UPS Airbus down in Birmingham

[GittinFatter]

"The SOP is there so guys don't fly into the fuc{ing ground."

The SOP is there so @$@#$%^&^% don't fly into the fuc{ing ground.

 

[JokerFuel]

Easy to say until you've been there. Never second guess an accident! You weren't there.

 

[Golden Falcon]

I'm convinced a certain poster does't understand stabilised approach requirements...not recommendations.... requirements...and of course once again, the possible consequences of an unstable approach are evident in this accident...it's not about what one is "comfortable with"..I've operated VOR approaches in mountainous areas where VS-1700fpm was a requirement to make the approach...our Ops manual had a specific procedure for this approach..we were allowed to become stable at 2 miles/650' QFE...try being hot and high on an approach with a normal profile and using a VS outside the prescribed stabilised approach criterion to regain the profile...and one would for sure find themselves standing at attention in the fleet office....or in the middle of a smoking crater...

 

[livin'thesim]

I thought we covered that - that the Birmingham approach would not require that rate of descent, but that there is nothing "magic" about the number 1000.

As you note, there are a handful of approaches that require a higher rate.

I gave an example of an approach that would require slightly higher than 1000 fpm.

I worked for one 121 carrier whose SOP was VS-1000 max, VS-1200 max if briefed. There were a few non-precision approaches with very short final segments where 1000 was just not going to get you in at minimums.

Bottom line is that even limiting to VS-1000 can kill you in some situations, depending on situational awareness. I've seen it in the sim more than once.

Numerical values on the instrument panel are only part of what makes an approach truly stabilized. The real stabilization takes place in the awareness of the crew. If the crew is behind the airplane, even being on speed and on path might not be enough.

Years of sim instructing will teach you an awful lot about how crews react to various non-precision approaches.

One caveat I will add about descent rates - they need to be planned well prior to starting the approach. I would not advocate VS>1000 without having a legitimate reason, and planning in advance.

Exceeding the planned rate reactively during an approach is a very bad idea.

 

[Traderd]

NTSB Revokes Party Status of a Union and an Airline for Violating Agreements

http://www.ntsb.gov/news/2014/140825.html

August 25, 2014

The National Transportation Safety Board has revoked the party status of both the Independent Pilots Association and UPS Airlines from its ongoing investigation of UPS Flight 1354, an A300-600 air cargo flight that crashed on approach to Birmingham, Ala., last August.

The NTSB took the action after IPA and UPS violated the terms of the party agreement that each had signed at the start of the investigation. In letters to each organization, the NTSB wrote that both IPA and UPS took actions prejudicial to the investigation by publicly commenting on and providing their own analysis of the investigation prior to the NTSB's public meeting to determine the probable cause of the accident.

 

[Erlanger]

On Sep 9th 2014 the NTSB conducted their board meeting to determine the cause of the crash and concluded the probable causes of the crash were:

- the crew continued an unstabilized approach into Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport in Birmingham, Ala.

- the crew failed to monitor the altitude and inadvertently descended below the minimum descent altitude when the runway was not yet in sight.

Contributing factors were:

- the flight crew's failure to properly configure the on-board flight management computer

- the first officer's failure to make required call-outs

- the captain's decision to change the approach strategy without communicating his change to the first officer

- flight crew fatigue

The NTSB stated the final report will become available in a number of weeks.

 

[THEPRFCT10]

Very sad.

 

[Golden Falcon]

Aazing apparently they weren't equipped with EGPWS, or even better T2CAS