[Peetwo]

Update: Courtesy the Times, via the Oz.

‘Get-home-itis’ and macho pride is a lethal mix for pilots

• Charles Bremner
  
• The Times
  
• 7:01PM December 1, 2016
  

 Ps I like to add to the mix (discussion.. ) the following archived post from P9 off the O&O thread:

A Sunday rant. (My turn).

This report –HERE - Absolutely overdue and most definitely obfuscated.  Don’t read the fluffy ‘abridged’ version, download the whole disgusting thing for the full nauseating effect.

Well Senator Sterle; I’ll see your 42 tons and raise you 49 tons.  The differences are worthy of comment.  Our 49 tons was doing about 280kph approaching the ‘bridge’, it cannot be reversed, nor can it be decoupled; it also had many of your fellow West Australians inboard. Had it 'jack-knifed', there is no friendly RTA to sort out the mess; only fire engines, police and ambulances initially, coroners and inquiry later.  

This nasty, grubby little report from the ATSB, for what they seem to find a cut and dried matter, has been three years in the making.  It is a grubby attempt to distract the reader away from several core issues which are not even paid the courtesy of being obfuscated; they are simply ignored.  

No calculator required for the simple mathematics.  Using the index finger of your right hand, count the fingers on your left hand – Norfolk (1) Mildura (2) Mildura (3) Perth (4).  Four known close calls all with several things in common, short of fuel and rapidly changing weather, three ending happily on runways, one ditched in open water.  

The common threads are easily discerned,but even this latest pathetic report tries to hint at pilot error.  It is a good thing that the ATSB do not apportion blame; but they do hint at it.  Why?, well, another common factor is the sacred cow of the BoM, who only need to be within +/-70% accuracy of actual in their forecast (from memory) to be off the hook.  This level of accuracy has little intrinsic or practical value to a pilot.  In court the responsibility will all fall to the pilot, everyone else has wriggle room and bolt holes, all except the poor mutt in the dock.  

ATSB, ASA, BoM and CASA need to resolve this situation; we now have escaped four times from disaster where bad weather and low fuel reserves have been intricately bound with poor, late weather forecast.  It’s a trend and ATSB should be screaming from the roof tops, demanding something be done to reverse that trend.  Do they? No sir, they do not.  We get presented with a snide, trite, puerile little report which tries to shift the spotlight off the piss poor service to the travelling public delivered by our expensive ‘safety watchdogs’.    

When planning for the return flight at Paraburdoo, the Perth aerodrome forecast (TAF) and the trend forecast (TTF) did not contain any forecast operational requirements for this aircraft to carry sufficient fuel to fly to an alternate aerodrome. At 2300, 5 minutes after take-off, the Perth TTF changed with the forecast onset of fog 65 minutes after the estimated time of arrival (ETA).

Snipe 1: perhaps on the basis of the new forecast the aircraft should have landed and uploaded more fuel, then tried again?  Bollocks.

At 0010, which was about the time when the aircraft commenced its descent and shortly before the aircraft no longer had sufficient fuel to divert safely to a suitable landing aerodrome, the Perth TAF was amended to indicate a requirement for the carriage of sufficient fuel to divert to an alternate airport on the basis of more than four OKTAS8 of cloud with a base below the alternate minimum of 700 ft above the aerodrome reference point. The forecast also predicted that 35 minutes after the aircraft’s ETA, there was a 30 per cent probability of fog reducing the visibility to 300 m, which was below both the alternate and landing minimums for runway 03.

Snipe 2: Neatly blurred; the implication is that somehow it’s the pilots fault that there is insufficient fuel.  There is little point (other than spite) to be mentioning any of the above; they were dead set legal and righteous to continue and had adequate fuel to complete the task as scripted on the weather forecast as applicable to the time; not the clucking future but right there and then.

Soon after, at 0014, a TTF SPECI9 was issued for Perth Airport indicating that the visibility had reduced to 7,000 m and the airport was partially covered in fog. The observed visibility, as reported on the TTF SPECI issued at 0030, which was soon after the aircraft’s landing time, was 900 m in fog.

Snipe 3:16 minutes from touch down, visibility 7000 meters partial fog – so what, still all good. Continue on; the nasty bit is the statement “soon after” etc.  This implies the landing was in ‘marginal’ (borderline illegal) conditions.  

When you break down the time line, you realise that this flight was always legal, the only ‘indiscretion’ was a conflict with company procedure.  The decision to land off the go around was righteous, given the circumstances.  ATSB would prefer you believed otherwise, they just hint at it though.    Pure spite and malice. 

During the flight, the flight crew did not seek or obtain an amended or updated forecast for Perth.

2255 – Take off.  Time en-route 90 minutes - ETA Perth 0130.

2300 – amended forecast for Fog at 1 hr 05 minutes after ETA.  Fog @ 0235.

0010 – Top of Descent (TOD).  Forecast amended to reflect a 30% chance of low visibility 35 minutes after landing; fog forecast from 0205.  

0014 -  Special weather visibility 7000 meters.

0030 visibility 900 meters.  AFTER LANDING...... FFS.  What's your point?

The captain reported that he normally obtained the latest TTF for Perth when overflying the automatic en route information service (AERIS) at Meekatharra, about 360 NM (667 km) north-north-east of Perth.

However, the timing of the flight and the delay normally encountered in updating the available weather information on the AERIS meant that he did not expect to obtain the latest TTF at that time.

When the aircraft was about 240 NM (440 km) from Perth, the crew obtained the latest automatic terminal information service (ATIS) weather observation for Perth, which provided no indication of deteriorating weather.

Routine, bog standard, sensible operating practice.  The rules and the BoM failed the public yet again, with everyone off the hook except those burned alive.  It is high time the ATSB started bringing this trend into focus instead of drafting a carefully prepared, prejudicial statement for prosecution use.

The Beyond all Reason methodology and those that espouse it are not only becoming an international embarrassment, but part of the causal chain.

Update 03/12/16: Damning evidence in flight notification 

P2 comment: Note that the listed alternate was Bogota, which the PIC chose to overfly -  

&.. via the Guardian:

 
Little sympathy for Colombia plane crash pilot: 'What he did was mass murder'

Miguel Quiroga’s father-in-law asked for forgiveness, as flight plan revealed inadequate fuel reserve for journey that killed most of a Brazilian football team.       
[/url] Coffins of members of Chapecoense soccer team lie in Medellín, Colombia. Seventy-one people were killed on flight in total. Photograph: Raul Arboleda/AFP/Getty Images

[url=https://www.theguardian.com/profile/dom-phillips]Dom Phillips in Rio de Janeiro
Saturday 3 December 2016 04.44 AEDT First published on Saturday 3 December 2016 04.35 AEDT

The father-in-law of the pilot who was operating the charter flight which crashed in the Andes killing 71 people, has asked for forgiveness, amid growing evidence that the aeroplane embarked with barely enough fuel to complete the journey.



Chapecoense plane crash: fans' anger after confirmation plane ran out of fuel
Colombian media release audio of pilot telling air traffic controllers plane – which crashed killing 71 players, crew and journalists – was ‘without fuel’

But his apology is unlikely to appease a growing sense of anger in Brazil, which is still mourning the loss of most of the Chapecoense football team, who were traveling on plane to their first-ever international final in the Colombian city of Medellín.

A copy of the flight plan has been circulated widely in Brazil, showing that the estimated time of the journey and the plane’s total range were the same – four hours and 22 minutes – leaving no time for any delays. As the flight neared its destination late on Monday, another flight with problems jumped in front of the team’s plane, leaving it circling while its fuel ran out.

Roger Molina, the father in law of Bolivian pilot Miguel Quiroga, 36, issued his apology in an interview with TV Globo.

He said he wanted to tell “millions of Brazilians, but specifically those relatives, children, parents and brothers and sisters of Chapecó, that we are very sorry”.

Speaking for the family, who live in the Brazilian town of Epitaciolândia, near the Bolivian border, Molina said he did not want to comment on the causes of the crash. “The word sorry does not resolve anything, but we want to ask for pardon,” he said.

Victims’ relatives and Brazilian pilots have said Quiroga should never have been allowed to set off with a flight plan as flawed as the one the company presented. There were no plans to refuel, nor did the plane have enough range to reach an alternative airport or keep flying beyond expected flight time, as is standard safety procedure.

Their anger and frustration has been compounded by media reports that Quiroga was also a partner in the charter airline LaMia, leading to speculation that he did not stop to refuel to save money.

“It was 77 people’s lives in the hands of one pilot. It was not just one family. It shocked the whole world, there is no doubt the company was wrong,” said Caroline Machado, 19, whose uncle Eduardo Preuss, one of the coaching staff, was killed in the crash. “We are very shaken.”

Brazilian pilots have strongly criticised LaMia for apparently taking unacceptable risks.

“This really was a tragedy, a tragedy that this happened because of pure irresponsibility,” said one pilot, speaking anonymously because he was not authorized to give interviews. “What he (Quiroga) did was mass murder.”

On Friday Brazil’s Estado de S Paulo newspaper reported that the same British Aerospace-built plane had flown four other trips at the limit of its fuel capacity.

Another Brazilian pilot, Evandro Garcia also pointed the finger at the Bolivian civil aviation authorities, who he said were more lax than other South American countries.

“Their criteria, their demands, are below other countries,” he said.

On Friday, the Associated Press reported that one of the LaMia airlines owners, Gustavo Vargas, had served as pilot to Bolivian president Evo Morales in 2006 and that his son, also called Gustavo Vargas, headed the office at the country’s civil aviation agency tasked with licensing aircraft. The younger Vargas was one of a number of high-level aviation officials suspended on 1 December as part of an investigation into the crash, AP said.
Marcelo Chavez, regional director of Bolivia’s air traffic control agency and one of the suspended officials, told AP that an inspector had flagged the issue with the aircraft’s fuel and range but the airline went ahead anyway and air traffic controllers had no authority to stop them. Morales said he did not know the airline existed and called a “profound investigation”.



'Our club represented Brazil': Chapecoense tragedy a crushing blow to nation in crisis
For many in the southern city of Chapecó the football team, whose players and staff were nearly all killed in a plane crash in Colombia on Monday, were a balm against the political and economic upheaval battering their country

The bodies of the victims are due to arrive in the team’s home of Chapecó, the medium-sized city in the south of Brazil, by Saturday, when a joint funeral will be held at the team’s small Arena Condá stadium. Large screens will be erected outside the stadium for a crowd that is expected to reach 100,000 – half the city’s population.

But controversy surrounds what happens next to the giant-killing team who had enchanted this football-mad nation.

This week, Brazilian Football Association president Marco Polo Del Nero caused controversy when he insisted that Chapecoense play their next league game against Atlético Mineiro.

“This game has to happen. There has to be a big party,” Chapecoense’s surviving vice-president Ivan Tozzo told Globoesporte. When Tozzo said he had no players, Del Nero replied: “You have the youth team and the players who stayed.”

Atlético have refused to play the game. “We believe in sport, respect the pain, this is not the moment to demand anything of any player,” Daniel Nepomuceno, Atlético’s president told reporters on 1 December.

Three Chapecoense players were among the six survivors – defenders Allan Ruschel and Helio Neto, and goalkeeper Jackson Follman.

Neto’s father has said his son will return to playing.

“He has just done surgery on his leg and the doctors say he will go back to football,” the player’s father, Helam Zampier, wrote on Facebook, the UOL site reported.

MTF...P2