'Miracle on the Hudson' pilot blasts 'absurd' lack of training in wake of fatal Ethiopian Airlines

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

The hero "Miracle on the Hudson" pilot who nearly a decade ago shot to fame when he was able to safely land US Airways Flight 1549 following a bird strike on the Hudson River discussed the recent Ethiopian Airlines crash and how pilots need experience before being entrusted to master an aircraft after.

Captain Chesley B. Sullenberger III, 68, wrote on his Facebook page that the Ethiopian Airlines tragedy and October's Lion Air crash both involved a Boeing 737-8 MAX and changes need to be done to that model.

“It has been obvious since the Lion Air crash that a redesign of the 737 MAX 8 has been urgently needed, yet has still not been done, and the announced proposed fixes do not go far enough,” Sullenberger wrote.

On Sunday, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crashed, killing all 157 on board, including some Americans. In October, Lion Air Flight 610 crashed in the Java Sea shortly after takeoff from the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, killing all 189 people on board.

This week, President Trump announced the U.S. issued an emergency order grounding all Boeing 737 MAX 8 and MAX 9 aircraft “effective immediately” in wake of the Ethiopian Airlines crash. Many other nations, like China and the U.K, have barred the Boeing 737 MAX 8 from its airspace.

Sullenberger said he believed the Ethiopian Airlines crew did everything they could to prevent the accident. The retired pilot pointed out that the first officer on the doomed flight had insufficient hours of flight experience.

“It has been reported that the first officer on that flight had only 200 hours of flight experience, a small fraction of the minimum in the U.S., and an absurdly low amount for someone in the cockpit of a jet airliner,” he wrote.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/hero-miracle-on-the-hudson-pilot-blasts-absurd-lack-of-training-in-wake-of-fatal-ethiopian-airlines-crash/ar-BBUOTVF?li=BBnb7Kz

[elleng]

1. Been wondering what 'Sully' thought about this.

[Devil Child]

4. I fly incident prone Allegiant 1-2 times per month

I wish I had Sully in the cockpit every time I board.

[wryter2000]

6. So sorry

Can't you switch to another airline?

[Devil Child]

13. Small regional destination limits affordable options

I try to "splurge" on an AA flight when able. $100 vs $350+ is hard to say no to especially when having to make frequent flights.

[ansible]

2. holy hell, only 200 hours?? for a commercial passenger airline??????

Someone dropped the ball big time there.

[mitch96]

11. "Someone dropped the ball big time there."

Or got a big payoff....... Cessna to 737??
m

[Blue_Tires]

16. Believe it or not, that's the requirement in a LOT of nations

And while 200 hours isn't as bad as it sounds to competently fly the plane (FWIW the USAF straps new pilots in the F-22A with less time than that, but to be fair the USAF packs a LOT of training in those hours), the general consensus on the pilot forums I lurk at is 200 is enough to fly, but NOT enough to properly handle an abnormal or dangerous situation...

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. It is just insane to allow a pilot with only 200 hours of flight time

to fly a transport category aircraft. Most major US airlines require at least 10x as much just to get an interview.

[Devil Child]

5. Sully highlights possible safety issues in addition the 737 MAX 8 itself

“It has been reported that the first officer on that flight had only 200 hours of flight experience, a small fraction of the minimum in the U.S., and an absurdly low amount for someone in the cockpit of a jet airliner,”

Makes me wonder if greater pilot experience would've changed the fatal outcome.

[ansible]

7. 200 hours of flight experience is absolutely fucking nothing

Pilot experience is absolutely critical in flying a plane properly, this is a massive fuckup

[Tracer]

10. 200 hours in total or 200 hours in the Boeing?

I'm morbidly interested in a Smithsonian show "Air Disasters", that details investigations into plane crashes. Possibly because I'm a nervous flyer.

It is quite surprising to learn that so many accidents occur due to pilot error or complete confusion about what the plane is doing when a sudden warning alarm sounds in the cockpit.

There have been very, very few crashes that can be blamed on a fault in the plane itself.

[EX500rider]

19. Yes I have seen every episode also (also known as "Mayday")

...and improper cockpit resource management (CRM) had been the cause of many of them.

However the Sr Pilot I believe had 9,000 hours or so, I hope he would have taken over as things got pear shaped.

[friendly_iconoclast]

8. K&R- Preach it, Brother Sully!

[malaise]

9. K & R

Tell them Sully!

[EX500rider]

12. "he believed the Ethiopian Airlines crew did everything they could to prevent the accident"

How the hell would he know that, they haven't even hardly cracked open the black boxes yet.

[fescuerescue]

15. It's certainly true unless they had a pretty damn lazy attitude towards death.

That is, they did everything they could to prevent the accident. To prevent their deaths.

It's not as if these guys said "well I guess i could extend the flaps, but gosh my arm is tired and besides, dying isn't that bad".

No. These guys did everything that -they- could and knew to do.

What Sully is saying is that they should have been trained more extensively, so that they had even more skills and tools available to address the matter. Perhaps another crew could have saved it. Maybe not, we'll know eventually. But it's safe to say that this crew feared death just as much as you and I and did tried everything they thought of.

[EX500rider]

18. I'd say it's the difference between everything they knew and everything they could..

Last edited Fri Mar 15, 2019, 09:51 PM - Edit history (2)

....as in many plane crashes have pilot error, the Air France Flt 447 for instance did not do everything they could, because the pilot in command flew (well stalled it) it right into the ocean.
If he had put the nose down they would have not crashed.

[fescuerescue]

20. getting rather pendantic

I'm sure both crews did everything they could.

Unfortunately sometimes in extreme situations it can also lack the ability to make the proper decision.

In Air-france case, they still did everything they could. Unfortunately one of the things they couldn't do was to properly determine that the airspeed indicator was inaccurate.

Honestly, that a HUGE HUGE factor in most incidents. Does the pilot have the experience and decision making capability to sift through hundreds of pieces of information and not alone make the correct call based on the data, but also have the insight to determine that some of the data is just wrong.

In any event, I doubt that Capt Sullenberger intended for his comments to be dissected and was really just trying to be respectful to the dead.

[ChubbyStar]

21. You a Pilot?

My late father flew A4 Skyhawk's over Nam. My ex husband was the CO of VF51 at Miramar and went on to be a TOPGUN instructor. They talked to me a bunch, because they loved me and I am really smart. So are you a pilot? Because your posts smell of wannabeism.

[fescuerescue]

14. Only 200? That's nothing

I had about 100 hours when I got my pilots license.

That's 100 hours of training. To Drive a Cessna. On a clear day. With no passengers.

While I'm quite sure that I could learn to fly -anything- within another 100 hours, it's ludicrous to put someone with that little experience into such a role that requires so so much more.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

17. The complexities of transport category aircraft can't be adequately learned after only 100 hours.

I used to work in the training department of a major airline. Our new-hire pilots had already been either military pilots or captains at a regional airline, and they typically came in with about 4,000 hours, so they already had experience with multi-engine turbine-powered aircraft with advanced systems. Then, as first-officer trainees, they had to become qualified in a new aircraft type, which required about a week of just studying the systems followed a test on those systems, then another week on procedures and a test, then another week of full-flight simulator training followed by a check ride, followed by supervised line flying. It was not an easy program, and while most of them got through it without having to redo any part of it, sometimes a recheck was necessary - even for pilots with 4,000 hours and prior airline experience. Nobody could get through that program with only 100 hours of prior flight time, or even 200. The hiring standards and the training program at the Ethiopian airline must not have been very rigorous at all.

[fescuerescue]

22. That's what I was trying to say

GUess I didn't get it across.

Can a pilot learn to fly <anything> within 100 hours of training? of course. Even the most complicated aircraft isn't that much different than others that it would suddenly stump even a basic pilot. The fundamentals are the same. Bear in mind we are talking about cowboying the machine into the air, basic navigation and getting it on the ground.

That kind of where I felt at 200 hours. I'm certain that i could cowboy an airliner into the air. And the airplane would probably be usable again after the all the dents were hammered out

But to be GOOD at it. Fly it smoothly, safely, learn all the details of everything required? And to be trained so as to intuitively react properly in case of emergency? Oh gosh no. 200 hours is nuttin.

As you suggest, there is clearly a HUGE difference in our standards and training vs those of this Ethiopian airline.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

23. I'm not sure a 200-hour pilot could even cowboy it into the air,

because for starters they probably wouldn't know how to start the engines with the APU (or start the APU) or taxi it, or calculate the correct takeoff and climb speeds and power settings for its weight, or know how or when to safely retract the landing gear and flaps. Landing would be really dicey, too, if they didn't know the safe gear and flap extension speeds or the correct approach and landing speeds, which can vary enormously with aircraft weight - if you're too fast for the weight you'll overshoot the runway and if you're too slow you'll stall it on. It's a whole different animal.

[fescuerescue]

24. I come down on the side of, yea it's possible

For a really smart guy or gal who studied it ahead of time. Just a few months ago a suicidal airport employee stole an airliner in Seattle and crashed it. I don't think he had any hours, but he did manage to get it into the air before he lost control doing some stunts.

But either way. We are talking -marginal- ability to even survive here, we aren't even talking proficient and safe, let alone comfortable for the passengers.

How the heck this airline can make someone FO with that level of experience is mind boggling.

[Snake Plissken]

25. IF you want a general understanding of what issue is with the 737 MAX 8

This pilot has an excellent channel on Youtube I've been watching for quite some time and he just received a video related to this jet and he has a really cute dog who likes to be part of this episode

In a nutshell the engines are larger on this model than previous models and thus had to be relocated which consequently requires more skill to operate when it is in a near stall condition therefore Boeing added a software assist to help make it easier to level the aircraft out in those conditions when it's nose it getting too high, but it's obvious that the software assist can not take the place of pilot experience and training 100% of the time and needs to be addressed.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

26. Pretty much confirms what I've read so far

[at140]

27. During 37 years of developing expert computer systems,

what I know for sure is that no complex software can be without bugs.

So Sully is right on to opine that pilots need to be trained to quickly disengage
auto-pilot at the first hint of mis-behavior.

Southwest Airlines has been flying these exact same planes by the dozens for thousands of flights and experienced no mishaps. Looks to me like the pilots in Somalia and Indonesia (?) lacked sufficient training.