I wonder if it could have been a wind shear or a micro burst?   Sounds like the pilot lost airspeed and stalled on final, pulled up and the tail struck. 

I would be surprised if the lack of ILS was NOT the key to the NTSB investigation.  The questions I have not seen anyone from the media ask is "how often do these pilots practice landing 777's manually without ILS"?  I would imagine it's pretty rare that a 777 lands at any airport that isn't equipped with ILS.  Based on the glidescope information, the pilot was obviously having a difficult time even under almost perfect weather conditions.

 

 

I wonder if it could have been a wind shear or a micro burst?   Sounds like the pilot lost airspeed and stalled on final, pulled up and the tail struck. 

 

I haven't read any reports of reported wind shear.

 

It's all speculative and it's not fair to the crew to comment before the all facts come out.... could be anything... maybe mechanical, or maybe their hand flying skills were just plain rusty and they simply screwed up....just be glad you're not one of the pilots right now.  You could only imagine how they must feel.

What I find interesting is the fact that the debris trail does not go down the center of the runway from the point of contact, but rather to the right a bit. It doesn't look like they were even aligned with the runway that well.

I would be surprised if the lack of ILS was NOT the key to the NTSB investigation. The questions I have not seen anyone from the media ask is "how often do these pilots practice landing 777's manually without ILS"? I would imagine it's pretty rare that a 777 lands at any airport that isn't equipped with ILS. Based on the glidescope information, the pilot was obviously having a difficult time even under almost perfect weather conditions.

Rob i just had a talk with a friend thats flying the 777 and we talk among other things about manual landings training . he and others that i know had told me that there was a point where they start it new routes to parts of the world were The ILS was not present their manual landings training was double up.but before that there was not alot of work done towards manual operations at all just the regular training. so who knows if this time that was the case ......

Came on here to get away from the talking heads on CNN ..argh.

 

Couple of things came to mind after looking at the photos and reading.

1. Why was the aircraft approx 100' off center line of the runway?  Not normal.  No crosswind. 

2.  Landing (main touch down) is normally 1000 feet from threshold - obviously off of the glidepath.

3. Witnesses and a pax stated they heard spool up of engines prior to impact. . 

4. Tail had to hit the berm.  Look at the debris field.  Luggage, parts, etc strewn from point of impact.

5. Note the rear pressure bulkhead (now visible due to the empennage being ripped off).  It is split open.  This is where the flight attendants- strapped to their seats close to that wall.  Two bodies were found on the runway.  Them....perhaps?   Sad.

 

The bad is that people were killed. The good, they got the pax off that plane in less than 3 min, Crash Crews were very quick, the PIC and CO are alive, the orange boxes should be retrievable, but they are in the tail so may be a bit damaged.

I would be surprised if the lack of ILS was NOT the key to the NTSB investigation.  The questions I have not seen anyone from the media ask is "how often do these pilots practice landing 777's manually without ILS"?  I would imagine it's pretty rare that a 777 lands at any airport that isn't equipped with ILS.  Based on the glidescope information, the pilot was obviously having a difficult time even under almost perfect weather conditions.

I could certainly imagine a pilot who has not recently practiced manual, non-ILS landings to, after inadvertently deviating from the glide slope, become spatially disoriented, over-correct, or destabilize the trajectory of the aircraft. But as others have mentioned, everything is currently speculation. 

 

1. Why was the aircraft approx 100' off center line of the runway?  Not normal.  No crosswind. 

If the aircraft partially impacted the rocks immediately before "landing", its trajectory would have been skewed.

And for that size aircraft =)

Shouldint it be more like 140-150 kias?

 

Surprisingly, our average landing speeds (Vref) are around 128-134, then we add 5 for cushion. If it's sporty we add 1/2 the steady state wind + the gust factor. Slowest I've ever seen was 129 kts with a light load, usually we're around the mid 130s. The 73NGs come in hotter, high 140-low 150s over the numbers.

 

Those big flaps do a great job, I've done the circle to 29 at EWR and turned off with runway to spare, and I even floated it a little on landing. Boeing really did the 77 right.

 

 

 

Godspeed to those we lost today, and BZ to the SFO CFR team.

I did read that there were lot of wind shifts aswell. On flightaware.

 

 

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<sup>No. It hit the rocks off centerline. Look at the photos. Oddly enough, if they were centerline they would have taken out the rabbit lights.

That recording was so bad (and CNN et. al edited) it was hard to tell what was going on exactly, All I heard was the tower clear for the runway, garble, then the tower telling them everyone (crash trucks I assume) was on the way,</sup>

Surprisingly, our average landing speeds (Vref) are around 128-134, then we add 5 for cushion. If it's bad we add 1/2 the steady state wind + the gust factor. Slowest I've ever seen was 129 kts with a light load, usually we're around the mid 130s. The 73NGs come in hotter, high 140-low 150s over the numbers.

 

Those big flaps do a great job, I've done the circle to 29 at EWR and turned off with runway to spare, and I even floated it a little on landing. Boeing really did the 77 right.

 

 

 

Godspeed to those we lost today, and BZ to the SFO CFR team.

Thank you!

Whatever the case, I'm almost certain this investigation will end up as a Discovery channel special.

 

But even with a critical mechanical failures many pilots are often still deemed "in error" because of all the available warning systems and how they incorrectly respond to those warnings and/or a mistake even in pre-flight prep that caused the situation (i.e. mis-calculation of fuel). Heck, some NTSB findings have faulted the pilot with "excessive input" as causing vertical stabilizer failure ... it's a harsh environment for commercial pilots ... there is so much they have to get exactly right every time, no room for a single mistake from pre-flight to arrival.

 

I hate to see things like this happen, but it's that fine line of what is the "value of life" -- just how safe do we want to make something...the answer is NOT "as safe as we can" but more like "as safe as we can afford to stay in business". There is indeed a very real "value" associated to human life ... if there weren't, no one would be allowed to drive a vehicle -- it's probably good to keep in mind that driving your vehicle is still far far far more "risky" than flying. Acceptable risk.

 

It's still amazing that so few were hurt. If that 777 wing had dipped left and caught the ground first pulling the AC left instead of right it would have collide with the 747 on hold.

...BZ to the SFO CFR team.

 

Agreed!

 

Impressive!

 

 

It's still amazing that so few were hurt. If that 777 wing had dipped left and caught the ground first pulling the AC left instead of right it would have collide with the 747 on hold.

 

 

Extremely lucky... the fatality count would have likely been everyone in both planes, and it would be the end of Asiana.

I must say the 777 really shown it's strength of design, by the looks of it this was a very severe impact on the tail and for the aircraft to stay intact without breaking a wing and rolling over/splitting or something like that is quite amazing. This goes for the BA 777 that slammed down hard aswell. Along with the exacuation speed and emergency services response the 777 design saved a lot of lives.

I am sad to hear two passed away however.