Atlas Air/Amazon Prime 767 crashed outside Houston

[HighBypass 2,339]

... no link, Brian?? Sorry.

[thibodba57 462]

12 minutes ago, HighBypass said:

... no link, Brian?? Sorry.

My mistake.

[rmeier 473]

Brian, thanks for the link. Very sad indeed.

[Mace 1,927]

It's long, but his perspective is worth it....Juan Browne (a 777/767/757 pilot) reports on Amazon Prime / Atlast Flight 3591:

 

[HighBypass 2,339]

Juan is my go-to guy for factual accident reporting. 

Sad that 3 souls and a perfectly good aeroplane were lost due to due to training issues (going back for some time) and a lack of believing what the instruments and the plane are telling you.

[cmpbellsjc 2,963]

@thibodba57 thanks for posting the updates. I was just thinking about this crash a few weeks ago and searched to see if anything had been resolved.

After reading the Forbes link, it’s hard to believe the FO Aska who had had a history of training failures dating back so far was able to secure employment with Atlas and even after that still had training issues and ended up in the cockpit. Even Cpt Blakely failed to earn his 767 type rating the first time around.

Reading that article makes me wonder how many other pilots like Aska are out there working for regionals, commuters, cargo and large airlines. Kind of gives you something to think about the next time you get on a plane that your not piloting yourself. 

As bad as it was that the three fellows on that plane were killed, we can be thankful that it wasn’t over a populated area or that they were flying an airliner with hundreds of people on board.

[thibodba57 462]

29 minutes ago, cmpbellsjc said:

@thibodba57 thanks for posting the updates. I was just thinking about this crash a few weeks ago and searched to see if anything had been resolved.

After reading the Forbes link, it’s hard to believe the FO Aska who had had a history of training failures dating back so far was able to secure employment with Atlas and even after that still had training issues and ended up in the cockpit. Even Cpt Blakely failed to earn his 767 type rating the first time around.

Reading that article makes me wonder how many other pilots like Aska are out there working for regionals, commuters, cargo and large airlines. Kind of gives you something to think about the next time you get on a plane that your not piloting yourself. 

As bad as it was that the three fellows on that plane were killed, we can be thankful that it wasn’t over a populated area or that they were flying an airliner with hundreds of people on board.

If you are up for a read the interviews in the docket are worth it.  Lots of check airman interviewed.  Some I think were worried about repercussions from Atlas management if they spoke their mind.  One check airman initially started with praise for Conrad then it turned to he was concerned about him then by the end of the interview he was stating he didn’t belong in the plane.

But if you want to know why he got on at Atlas read Denises (head of HR).  It made me want to hit my head on the table.  You can also look thru the Interview papers. They asked Conrad if he had failures and his answer was ‘No’.  I’d have to look into it a bit more but I don’t think he even filled the paperwork out for all his PRIA info to provide to Atlas.  Hiring wise this highlights why HR needs to take a supporting role in hiring not the primary drivers. This whole industry is suffering from that right now.

[Les Parson 99]

Are you sure about that TOGA labeling @ 14:05? 

[thibodba57 462]

1 hour ago, Les Parson said:

Are you sure about that TOGA labeling @ 14:05? 

If you are asking if that’s the accurate location or them. Yes it is.

[cmpbellsjc 2,963]

On 1/19/2020 at 4:55 PM, thibodba57 said:

If you are up for a read the interviews in the docket are worth it.  Lots of check airman interviewed.  Some I think were worried about repercussions from Atlas management if they spoke their mind.  One check airman initially started with praise for Conrad then it turned to he was concerned about him then by the end of the interview he was stating he didn’t belong in the plane.

 

Not sure I’ll dive into the thousands of pages in the link to the NTSB report but it sounds like a problem from what I’ve read and what you posted. He (Aska) shouldn’t have been allowed behind anything larger than an automobile with his training record.

Hopefully there’s not hundreds more Askas out there flying passengers around after repeatedly failing training/check rides. 

This kind of reminds me of the diversity thing the FAA had instituted to bring more minorities into being traffic controllers by reducing the educational requirements and passing lower test scores. Saw some interviews about it and the lawyer suing the FAA to keep requirements and standards the same for all ethinic groups. Another situation that gives you something to think about, no only the pilots but also the controllers might not be up to snuff.

[Mace 1,927]

On 1/19/2020 at 4:19 PM, cmpbellsjc said:

Reading that article makes me wonder how many other pilots like Aska are out there working for regionals, commuters, cargo and large airlines. Kind of gives you something to think about the next time you get on a plane that your not piloting yourself. 

I'm about to be a pax on a KSTL to KSLC Delta flight this week.  Probably will be an A319 or A320.   I can only trust that Delta has the right people in the right places.

It sounds like the Atlas FO didn't even know to trust his instruments in IMC.

[KevinAu 441]

4 hours ago, cmpbellsjc said:

This kind of reminds me of the diversity thing the FAA had instituted to bring more minorities into being traffic controllers by reducing the educational requirements and passing lower test scores. Saw some interviews about it and the lawyer suing the FAA to keep requirements and standards the same for all ethinic groups. Another situation that gives you something to think about, no only the pilots but also the controllers might not be up to snuff.

I haven’t dived into all the thousands of pages either, but I will guarantee you the fact that Aska was where he was had nothing to do with his skin color or affirmative action or anything else democrats or republicans want, but rather because of $$$$$.

The situation in the Amazon cargo carriers world is akin to the airline regional world back in 2008 leading up to the Colgan crash. Back then, Colgan was winning all the CoEx flying because of their low ball bidding. They were getting all the routes and new planes (Q400s) that they could and couldn’t handle. To be a low ball bidder, the Colgan brothers ran their operation on the cheap cheap cheap. Part of that low cost strategy was bare minimal training of their crews. That winning strategy meant that they were expanding at a supernova rate. Which means they needed more and more pilots. Economy was good back then so pilots were already being taken by higher paying and more prestigious places. So their recruiters had to wait outside our crewroom doors trying to entice pilots to jump ship over there by offering six month captain upgrades to our brand new FO’s. Their tactic to fill their cockpit seats was to hire the most inexperienced pilots they could find. And their expansion meant that all these minimally trained, highly inexperience crews were filling both left and right seats inside a growing portion of the continental connection system like a cancer that was about to kill. This was how Colgan 3507 happened.

Just replace Continental with Amazon and you will understand how this happened. This was how Aska came to sit in that 767. Not because of his skin color. But because he was able to fog a mirror. And they were applying that test to people regardless of skin color. Amazon’s migration away from the traditional usps, fedex, and ups contracts led to dangerous growth in the third party cargo subcontractors like Atlas exactly the same way Continental’s migration away from Continental Express led to dangerous growth in regional subcontractors like Colgan.

[cmpbellsjc 2,963]

1 hour ago, KevinAu said:

I haven’t dived into all the thousands of pages either, but I will guarantee you the fact that Aska was where he was had nothing to do with his skin color or affirmative action or anything else democrats or republicans want, but rather because of $$$$$.

Kevin, I think there was a misunderstanding, perhaps my post wasn’t worded the way it should have been in the lead up to my part about the FAA lowering it's requirements for diversity. I wasn’t eluding that the Amazon crash had anything to do with filling seats for diversity reasons. I don’t know what FO Aska looks like or if he’s black, white, short, tall, fat or thin.

I was aware that Atlas was probably hiring for the reasons you stated and cutting costs where they could to get pilots. 

What I meant was that it was disheartening to learn that the FAA is lowering standards for some ethnic groups to gain a more diverse group of controllers. I’m all for diversity but in some occupations that can lead to life or death situations, I think we need the most qualified people to fill those positions regardless of what race they are. 

[skelsey 765]

On the subject of Colgan...

Perhaps we can now all agree that the FAA nonsense of requiring pilots to blat around in GA and regional carriers for 1500 hours before putting them in a big jet does not automatically produce skygods and in fact may even exacerbate this sort of situation?

The current system is not set up to emphasise and require high quality training, it is set up to shove people through the bare minimum at every level and hope that "experience" covers up the deficiencies. By preventing larger airlines like Atlas from hiring and training from scratch - instead they have to rely on the training departments of all manner of tinpot carriers to provide that all important formative training.

The number of hours spent performing a task are a pretty poor marker of competency. You only have to look at driving, golf, or indeed our own hobby of flight simulation to see that. Yet in aviation we still place far more importance on the sheer number of hours logged than the quality of the training or type of experience.

Practice (which is all hours really represent) is only really worthwhile if the individual has been properly trained in the task to be carried out, coached and monitored to ensure that they are carrying out in the correct manner to a high standard. I could go and play golf every day but without the right coaching it's not going to make me Tiger Woods. Even with the right coaching I'm unlikely to attain that sort of standard, but I'd still be better after the same number of hours of practice than if I had a substandard coach or simply got on with it myself.

The common link in almost all 'pilot error' type accidents is not the number of hours in the log, but a consistently poor training record, with failings inadequately remedied or glossed over.

HR and the hiring process has a part to play in this, but so does the overall system and the approach to and investment in training vs simply looking at experience.

[HighBypass 2,339]

15 hours ago, KevinAu said:

... But because he was able to fog a mirror. And they were applying that test to people regardless of skin color.....

There's hope for me flying a real MD-11 yet...