Lost Northwest Pilots Were Trying Out New Software 518
Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that two Northwest Airlines pilots who flew about 110 miles past their destination to the skies over Wisconsin as more than a dozen air-traffic controllers in three locations tried to get the plane's attention had taken out their personal laptops in the cockpit, a violation of airline policy, so the first officer could tutor the captain in a new scheduling system put in place by Delta Air Lines, which acquired Northwest last fall. 'Both said they lost track of time,' said an interim report from the National Transportation Safety Board countering theories in aviation circles that the two pilots might have fallen asleep or were arguing in the cockpit. 'Using laptops or engaging in activity unrelated to the pilots' command of the aircraft during flight,' said a statement from Delta Airlines, 'is strictly against the airline's flight deck policies and violations of that policy will result in termination.' Industry executives and analysts said the pilots' behavior was a striking lapse for such veteran airmen who have a total of 31,000 flying hours of experience between them. In the case of Flight 188, 'Neither pilot was aware of the airplane's position until a flight attendant called about five minutes before they were scheduled to land and asked what was their estimated time of arrival,' the interim report said."
Re:Radio Reception? (Score:4, Informative)
I happened to hear this morning on CNN that the pilots indicated they had removed their headphones, which is a reason not to hear the airport calling for their attention. They also said they did not see any messages from the home office trying to get their attention but did hear general conversations on the radio.
P.S. Your comment is number 3 on Google if you search for 'Northwest pilots headphones'.
Re:Radio Reception? (Score:5, Informative)
“Both said they lost track of time,” the report stated. It also said that the pilots had heard voices over their cockpit radios but ignored them.
Bad. Real Bad. (Score:5, Informative)
As for the scheduling system they were going over - actually, that is probably the 'news for nerds' part. The old airline schedules were built in two units - 'pairings' and 'lines of time'. A pairing is a group of flights, typically from 1 to 6 days long, that begun and ended in a pilot domicile. The word 'pairing' was to indicate that an entire crew was 'paired' together that whole time. A line of time (or simply a line) was a month-long group of those pairings. There is a long list of legal requrements (min rest, max flight time, union contractual obligations, aircraft mx requirements, etc.) that these schedules had to meet.
Ultimately, from the pilot's point of view, these lines were published each month for the next month. Bidding was very straightforward. If you were the number 1 senior pilot in that base (technically, domicile, aircraft and status (capt. or F/O), you picked your line, and that was that. If you were #2, you picked your schedule, and got it.... unless the number 1 guy already got it, in which case you got your second choice. If you were number #300.... well, picking 300 schedules in the order you want them was a time consuming task, but the outcome was perfectly transparent. The line awards were public, so you could verify that the schedules you didn't get really did go to senior people. You can debate whether such a system is 'fair', but at least it is clear how it works, both globally and month to month.
Then, with the advent of more powerful computers, a system called 'PBS' was born - Preferential Bidding System. These systems, instead of having hard, published lines you bid from, instead only published the pairings. You expressed your 'Preferences' through a computer language. A computer program then ran, taking everybodys preferences, seniority, system constraints, etc. into account and generated schedules.
In theory, PBS sounds great. A pilot's preferences generally don't change that much month to month, so you could file your bid away and let it run automatically each month with little or no tweaking.
In practice, it's usually been highly disruptive and caused great angst for a year or two after being implemented, for many reasons:
1) The language used to express your preferences is generally designed for the programmers, not the users.
2) The results can be, to put it mildly, unexpected. When you have pre-published schedules, you have a pretty good idea ahead of time what to expect.
3) There are no month-to-month conflicts that generate additional days off, resulting in more work per pilot, a reason the airlines like them and pilots don't, on average.
4) Non-computer savvy older pilots (Captians) have a harder time getting it than younger pilots (F/O's), on average. It takes a vastly important piece of your life (when are you working? Where are you going? 28 hours in HNL or 32 hours in XNA?), and makes it tied to your comfort with learning, essentially, a primitive computer language.
I cringe when I see this, because I've done this - taught Captians while flying about PBS. So have many other F/O's. You just prioritize it where it belongs - below aviating, navigating and communicating. These guys made everyone else look bad.
Re:Cockpit voice recorder (Score:4, Informative)
The CVP on this aircraft only records the last 30 minutes of conversation. So what they have is roughly from just before final approach to parking at the gate.
Re:It's a tough job (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sorry but that's just crap. New pilots, sure, they make less, but on *AVERAGE* the pay is around $70k.
http://www.avjobs.com/salaries-wages-pay/pilot-pay.asp
Complete overreaction (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Luck not shot down (Score:5, Informative)
ATC would have guided them through maneuvers anyway, so I'm sure that's true. They would have had to receive and acknowledge a new course back to the airport control area, and a descent path to pattern.
But, yeah, it wouldn't surprise me if they had the aircraft execute a few turns first to make absolutely sure they had the correct aircraft and that the pilots could comprehend and execute instructions. I've never heard of the procedure, but I'm only a private pilot and the few times I've used flight following I've managed to keep positive radio contact at all times.
And the maneuvers served another purpose. Time building. After all, since this was probably their last flight the pilots might as well make the most of it and log as much PIC time as they can... and, hey, they know how to use the new scheduling system now, so they can clearly see that they don't have any flights coming up in the near future.
I just read a more thorough FAA report on the incident, and it seems they were out of contact for about an hour, and other pilots on other aircraft where assisting trying different frequencies. Pilots do lose contact with ATC from time to time when up in Class A airspace, but this one was probably VERY close to the point where they'd scramble a couple of fast intercept planes to go check things out.
Re:It's a tough job and it pays accordingly (Score:4, Informative)
I'm sorry but that's just crap. New pilots, sure, they make less, but on *AVERAGE* the pay is around $70k. http://www.avjobs.com/salaries-wages-pay/pilot-pay.asp [avjobs.com]
Yeah, GP is full of BS. No stats, just single anecdotal sob stories. From a list of overpaid jobs [marketwatch.com]:
9) Major airline pilots
While American and United pilots recently took pay cuts, senior captains earn as much as $250,000 a year at Delta, and their counterparts at other major airlines still earn about $150,000 to $215,000 - several times pilot pay at regional carriers - for a job that technology has made almost fully automated.
By comparison, senior pilots make up to 40 percent less at low-fare carriers like Jet Blue and Southwest, though some enjoy favorable perks like stock options. That helps explain why their employers are profitable while several of the majors are still teetering on the brink of bankruptcy.
The pilot's unions are the most powerful in the industry. They demand premium pay as if still in the glory days of long-gone Pan Am and TWA, rather than the cutthroat, deregulated market of under-$200 coast-to-coast roundtrips. In what amounts to a per-passenger commission, the larger the plane, the more they earn - even though it takes little more skill to pilot a jumbo jet. It's as much the airplane mechanics who hold our fate in their hands.
The mechanics are the ones that really get the short end of the stick. But they don't have expensive schooling.
Re:Luck not shot down (Score:5, Informative)
The stall speed of an F-16 is around 120 knots. This would be a problem when intercepting a Cessna at cruise, because they can cruise comfortably at about 90 knots. But a passenger jet is going to be running at a minimum of 300 knots or so at cruise. Intercept would be absolutely no problem under these circumstances.
Re:This is a non-event. (Score:2, Informative)
You don't know what the hell you're talking about. Autopilots don't just "do everything", they don't make decisions or navigate themselves. The pilots input the desired course, the pilots monitor and arm/disarm the autopilot, the pilots make all of the decisions. Autopilots are not do-all AIs; they're more like a glorified cruise control.
Re:It's a tough job (Score:2, Informative)
Re:pushed? not a big deal? (Score:5, Informative)
I am an ex-IT engineer turned airline pilot (currently flying Airbus A320) so will bite and explain some items...
1. there are loudspeakers in the cockpit, usually the volume is at mid-level, but you choose the volume you want
2. it takes about 10m to fly 80 miles, so 110miles of course would mean they were engaged in the discussion for some 25m (10m from Top of Descent plus the 110m after destination)
3. You normally keep an ear out for someone calling you in the radio, but sometimes you just might miss it. I concede that 30m without listening to air traffic control is too much...
4. Their timing was all wrong... Near top of descent turning on their laptops?? Come on...... It's one of the only 2 situations were you really must have full attention, Takeoff until Top of Climb and from Top of Descent to Landing....
5. There is an automatic system called TCAS (Traffic Collision and Avoiding System) that would warn them if there was any chance of colliding with another aircraft. This system is mandatory (at least in Europe) and is why those 2 aircraft over Brazil collided some years ago.
6. In what regards to fuel, you take fuel to fly to destination + fuel to fly from destination to alternate landing + 30m holding at alternate + whatever your airline policy sees fit + whatever captain decision sees fit. They probably landed short on fuel to fly to destination, but there are procedures in place for this.
7. Normally there are allways 2 radion frequencies in use, the area you are in and the emergency frequency. Also, some airplanes have HF frequencies and can be called over HF. This will sound a buzzer in the cockpit and is quite loud.I doubt ATC called them over HF....
8. Autopilot was obviously on, but it doesn't beep when reaching Top of Descent...
9. Firing them is a bit excessive, but some sort of disciplinary action should be taken. Do not forget that training a pilot costs above 100kUSD, so it is not immediate to find a replacement. Also it is easy to just appoint blame, but keep in mind that aviation is not like your regular day job. There is no excuse for what happened here but the mentality of "you erred, you're fired" will cause problems in the future.....
B
Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Luck not shot down (Score:1, Informative)
They have 31k hours between them. Nobody is "building time" on the flight deck of Northwest Airlines. Besides only one of them could get PIC time ;-)
Re:Luck not shot down (Score:4, Informative)
I was wondering about this given the cost pressures on airlines these days. The FAA website says this:
A. Required Fuel Supplies for Flights with Alternate Airports. When the Regulations require an alternate airport for the destination to be designated on the release, the aircraft must have the following types and increments of fuel on board at takeoff:
So they need enough additional fuel to fly 15% of the time required to reach the furthest alternate airport taking into account traffic delays and other factors that might delay the landing.
I think it's safe to say that they'd have plenty of fuel in this jaunt, where they extended the flight by 300 miles (round trip). Still, if alternate airports were relatively close, and had they not been disturbed by that member of cabin crew, I guess it's possible they could have been landing on a rural strip that doesn't see many A320s?
Any pilots able to tell us just how far they could get if they had been carrying the minimum fuel allowed by law?
Re:It's a tough job (Score:4, Informative)
Re:It's a tough job (Score:1, Informative)
I'm sorry but that's just crap. New pilots, sure, they make less, but on *AVERAGE* the pay is around $70k. http://www.avjobs.com/salaries-wages-pay/pilot-pay.asp [avjobs.com]
As a slashdotter, you should be aware of the difference between average and median [wikipedia.org], and should be well enough aware that you can have both a $70k average salary while still having a vast majority of people earning in the $20-30k range.
Re:Luck not shot down (Score:5, Informative)
No flares, no afterburners. Intercept procedures are well-established and are part of basic pilot training.
The intercepting aircraft will perform a closing pass, starting from one side and overtaking (generally on the left since this is where the senior pilot usually sits). If the intercepting craft cannot slow enough, it will make a crossing overtake pass in front of and below the intercepted aircraft (to avoid inducing turbulence on the intercepted craft), repeating as necessary until radio contact has been made or the intercepted aircraft waggles its wings to acknowledge presence (or eye contact is made between the two pilots if both aircraft can fly at the same speed).
A second intercept aircraft flies behind and above the intercepted craft, watching for wing waggle and/or any other signs the pilot of the intercepted craft may give. If you're going to be shot down, that's his job too. But to my knowledge that's never been done.
There is a clearly-established set of hand signals AND aircraft signals that may be used to indicate what the interceptor wants the intercepted pilot to do. The VERY first thing is to acknowledge to the interceptor that you see and are aware of them (waggle the wings), then the intercepted pilot gets on the emergency frequency at 121.5 and identifies himself as an intercepted aircraft, if a radio is available and working. From there, the interceptor has a series of very visible signals to indicate that you should follow them, or you are free to go about your business, or you are to land at the airport they are headed toward, or whatever they want you to do.
The AOPA does a big campaign to get these cards in the hands of every pilot several times a year. If you know a pilot and they don't carry one of these, print out one and glue it to their lapboard: http://www.aopa.org/asf/publications/intercept.pdf [aopa.org]
When ATC talks, you listen (Score:5, Informative)
Nearly everything that ATC says is safety related. There is no chit-chat. ATC gives heading and altitude assignments. You need to go where they tell you to go because you are not the only plane in the sky.
Also, ATC will vector you around severe weather. One reason why these pilots were not paying attention is likely because there was no severe weather near their flight path. They would not be expecting any vectors for weather. They would only be expecting vectors for the descent and approach.
It's never a good idea to tune out ATC, either electronically or mentally, a pilot needs to be aware of what's going on in the area. If there is traffic above, below or crossing it's a really good idea to get visual contact.
There are many possible safety consequences of ignoring ATC. When ATC doesn't know what you're doing, they can't ensure separation. They get pretty upset about that since separating traffic is what they do all day. ATC has procedures for getting everyone out of the way of a plane that is not responding. Those procedures are very disruptive to the normal flow of air traffic.
Before 9/11, an equipment failure or a brain fart was more forgivable. Now the response for ignoring ATC is pretty strong. Ignoring ATC, at any time, is a career limiting action.
Re:It's a tough job and it pays accordingly (Score:4, Informative)
Wot a load of pish. Yeah, it's a job that's fully automated - until the shit goes down and the automation suddenly cannot cope with 'out-of-the-envelope' conditions. You think a machine could have landed Sully's jet safely following a bird strike?
Re:Similar Distraction in 2006 Brazilian Collision (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Luck not shot down (Score:5, Informative)
Minnesota Air National Guard here-
(Just for your own information)
We were on alert standby throughout the event; that is to say, we knew about it and kept in contact with norad and the mpls atc, and our pilots were suited up. Had a scramble been declared, we probably would have intercepted the airliner within 20 minutes unless Madison got there first. Wouldn't be the first time this has happened.
-b
Re:It's a tough job (Score:2, Informative)
man, it'd be nice if i ever saw that as my job as an airline pilot. i have been with my airline for 3 years now, and i'll be lucky to clear $40k gross. that includes all my per diem, reimbursements for uniform, medical certificate, and other job-related expenses. in my first year, my gross income was almost exactly $20,000.
the senior captains everyone mentions that makes $250k a year are the guys that have been there since their early 20s and are in the top 1% of the seniority list. they will make that pay for a few years, then they retire. the vast majority of us are lucky to get close to $100k
Re:Luck not shot down (Score:5, Informative)
I may be misunderstanding your wording, so we may be agreeing vehemently here..
Any alternate airport is not going to be a rural strip, this is a Part 115 flight which means they need a manned tower to legally land unless overriding safety concerns apply. "Alternate airport" does not mean "gotta get on the effing ground now where's a strip of tarmac or a long stretch of highway", it means another airport with sufficient capacity for a routine landing of the aircraft in question, including the ability to handle the passengers and sufficient emergency equipment to handle trouble. So the alternate is probably not terribly close to the main airport (though I don't know what they'd pick as an alternate on that flight), and the landing is going to be pretty routine (if in an inconvenient location for the passengers on board).
I've been diverted due to traffic (En Route Reserve exaustion), and basically it went like this:
1. Thunderstorm over destination airport (CVG), traffic backed up.
2. Entered pattern way the hell up in the air, started working down the stack.
3. Pilot used up "En Route" and "En Route Reserve" and started digging into "Contingency Fuel" due to heavy traffic (stacked pattern). Pilot announced that we needed to divert and started the clock on "Alternate Fuel" to get to the alternate airport. We were 15 minutes or so from getting landing clearance based on where we were in the pattern, BUT we were out of Contingency Fuel and En Route Reserve, and so we had to divert to Alternate because if we had been delayed any longer AND THEN had to go to Alternate we would have been deeply screwed.
4. Flew to Toledo, landed. Note that this was probably the CLOSEST alternate, and I'm sure we had a good chunk of Alternate fuel left. Airport looked different, but it was a normal landing.
5. Refueled. No one allowed off plane because we all wanted to get to CVG soonest and a deplane/replane would have cost time.
6. Waited an hour on the tarmac in Toledo for CVG traffic to normalize again.
7. Flew back to CVG, landed, taxiied to different gate since we were off schedule.
8. Thankfully I had a 2.5 hour layover and made my connector.
En-route Reserve and Contingency fuel are in addition to En Route and Alternate fuel. I don't have that section of the FAR/AIM in front of me at the moment and don't have time to look it up, but I think the International reserve is an international standard, and not just for international flights. However, let's assume it does not apply.
Assuming they picked their most distant alternate 1 hour away, and the flight is 3h 45m long (approximately what the Delta Flight Status page calls for).
En Route: about 4 hours, including a missed approach of 15 minutes.
Alternate: 1 hour. Total 5 hours.
En Route Reserve: 15% of 5 hours, 45 minutes. Since that's less than 90, we use that. Total is now 5:45.
Contingency: For a busy airport, add an hour. Let's assume they added a ridiculously low 15 minutes to save fuel weight. Total is now 6:00
So we have an approximate 6 hours of fuel on board for a less-than-4-hour flight. Maybe 6:30 if #3 applied.
So assuming 15 minutes to discover their mistake and 15 minutes to fly back, Dumb and Dumber used 2/3 of their En Route Reserve, and didn't touch their Alternate or Contingency fuel levels at all. In other words, the flight was made within FAA fuel regs, if not within Delta CRM (Cockpit Resource Management) regs or within the boundaries of common sense.
And yes, they are all in the same fuel tank (grin). But you burn them for the purpose for which they are intended. If you are out of En Route Reserve and Contingency, then you NEED to head straight for your nearest practical (weather, traffic, and other factors considered) Alternate airport right now so you arrive with plenty of fuel to make a safe landing there.
Re:Radio Reception? (Score:4, Informative)
on most airliners, there is no beeping when you cross a waypoint in the FMS. that would get real annoying when the waypoints are under a minute apart (departures and approaches) and i'm trying to concentrate on hand-flying the plane.
almost all airliners designed in the last 30 years are centered on the "Dark & Quiet" flight deck concept. if everything is normal, and all systems are as they should be, then there will be no lights on over/inside switches & buttons, and there will be no noises. this way, when something does go wrong, we know about it immediately. if we get a caution message, there's a "ding" and the master caution light that's right in front of my face blinks amber at me till i cancel it. then i look to see what the message was, and run the appropriate checklist.
in my airplane, if we pass the last waypoint in the FMS, we will get the "ding" and caution light, as the computer has no where else to go, so drops out of LNAV mode into ROLL mode. all roll mode does is, ironically, keep the wings level and on the selected altitude.
its really easy to see why they went 100 miles past the airport, as they were made away about 5 minutes before passing the field. it'll take about 15 minutes to figure out what the proper frequency is for the altitude and location you're at, then establish communications with the controller, and get re-sequenced back into the arrival streams. and at the standard cruise speed of ~500kts, you cover a mile every 8 seconds or so.
Re:Radio Reception? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Oh, puhlease (Score:3, Informative)
I am a pilot also. If I don't hear something on frequency after a certain period of time I get worried and check in. I have never gone a whole hour without hearing something.
Once I had a radio failure in Class B over LAX while talking to SoCal on the way north from San Diego. I could hear other pilots in the air but couldn't hear ATC. I was on a vector to avoid traffic heading mostly west out to sea (they had assigned me a temporary heading) instead of heading north to my destination. A couple minutes passed and I knew something was up. There is a pattern/timing to radio communications. And when things go amiss you get a weird feeling that someone should be talking to you by now. I tried to check in a couple of times, heard nothing, but could hear other pilot's replies. I thought there was a problem with the controller's radio or something. I went to the previous controller's frequency that I had been talking to earlier and told them who I was, where I was, and that I had lost contact with the freq I had been on. They knew exactly who I was, what I needed to be doing, who I needed to be talking to, and had been trying to get ahold of me.
It turns out the squelch was broken on my #1 radio. Other pilot's transmissions were strong enough to break squelch and I would hear them but SoCal's transmissions were being filtered. Everything worked as soon as I flipped over to #2. After I got back on the ground I had to call in and explain what happened. Since it was clearly equipment failure there was no problem but if I had fallen asleep or was on my laptop or whatever there would have been consequences. Not my first equipment failure (I've lost count) and not the first time I have had to call in to explain myself due to equipment failure.
I am definitely against second guessing the actions of other pilots in the event of an accident. Fortunately there was nobody hurt here. I am having difficulty understanding how this could possibly be reasonably explained. I am NOT in favor of firing pilots for one screwup. That is one of the things I hate most about the flying business: You invest $100k+ of your OWN money to get that first $30k/year job flying commuters, everything is seniority so as long as you don't screw up you are no better than the next guy (in contrast to the computer business where people can easily distinguish themselves and advance), and the first mistake you make is quite possibly career ending. Imagine if you accidentally lose the customer's data once and could never again be a sysadmin. Unthinkable.
But what I might consider firing them for is lying (if they lied). And right now I just can't see how they aren't lying. Off the radio intentionally for an hour and didn't think someone might want to talk to them? Lost track of time? Took headsets off/didn't have ATC on the cockpit speaker? Lost situational awareness and overflew the airport? Were using laptops in flight? Unbelievable. I have known pilots to read magazines and other things in flight (and even that I'm not a big fan of) but this is beyond the pale.