Korean Air Disaster

E-Mail | 7/10/2013 | Pilot Instructor

[TADSLOS]

(Full disclosure: If I had been hired by the airlines, I probably would have died of boredom.)

I can relate to that. LOL.

[Moonman62]

This reminds me of the Air France crash in the Atlantic a few years ago. After a mechanical problem, the two pilots on deck were unable to fly the aircraft manually. The European airlines hire pilots with no flying experience.

[Vigilanteman]

Wish I could find the original article, but you are right about it being the 1997 KAL 801 flight which crashed in Guam.

Also, it was a hillside, not a mountainside since 23 passengers and 3 crew survived.

The details of a 17 year ago plane crash fade with time, but that chilling account of a KAL copilot unable to convince his superior to avoid a looming disaster does not.

I used to fly KAL pretty regularly and haven't flown it since.

[B4Ranch]

>>The European airlines hire pilots with no flying experience. <<

Which explains their demand for the fly by wire aircraft.

[katana]

I have flown with a number of them over the years and have to say that when the pilot starts speaking over the com in a nice broad Australian accent I do tend to relax a bit more. Common on Singapore, Thai, and Cathay but not on any of the Chinese, Japanese, or Korean lines.

[namsman]

The story is consistent with what I’ve always heard about certain Asian airlines over my many years of experience in the industry. Creative thinking isn’t valued very highly. Add in the Confucian culture and rigid military-type discipline and you have all of the elements for never-ending safety problems.

[Polynikes]

I remember that. The KAL plane did a CFIT ( controlled flight into terrain) aka the hillside. From what remember the cockpit voice recorder heard the auto systems screaming “Pull up!” and there were the sounds of a manuals’ pages frantically being turned along with Korean and broken English yelling “What means Pull Up?” then silence

[USNBandit]

http://155.178.201.160/d-tpp/1307/02146VDT6L.PDF

Here is the approach they were attempting to shoot for KAL 801. If you can read this plate the approach flies over the navaid and out the opposite radial to a minimum descent altitude of 760 feet with the last portion of the descent happening 1.3 DME outbound from the station. I think they read the plate wrong and tried to get to 760 either at the navaid or 1.3 miles short of the navaid and put themselves into Nimitz Hill. The pictures of the wreckage showed the aircraft coming to a stop just to the north of the VOR antenna. Not good.

I did just hear an NTSB statement that the crew of the ASIANA mishap cycled through a bunch of different autopilot modes attempting to get set up for the visual including several auto throttle modes. I am betting in the end they kicked off the auto throttles without realizing it and that is how they got so slow. Still no excuse for the PNF or PF to not catch that.

[wastedyears]

Conversely, look at all the US legislators with Ivy League degrees (most of them), then think about what how they vote and what they believe in. Education to me is failing. It really isn’t worth the expense today.

[Jayster]

I am a retired ATC out of SFO. I worked SFO Bay Approach at NCT (Area B)and we dealt with foreign pilots on a regular basis.

If you get a couple of them on frequency at the same time and you are having a problem with them reading back your clearances in a manner that you think is correct and you have to keep going back to them to verify, you can “go down the shitter” pretty quick.

That is one issue.

I can’t verify, but I have heard that the requirement to speak English (the universal language in ATC) is very lax. This would not surprise me from my experience. A few have told me that it is just a matter of them checking a box on a form.

Here is an issue that is not being brought up and might be a factor in this accident. Cockpit/Crew Resource Management CRM is a bit different in the Asian Culture. There is a tendency to not question your superiors. This can have disastrous consequences in the cockpit.

I am not sure about the dynamics that were in play on this flight with training going on etc... but someone should have said something sooner.

I have always felt that it would be very very easy for a reporter looking for a story to get a scanner and monitor the traffic at SFO or any other international airport and document just how bad the language barrier is.

Also read just now that at least one of the pilots that was being interviewed was using a translator. HMmmmmmmm..... That does not surprise me at all.