Safety
The good news today is that this blog has moved. It's now at this location.
We're switching to Movable Type as our blogging platform and you'll see that the result is more elegant for you, and with better functionality built in for you and us. Searches, trackbacks, comments, and feeds all work better.
All the archived content has been painstakingly migrated to the new site. We'll keep it here for a while, but this site won't be updated from now on and I urge you to bookmark the new location immediately.
Naturally we'd love to hear what you think of the new format.
It's not terribly often that a Boeing vice president discusses her maternal instincts in public, but the charming Marsha Bell (pic below), VP first officer program(me) at Boeing's Alteon training division was doing just that in London today. Let me explain...
Alteon is currently hard at work devising a programme to train pilots to obtain the newly developed ICAO-approved Multi-Crew Pilot Licence (MPL). This is a licence for which pilots would be trained from scratch to be qualified airliner pilots so long as they fly in a multi-crew aircraft - which of course they all do anyway. It's a very big deal in China and India because it could enable them to produce the staggering number of pilots that they will need over the next 20 years quicker than is currently possible. We've written about it in the magazine and will be doing so again a lot I suspect.
One oddity of the MPL is that there is no ICAO requirement for the pilot ever to fly solo. And, as a large part of the whole idea is to cut training time, Alteon don't really intend that their curriculum - which is still under development - will include a solo flight. Although their customers could request it of course.
Alteon are going to use the Diamond DA40 four-seat trainer for the early part of the course, intending that on each sortie there will be on board: an instructor, the primary student acting as pilot-flying, a student acting as pilot-monitoring, and a student observing. Arranging for a true solo would obviously be an interruption.
However Ms Bell concedes that individual airlines may well decide that the value of the solo is worth a little extra cost, and individual regulators may conclude that they'd be happier if everyone goes through that "rite of passage". She sympathises with them, commenting: "Maybe it is the maternal instinct in me but I want these guys to have a first solo and cut their ties. But people who are perhaps less emotionally engaged always explain to me that it is just not necessary."
And she reflects, that maybe actual flight-time is truly overated, saying: "I have been around simulators for about 20 years and there are plenty of times that pilots emerge soaked in sweat from the simulator with a renewed appreciation of what can go wrong."
Alteon's first MPL course will be run in Brisbane and, as it happens, the Australian regulatory authority - CASA - is still thinking about whether it wants true solos or not. Perhaps you've got a view on that - leave a comment.
Brazil's blog forums are buzzing, if you can read Portuguese, and there appears to be a concerted opinion forming.
The topic of interest is the fatal crash of Gol Lihnas Aéreas flight 1907. Indeed, type in "Vôo 1907" into a blog search engine such as Technorati.com and a multitude appear, such as those from Varanda Cuibana, As Máximas do Joe Baloo, O Blog do Barretto and the well-read Primera Clase.
Among the postings you'll find lots of detailed official-looking diagrams of the mid-air collision, all purporting to be from sources within the accident investigation (one example pictured below).
These show the wingtip of the Legacy scoring the underside of the 737-800's wing, forcing part of it to shear off, causing a death spiral of just less than 2min. This is close to the theory of most informed observers, including Flight (although clearly there are many unanswered questions).
Yet dig deeper and there is quiet a conspiracy theory being developed among some posters. I’ll let you go and find it yourself, rather than risk libel on these global corporatation-owned pages.
But needless to say, the Brazilian public is upset at the tragic loss of close to 160 passengers over dense jungle.
But there is anger at the US response to the detention of the two Exelaire pilots in command of the Embraer Legacy 600. The Legacy pilots have had their passports confiscated pending military investigation into the crash and could face manslaughter charges if found to be to blame.
While the Brazilian press is remaining neutral, the online community is baying for blood. Someone has to pay the price, and all the better if it's a yanqui, they reason.
Brazilians have long been outraged that the post 9/11 security arrangements force them to apply for a visa, along with visitors from the developing world. So when US congressman Steve Israel (Dem-NY) said he was to raise the issue of the pilots' treatment at the hands of the Brazilian authorities with US foreign affairs supremo Condoleezza Rice ahead of her South American tour, bloggers went into overdrive. The fact that Rice expressed support for the Brazilian authorities was overlooked in the wave of paranoia that saw Os Gringos going into bat to free their hero pilots in the face of a "third world regime" (in the minds of the majority of bloggers). Media in the USA was far less jingoistic in the main than the bloggeristos made it out to be.
Inconsistency also plagues the blogs. Different reports had the Amazon Two either locked up in a military prison or ensconced in a plush Rio de Janeiro hotel.
Worst were the horrific pictures purporting to those of the victims posted on many sites. The provenance of the photos is unchecked, but they are designed to shock the USA into reversing its perceived campaign to free the pilots.
The main US blog presence, meanwhile, has not been opinion or Brazil-bashing, but the sensitive, descriptive blogs of the journalists onboard the Legacy, principally those from the New York Times and the Washington Post.
Explore the Brazilian blog jungle at your peril.
On our homepage we've been running a poll asking which manufacturer's aircraft you believe are safest out of Boeing, Airbus, Embraer and Bombardier.
For a while it ran pretty much neck and neck, then after a couple of days Embraer suddenly shot up to about 40% of people considering it the safest - and an awful lot of people voting. Hmm...
I had a quick look this morning and, surprise, surprise, found another 4,000 people had suddenly voted - taking the turnout to 11,000, about five times more votes than we've ever had before - and pushing Boeing up to roughly equal. At the time of writing we have 12,747 votes, with Embraer and Boeing running at 44% and 43% respectively. Airbus and Bombardier are at 8% and 5%.
I don't think that tells us much about safety, or even perceived safety, but it's quite illuminating about the web habits of manufacturers' staff!
Thanks to everyone who read, and better still commented, on my earlier account of experiencing the A380 evacuation up close and personal. As promised, there will be a more detailed story in next week's Flight International which will of course appear on www.flightglobal.com as usual.
Among other things, it will describe just how I personally got out of the aircraft - and perhaps spark an interesting debate about game theory and actions that are good for an individual not necessarily being good for a group. You'll see what I mean.
But I did immediately want to clear up one loose end that I left hanging in my first post and which I've since been able to discuss with Airbus. That is the mysterious question of what happened to evacuee number 737.
You may recall that I mentioned previously that this was a woman who was escorted off the aircraft a short while before the evacuation - this was important because it appeared to leave only 852 on board and not 853 as planned. Other passengers said she looked ill and we assumed that was why she'd gone.
Well, I am assured that in fact the poor lady needed the bathroom and furthermore that, categorically, she did get back on. Fact is that I didn't see her return, but it is quite true that there were a lot of comings and goings by various programme staff and I'm happy to accept that I just missed it. Hey, I had a lot on my mind!
It's Sunday morning and as usual I'm wearing a numbered bib and doing agility tests in an aircraft hangar with 1,000 Germans I've never met before!
As you'll have guessed, the one thing we had in common is that we all thought it sounded interesting to be a volunteer in the first - and probably only - evacuation trial of the A380.
So here we are on a miserable, wet airfield in one of the biggest hangars in Europe at Airbus' Finkenwerder production facility next to the River Elbe.
I'm number 873, proud of it, and with a white bib numbered in black to prove it. We hand in everything in our possession which, though I don't realise it then, is going to make the next five hours pass very slowly indeed.
First the agility test. Line up, run along the wobbly board, bounce on the trampette, up on the vaulting horse, through the maze of cones without falling over and you're in. Immediately a tall, blond chap who looks like a candidate for the German decathlon team vaults about a metre over the horse.
No, no, no says the supervisor sensing a long day ahead, you have to stand on it. We chuckle, the decathlete gives us a dark look, then grudgingly clambers onto the horse. He passes, we all pass.
We've handed in our watches and there then passes an interminable five hours or so while the 1,000 or so volunteers get whipped into whatever mysterious order Airbus, EASA and the FAA have decided. I don't speak any German - everyone else in the hall is speaking German. It's no fun at all.
We're all sitting at endless trestle tables, with neon lighting and a concrete floor, drinking soft drinks - the whole thing looks like a church-hall coffee morning on a gigantic scale.
An a capella group comes on and sings Lollipop, in English. It's cute. Then a sort-of comic comes in and talks in German. I laugh when everyone else does. The a capella group comes on again, with suits - I think the first performance was actually a sound-check.
We get fed two choices of near-indistinguishable creamy pasta that make us crave airline food, but presumably set us up with our slow carbohydrate fix for the afternoon's activity.
Finally we're on. We get an epic briefing of which I understand not a word. When the blonde with the number next to mine moves off, I follow her. We all warm up properly, now looking like a church-hall yoga session, and then it's through a sinister elevating steel connecting door to the other half of the hangar.
What we see is the nose section of an A380 in zinc-chromate green with one upper-deck door and one main-deck door exposed, and stairs leading to them. The rest of the aircraft is shielded by a huge black curtain so that we can't see which of the upper-deck slides has been pre-deployed, as agreed with EASA for safety reasons. The void under the aircraft is stacked with cardboard boxes so that we can't see through for the same reason.
We board the aircraft and are greeted by a Lufthansa cabin crew treating us as if we were all off across the Atlantic.
Boarding is painfully slow - the 853 seats are just numbered like our bibs from 1 to 1,200 and something with no indication of where they are across the aircraft. We're first on the top deck and have another interminable wait while all the other groups board. I'm in an aisle seat immediately ahead of what should be the lavs, the nearest door is immediately the other side of the lavs - no problem choosing the door anyway.
To get that many people in, the aircraft is of course in all-economy configuration with extremely basic seats and definitely no IFE. The window shades are down to stop us looking out at the slides again. The clocks came forward the previous night and I have the quick snooze I've needed for a couple of hours.
The cabin crew brief us with Airbus' first attempt at an A380 safety card, apparently showing the aircraft being strangled to death by 16 escape slides. The good news is that there is only one type of door on the aircraft - look, lift up the swing handle, hit the button, look again, jump onto the slide if there is one. I can do that I think.
We all sit in economy class for another half-hour or so. Where the lavs and/or galley should be there is actually a wooden cubicle with two letterbox shaped slots in it through which two pairs of eyes - one male and scary, the other female, sexy, and also scary - are blinklessly watching us. (I made the blink-bit up, but you get the idea.) I start to feel I know how lab rats feel.
A woman is led out of our cabin looking faint and doesn't return. Ironically she's got bib number 737 (for you conspiracy theorists.)
Two anonymous guys, presumably from the regulatory authorities, wander through throwing blankets and simulated baggage - lots of it - in the aisles. They also make notes about all of us on clipboards. I start to feel a hint of adrenalin. How we all behave in the next few minutes has very serious ramifications for the A380 programme one way or the other.
The lights are dimmed in a pre-take-off sort of way. We sit for a while and I start to lose focus. With no warning it goes totally dark, but there's no other indication of anything being amiss. I hear shouts in German, which as usual I don't understand, but I get the message.
I'm out of my seat like a snake and reach my favoured door just in time for the male flight attendant to turn round and tell me it's not working. I knew the regulators had disarmed half the doors, and now I know at least one of the ones they chose.
I know it's irritating, but I'm going to have to save what happens next for my feature piece in Flight International next week. Suffice it to say that a short while later I'm standing in the pitch black hangar looking back at the utterly surreal sight of the towering bulk of the A380 with slides hanging from it everywhere, bathed in a pale yellow light from the slides' LEDs, and literally hundreds of shadowy black figures plunging down them.
The simulated ground rescuers are screaming at them to run, the flight attendants are screaming at others to jump. Suddenly I realise the people coming down the slides are wearing uniform - it's the cabin crew and it's all over. I feel the adrenalin drain away and wonder why I also feel utterly exhausted after not really doing very much. I suspect I'm getting a tiny inkling of what the real thing must be like.
I'm certain it's been fast and, sure enough, already Airbus programme officials in their bright green tee-shirts are punching the air and hugging each other. One senior manager who I know mutters something about 75 seconds as he passes and we shake hands.
Finally it's all over, a German debrief that I don't understand, and off I go to hear Airbus and EASA give the rest of the media the official line.
Airbus CEO Gustav Humber, A380 programme chief Charles Champion, and a party of other Airbus execs have flown up from Toulouse this Sunday to see all this and I'm gently reminded that, had it gone wrong, they would all have been back in Hamburg to do it again next week. And if that went wrong then this multi-billion dollar programme would be in serious difficulties.
Journalistic objectivity aside, I'm pleased as Punch for them. And I forego the €60 that each volunteer gets. Sometimes it's worth it just to be there.
This thread over with our good friends at Pprune prompts me to warn our pilot readers not to read Flight International while flying. It's the contribution by username Klink that got my attention.
The debate there is over the question of whether it is OK for airline pilots to read while in the cruise. Klink says you shouldn't read novels because they get too much of your attention. Stick to something lighter, he recommends.
Excellent point. As responsible publishers we're urging you not to read Flight International either - because if novels grab too much of your attention, then think what this cracking magazine will do! Especially the jobs section!!!
I'd be interested to hear suggestions as to suitable cockpit reading material which takes so little mental effort that it does not pose a hazard.
And I'm happy to point readers (who contact me privately I think) at publications that carry no risk of distracting their attention at all, leaving them bright and alert and ready to respond in an instant to their next TCAS RA. (Not that they'll need to be for much longer it seems.)
I've argued before that blacklists do little to help aviation safety, and the publication today of the European Union's long awaited list of banned and restricted carriers has done nothing to change my view. Here's the list in full.
The news is that any of you who were considering flying to or from Europe on the airlines of Equatorial Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone or Swaziland will now find that impossible. It's also going to be even harder to put yourself in the tender hands of North Korea's state airline, and you can tear up your frequent flyer cards on a handful of carriers from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Rwanda, and the Comores. There's more detail, but you get the idea.
The EU says this will make a substantial contribution to air safety in Europe, but I can't for the life of me see how. A miniscule contribution perhaps - anyway, I hope nobody spent too much time producing the list. I rather fear they did, but maybe they just looked up the US FAA's IASA list which would have largedly saved them the trouble.
Perhaps most significantly for the people of Europe, the methodology that appears to have been employed would not have prevented any of the accidents that resulted in all the political furore that culminated in the publication of the list.
Well the much awaited Ryanair documentary on Channel 4's Dispatches programme in the UK aired last night and contained pretty much what Ryanair had cleverly already told the world it would contain. Smart move.
It was fairly unimpressive stuff - a decent 5 minute news bulletin stretched into a creaky 1 hour documentary after 5 months of covert filming. But it will hurt Ryanair.
Incidentally, Dispatches producer Steve Boulton yesterday suddenly started calling on a recent