistancy is the key when it comes to training, and what is being taught should be FACTS, not opinions.

While I was in the right seat I found that only a few really were standard (operating according to the FCOM, FSM, and training they were given) so when I had the opportunity to upgrade one of my goals was to be "Standard", Standard to veteran and new hire alike. CRM is so much easier when you have your fo/captain standard especially when the ____ hits the fan.