Trans Asia crash video

SixPapaCharlie

SixPapaCharlie

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How on earth did anyone survive this?

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/04/taiwan-plane-crash-lands-in-river


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If I understand correctly, it was taking off.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
If I understand correctly, it was taking off.
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If he was taking off it's really hard to make sense of. :confused: I looks like something an iced up plane would do. :dunno: I wonder what the weather was. The only T/O scenarios that make sense is if there was a freezing drizzle that managed to accumulate, or he flew into a microburst or similar, and it didn't appear to me that kind of weather.
 
Henning said:
If he was taking off it's really hard to make sense of. :confused: I looks like something an iced up plane would do. :dunno: I wonder what the weather was. The only T/O scenarios that make sense is if there was a freezing drizzle that managed to accumulate, or he flew into a microburst or similar, and it didn't appear to me that kind of weather.
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power loss?

Had a falling leaf attitude. Not vacillating but coming down flat until the left wing stopped flying.
 
Total speculation but right prop is more blurry than the left.
Possibly failure of the left engine?
 
METAR in Taipei at 0300 Z (11 AM Taipei, matching the time shown in the video frame). I don't see anything bad there.

RCTP 040330Z 03018KT 9999 -DZ FEW012 BKN015 BKN020 15/12 Q1024 NOSIG RMK A3024
RCTP 040300Z 03019KT 9999 -DZ FEW012 BKN015 BKN020 15/12 Q1024 NOSIG RMK A3024
RCTP 040252Z 03020KT 9999 FEW012 BKN015 BKN020 15/12 Q1024 NOSIG RMK A3025
RCTP 040230Z 03020KT 9999 FEW010 BKN013 BKN020 15/12 Q1024 NOSIG RMK A3025

The 9999 means 10 km or more visibility.
 
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Henning said:
If he was taking off it's really hard to make sense of. :confused: I looks like something an iced up plane would do. :dunno: I wonder what the weather was. The only T/O scenarios that make sense is if there was a freezing drizzle that managed to accumulate, or he flew into a microburst or similar, and it didn't appear to me that kind of weather.
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No ice. It was 15 degrees C.
 
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NoHeat said:
No ice. It was 15 degrees C. No significant changes in weather noted in the notam.
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Yeah, saw that. Maybe it lost an engine and the auto feather system failed and the pilot didn't drop the nose?
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
Total speculation but right prop is more blurry than the left.
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Looks that way to me, too, in the video posted in the Facebook page above. I stopped the video and looked at the individual frames just before impact, and it seemed like I could see the individual blades on the left, not on the right.
 
Rumor is they reported an engine failure in native language as they went down.
 
Just too low to get a full vmc roll to occur? Looks like the video said 9 people died. Hopefully no more.
I think that is the thing that scares me most about flying twins.
 
really unfortunate with lots of deaths. The cab on the bridge got hit by a big chunk of debris. The windshield and hood are mashed up pretty good in the vid.
 
RotorAndWing said:
Any wonder why most countries won't accept a Taiwanese pilot license?
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Man, that bad huh? Because you have to mess up pretty bad to get that result out of an engine failure with that much horsepower on tap, plus he already had altitude, it wasn't like the gear was still out. I can't imagine getting that result unless maybe the prop wouldn't feather, and even then.:dunno:
 
Wow, that was pretty quick! I don't speak or read Chinese, so can't comment on anything spoken or written, just what I saw. Sorry to hear loss of lives, but at least some survived. That's a decent outcome for departure engine failure.

Imagine the poor guy driving the van . . . Here you are, minding your own business, driving down the highway, and suddenly you are hit by the wing of a crashing airliner! Try explaining that one to your insurance agent! At least someone else filmed it for him.
 
Looks like a classic vmc roll,could have had a runaway engine ,and feathered the wrong prop. Loss of life is never a good thing.
 
I'd wager lost the left engine.

Wonder how many hours those guys had, and how long ago their first solo was.
 
Henning said:
Man, that bad huh? Because you have to mess up pretty bad to get that result out of an engine failure with that much horsepower on tap, plus he already had altitude, it wasn't like the gear was still out. I can't imagine getting that result unless maybe the prop wouldn't feather, and even then.:dunno:
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I guarantee the Capt was a whiz on the FMS. The local training in that part of the world focuses on FMS and procedural use, no systems knowledge, no piloting knowledge, no weather knowledge, etc.

I can guarantee you the pilots have never done a VMC demo, or even know what VMC is. They are only given the classic "V1 cut" in the sim and as long as all systems are working it's no big deal, they are never taught or train for other situations (such as prop that fails to auto feather).
 
James331 said:
I'd wager lost the left engine.

Wonder how many hours those guys had, and how long ago their first solo was.
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"The pilot flying had accumulated 4,914 flight hours and his co-pilot, 6,922 flight hours, says Lin. There was also a third pilot in the jump seat with over 16,000 flight hours of experience."
 
RotorAndWing said:
I guarantee the Capt was a whiz on the FMS. The local training in that part of the world focuses on FMS and procedural use, no systems knowledge, no piloting knowledge, no weather knowledge, etc.

I can guarantee you the pilots have never done a VMC demo, or even know what VMC is. They are only given the classic "V1 cut" in the sim and as long as all systems are working it's no big deal, they are never taught or train for other situations (such as prop that fails to auto feather).
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So they get, "When engine fails pitch to **°" for training, sad, but not particularly unexpected.
 
Looks like he didn't want to pitch down...that building he nearly clipped was probably filling his windscreen.
 
Hank S said:
That's a decent outcome for departure engine failure.
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Not on a part 25 aircraft.

Maybe they had a more sinister problem, but flown properly an engine failure at any point should not bring the plane down. If it fails before V1 you abort the takeoff. If it fails after V1 (late in the takeoff roll) takeoff should be continued. Use rudder to counteract the yaw, make sure the autofeather worked, get the gear up asap, climb at the right speed.
 
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He's either damn lucky or good to have landed in the river. On solid ground, the fatalities would have been much higher.
 
Matthew said:
Looks like he didn't want to pitch down...that building he nearly clipped was probably filling his windscreen.
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I wonder if he tried to horse it up over the building, and by then it was too late?
 
dell30rb said:
Not on a part 25 aircraft.

Maybe they had a more sinister problem, but flown properly an engine failure at any point should not bring the plane down. If it fails before V1 you abort the takeoff. If it fails after V1 (late in the takeoff roll) takeoff should be continued. Use rudder to counteract the yaw, make sure the autofeather worked, get the gear up asap, climb at the right speed.
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Verify, confirm. Again, they spend zero time ever training for such an event, it's just the canned V1 cut that is practiced over and over.
 
Bill Jennings said:
I wonder if he tried to horse it up over the building, and by then it was too late?
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I think he was already right at the stall given both AoA and rate of sink as he came into frame. Man it's sad to see airline pilots with a lack of such basic airmanship, the AF447 guys did no better, one small glitch brought the plane down because the basic knowledge/thought that "the nose must come down for energy to fly" wasn't there. :nonod:
 
From the signs, I'm pretty sure this was Songshan airport. There aren't a lot of good options for where to put down if you discover you can't fly. But I can't quite pin down where the crash happened.

I think it was an amazing job of energy management by the pilot to avoid wiping out a couple of city blocks. At some point he was going to run out speed and altitude. Maybe intending to make it to the river, but not quite enough oomph.
 
Henning said:
because the basic knowledge/thought that "the nose must come down for energy to fly" wasn't there. :nonod:
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Unless he converted his energy to altitude to clear the buildings and then game over.
 
bflynn said:
From the signs, I'm pretty sure this was Songshan airport. There aren't a lot of good options for where to put down if you discover you can't fly. But I can't quite pin down where the crash happened.

I think it was an amazing job of energy management by the pilot to avoid wiping out a couple of city blocks. At some point he was going to run out speed and altitude. Maybe intending to make it to the river, but not quite enough oomph.
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Why?:dunno:
 
RotorAndWing said:
Any wonder why most countries won't accept a Taiwanese pilot license?
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No wonder at all. International reciprocity is governed by ICAO, a UN organization. China holds a veto in the UN Security council, and refuses to permit recognition of Taiwan's independence for any UN purpose. So, to ICAO, Taiwan doesn't exist.

Why do you think that has anything to do with this accident?
 
bflynn said:
From the signs, I'm pretty sure this was Songshan airport. There aren't a lot of good options for where to put down if you discover you can't fly. But I can't quite pin down where the crash happened.

I think it was an amazing job of energy management by the pilot to avoid wiping out a couple of city blocks. At some point he was going to run out speed and altitude. Maybe intending to make it to the river, but not quite enough oomph.
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I found this chart:

Almost looks like he was aiming for the river, adjusted course to miss a bridge, then swung back to line up with the river again and ran out of energy.
 

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DJTorrente said:
No wonder at all. International reciprocity is governed by ICAO, a UN organization. China holds a veto in the UN Security council, and refuses to permit recognition of Taiwan's independence for any UN purpose. So, to ICAO, Taiwan doesn't exist.

Why do you think that has anything to do with this accident?
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It actually runs deeper than that. Taiwan standards are so low (to non existent) that most countries will not do a validation of a Taiwanese license.

Although ICAO has in place rules on reciprocity, each member state is free to interpret or edit that rule. This is why some countries it's fairly easy to "exchange" certificates while others are more difficult.

Taiwanese pilots typically go to an easy third world country, validate their certificate and convert it, then take the new one to another country for conversion.
 
It is a highly congested city with nowhere to land. He might have tried to make the river and fell short. Under slightly different circumstances our Hudson River incident could have also ended up the same way.
 
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