Japan Airlines plane in flames at Tokyo's Haneda airport

[MEL_Traveller]

As more information unfold, one thing that may get scrutinized is JL's procedures. It's reported that it was 18minutes before all passengers were evacuated. I'm sure there had to be processes and procedures to follow, but this does seem like a lengthy period of time when you could see the engines already burning while the plane was rolling to a stop.

Reported that the pilots weren’t aware of the fire, and cabin crew weren’t permitted to open the exits without authority. Made more difficult given no communication system.

A passenger on the flight was interviewed on the news and said passengers were crowding the front of the plane, wanting to be let out. They were being told to stay in their seats, but the conditions meant this wasn’t possible.

 

[Franky]

Plus how much currency they had in actual night operations, versus only daytime training flights.

I’m no expert, but I would expect that Coast Guard crews would be experienced in day and night flights. Not all incidents occur in the daylight hours…

 

[elanshin]

Reported that the pilots weren’t aware of the fire, and cabin crew weren’t permitted to open the exits without authority. Made more difficult given no communication system.

A passenger on the flight was interviewed on the news and said passengers were crowding the front of the plane, wanting to be let out. They were being told to stay in their seats, but the conditions meant this wasn’t possible.

I think this is one of those areas where post event analysis may result in procedural changes to improve such situations. I do hope that this does get looked at (not trying to fault the JL crew), but there's always learning to be had for any major incident even when things ended up in a good result.

 

[p--and--t]

There is rarely a single cause or action resulting in an accident.

It is even rarer that humans or mandated procedures will act faultlessly in resolving a problem in stressful or unique situations, let alone life threatening situations.

Patient thorough investigation is required, not supposition or assumptions.

There will be things to learn and hopefully changes implemented or improvements made before the next occurrence of a similar situation.

 

[Quickstatus]

The pilot can “say” he had clearance but there’s no evidence to support this view so far

There may be zero evidence to support the pilot's belief. However that is actually not the important question.

The more important question is why did the pilot have that belief?. This gets into the very grey area of human factor analysis. It is never as black and white or as reductive as we would like it to be.

I go back to my other earlier post about human error. Investigation finds Human made mistake . The big question is Why? And what were the contributing factors? Any of the 12 I mentioned?

 

[drron]

The 18 minutes was from the time of the collision. The plane is reported to have continued down the runway for about a kilometre.
It also would appear that communications with the coughpit were taken out by the collision. It would also take the FAs a little time to make sure which exits were safe from the fire.
So I am still in awe of the FAs for getting everybody of including young children and I am sure a few older, less mobile folks.

So that is basically 10 people a minute down each exit available.

 

[justinbrett]

There may be zero evidence to support the pilot's belief. However that is actually not the important question.

The more important question is why did the pilot have that belief?. This gets into the very grey area of human factor analysis. It is never as black and white or as reductive as we would like it to be.

I go back to my other earlier post about human error. Investigation finds Human made mistake . The big question is Why? And what were the contributing factors? Any of the 12 I mentioned?

Anybody know who's voice (Dash 8) it is on the radio? Captain or first officer?

That would easily explain the comms breakdown, and would not be the first time this kind of thing has happened (if I recall it was similar in Tenerife)

 

[encryptededdy]

I believe the reported 18 minutes is until the last person (the Captain I believe) went down the slide. It's possible that most of the passengers went down earlier and the Captain did a final check for remaining people, but we probably won't know for a while.

 

[Quickstatus]

radio

no info that I have found so far.

But yes, what a PM might recite back to the Tower might be very different to what the PF is thinking. There may have been more than one Shared Mental Model in the flight deck that night. Lots of research into SMM in human error analysis.

Additional the SMM extends outside of the flightdeck to the Tower as well.

Shared Mental model = AKA "Is everyone on the same page".

 

[Brissy1]

Very very very selective transcript. The aircraft was cleared to a holding point, so what!
What else? What then?... garbled (or worse partially) transmissions? similar/wrong callsigns? Instruction acknowledgement from wrong aircraft? clipped instruction? duplicated acknowledgement? et al.

 

[justinbrett]

Very very very selective transcript. The aircraft was cleared to a holding point, so what!
What else? What then?... garbled (or worse partially) transmissions? similar/wrong callsigns? Instruction acknowledgement from wrong aircraft? clipped instruction? duplicated acknowledgement? et al.

It's not so much selective as it is the critical element of the transcript.

Taxi to the holding point includes a requirement to hold short of the runway - ie Dash 8 isn't allowed on the runway.
JL is cleared to land - the A350 is allowed on the runway

That's basically the crux of the situation. Other things will come out of the investigation but those two facts put some meat on the bones of the investigation.

 

[Quickstatus]

Taxi to the holding point includes a requirement to hold short of the runway

Would ATC generally add in "taxi Charlie 5, hold short of runway" even if as you say it is supposed to be understood to include a hold short?

 

[justinbrett]

Would ATC generally add in "taxi Charlie 5, hold short of runway" even if as you say it is supposed to be understood to include a hold short?

That is effectively the FAA RT (USA) - but you would specify the runway number (hold short runway 34R).

However for ICAO, by the book - at least in Australian AIP, it should have been "taxi to holding point C5 Runway 34R", but from what I can see the runway number was omitted in the clearance. That's not a huge deal (and maybe not required in Japan), the intent of the runway in the clearance is to confirm the departure runway and direction, and also there could be a C5 34L as well, so the holding point is not necessarily unique unless the runway is specified. The words taxi to the holding point is the key part, meaning don't go on the runway.

If you were to say your suggestion in ICAO, it would be "taxi to holding point C5 Runway 34R, hold short Runway 34R". That's really not the done thing, but also not incorrect. However, if the aircraft is at the holding point and reports ready, it's common to respond with "hold short runway [x]", though not strictly required.

If in any doubt, especially with foreign pilots, liberal use of "hold short" doesn't go astray.

 

[TheRealTMA]

There may be zero evidence to support the pilot's belief. However that is actually not the important question.

The more important question is why did the pilot have that belief?. This gets into the very grey area of human factor analysis. It is never as black and white or as reductive as we would like it to be.

I go back to my other earlier post about human error. Investigation finds Human made mistake . The big question is Why? And what were the contributing factors? Any of the 12 I mentioned?

Human error

 

[Quickstatus]

Human error

the investigation will / should go beyond that and answer the question "Why did human error occur, were there any preconditions that led to the human error"

 

[DC3]

Patience, Grasshoppers

 

[DC3]

… FAA RT …

 

[jb747]

The 18 minutes was from the time of the collision. The plane is reported to have continued down the runway for about a kilometre.
It also would appear that communications with the coughpit were taken out by the collision.

We’ll eventually find out, but I wouldn’t be surprised if just about everything failed. The impact has been pretty much right on the main electronics bay, and everything in that aircraft is computer controlled.

It would also take the FAs a little time to make sure which exits were safe from the fire.

10 seconds tops.

So I am still in awe of the FAs for getting everybody of including young children and I am sure a few older, less mobile folks.

That’s what they are there for…..when bags aren’t blocking the aisles.

So that is basically 10 people a minute down each exit available.

Which is an absolutely appalling rate.

I believe the reported 18 minutes is until the last person (the Captain I believe) went down the slide. It's possible that most of the passengers went down earlier and the Captain did a final check for remaining people, but we probably won't know for a while.

There’s going to be lots coming out about the evacuation, how it was done, and the timings. Looking at it now, JAL can probably consider themselves extremely lucky with regard to the outcome.

For instance, whilst we’re being told that the cabin crew can initiate the evacuation without instruction from the coughpit (in certain cases) feedback from a bloke I know who flew for them is that in practice that means that the hull would have to be in multiple pieces before they would. So basically, given the power, but then it’s been toned down by subservience. I don’t think there’s enough fear of fire inside the hull. The smoke will kill you, and if you wait until you see a flame, it’s too late.

Whilst calmly assessing what‘s going on before doing something extreme is what should generally be done in an aircraft, there are times when you should think a little differently. Basically, if in flight and it’s all falling miles outside of the ‘norm’ then it’s probably time for that ”mayday”. And the same here. The aircraft has fallen on to its nose on landing. Does it really matter why. The engines are going to be eating dirt, you have no idea what shape the structure is in. The coughpit is either full of warnings, or dark. Time to be elsewhere.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

This is now the third evacuation I can think of where there have been potential delays in evacuation while waiting for the flight deck. In the Asiana SFO crash the pilot caused the accident, but then didn’t authorise an evacuation of the damaged aircraft. There was the Singapore Airlines ‘wing on fire’ landing, where the investigation found flight deck crew should have ideally used other means to assess damage rather than relying on a single outside source, which was the fire truck. Then there is this one, where the flight deck drew were - allegedly - unaware of the fire. Or equally as bad, the smoke.

I fully understand the reasons why the flight deck is given the authority to order an evacuation… extent of the hazard, whether engines have been shut down, direction of the wind, and so on. But today, there are many very senior cabin crew on legacy airlines…inflight supervisors, pursers or cabin managers, that have vast experience of 20-30 years or more. Is it time to re-examine who can initiate an evacuation given the crew in the cabin are most likely to be aware of the situation and extent of the damage?

Engine shut-down is a major consideration. But with today’s electronics could there be a red warning lamp by the wing exits to indicate the engines are still running? Something similar maybe to the ‘cabin pressure’ warning lamp on Airbus aircraft.

Or do we get more cameras - internally and externally - to assist the flight crew?

All three incidents above, with a minor exception for Asiana, resulted in the safe evacuation of passengers. But ‘what if’ there isn’t the same good luck in the next incident? We saw what can happen with the Saudia incident.

 

[Seat0B]

What's with the please? I've never included that in a clearance in my life.

Again likely a translation issue. If it is correct as surmised by @jb747 that the English trnasmission has been translated to Japanese and then back again to English, it’s likely that that the very common (in Japanese) “ te…kudasai” polite form form of imperative (telling someone to do something politely) was used.this tends to be translated into English as “please do…”. It does not exactly mean that in Japanese.