19 hours ago, jon b said:

This is exactly right, believe me you made the right decision.

I’ve seen the industry change tremendously and pilots, engineers and crew pushed to the absolute limits.

Regulatory Flight time limitation schemes are now  used by airlines as targets rather than limits to squeeze the absolute maximum amount of work and productivity.

 

if all else fails blame fatigue. That easyJet pilot that stalled that 737 going into Athens has made a career/books about it, at the end of the day he stalled it when he was flying it, then claimed fatigue to keep his license.

Every year when I do my 2 day course in Gatwick run the CAA, its done by thje same 2 women.

Each year I ask the same 2 CAA civil servants (whos never worked in crewing or worked on an aeroplane in any capacity) to come sit with me a week Ill show you some rosters where they went fatigued on day one after 3 weeks leave.  Alas Shes never taken me up on my offer. 

Ive also asked her numerous times to give me a last land on a standby split duty FTL, using pen and paper.  she cant do that either.

You then ask her if shes thinks is really possible to deboard a full plane of pax on a 787, with 9 wheelchairs and get all 12 crew off the A/C and through T3 into arrivals,. and have their cases out the crew bins, within that stupid EASA 30 mins "off duty"   Of course you cant.  It should be 45 mins (in my opinion)  

But she rattle on about the samn perelli scale, even though shes never flown in her life, written a roster, or calculated an FTL.

Point im making here is as much as agree FTLS are poilcy written for good reason to eliminate FRMS issues,  they are written by civil servants who never done the job of flying a plane where your expected to be a little robot thats switches on and off, but nor have they ever worked crewing/rostering where you see fatigue abused by the cabin crew and flight crew, but equally FTLS fudged a little bit to get the A/C to go by us in ops.

No one is perfect here, but if all else fails blame fatigue, it will get you out the doo doo  

   

13 hours ago, Fielder said:

experience dreamliner pilot who says he thinks it unlikely that a pilot or copilot could move those switches so quickly, only 1 second between the two switches moving

I’d say that timing is easily achievable and quite normal.

This is just getting stranger and stranger, but the voice recorder doesn’t really fit the scenario to me.

I can’t think of any pilot whose reaction to seeing the fuel control switches being turned off 3 seconds after becoming airborne would be “ why did you do that?”

There would be a lot of expletives and action.

My personal thoughts and speculation now is that it was a deliberate act by the captain and that little “ why did you cut off?” question was for the benefit of the CVR to deflect blame onto the FO in the subsequent investigation.

That’s also reinforced by the order of the cut off, left then right. That’s how I and everyone else I’ve seen does it from the left seat, you switch off the nearest one to you on the left  first then the right hand one

Edited July 14, 2025Jul 14 by jon b

@fluffyflops

yes, and one obvious thing that has only just struck me with the Air India flight , is it was 2 crew, that’s a heck of a long way for a 2 crew operation.

The Daily Telegraph reporting concerns about the mental state of the captain who was pilot monitoring on this flight thereby leaving both hands free. Free to read article.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/9e426c21d3282f87

I don’t buy for a second they don’t know who said what either, that’s a smokescreen by authorities in my opinion.

If they were on interphone the CVR would differentiate the left and right channels, if speaking normally without the interphone they would still be able to tell who’s who by comparing voices recorded earlier.

 

Regardless of what happened.... I'm thinking covers over those switches that you have to lift would-be a good idea.

21 minutes ago, martin-w said:

Regardless of what happened.... I'm thinking covers over those switches that you have to lift would-be a good idea.

If it was done deliberately as I believe it was what difference would covers make? None.

6 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

If it was done deliberately as I believe it was what difference would covers make? None.

 

Agree. But as I said, regardless of what happened, such critical switches could perhaps do with more protection than they currently have. More than just pull and flip.

23 minutes ago, martin-w said:

Agree. But as I said, regardless of what happened, such critical switches could perhaps do with more protection than they currently have. More than just pull and flip.

Given they’ve been that way for countless flights I’m still struggling to understand where you’re coming from. It’s clear to me one of the crew wanted to end his life. There are other ways of bringing down an aircraft. Pushing the yoke full forward being the most obvious.

3 hours ago, jon b said:

I don’t buy for a second they don’t know who said what either, that’s a smokescreen by authorities in my opinion.

I am 99% certain they know who said what, but the initial reports are under no obligation to release or discuss all available information.

6 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

Given they’ve been that way for countless flights I’m still struggling to understand where you’re coming from.

I completely agree. Each change or addition of complexity has unexpected consequences.

Cheers

34 minutes ago, martin-w said:

 

D'accordo. Ma come ho detto, a prescindere da ciò che è successo, interruttori così critici potrebbero forse beneficiare di una protezione maggiore di quella attuale. Più che una semplice estrazione e apertura.

I don't see much difference between covering the switches and possibly lifting/removing this protection if there is a "voluntary" intention to switch from RUN to CUTOFF and vice versa, but it would only be a small additional time.

When it comes to protection, it's important to consider that there is a locking/unlocking device for the switches, and only with a "voluntary" action, which consists of first lifting the switch knob to unlock the locking device, can the switch be set to the desired position.

An "inadvertent" action that first lifts the switch and then moves it seems very unlikely to happen to me.

6 minutes ago, RobPol471 said:

An "inadvertent" action that first lifts the switch and then moves it seems very unlikely to happen to me.

And what is even more unlikely, the same inadvertent action occurring on the other switch 1.5 seconds later.

Cheers

5 hours ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

The Daily Telegraph reporting concerns about the mental state of the captain who was pilot monitoring on this flight thereby leaving both hands free. Free to read article.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/9e426c21d3282f87

Ray if you brought in all the flight deck and cabin crew at my airline you would fined most of the cabin crew are on anti depressants of some sort and most of the pilots have got issues at home, it’s just the nature of the industry.  

I was working in crewing when the ash cloud in Iceland went off in 2011 , it was staggering the problems we had with crews downroute that needed Medaire to sort their prescriptions for anti depressants and anti psychotics.

 

The amount we had to refer to Heathrow medical afterwards because it had come to light they were on worrying prescriptions was in the 100s.

There’s 2 sayings that come to mind

“if you drug tested all the crews , you’d loose half your rosters”

”if the passengers really knew what went on in aviation they never get on the plane”

 

I agree with @jon b it’s a cheap shot trying to level it at the skipper due to mental health because he’d been nofly for a few months.  

 

but I bet the execs and legal execs at Boeing breathed a sign of relief when they tried to stick it to skipper like that.  Very dirty business indeed

Edited July 14, 2025Jul 14 by fluffyflops

I believe it is time, considering that technology would allow it very easily, that, in addition to CVR and FDR, there is also a recording of a webcam in the cockpit which, as in this case, would resolve the doubts about "who or what" moved the switches from RUN to CUTOFF.

1 minute ago, RobPol471 said:

I believe it is time, considering that technology would allow it very easily, that, in addition to CVR and FDR, there is also a recording of a webcam in the cockpit which, as in this case, would resolve the doubts about "who or what" moved the switches from RUN to CUTOFF.

Given what has been reported as a lack of current (and future) qualified applicants for flight schools, I suspect that the energy required to face fierce Union opposition to this proposal would make it DOA.

In addition, any pilot with susceptible mental conditions wouldn't likely alter their motivations while being video recorded.

The question would be; could you eliminate all possibility and prevent an intentional action to cripple the normal operation of an aircraft?

As of now, we only know the cause of the dual engine failure...the root cause for the action may never be truly known. Sadly, this is not the first example of a downed airliner due to a suicidal pilot. (The jury is still out regarding the actual actions of the pilots of Air India 171.)

IF...this proves to be an intentional act, it's very sad for the victims. RIP.