Air India setting records

Smart, because I think that will be the case once the data is analyzed.

 

I've read a few reports now, and it seems that they didn't use all available runway, either. They left from an intersection that gave them less than 7000' total runway. Also it was over 110 degrees, which means the density altitude (the "feels like" altitude for performance calculations) was over 4000'.

I'm not a 787 pilot, so I don't know intimate details of 787 performance. And while this was probably well within the capabilities of the airplane, it was also likely close to a max performance takeoff with full pax, fuel, short runway and high / hot conditions. I would expect a higher flap setting and higher thrust setting (although probably still not MAX power)

All of this adds up to less margin for error.

If there's a loss of thrust on one engine, the plane would still be flyable, that is what the performance calculations are based on. Accelerate, lose an engine, continue. Even at the reduced power setting. That is how much thrust these modern engines have.

Retracting the flaps early is a different story. There's a reason we don't mess with the flaps until we're above 1000', gear is up, and we're accelerating. Takeoff speed is maybe 145 knot range, minimum clean speed (no flap) is probably 210 in the 737 and maybe higher in a heavy beast like this. That wing will just not fly at zero flaps without significantly more speed. If the flaps are retracted at low altitude and barely above rotation speed, 150 knots or so, that is probably not recoverable. The reason is, as the flaps retract, you'll increase pitch in an attempt to achieve level flight, and even if you *could* keep it from stalling, you would be way behind the power curve and could not accelerate or climb. Even with max thrust.

Alot of people are focused on the gear, but failing to retract the gear, while it is a performance penalty, is probably not going to crash the plane even in an engine out scenario. To me it's more indicative of some other issue, whether it's human or mechanical, we'll see.

There are just SO many factors that we don't know about- did the plane have maintenance issues? Some people are taking the sound from videos and saying they hear the Ram Air Turbine deployed, but why the hell would it be deployed on takeoff? Were they ignoring some warnings because of maintenance issues? We have the experience of the Captain but they said nothing about the FO, was he brand new? Did he reach for the flaps instead of gear? Eventually we'll have some answers.

Nowadays it also seems like so much garbage info is out there after an incident like this, it makes it hard to watch videos and read articles. Plus you have garbage AI and flight sim videos where everyone and their brother is trying to get clicks.

One thing I'll mention that @Resident Plarp said- you're probably not wrong that planes are being utilized more these days, but that doesn't mean that they aren't maintaining them. These things are capable of flying almost round the clock. Now, that has been my experience in the US. But looking at what some foreign airlines have done, even with brand new airplanes, can be shocking when it comes to maintenance. The Lion Air 737 was flying around with that condition that eventually caused the crash for almost a week and it was never fixed properly, nor did they call the Boeing Tech Rep for support. So who knows.

Also, the reduced thrust takeoff isn't for fuel savings, it actually costs us fuel because it takes longer to get to altitude. It's to keep engine temps lower and prolong engine life, as recommended by the manufacturer. So in effect you're right that it's for cost savings. Minor point I guess.

 

Mentour Pilot and others are now saying it's a standard thing at that airport to enter at intersection and backtrack to the end, and it's believed this is what he did. To your point, everybody is guessing until they have data from the boxes and have done some investigating. Watching it reminded me of that Airbus at the airshow many years ago, but that was simply a cocky pilot getting behind on things.

 

I find it amazing that all airlines don't have a policy to use all the available runway regardless of what the calculations say.

It's funny when I was going through my commercial training (92), they wanted us to call "500 ft. Flaps up. Gear up." Supposedly to match what they did at most of the airlines. I guess that has changed.
Actually, we were taught that the gear was supposed to come up as soon as we got a positive rate of climb on the job, but in our little Seminoles at school, we waited 500 feet since landing might be an option in an emergency.

 

Every airline has a policy that restricts it to some degree. But you MUST have the data to be legal. Even with our crazy control driven society, there's still a thing called Captain's discretion. There is more autonomy than you think involved in airline operations.

An example would be Atlanta, you're #5 for takeoff and the #1 guy gets some kind of delay. You're sitting right next to an intersection where you still have 9000'+ of runway and the tower says you can go from there? If I have the numbers, we're going! Many times in situations like this, an experienced crew will run the numbers for those intersections (in advance), in anticipation of this kind of thing.

 

I never realized the planes werent at max power for TO...seems kind of asking for an issue like this. And yes I would expect getting behind the curve on a wide body is more difficult to recover from than a 182.

As to the FO...i think i saw that he had something like 1200 hours...so maybe they have the EU style SIC crew license thing there.

 

Reduced power takeoffs are a big big deal. They help the engines last longer.

 

They pay by the meter of runway used for TO in India.

 

I saw a Reel vid of the same plane earlier in the day or the day before... someone in the cabin was filming and showing that the AC wasn't working and the IFE was kaput. Electrical issues?

 

The 787 air conditioning is different than most airliners. It has an electric powered air conditioner similar to your car. Most other airliners take compressed bleed air from the engines and runs that thru turbomachinery and heat exchangers to make cold air.

 

Pilots should have seen TO config error at take-off on the EICAS. I just don't see how they could have bypassed/ignored that.

We have a meeting every year on de-rate percentage for our fleet. Depending on our fleet engine health that number can be above or below the set agreement with GE. Its a business now with these engines due to all the performance matrix info and analysis. We can pretty much determine when our engine is gonna fail.

 

I agree, and that's why I said in response to someone earlier that I really doubt that they took off with flaps UP. However, I'm betting (because I don't know) that the setting in the FMS which reflects the calculated Takeoff data is cross checked with the actual lever position (or actual flap position) to generate the takeoff warning if there's a mismatch. But if the data is wrong.....you won't get a warning at all.

 

I’ve been trading options a fair bit the past year. It’s not that hard to be directionally right.

The hard part is figuring out whether you’re buying in at a decent price, and setting good limits and stop limits. I doubled my money on some Boeing calls about 2 months ago when there was some other event. I got too conservative though and I set my stop limit too high. That trade if I’d stayed in the position would’ve made me 10x.

It’s definitely an art and requires you to be on top of it every day, the money you can make is insane. I was about to pull the trigger on UHC puts the day Luigi pulled the trigger on the UHC dude, and got cold feet at the last second just as I was about to execute. I would’ve made $300k. I’m still sore about that one.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...y-authorities?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us

 

Better quality video seems to 100% show the RAT is out. Captain Steeve on YT has said the 787 RAT comes out automatically for Major electrical failure, hydraulic failure or dual engine failure.

 

RAT?

 

Ram Air Turbine

Its a propeller which swings into the airsteam to provide emergency electrical and hydraulic power.

 

You know the best part of having that sanctimonious cunt on ignore?



















All of it.

 

If the RAT is truly deployed, that changes everything.

There's also evidence emerging that they did begin the gear retraction sequence, because of the position of the wheels, but then the retraction sequence stopped? The APU door appears to be open in the wreckage, the 787 has APU Auto Start for certain conditions.

So the question becomes, what could cause both engines to fail simultaneously and instantaneously?

1. Fuel
2. Software
3. Intentional shutdown /misprogramming

I did some reading by some test engineers, they said Air India is famous for maintenance practices, and not in a good way. He also said the sample rates of the fuel tanks would clear the fuel lines during taxi out, so contamination should have shown up earlier, before the takeoff roll began. Also no other aircraft reported problems with the fuel at the airport. There is also a system on the 787 (TMCA but I may have screwed up the acronym) That is designed to roll back a runaway thrust engine on the ground. However he feels it's extremely remote that this caused an airborne loss of thrust inadvertently.

There's also a 4th (actually there's a zillion) possibility- the misprogramming of the autopilot with an altitude of 0 or lower than 400'. This nearly crashed an Air New Zealand 777 in 2019 and an Emirates 777 a few years ago. The autopilot captures the low altitude and immediately reduces thrust to maintain the selected speed (climb out speed).

The First Officer is reported to have 1100 hours which is not even enough for an ATP license in the US. Not sure if that is even a factor though.

Appears I was not correct about them using all of the runway and taking off from the intersection, that was bad data and from the camera angles it's been pointed out that the rotation point was pretty normal. The dangers of speculation.

My head hurts, I tend to get obsessed with what happened in these accidents and spend too much time reading. I did take a break to see the Panthers win last night though!