The great big "ask an airline pilot" thread!

smurfjed

http://avherald.com/h?article=4867f2bd&opt=0

So the system does work and protects against a crews lack of situational awareness!

If Air France was a non European airline, they would most likely be banned from Europe due to their safety record!

eatmyshorts

smurfjed wrote: »

So the system does work and protects against a crews lack of situational awareness!

If Air France was a non European airline, they would most likely be banned from Europe due to their safety record!

Basic SA... Always know your MSA, especially when in a non radar environment.

Tenger

faceman wrote: »

.....
Anyway I'm on a 4 hour domestic US flight to the West coast and it got me thinking. Is there an agreed standard as to what constitutes long haul or short haul travel? Is it purely duration or does skipping timezones? (or is it called sectors?)

Its all a bit vague...

Wikipedia has these definitions:
Short: hrs
Medium: 3-6
Long: 6-12
Ultra Long: >12 hrs

For the travelling public anything over 4 hours is 'long'.
US Domestic routes are a bit odd as they are very long but they are not treated the same as International. SOmeone recently posted how they flew 2 sectors with Delta (on the same aircraft) free headsets on the International but charge for them on the Domestic sector.

Generally transoceanic is referred to as longhaul.....hence DUB-BOS-DUB is called longhaul when it just about gets into the over 6 hrs.

So FR would be a short-medium operator, while Aer Lingus would be seen as Short and Longhaul operator. (Its assumed the Medium is also flown)

JCX BXC

What about the Dublin-St Johns (DUB-YYT) flight? Medium or long? I'd consider it a long haul flight due to the eastbound flight being a Red eye flight.

olive20

Deleted reply as Ive just noticed its for pilots to reply here. Oops sorry.

Tenger

olive20 wrote: »

Within the company I work with/for its only LH if we put 3 Pilots on it, required for rest etc. East Coast/ORD/IAD are classified MH....

The CCrew may beg to differ as I can understand but for Pilots with us its only LH to SFOvv
.....

Don't they just call it "Europe's" or "T/A"

smurfjed

http://avherald.com/h?article=4868e523&opt=0

Just shows how a diversion can really ruin the day for the crew and passengers!

islanderre

eatmyshorts wrote: »

Shameless self-gloss:...

Just been totalling my logbook and realised I've passed the 10,000 hour milestone, 18 years since the first entry in my first logbook.

Wow.....

Fair play eatmyshorts.......

If I could be a bit nosey!!!!! Could you post the aircraft you have progressed through in your career so far..... and the pros / cons, likes / dislikes of each.

Ignore if you like; dont want to be too intrusive into your life but the idea behind this post is a great thread over on airliners.net tech forum that detailed some pilots flying career and there likes / dislikes for various aircraft.

I found it fascinating reading.

Thanks,

Islanderre

eatmyshorts

islanderre wrote: »

Wow.....

Fair play eatmyshorts.......

If I could be a bit nosey!!!!! Could you post the aircraft you have progressed through in your career so far..... and the pros / cons, likes / dislikes of each.

Ignore if you like; dont want to be too intrusive into your life but the idea behind this post is a great thread over on airliners.net tech forum that detailed some pilots flying career and there likes / dislikes for various aircraft.

I found it fascinating reading.

Thanks,

Islanderre

220 hours is light piston. All the rest is multi engine jet, with about 6000 of that heavy jet.
The first logbook entry was an hour on a C150 at my local flying club at age 17. Last night's entry was 9h 20min sector in command of a 777 from the US to Europe.

I'll type out something detailed later. Away on a trip at the minute. Having my morning coffee in the hotel exec lounge (the free beer and wine is only from 17:30 to 21:30 :-o) .

duskyjoe

eatmyshorts wrote: »

220 hours is light piston. All the rest is multi engine jet, with about 6000 of that heavy jet.
The first logbook entry was an hour on a C150 at my local flying club at age 17. Last night's entry was 9h 20min sector in command of a 777 from the US to Europe..

I have a very similar pattern re my career to eatmyshorts. 17k total time. When I look back I just keep saying to myself where has time gone. Days turn into weeks, weeks turn into months , weekends I'm never around.......it's a funny old life dictated utterly by a roster and jet lag. Don't regret a minute though.

Tenger

duskyjoe wrote: »

.......Days turn into weeks, weeks turn into months , weekends I'm never around.......it's a funny old life dictated utterly by a roster and jet lag. Don't regret a minute though.

Oh the glamour of working in aviation!!!

RobAMerc

folks,

can i ask what the noise is when on the ground that sounds like bursts of a drill going with a high pitch whine after it.

It sounds similar the motor deploying the flaps perhaps ?

I hope I've explained it well enough for anyone to figure out what I am talking about.

thanks

basill

Airbus perhaps? More like a dog barking? If so PTU is the answer.

Keedowah

I always thought that was the sound of them securing the cargo holds!!!

smurfjed

They have done it again...... why isnt this airline banned in Europe?

Air France faces its second safety investigation in as many weeks after pilots were forced to recover in mid-takeoff after entering the wrong data into the computer of a cargo jet, airline and safety officials said.

The mistake over the plane's weight was discovered when the Boeing 777 freighter accelerated too slowly while starting off down the runway at Paris Charles de Gaulle airport on May 22.

Underestimating the weight can cause the plane to settle for less thrust than needed and try to leave the ground too early, increasing the risk of damage from a 'tail strike'.

A person familiar with the matter said the weight entered into the system of the Mexico-bound jet was drastically lower than the correct value, lagging by as much as 100 tonnes, which is over a quarter of its maximum take-off weight.

To compensate, pilots had to override the automated settings and order up maximum power from the aircraft's two engines.

Air France confirmed the incident in response to a query from Reuters and said the crew had been taken off flying duties once they had reached their initial destination.

A spokeswoman for France’s BEA air crash investigation agency said it had launched an investigation in addition to the airline’s own internal probe.

"I confirm that an investigation has been opened in response to information provided by Air France," she said.

Sounds like they entered the Zero Fuel Weight in the Gross weight box!

basill

Looks the the ole mark 1 eyeball and gut feeling saved them on this occasion. Having a ballpark VMU in your head when reviewing the perf in the FMGC would have hopefully caught it earlier.

eatmyshorts

smurfjed wrote: »

Sounds like they entered the Zero Fuel Weight in the Gross weight box!

Our FMC's have the option to enter a gross weight on the PERF page removed, in order to erase the possibility of doing this by mistake.
It's a Boeing/Honeywell option.

duskyjoe

smurfjed wrote: »

They have done it again...... why isnt this airline banned in Europe?



Sounds like they entered the Zero Fuel Weight in the Gross weight box!

An offence that deserves demotion in my world.. This is a mega fugh up. As eatmyshorts says knowing ones minimum unstick speeds for say 200/250/300tons is essential and not rocket science

smurfjed

Our FMC's have the option to enter a gross weight on the PERF page removed

Was this a reaction to the A340 incident in Australia?

faceman

Looking for some insight for a flight today if possible please! Flying to MCO. According to Flight Track we depart on time but it's showing almost 90 minute delay to arrival. Checking arrivals for other European flights at that time isn't showing similar delays.

Is it weather related or something else? Am I in for a bumpy flight?

Tenger

faceman wrote: »

Looking for some insight for a flight today if possible please! Flying to MCO. According to Flight Track we depart on time but it's showing almost 90 minute delay to arrival. Checking arrivals for other European flights at that time isn't showing similar delays.

Is it weather related or something else? Am I in for a bumpy flight?

I am going to guess that this is related to EI being down an aircraft today.
EI-138 last night had to divert to St.Johns with a medical problem, so aircraft/route assignments were re-jigged.
It arrived in at 1350 when it should have been on the ground at 0800 normally.

faceman

Tenger wrote: »

I am going to guess that this is related to EI being down an aircraft today.
EI-138 last night had to divert to St.Johns with a medical problem, so aircraft/route assignments were re-jigged.
It arrived in at 1350 when it should have been on the ground at 0800 normally.

Yeah seems there was a medical emergency on the BOS-DUB flight. They didn't want to announce the delay until everyone was through immigration.

Fortunately I have lounge access.

Locker10a

RobAMerc wrote: »

folks,

can i ask what the noise is when on the ground that sounds like bursts of a drill going with a high pitch whine after it.

It sounds similar the motor deploying the flaps perhaps ?

I hope I've explained it well enough for anyone to figure out what I am talking about.

thanks

If it's the A320 family you experienced this on it will be the blue hydraulic transfer system!

Skuxx

Locker10a wrote: »

If it's the A320 family you experienced this on it will be the blue hydraulic transfer system!

Sounds to me like the PTU which does yellow to green on the ground as there is no green system electric pump on the 320!

smurfjed

An Air France Boeing 777-300, registration F-GZNB performing flight AF-275 from Tokyo Narita (Japan) to Paris Charles de Gaulle (France) with 275 passengers and 17 crew, was enroute at FL300 about 50nm south of Khabarovsk (Russia) when the crew reported a problem with the left hand engine (GE90) and decided to divert to Khabarovsk for a safe landing on runway 23L about 40 minutes later.

Is it time for an Air France thread??

Taken from avherald.com

merryberry

Just wondering do aer lingus pilots get to fly different models of the airbus like fly an a320 to a European destination one week and switch to an a330 for tran Atlantic routes the following week.

Jack1985

merryberry wrote: »

Just wondering do aer lingus pilots get to fly different models of the airbus like fly an a320 to a European destination one week and switch to an a330 for tran Atlantic routes the following week.

No. Pilots in EI are either Short-Haul (A319, A320, A321) or Long-Haul (A330-200, A330-300).

Aer Lingus Boeing 757s are operated by a 50% split of EI/ACL Pilots and Aer Lingus Regional (ATR42 and ATR72) are operated by Stobart Air Pilots.

mayfly757

Jack1985 wrote: »

No. Pilots in EI are either Short-Haul (A319, A320, A321) or Long-Haul (A330-200, A330-300).

Aer Lingus Boeing 757s are operated by ACL Pilots and Aer Lingus Regional (ATR42 and ATR72) are operated by Stobart Air Pilots.

No 50/50 split on the B757 with Aer Lingus pilots and ACL pilots

cuterob

Jack1985 wrote: »

No. Pilots in EI are either Short-Haul (A319, A320, A321) or Long-Haul (A330-200, A330-300).

Aer Lingus Boeing 757s are operated by a 50% split of EI/ACL Pilots and Aer Lingus Regional (ATR42 and ATR72) are operated by Stobart Air Pilots.

and I know some pilots with EI who is type rated on both a320 and a330

Tenger

cuterob wrote: »

and I know some pilots with EI who is type rated on both a320 and a330

There have always been a few instructors/managers like that. But for normall day-to-day Ops there is no cross-fleeting.