Ask The Pilot

[mjt57]

i'm not sure that I quite understand what you are asking....

ie. are there interlocks or logic built into the system that would prevent any actions if something isn't met. Hard to expand without knowing what you look at with the checklists.

Or, are they simply lists which monitor conditions and, as you wrote, change color when the "yes/no" criteria is met? ie. purely monitoring, nothing else?

I flew across the pond with one of the US carrier a few years ago. I found it appalling in almost every way...including a landing in NYC that was so long that stopping at the far end became an issue. If I were to do it again I think I'd give Icelandair a go...

That's what I'm afraid of. I have no idea what Delta's like. But I'll tell, sorry, request my wife check out Icelandair.

 

[jb747]

ie. are there interlocks or logic built into the system that would prevent any actions if something isn't met. Hard to expand without knowing what you look at with the checklists.

Or, are they simply lists which monitor conditions and, as you wrote, change color when the "yes/no" criteria is met? ie. purely monitoring, nothing else?

The ECAM is really just a fancy way of presenting a checklist. It's not really any smarter than a piece of paper, and it certainly doesn't provide 'interlocks' of its own. Think about it...those interlocks would be almost bound to cause more trouble than they cure.

Some things don't happen until other items are done, but that's just normal progression, i.e. the fuel dump must be armed and selected on, or the APU can't be started until the APU door is opened. Actually some things that require two selections in the 380 can be done by one in the 747...

 

[Tortuga]

Hey JB, do you find it difficult when you are a passenger on an aircraft versus being up the front in control? Do you notice every movement the plane makes and instinctively question what's going on up the front? Is it possible to judge a pilots skills from the passenger seat, eg if they over control the stick when landing which seems to be a common thing. Do you ever end up in economy and if so what is your opinion on it?

I flew Iceland air and found the crew very professional (for some reason I have this idea that they have good quality pilots).

 

[jb747]

Hey JB, do you find it difficult when you are a passenger on an aircraft versus being up the front in control? Do you notice every movement the plane makes and instinctively question what's going on up the front? Is it possible to judge a pilots skills from the passenger seat, eg if they over control the stick when landing which seems to be a common thing. Do you ever end up in economy and if so what is your opinion on it?

I probably notice the movement, and hear the noises, but as I understand what they are, I take very little notice.

It is pretty well impossible to judge a flight/pilot from aft of the cabin door. You have virtually no information, and have no idea of what he is seeing or dealing with.

Aircraft are not being over controlled near the ground. A couple of things come into play to affect what you feel at that point. Firstly the controls behave differently as flap is extended, but most importantly, the margin for error decreases. At altitude it really doesn't matter if you're hundreds of metres laterally displaced, so smooth is the overriding concern. In the later stages of an approach you margins rapidly head towards zero, so rapid and sometimes very firm control inputs are required. And, as soon as you put an input in, you'll need to cancel it, and then often apply the opposite. It's interesting to note that as the aircraft closes on the ground the autopilot authority is reduced, whilst pilots become much more willing to use large inputs.

 

[QF029]

Hi JB. I was reading a report of the search for Glenn Ey 270 nm of the NSW coast. Is there a minimum height that an aircraft must observe when not taking off or landing? Have you ever been involved in a request such as this?

"The Australian Maritime Safety Authority asked two international flights to divert to his location according to the GPS on his beacon. The pilot of an Air Canada Boeing 777 flight from Vancouver, Captain Andrew Robertson, said his plane flew down to 1524 metres, while the crew and passengers used binoculars to search for Mr Ey. They saw the yacht and the captain confirmed his location, before an Air New Zealand A320, flying from Auckland, later checked on his position."

Read more: 'I couldn't believe it': rescued yachtsman Glenn 200 nautical miles from where he thought he was

 

[D747]

Ask The Pilot

Hi jb,
about 7 years ago I was having a chat with with a young second officer on a SYD-JNB 747 flight. He talked about ground effect of the wing and tail plane and also of the effect on pitch that the increase in power has due to the power plants being so far below the centre line. He mentioned take off and landing as the most notable times for this. I would be most appreciative if you could share your knowledge on this. As always thanks for the time that you spend both answering our questions and for the wonderful videos you post. As an "aviation enthusiast" I really appreciate it.

 

[jb747]

Yes, there are minimum heights...generally in the middle of nowhere 500 feet. Company rules will override this, as long as they set a higher minimum. Searching for a yacht, 4000-5000 feet would seem reasonable number.

It's a little surprising that a flight from Canada had any fuel to spare to help at all. Fuel burn down low is very high.

I've only been involved in searches in my military days. Sadly two of them were successful, in that we found bodies....

 

[jb747]

Hi jb,
about 7 years ago I was having a chat with with a young second officer on a SYD-JNB 747 flight. He talked about ground effect of the wing and tail plane and also of the effect on pitch that the increase in power has due to the power plants being so far below the centre line. He mentioned take off and landing as the most notable times for this. I would be most appreciative if you could share your knowledge on this. As always thanks for the time that you spend both answering our questions and for the wonderful videos you post. As an "aviation enthusiast" I really appreciate it.

Ground effect (aircraft) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

That's a good explanation of ground effect.

In the 747 it was very noticeable, and generally countered with a very slight reduction in pitch and power (half degree, 1%) as you approached the flare. As most approaches are never totally steady state anyway, it just tends to be absorbed into all of the changes that are happening. Do nothing, and the aim point will move further down the runway.

The 380 is even more inclined towards it, but the effect is masked by the flight controls. Generally though, you'll need to lower the nose very slightly from about 250' to hold a fixed aim point.

Ground effect probably saved the Singair 747 that had the massive tail scrape out of Auckland a few years ago.

Pitch couples come into play because the thrust is below the drag line, thus creating a pitching moment. So, increase power and it pitches up, decrease and it pitches down. This is totally masked by the Airbus FBW system...which is great until you have to fly in a degraded mode where it doesn't work. In the 767, the combination of the engines being quite forward slung on the pylons, plus being well below the drag line gives rise to extremely strong coupling.

It is really much the same thing as the yaw coupling that happens on any engine out flying...but in that case the moment arm is across the aircraft. The various moments mean that single engine flying in a 767 was very interesting, with any thrust change causing the aircraft to pitch and to yaw appreciably.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

there was some strange reporting regarding the missing yacht... first thing i read how the guy miscalculated his position and was 200 miles farther away than he estimated, and he was claiming it was a miracle he was found etc etc. The later report form the Canadian captain said they had locked on to the emergency beacon, knew where the guy was, and it was all straight forward. So it didn't seem like the Canadian jet spend hours searching.

 

[jb747]

there was some strange reporting regarding the missing yacht... first thing i read how the guy miscalculated his position and was 200 miles farther away than he estimated, and he was claiming it was a miracle he was found etc etc. The later report form the Canadian captain said they had locked on to the emergency beacon, knew where the guy was, and it was all straight forward. So it didn't seem like the Canadian jet spend hours searching.

They certainly wouldn't have spent hours searching. I'm surprised they had fuel to do ANY searching at all. Not sure about 'locking on' to the beacon either. The aircraft don't normally have the capability of getting bearings from a beacon. Like all stories, there will be more to it.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

They certainly wouldn't have spent hours searching. I'm surprised they had fuel to do ANY searching at all. Not sure about 'locking on' to the beacon either. The aircraft don't normally have the capability of getting bearings from a beacon. Like all stories, there will be more to it.

I might have got the exact details a bit wrong. They certainly mentioned though that the emergency beacon gave the location. This was not some case of the guy drifting with everyone searching in completely the wrong direction. (No telly movie here!!)

 

[jb747]

I might have got the exact details a bit wrong. They certainly mentioned though that the emergency beacon gave the location. This was not some case of the guy drifting with everyone searching in completely the wrong direction. (No telly movie here!!)

Most likely he had a satellite/GPS beacon. They transmit the actual position. The SAR people would have sent that to the Canadians, and they'd then have a pretty accurate spot to fly to.

 

[markis10]

They certainly wouldn't have spent hours searching. I'm surprised they had fuel to do ANY searching at all. Not sure about 'locking on' to the beacon either. The aircraft don't normally have the capability of getting bearings from a beacon. Like all stories, there will be more to it.

The beacon would have had a lat and long calculated by the COSPAS satellites, I suspect the 777 was tasked to provide a visual ident and confirmation of the COSPAS estimates. While the beacon does transmit analog signals that could be triangulated by an aircraft using nulls through its nav system (omni), its unlikely the crew had the time or skills to do so, and they would have been just replicating what COSPAS had already done, had a striker (P3) been loitering nearby, different story.

 

[Hvr]

If required could you land the A380 at CBR? I.e. is the runway long and thick enough?

Would they have any equipment to get people off the plane? and so on...

Thanks.

 

[NM]

They certainly wouldn't have spent hours searching. I'm surprised they had fuel to do ANY searching at all. Not sure about 'locking on' to the beacon either. The aircraft don't normally have the capability of getting bearings from a beacon. Like all stories, there will be more to it.

I might have got the exact details a bit wrong. They certainly mentioned though that the emergency beacon gave the location. This was not some case of the guy drifting with everyone searching in completely the wrong direction. (No telly movie here!!)

Do such emergency beacons have the ability to transmit their current GPS coordinates? That would make it pretty easy to located.

 

[jb747]

If required could you land the A380 at CBR? I.e. is the runway long and thick enough?

Would they have any equipment to get people off the plane? and so on...

The biggest problem is unlikely to be the runway, but the taxiways and obstructions adjacent to them. Turns would almost certainly not be wide enough. Melbourne, which served large aircraft as a matter of course, had to be substantially upgraded to allow 380 operations. Even four years after its introduction, most places that it goes to regularly have very substantial limitations on just where it can go on the field.

I'd be extremely surprised if there were any ground equipment in Canberra capable of serving the 380.

 

[jb747]

The beacon would have had a lat and long calculated by the COSPAS satellites, I suspect the 777 was tasked to provide a visual ident and confirmation of the COSPAS estimates. While the beacon does transmit analog signals that could be triangulated by an aircraft using nulls through its nav system (omni), its unlikely the crew had the time or skills to do so, and they would have been just replicating what COSPAS had already done, had a striker (P3) been loitering nearby, different story.

I haven't seen an aircraft with the ability to DF signals since I last flew the Classic. The -400 couldn't do it, and neither can the 380. I guess the airlines don't want their aircraft doing that sort of thing. About the only way you could do it, assuming the time and fuel, would be to wait until it faded out, and draw a circle based on the likely radio line of sight at that height...then try to get another circle from another angle. The beacon should be near one of the intersections.

 

[jb747]

Do such emergency beacons have the ability to transmit their current GPS coordinates? That would make it pretty easy to located.

As described above by Markis...

 

[anat0l]

Might be a really, really greenhorn question, but at all times during a flight, is the exact location (global position, height above sea level) of every aircraft known to the airline?

Does the airline keep data detailing all flight paths traversed (e.g. for reconciling / analysing against fuel burn)?

 

[jb747]

Might be a really, really greenhorn question, but at all times during a flight, is the exact location (global position, height above sea level) of every aircraft known to the airline?

Firstly there is no such thing as a 'greenhorn' question. If you have question, I can guarantee that many others have the same query.Perhaps surprisingly, the answer is no. Lots of reasons. Firstly the data links aren't always available, so the company has no direct access to the aircraft.... Some of the aircraft aren't all that new, so they aren't equipped with the later nav and comms systems (i.e. most of the 767s don't have GPS nav). Satellite comms cost appreciable money, so whilst any given data query sent to an aircraft wouldn't cost much, it would add up pretty dramatically (as do the data calls that crew make). They can 'ask' the aircraft for data, but it isn't a constant stream. Engineering do more monitoring, but even then the aircraft only transmits in particular phases of flight, or as response to failures (for instance in both QF30 and 32, engineering were watching in real time once the initial failures had activated the system).I expect the various apps that keep track of aircraft are on many computers around the company...

Does the airline keep data detailing all flight paths traversed (e.g. for reconciling / analysing against fuel burn)?

The flight plans are all kept for some years. Data extraction happens in some instances, generally when trying to assess why fuel burn is higher on some sectors than planned. They're not interested in any individual sectors, but sometimes certain routes start to get a reputation as being high fuel burn. Solutions can come from all sorts of sources. The FMC data is dumped at the end of all flights. Flight recorders are never accessed in normal circumstances. Quick access recorder data is accessed for generic fleet issues, but at that stage it is not possible to relate it to any individual flight.