Sorry but they were hand flying. The AP had disconnected and so the a/c was responding to manual inputs. That is the definition of hand flying.

 

I guess he's saying that, since the pilots were hand-flying the AF447, automation cannot be blamed for what happened.

I don't really use it at all my sylph. Mostly because I find auto pilot extremely boring and in real life I couldn't imagine not hand flying. Honestly I find it takes some of the magic away from flight.

 

I can see that its nice for airliner pilots but I'm not one of them.

You should try David Maltby's VC10 or Coolsky/McPhat DC9 both have an older form of AP which will keep you quite busy!

You should try David Maltby's VC10 or Coolsky/McPhat DC9 both have an older form of AP which will keep you quite busy!

 

I vary well might.... If I can find the money or the hanger space so to speak  B)

I find I'm well through 10k' before I even get a chance to think about getting the AP on in the DC-9. Between sorting out getting cleaned up, picking up the right radial (or following the (non-RNAV)SID), getting on speed, the EPR down from TO thrust, etc I don't find time. Suspect I just need more practice...

 

As far as criticising anyone who wants to flick it on at 400' and turn it off again at minimums, well that's their prerogative. About as futile as criticising those who deem only 'flying' planes with FMCs et al as 'proper' simulation, or the unwashed masses who couldn't care less about liners and their precious systems as long as they can find their dirt strip in the New Guinea jungle in their well enough simulated Caravan in more or less legal VMC.

I've all ways frowned at the idea at cutting guys down for their use of automation in sim aircraft. As a real world ATP pilot and a avid simmer, I'm not impressed at all if you could hand fly the whole flight. Even once hired in the real world, no one cares about your hand flying skills. Once you reach a airline interview, you've all ready proven that you can hand fly. Being a great stick and rudder guy doesn't land you the job, it's experience and knowledge of procedures/regulations that get you in. You better have good results from the psyc test too! In the real world, things get busy on the flight deck. Takeoff climb and arrival approach are the busiest. The concept of automation is to de-load pilot to increase situational awareness. I hand fly in the real world, but it's mostly in low traffic, clear weather and simple departures/approaches. During VFR patterns and visuals, i also hand fly. The fact of the matter is that hand flying during instrument procedures creates tunnel vision. You are pretty much head down on instruments. You don't really hear radio calls or anything because you are out of the game. With the autopilot on, you hear everything, see whats going into the FMC, following along and monitoring the approach/departure, staying ahead of the jet and expecting whats next, calculating performance, restrictions and constraints to verify what the FMC is telling you, cross confirming procedures with the other pilot, etc. In the big leagues, you are more of a manager than a pilot. Atleast in the real world, i have another pilot who assists me while hand flying. He sets my heading, nav modes, courses, vvi, altitudes or what ever I ask for. Also so when I hand fly, I'm loading up the other guy. He all ready has duties to attend to and now he's also taking on my duties. If he misses something or makes a mistake, there is a small chance that I will catch it being head down.

 

In the sim, i'm a one man pilot so i put the AP on after initial climb out so that i can work the guidance panel, configuration, ATC and FMC. On approach, i click off the AP once i have my final glide path to the runway. To the guys that find yourself bored, try printing out charts and follow along. Go through and brief the approach. Calculate descent points, vert spd and timing for FMC comparison. Instead of doing the ILS, shoot the localizer using step down altitudes. Instead of using VNAV, use LNAV only procedures and calculate descent rates to ensure you make all of your step down altitudes. For all those awesome, perfect hand flying simmers, if you want to impress me try flying localizers, NDB's, VOR's, and LNAV only approaches with weather down to minimums, no automation, all by hand in mountainous terrain. Also try a little no automation, handflying, fix to fix navigation in the weather. I just don't see how one simmer flying his aircraft the way i do in real life bothers another guy who can could do what ever he wants in his home. I don't see the point in cutting other guys down.

 

There are alot of products like fs2crew and vox atc that simulates the real world and having another pilot. In reality, flying is mainly hours of boredom with moments of sheer terror.

I don't think that anyone is trying to say that they are "Top Gun" hand flyer pilots, Rick. I have already stated that I would reach for the AP real quick if I intended to fly an airliner for hours across the Atlantic, but I have little interest in doing so. I prefer to "pootle" around below 3000 feet, and enjoy the scenery :smile:

At least in the real world, i have another pilot who assists me while hand flying. He sets my heading, nav modes, courses, vvi, altitudes or what ever I ask for. Also so when I hand fly, I'm loading up the other guy. He all ready has duties to attend to and now he's also taking on my duties. If he misses something or makes a mistake, there is a small chance that I will catch it being head down.

In this case, you are choosing to use "Fred" (your copilot) instead of "Otto..." The main difference being that "Fred" can talk to you during the moments of boredom. :Big Grin:

For me it depends on the kind of flight I am doing, if it is a general aviation group flight I will hand fly it and trim the aircraft out, if its a Virtual Airline flight in a jetliner I will use the FMS/AP systems, I generally turn the AP off on short finals about 3nm weather permitting. This is what many REAL pilots do, in fact a friend of mine is a 757 pilot for Delta, he tells me that many times especially when flying into KATL they use the Autoland systems all the way down to the runway, this allows them to maintain traffic patterns more effectively and have full situational awareness, however at smaller airports with minimal traffic and good weather they may shoot a visual approach. Not ONE pilot in NON-EMERGENCY situations will hand fly a jetliner at cruise altitudes, GA flying is entirely different than VA jetliner flying, GA is physical while Jetliner is mental. As a rule of thumb my flight instructor told me, in a jetliner you need to be thinking 20-30 minutes ahead of the aircraft at all times in a GA flight its about 5 minutes ahead, this is why many jetliner pilots rely on the AP systems as it allows them to focus while the AP "flys" the aircraft, once the pilots are on short final again weather permitting they can once again focus on hand flying the aircraft so should they wish to do so.

The first warning was when the airspeed was inconsistent.  The system went into manual mode. The automatic response for unreliable airspeed is attitude and thrust. So if they had done nothing all would have been well as the thrust and atttiude were correct immediately before. So instead of maintaning attitude and thrust the PF pulled the stick fully back and pretty much maintained that position. It was that which caused the stall warning which everyone proceded to ignore. They ignored the stall warning and every other instrument indication even when the IAS came back they didn't monitor it. They sat there with the stick fully back wondering why the a/c was falling out of the sky. Simple basic flying techniques learnt as a student would have prevented the accident.

 

 

Stall recovery is the same. It gets dangerous close to the ground obviously. Coffin corner is really when the a/c is flying at or above its maximum ceiling. In the case of jet transports their operating ceiling is well below what the a/c is actually capable of. Cofin corner really applies to military jets like the U2 for example.

 

Sorry but they were hand flying. The AP had disconnected and so the a/c was responding to manual inputs. That is the definition of hand flying.

 

Hi Folks,

 

two things i´d like to know is, why are we talking about AF447 in this thread and who of you guys a real world airline pilots holding at least a valid rating for an Airbus 3xx family or any other high performance jet airliner. If so we can start talking on a serious and professional level. I start for myself, i am PIC on Embraer 190 with 15 years of experience and still learning, besides that i am certified trainer for human performance and limitations.

 

In my opinion, this thread is not the right place and the discussion is far away of being professional. These people lost their lives of more than crapy basic flying. There are more examples like AF 447. Turkish Airways TK1951 -radar altimeter u/s, Birgen Air KT 301 -blocked pitot head-, Aero Peru PL 603 -blocked static port-, Asiana Airlines OZ214...etc 

 

Besides all that you guys should check out this video.

 

 

Now what would everyone of us pilots do if we were trained to fly evasive maneuvers like the one Bruce flies at the end of the video?

 

Discussing airliner fatal crashes and the "really easy actions" pilots had to take to get the planes out of their deadly situation on the round table  is always easy. The real world looks much different and it isnt that easy as the hot shots at their round tables think it is.

 

Only thing we could do is learn from the errors that has been made in theses accidents and not blame pilots for their errors.

 

 

guess he's saying that, since the pilots were hand-flying the AF447, automation cannot be blamed for what happened.

 

Exactly, and hand-flying isn't the panacea that some posters believe.

 

 

the errors that has been made

OK, who made them??

 

 

 

accidents and not blame pilots for their errors.

And who exactly is to be blamed for the fact that AF447 pilots didn't even bother to go through their airspeed malfunction checklist?

I am not an Airbus pilot but I can read accident reports.

 

 

Discussing airliner fatal crashes and the "really easy actions" pilots had to take to get the planes out of their deadly situation on the round table  is always easy. The real world looks much different and it isnt that easy as the hot shots at their round tables think it is.

 

Well said. No arguments here.

Bush flyers just rolling their eyes lol. The thing is like giutar playing some will bend strings to hit notes others will slide up to it to hit same notes. At least VFR flying look out the window instead reading some SOP that someone need lots of money to caffeine to actually write for a tubeliner flying.

Discussing airliner fatal crashes and the "really easy actions" pilots had to take to get the planes out of their deadly situation on the round table is always easy. The real world looks much different and it isnt that easy as the hot shots at their round tables think it is.

 

It's quite easy to followi the memory procedure and stabilise the aircraft initially, and even easier not to hold the stick back when the stall warning sounds 54 sec continuously.

Hi Folks,

 

who of you guys a real world airline pilots holding at least a valid rating for an Airbus 3xx family or any other high performance jet airliner.

Greetings Mickyj

I have been qual'd in the beechjet 400, C-141B, KC-10A, DC-10-30, G-III and current and qualified in the G-5/550 training captain. I have about 17 years experience .