Safety aides chide FAA for ignoring warnings on ice

[RamboLiberal]

Source: Buffalo News

Tougher regulations are needed to protect planes flying in the kind of icy conditions that possibly downed a Continental Connection flight in Clarence Center Thursday, federal safety officials have said, again and again, for more than a decade.

But the Federal Aviation Administration has never heeded the safety officials’ repeated warnings that more needs to be done about the risks that ice can pose to propeller planes.

That’s proved frustrating for the National Transportation Safety Board, which first recommended improved icing regulations in their “Most Wanted Transportation Safety Improvements” in 1997 and then added to those recommendations several times over the years.

“The pace of the FAA0s activities in response to these recommendations remains unacceptably slow, despite recent encouraging action,” Steven Chealander, the safety board member who is currently in Buffalo to investigate the crash of Continental Flight 3407, told a Senate committee last April.



Read more: http://www.buffalonews.com/515/story/579313.html

[rollingrock]

1. The plane was apparently new and had a de-icing

mechanism on its wings. So either the de-icing mechanism failed or the FDA is somehow wrong about the cause of the crash. OTOH, I don't know if the icing on the wings would explain why the plane apparently nose-dived straight down, oddly enough, instead of leveling out before crashing, and why there was no may day distress signal from the pilot. Isn't it a bit odd that a relatively large airplane only struck one house? That's because it dropped out of the sky like a rock, which seems quite odd to me. Can any pilots or someone knowledgeable about aviation weigh in on this?

[BlooInBloo]

3. I assume you mean "FAA".

[rollingrock]

4. Yeah, lol

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

19. Although the Sully flight did involve geese.

:7

[lostnotforgotten]

6. The Plane Landed Flat Not In A Nose Dive!

Sounds to me like the plane stalled due to a higher stalling speed induced by ice on the wings.

Once the plane stalled it went into a flat spin that explains why it landed flat on the house like a pancake.

My background: Commercial Pilot, Single Engine Land, Multi-Engine Land, Instrument Airplane, Glider Ratings

[ShockediSay]

16. This might explain why the nose of the aircraft was reportedly facing

away from the airport

[lostnotforgotten]

17. Exactly!

eom

[maseman]

8. Some clarity to your post

Yes the Q400 Bombardier turbo-prop has de-icing mechanisms on the wings and tail. Many planes, especially turbo-props, use a de-icing mechanism called "boots" which essentially pop with air burst that removes ice from the leading edges. (Other aircrafts, namely jets, use a weeping-wing which releases de-icing fluids through pores in the wings.)

A few problems with the "boot" mechanism. 1. Pilots can simply not use them usually due to not knowing they are in heavy icing conditions. It sounds by the tape recording that they did know there was icing. 2. In heavy icing situations sometimes a boot system is used too often which essentially forms an ice shell on the leading edge where the boot has fully inflated. Once that happens, which is rare, it is trouble for the airplane.

Icing conditions are probably one of the most risky parts of flying for a few reasons. It typically happens at lower altitudes where you have very moist air (clouds/fog) coupled with temps between about -5 c and 5 c. At higher altitudes it is usually both drier air coupled with colder temps which makes icing rare. Since an airplane encounters icing conditions at lower altitudes there is less room for error since the terrain is much closer. In the case of the Continental flight they had heavy icing. Once they went into their landing routine which requires flaps to be deployed the minimum safe airspeeds for wing stalls is dramatically increased. They most likely stalled the wings and since it was so low to the ground didn't have time to go into a spin or spiral. Thus landing flat on the house.

Very tragic. Ice is a tough problem. I am a private pilot in the north where we get tons of icing conditions. I have no de-ice equipment on my small single-engine plane so I am super-sensitive to icing conditions.

[rollingrock]

11. Thanks for the informative replies

but why the pilot never made a radio distress call as soon as the plane began to stall?
at least that's what I heard reported from two different TV news channels. it seems to be a bit of a mystery.

[maseman]

12. I don't know

Quite frankly if I ever was in the position to make a distress call I may be too busy trying not to crash my plane. We are trained that as a part of an emergency landing sequence that we make a distress call. But no one knows exactly what transpires in an emergency until one is in one.

[rollingrock]

13. Maybe she attempted a distress call

but somehow the communications equipment failed? but I guess that shouldn't have anything to do with the icing.

I guess the blackbox should reveal more information. doesn't it records all the pilot chatter?

[maseman]

14. Yes

The cockpit crew is basically recorded at all times and hundreds of data points are also collected to determine airpspeed, vertical airspeed, altitude, etc.

I highly doubt the transmission equipment failed. It was a one year old plane with state of the art equipment.

[RamboLiberal]

18. No distress call cause they were too busy trying to save the plane

They only had a few seconds from what I can gather.

[BrklynLiberal]

15. .Why would the plane be on auto-pilot so close to landing?

[Stellabella]

10. The de-icing mechanism was just balloons that inflated slightly to

break up the ice, not chemicals.

The plane didn't nose-dive, it landed on its belly. And it was on auto-pilot, which does all sorts of incorrect maneuvers to correct for ice on the wings before it suddenly gives up and the pilots realize they're in grave danger.

By the time the pilots knew what was going it, it was most likely too late. If the plane pitched severely and went into a spin while still remaining level, it's possible the pilots couldn't say anything because they were suddenly disabled.

I saw an interview with an aviation expert who says the FAA should require pilots to take the plane off autopilot every 5-10 minutes to make sure everything is okay, not fly the whole way on that system because it can mask problems.

[avaistheone1]

2. I thought the FAA would have known the importance of deicing since at least the 1980s.

If I recall correctly there were a great deal of plane crashes back then where the lack of sufficient deicing was the culprit.

[RamboLiberal]

21. You're thinking of deicing before takeoff

Air Florida crash in D.C. for one. That's where they spray deicing fluid on the plane at the airport. That won't last for long once in the air.

[caraher]

5. recent reports claim the plane landed flat

which is hard to reconcile with it essentially hitting just one house. And which contradict the eyewitness reports, apparently...

I'm sure it did have de-icing gear, but just as a really heavy rain can overwhelm your windshield wipers so can especially severe icing conditions overwhelm the heaters the plane has. I think this is an issue of a need to reassess what weather conditions are safe for these smaller aircraft at the altitudes they use (seems to be much less an issue for jets cruising in thinner, probably dryer air at higher altitude).

[quabbin]

7. flat spin

The NTSB is now reporting the aircraft descended in a flat spin. That would account for the wreckage distribution oriented the way it is and the fact that only one house was impacted. Visualize a falling spinning maple leaf and you will get the idea.

[caraher]

9. that works

it also explains why the wreckage seems to be pointed opposite the direction you'd expect based on where they were flying

I though there were witnesses who claimed it was basically in a dive, which I'd assume meant they saw it in a nose-down attitude. But it's hard to know how much credence to put in those reports

[brentspeak]

20. Another Buffalo News article raises questions about when the pilot took the plane off autopilot

This article says that the crew noticed "significant" icing, but it's not clear if the autopilot was shut off right after they saw the icing -- or several minutes later. Apparently, once icing is recognized, it's wise to shut off autopilot and switch to manual. The exact time-line of events in this crash needs to be clarified.

http://www.buffalonews.com/home/story/580554.html?imw=Y