Ethiopian Airlines plane had "flight control problems," airline CEO says

[spanone]

Last edited Tue Mar 12, 2019, 12:59 PM - Edit history (1)

The pilots of the doomed Ethiopian Airlines flight told air traffic control they were having “flight control problems” before the crash, airline CEO Tewolde GebreMariam told CNN’s Richard Quest Tuesday.

That suggests the plane was not responding to pilots’ inputs and they were losing control of the aircraft, Quest explains.

GebreMariam said the flight data recorders “will be sent overseas,” rather than being read in Ethiopia, which does not have the technical capability to do it. He did not say where, specifically, they would be read.

Pilots were aware of airworthiness directive issued after the Lion Air crash in October and had had additional training, he said.

https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/boeing-737-max-8-ethiopia-airlines-crash/h_9dee508ccc0a80f533a2bdafb8d5b536

Link to tweet

Pilots of Ethiopian Airlines told air traffic control they were having “flight control problems,” reports @questCNN.

"This will be extremely worrying because that is exactly what was happening with Lion Air." http://cnn.it/2TJmtVP

[malaise]

1. Those must have been some terrifying moments for everyone on that aircraft

How sad.

[Coventina]

2. Seriously, I have to avoid thinking about it, or I'd never fly again.

I hate flying as it is.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

5. I hope you also don't plan to drive in a car anywhere.

In the United States about 33,000 people die each year in car accidents. Do you remember the last fatal plane crash in this country? I'll wait while you look it up.



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That's right, more than ten years ago. February 12, 2009. In that period of time more than 300,000 people have died in car accidents. Yeah, flying is scary and dangerous. Not.

[Coventina]

10. I am well informed of the statistics, and have lost loved ones to auto accidents.

In fact, I have survived a bad car accident myself.

All the facts in the world don't help when it comes to fear.

I know it's not rational. My brain knows that, thank you very much.

But when something goes sideways with a plane, you are helpless, and the odds of survival are not good.

Car accidents, while they kill far more people, are also much more survivable.

So, your little post is not helpful, and comes across as snide and belittling.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

17. And how many people do you know have died in plane crashes?

I am not intending to be snide and belittling and apologize for that. But I get very frustrated by people declaring that all airplane travel is unsafe after such incidents.

The real problem with car crashes is that they tend to kill one or two or three people at a time.

Some years back my local newspaper, the Kansas City Star, did a brief article on every single one of the local residents killed in car crashes in a recent month. For some reason I'm remembering that about thirty people died, but I could be remembering wrong. But the point was well made. If those who die in car accidents had their stories posted far and wide, we'd have an entirely different view of such incidents.

Meanwhile, how many hundreds of thousands of take-offs and landings have occurred since this recent accident? And again, I want to point to over 10 years of no commercial airplane fatalities in this country as another way of pointing out the safety. People need to work on being rational about things. Just glibly saying, "I know it's not rational but I'm still going be afraid" is at the root of a lot of things that are wrong.

[Coventina]

19. The comment I was responding to was not about numbers and statistics.

It was about the sheer horror of what those people experienced.

Yes, it's rare, we all know this.

But when it happens it is horrifying and terrifying because there is NOTHING we can do about it.

We can drive carefully, and buckle up, and train ourselves to be better drivers, but when it comes to air travel we are HELPLESS and there is something terrifying about that to many people.

I guess you are just incapable of understanding that, but please at least try.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

21. I'm a former airline employee.

And at least when I was working, it was not uncommon for us to discuss what crash we'd most prefer to be in.

Anything where you had no idea what was happening was good.

[spanone]

3. I can't imagine....

[Igel]

4. It might have been tech failure.

But I'm around people all do who have had trainings (and more trainings, and additional trainings, followed by specific problem-related trainings) on how to use technology.

And still they do stupid things.

In some cases they didn't really understand (or pay attention to, or understand the application of) their trainings.

In other cases they forget their training.

In other cases they simply bypass their training in favor of habit. Perhaps under stress, perhaps while "multitasking".

Often I've seen trainers not "check for understanding" while the people being trained don't want to ask questions (either from embarrassment or because they want to get out early for lunch). In some cases they think they understand and don't--maybe it's a language issue, maybe they were texting instead of being in the moment.

It's worse with "student centered" approaches, where the trainees watch videos, read and take quizzes, that sort of thing, while the "facilitator" just sort of watches the trainees' training. The computer screen doesn't gauge facial expressions to judge engagement and doesn't usually doesn't personalize instruction when the test or quiz questions are sometimes easily guessed or the answers predictable or predictably spread around during the test or beforehand.

When it's kids who screw up, I acknowledge their diminished (or "not yet developed&quot capacity and the greater responsibility of the trainer. But when it's teachers who screw up, I place the responsibility on the professional adults.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

6. And while the captain had some 12 or 15 thousand hours in the cockpit

(I'm forgetting which number I heard recently), the co-pilot had only 200 hours. Which in aviation isn't very much at all.

So, yeah, while there might have been something fundamentally wrong with that plane, it doesn't mean that all 737-Max ones are dangerous, and it especially doesn't mean all flying is dangerous.

[Dennis Donovan]

7. I thought I read the FO had two hundred hours in type?

Not TT?

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

8. Since the comparison I heard was between

12-15,000 and 200, I doubt one was for all flying and the other just for type. I might be wrong.

Okay, I just did a quick google search and according to the NYTimes,

Aviation experts expressed surprise at the vast disparity in experience in the two-person cockpit crew. Ethiopian Airlines said the pilot of Flight 302 had 8,000 hours of flying time but the co-pilot had just 200.

[Dennis Donovan]

18. Wow, he should be driving Cessnas, not 737's...

I thought you needed at least 1500 hrs TT to get an ATP? Well, in the US, at least...

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

20. Which may be more of the problem, rather than anything

with the aircraft itself.

[Girard442]

9. Sounds remarkably similar to this:

During the 1990s, a series of rudder issues on Boeing 737 aircraft resulted in multiple incidents. In two separate accidents, pilots lost control of their Boeing 737 aircraft due to a sudden and unexpected movement of the rudder, and the resulting crashes killed everyone aboard. A total of 157 people aboard the two aircraft were killed. Similar rudder issues led to a temporary loss of control on at least one other Boeing 737 flight before the problem was ultimately identified.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737_rudder_issues

Doesn't mean it is that, but I wouldn't be too quick to say "pilot error."

[helpisontheway]

11. Just what I needed to hear as we prepare for a flight from east coast to Hawaii in two weeks. Nt

[Coventina]

12. You're about to be told you're silly for feeling your feelings.

(see above)

[Mariana]

22. The only person who's used the word silly in this thread is you. nt.

[Coventina]

23. So?

I was shamed for expressing fear about flying.

I merely informed another poster they were likely to be shamed as well.

You are arguing semantics, and I have no interest in doing that.

[Recursion]

13. This model is much less common in the US, and isn't used for long-hauls mainly

East Coast to HI will probably be a 747 or 787

[helpisontheway]

14. Thanks..I checked and it is 787,777 and an Airbus 321.nt

[roamer65]

15. I love Airbus A321's

Solid, reliable workhorses. Best damn airliner in the air today.

[Recursion]

16. Ever since I rode an A380 on Emirates it's been my favorite

12 hours, Dulles to Dubai, with me spending the entire time saying to myself "holy shit this is a big airplane"

[Blue_Tires]

24. I'll wait until the CVR readout