[Peetwo]

Update - Courtesy NY Times:

Possible Pilot Error Is Cited in FlyDubai Crash in Russia

By IVAN NECHEPURENKO MARCH 26, 2016

MOSCOW — An error by a crew member committed during adverse weather conditions may have been responsible for the crash of a passenger jet last week in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don that killed 62 people, a report broadcast by Russian state television said.

The Rossiya-1 television channel said late Friday that it had obtained a transcript of the pilot interactions a minute before the FlyDubai passenger jet nose-dived to the ground, killing all the passengers and crew members onboard. A source in the investigative commission with access to flight recorders provided the channel with the transcript.

The channel emphasized that its interpretation of the transcript could not be considered the official version of what had happened.

Flying from Dubai, the plane was not able to land on its first attempt because of heavy rain and wind, and it entered a holding pattern for two hours. On the second landing attempt, the crew decided to pull up and try again, but 40 seconds after beginning the ascent, one of the pilots switched off the autopilot, possibly in response to sudden turbulence, the report said. Seconds after the autopilot was turned off, the plane plunged to the ground.

“Don’t worry,” one of the pilots says, according to the transcript, which was translated into Russian, seconds before saying, “Don’t do that!” The last words recorded were repeated calls to “Pull up!” Only “inhuman screams” could be heard for the last six seconds.

The television channel cited experts who suggested that by turning off the autopilot, the pilots were trying to pull the plane back to a horizontal position. But at that moment a stabilizing fin at the jet’s tail was switched on.

With the fin activated, “the elevator is no longer working and the plane practically does not react to the pilot’s control panel,” the report said. The channel suggested that the pilot could have accidentally hit the button that activated the fin because of his reported “chronic fatigue.”

Russian investigators have opened a criminal inquiry into the crash. On Thursday, the investigative commission said that the flight recorders were in good condition and were being deciphered. The first preliminary reports of the commission could be made public within the next two weeks, they said.

Further update - 28 March 2016

FlyDubai air crash in Russia: Pilots fight in cockpit before crash

28.03.2016 | Source:
Pravda.Ru
 

AP photo

The analysis of flight recorders of the Boeing 737-800 passenger jetliner that crashed in Russia's Rostov showed that the pilot error was the most plausible version of the tragedy that killed all 62 on board.

 

The Boeing-737-800 of Fly Dubai airline crashed in Rostov-on-Don in Russia's south on March 19. The aircraft crashed while landing, killing all 55 passengers and seven crew members.

During an attempt to take the plane higher after an unsuccessful landing approach, the  pilot apparently lifted the nose of the aircraft too much, thus making the plane lose speed and altitude. A conflict sparked in the cockpit; one pilot shouted at his partner: "Where are you flying? Stop!" Yet, his attempts to "win" the wheel only made matters worse.

According to experts, the aircraft made two landing approaches in an automatic mode. Strong winds interfered into the so-called autothrottle system of the aircraft that ensures the flight of the airplane on the predetermined path of descent or take off during autopiloting.

The crew decided to switch to the manual mode for another landing approach. While flying at an altitude of about 270 meters, about 6 km far from the runway, one of the pilots pressed the TOGA key (Take off. Go around) that commands the aircraft to go for another approach and turned off the autopilot, taking full control of the aircraft. 

According to the data obtained from flight recorders, the pilot did not take into account the specific transition of the Boeing 737 from landing into climb mode.

When the speed of the aircraft started plummeting, a conflict between the pilots occurred in the cockpit. The first pilot tried to get up to speed and put the engines into the takeoff mode. His partner believed that one should lower the nose of the Boeing first. He was shouting: "Stop. Where? Stop! Stop!" while trying to stop the climb, pushing his wheel away. 

As a result, the on-board computer of the aircraft started receiving electrical impulses from the manipulations that the pilots were making at both wheels. The crew began to act in concert only when the uncontrollable Boeing with 62 people on board was diving to the ground at the speed of 325 km/h, at an angle of about 45 degrees. The pilots were only screaming during the seconds before the aircraft hit the ground.
 

FlyDubai airline was founded seven years ago by the government of the United Arab Emirates. The airline is based at the Dubai International Airport. The low-cost airline has not had air disasters  before. The company started with a few aircraft before it expanded its fleet to 50 Boeing 737-800 aircraft. In November 2013, FlyDubai ordered another 111 Boeing aircraft.

- See more at: http://www.pravdareport.com/news/hotspot...mV9rI.dpuf

 

Update 09 April 2016: Reuters article via ABC online

FlyDubai plane crash: Russian investigation suggests pilot error

Posted yesterday at 8:05pmFri 8 Apr 2016, 8:05pm

Photo: Still picture of CCTV footage showing a FlyDubai plane crashing at Rostov-on-Don airport in southern Russia. (YouTube)
Related Story: FlyDubai plane crashes at Russian airport, killing 62
Related Story: Russia opens criminal investigation into FlyDubai crash

Map: Russian Federation
Investigators say a FlyDubai passenger plane crashed in Russia last month after being flown in a contradictory manner minutes before, suggesting pilot error was to blame.

Key points:

• 55 passengers, 7 crew members were killed in Flydubai plane crash
  
• Russian investigation says plane flew in contradictory manner before crash
  
• Poor weather conditions made landing difficult
  
  

The Boeing 737-800, operated by a Dubai-based budget carrier, came down in the early hours of March 19 at Rostov-on-Don airport in southern Russia on its second attempt to land, after flying from Dubai.

All 62 people on board were killed.

Poor weather conditions, including strong winds and rain, made landing difficult.
In a statement the Moscow-based Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC), which is investigating the crash, said the plane had been flown in a contradictory manner in the minutes before it crashed.

It said the crew had decided to abort landing and circle round again.



Photo: A screen shot from a flight tracking website shows FlyDubai flight FZ981 circling a number of times. (www.flightradar24.com)

They had begun to gain altitude when the controls of the plane were abruptly pushed away, pushing its nose lower.

That, combined with the angle of the tail fin, sent the plane into a steep dive, which the pilots were unable to pull out of, the IAC said.

It stopped short of saying the pilots were definitely to blame, noting they had the necessary experience and training, but said their condition and actions were being evaluated.

The IAC said it now needed to complete work on deciphering the pilots' final conversations in the hours leading up to the crash before it could wrap up its investigation.

Unnamed sources have told Russian newspapers that an initial read-out of the plane's flight recorders had suggested the two pilots argued about the right course of action to take in the minutes before the crash.

Reuters

Somewhat related apparently the Russkies may soon fall under the umbrella of the Montreal Convention (MC99). However there is general legal disagreement on whether the provisions of MC99 may need further revision in a rapidly developing & more affordable aviation world.

Last week in the Oz:

The Feds Legal Counsel on Montreal & LCCs.


As some of the initial findings with the tragic FlyDubai 737-800 prang in Rostov-on-Don Russia filter out, it would appear that fatigue may well be a factor in the causal chain.

 "significant and obvious risk"

The knock on effect of course is that fatigue & the relationship to aviation safety suddenly becomes topical in the MSM. Which also happens to be coincidental because FRMS & the controversial CASA CAO 48.1 is currently topical in the Australian aviation safety stakeholder scene (above & - To Disallow or not to Disallow; that is the Q?) 

Therefore I found the following article from the AFAP's official legal counsel Joseph Wheeler of particular interest because he not only joins the dots between fatigue but other safety issues related to the travelling public's love affair with LCCs...

Montreal Convention needs universal support


Joseph Wheeler

The Australian

April 1, 2016 12:00AM

Without certain fixes our “air safety privilege” as passengers will forever sit uneasily with our insatiable demand for lower airfares. And, for the crew and passengers of the doomed FZ981 flight from Dubai to Rostov-on-Don, those occasionally incompatible demands can and do sometimes manifest as failures in the safety systems and compensation regimes designed to protect us all.

The Flydubai crash in Russia on March 19 regrettably typifies air disasters in many respects, and inevitably will lead to an official report that makes many in the aviation industry and regulators admit “we should have heeded the warnings”.

It also exemplifies why all states must ratify the Montreal Convention of 1999 or the patchwork of liability laws that exist will continue to guarantee that those who need appropriate compensation most won’t get it.

Let’s consider one well known safety risk (or “warning”) within the aviation world, cumulative fatigue — the convergence of several realities for international aviators: shiftwork, night work, irregular work schedules, unpredictable work schedules, and time zone changes.

Fatigue management, or rather how it was addressed in rostering, was raised by Russian media as a potential contributing cause of the Flydubai crash.

There is little escape for pilots who genuinely feel unable to perform because of tiredness.

Employment ramifications for pilots who “go sick” together with continuing uncertainty over impending regulations, which some argue prefer air operators’ ability to roster pilots to the edge of the law, resonate with Australia’s pilots.

This includes concerns that commercial imperatives will outweigh safety once new Australian fatigue management rules come into force next year.

The upshot of this is that we know, and have known for years, that fatigue management is a topic that has major safety implications if handled improperly by regulators and airlines.

If the allegations are right that Flydubai has mismanaged safety to its own detriment (knowing the risks), then the legal retribution from passengers’ and crew members’ families should fairly reflect that knowledge.

And that brings us to why universal ratification of the Montreal Convention of 1999 is necessary.

This international law places a strict liability system at the heart of providing compensation to air disaster victims.

It is a system that uses a passenger’s contract of carriage to determine the available choices of jurisdiction of a legal case against an airline for injury or death, including where you live permanently, where the airline calls home, or where you were ticketed to start or conclude your journey.

Thus, the system works to ensure justice as intended only if every country accedes to it — and at last count, out of 191 sky-faring nations, only 119 had ratified Montreal.

The significance of this is in the composition of the 119 nations.

Many populous and far-reaching aviation states such as the Russian Federation and, closer to home, Indonesia do not protect their citizens with Montreal in the way Australia does.

This is important because it means that for most people on flight FZ981, and likewise on AirAsia flight QZ8501, which crashed in late 2014, the law (and courts) of Russia or Indonesia will apply for the purposes of assessing compensation for death, rather than the more forward-thinking Montreal Convention choices.

The lack of choice of jurisdiction is significant for affected families and represents the loss of a pragmatic way to ensure that those responsible for the organisational, regulatory, mechanical and human factors causing the crash face justice at a time and place that suits the surviving family members, rather than just the airline and its insurers.

Joseph Wheeler is aviation special counsel to Maurice Blackburn Lawyers and the Australian Federation of Air Pilots.

Ps While your at it JW: Q/ What about the PelAir/Ziggy exposed holes in the Montreal Convention, which all started because of yet another uniquely Australian definition of 'commercial air transport'? That also still needs to be fixed doesn't it??  

  
&.. this week in the Oz..

Montreal Convention to have universal support

• David Hodgkinson, Rebecca Johnston
  
• The Australian
  
• April 8, 2016 12:00AM
  

From 1929 to 1999, states have variously signed up to a patchwork quilt of international agreements — mostly treaties — that govern the liability of air carriers for the transport of passengers, their baggage and cargo.

The first of these was the Warsaw Convention of 1929 and the latest (and probably last in a long line) is the 1999 Montreal Convention, or MC99. Each successive treaty has been more friendly to passengers.

For example, the 1929 agreement (as amended by 1955 and 1975 agreements) provides that air carrier liability for each passenger is limited to just under $31,000. MC99 provides for compensation of about $210,000 and the possibility of unlimited liability in certain circumstances.

Joe Wheeler, of Maurice Blackburn Lawyers, argued in these pages last Friday that all states must ratify MC99. It’s a relatively uncontroversial argument given that most states recognise this and that one of the express purposes of the treaty is to “modernise and consolidate” the Warsaw regime and related agreements.

From the date on which the treaty was opened for signature in May 1999, 119 state parties have signed up — almost two-thirds of all states across a decade and a half.

This is quite the achievement. And it’s likely to have near-universal if not universal reach. Exhortation — such as that from Mr Wheeler — to ratify given the exceptional take-up so far could be viewed as unnecessary.

It’s also open, of course, to carriers to voluntarily raise their passenger compensation limits outside of any treaty framework — which carriers can do, they just can’t go lower than the applicable treaty amounts. This, in turn, calls into question the assertion in Mr Wheeler’s piece that “the system works to ensure justice … only if every country accedes to it”.

That assertion is also called into question when one looks at a passenger’s ticketed journey. For example, in the tragic case of the FZ981 flight from Dubai to Rostov-on-Don — a focus of Mr Wheeler’s article — it’s possible that flight for a number of passengers might well have been part of a longer journey that included a point of departure and a point of final destination in Montreal Convention states (although the majority of the passengers were Russian).

In that case, MC99 might well apply to some FZ981 passengers, given the great majority of states that have signed up to MC99. On any one international flight different liability regimes may well apply to different passengers.

Mr Wheeler rightly bemoans the potential lack of MC99 compensation levels for FZ981 passengers, in part because Russia is not a party to that treaty. It should be noted, however, that the Russian Ministry of Transport did publish in 2013 the draft Federal Law on the Accession of the Russian Federation to MC99.

If the law is adopted — and it likely will be — Russia will become a party to MC99 60 days after the instrument of accession is lodged with International Civil Aviation Organisation.
Finally, Mr Wheeler lists three jurisdictions in which a passenger action for damages can be brought against an airline — there are five, of course, with the final jurisdiction being added by MC99. That jurisdiction is the territory of a party to MC99 in which at the time of the accident the passenger has his or her principal and permanent residence and to or from which the carrier operates services.

David Hodgkinson and Rebecca Johnston are partners with aviation and aerospace law firm HodgkinsonJohnston.

It is all very well this tit for tat legal bollocks on the original Warsaw Convention & MC99 but at the end of the day you can bet that the real obfuscation & liability minimisation strategies are being conducted in the board rooms of the fat cat multinational insurance  companies totally oblivious to the suffering of the victims & NOK of air crash tragedies -


MTF...P2