Pop Mech article on PCL 3701

[IP076]

Sounds like Core Lock has as much to do with this accident as the fence off the end of a runway when an idiot takes off 20% over gross on a 9000' DA day! Good Work ALPA!

 

[ReportCanoa]

Sounds like Core Lock has as much to do with this accident as the fence off the end of a runway when an idiot takes off 20% over gross on a 9000' DA day! Good Work ALPA!

Yeah, I can't believe ALPA acknlowledged these fools were actually members.

 

[FedEx1]

Who cares if you fly at 410 anyway? I don't know any pilots that think that makes you .... "cool" or whatever. Just makes you absorb more radiation from the sun. Unless you flew the U-2 or worked for NASA, you shouldn't be bragging about how high you flew anyway.

 

[starshipdrvr]

A couple things I think the PM missed on this article. I think that a lot of the blame needs to be attributed to the pilots, however I think that there are a few things that needed to be addressed with this incident.

First, I think that ALPA was right in addressing corelock. Until this incident, not a lot of regional pilots really understood the danger of corelock. There was a good reason that the Bombardier QRH states that in the case of a dual engine failure, the pilots must maintain 240 knots UNTIL they are sure that there is no chance of a relight, only at that point will you maintain max glide speed. In a long conversation I had with a Bombardier test pilot, he stated that during flight testing the 200 had a lot of difficulty getting the engines to relight. The 700, 705, and 900 did not seem to have the same issues with their power plants.

Secondly, I think this incident highlighted the need for training in high altitude aerodynamics at the regional level. With the rapid expansion and popularity of RJ's, many regionals were faced with accelerating training to try and fill seats and I think high altitude/high speed aerodynamics was a topic that was typically glossed over during ground/flight training.

Its easy to assume that the 700 does not have the same difficulty at high altitudes as the 200 because of the higher thrust-to-weight ratio. However, the 700 also has a history of stick shaker incidents at 410. I believe that both Mesa and Horizon have had some isolated incidents as well as Air Canada Jazz's incident stick shaker incident over Colorado Springs in the 705. In fact, when the 700 was first introduced, there was a rash of stick shakers at altitudes as low as 370 because operators were training their crews to use the same climb profiles that they had been using in the 200 and the airplanes were never able to accelerate once they got to altitude.

In closing, the Pinnacle crew was definitely at fault but I believe that in the final report we will see that there were a number of other factors that came to play in this incident.

 

[T-REX]

http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin2004-11.html

Another article about this award-nominated crew.

 

[Turtlesfly]

Oh wow - so that makes it official

 

[DoinTime]

Sorry DoinTime . . . it's like if you drink a lot of alcohol and then go in your car and don't wear a seatbelt and then get in a single-car accident and don't take anybody else out when you do this . . . it sucks to be you but as they say, "they have fortunately eliminated themselves from the gene pool."

I never said what they did was excusable. It is most certainly not.

These men paid the ultimate price for their mistakes and thankfully they didn't take anyone with them. While I cannot forgive them for their actions I have enough respect to allow them to rest in peace. Maybe when you grow up you can extend them this same courtesy.

 

[NYCPilot]

Unbelievable what unprofessional and reckless behavior these two displayed. It's unfortunate because they had several opportunities to save themselves, but their immature and unprofessional judgment did them in. Makes me wonder how they would handle a similar emergency with passengers on board.

 

[IP076]

Hey starship...thanks for the good info

 

[Nancy Pryor]

A disgrace, and a shame, and a very clear testimony to the quality of many airline "professionals" these days.

"Just teach me what I need to know to pass the test, dude, so that I can get into that shiny jet right away, dude. I'll pick up the rest on the job."

Agree 100%. This is what happens when children are put in charge of an airliner. They might have been 31 and 23 but their maturity levels were closer to 21 and 13. Just the kind of "professionals" I want flying my family and friends around in a jet, shiny or not.

Make all the excuses you want, object to disparaging their behavior even though they're dead or not, they were incompetent and stupid and it killed them, and luckily it didn't kill anyone innocent. Argue that. The CVR transcript says it all. While many accident chains contain links that are beyond the control of the flight crew, this isn't one of them.