Canadian pilot recounts losing both engines over the Atlanti

[golden hawk]

http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/canadian-p ... -1.2997241

Canadian pilot recounts losing both engines over the Atlantic Ocean



Josh Dehaas, CTVNews.ca Writer

@JoshDehaas
.
Published Thursday, July 21, 2016 7:07PM EDT
Last Updated Friday, July 22, 2016 9:54AM EDT

An Air Transat pilot who saved 306 people by guiding a plane to safety in the Azores after losing both engines mid-Atlantic says he hasn’t lost his passion for flying 15 years later.

Capt. Robert Piche’s Airbus A330 starting losing fuel mid-way between Toronto and Lisbon, Portugal, on Aug. 24, 2001. Both engines died and Piche calculated he had about 15 to 20 minutes before hitting the water.

Eighteen minutes later, a remote military airport at Lajes came into view.

But he was still at 15,000 feet and not sure how quickly he would need to lose altitude to make it.

“It’s a big bird and it weighed 155 tonnes that night, so I didn’t know (how) the plane is going to land,” he told CTV Windsor in Chatham, Ont., where he will speak at a fundraiser for Air Cadets on Friday.

“Sure enough, when we landed, it bounced 30 feet in the air and went forward 2,000 feet.”

Eight tires were blown, but the injuries were mostly minor. Piche and First Officer Dirk de Jager were hailed as heroes worldwide.

“You’ve never practiced that because running out of fuel over the ocean is not supposed to happen,” he added. “You don’t know how to do it.”

Piche said flying “dead stick” is “about 80 per cent instinct and 20 per cent procedures.”

His 18-minute glide broke the world record set in 1983 after Air Canada’s “Gimli Glider” ran out of fuel 17 minutes before a miraculous landing in Gimli, Man.

Piche said he had “some butterflies” in his stomach two months after the incident, when he was about to get back into the captain’s chair.

“I wasn’t afraid of flying,” he explained. “It was more likely that I would have lost my passion that put me there, because to get a job as Captain of Airbus A330 based in Montreal going worldwide -- a lot of people want to get that job.”

But Piche hasn’t lost his passion. He still flies the A330 out of Montreal.

Piche said the cause of the incident was a roughly three-inch-wide hole in a fuel line.

A Portuguese investigation found that improper maintenance caused the leak. Air Transat was fined $250,000 by Transport Canada.

Piche, who was an Air Cadet as a teenager in Mont-Joli, Que., is speaking Friday at Flight Fest in Chatham, Ont., to raise money for Air Cadets.

With a report from CTV Windsor

[Nark]

Wow, great timing of this article. Sure glad no other Air Transat pilots have made the news lately.

You’ve never practiced that because running out of fuel over the ocean is not supposed to happen,” he added. “You don’t know how to do it.”

Hmmmm, I'd hate to be a Monday Morning QB, but wasn't there a massive breakdown in common sense (procedure?) not to X-feed fuel to a "problem."

[crazyaviator]

Lots of blame to go around,,, maintenance screwed up, PILOTS screwed up by not following SOP s and pumping most of their fuel overboard, I sure hope Captain Picard tells the WHOLE story when he is doing his seminars ( being an alcoholic and convicted drug . ) Is he a hero to Me ? naaa

[av8ts]

A hero is someone who leaves safety and puts themselves into danger to help others ( SAR TECH). Piche was just saving his a$&. Everyone just happened to be attached to it

[tohellnback]

And then came 9/11 two weeks later
I do believe Transat would of been done!
The Media was having a joyride with Transat and I don't think they would of survived

[Eric Janson]

Hmmmm, I'd hate to be a Monday Morning QB, but wasn't there a massive breakdown in common sense (procedure?) not to X-feed fuel to a "problem."

airbus changed the fuel leak procedure as a result of this event.

A crew at the Asian Airline I was previously working for also mishandled a fuel leak - fortunately they were close to their destination and didn't run out of fuel. This would have resulted in a ditching if they had been further out.

This incident is not listed on the local CAA website.....

[GRK2]

Hero...you might want to ask the guy that was in the right seat when this idiot ran roughshod over the checklist and used his "superior" knowledge to trouble shoot and cause this accident. I had a talk with his FO on the night a few years ago and he is less than complementary to say the least. AT was seriously lucky and played the "Do Not Disturb" card as fast as they could to hold on to their AOC.

So no, there is no hero here. Just a poor example to these young Air Cadets. I hope they are shown the difference between proper airmanship and procedure vs what this *sshat did that night.

[Nark]

Reminds me of a guy here. Absolutely destroyed an engine.
The FA's called up saying they smelled smoke.
Our hero captain ignored the ECAM and went to TOGA. He was doing his own thing, until the FO was assertive enough to say, "hey we need to run the ECAM!"

I flew with him across the country (longest 6.5 hrs of my life). I have stories upon stories of "tell me about a captain..." type HR questions.

Excerpt from the NTSB report:

Although he did not recall the action later, the captain then advanced both throttles from climb power to the takeoff/go-around setting, a move not referenced in any of the applicable Company abnormal and emergency procedures.
...
Along with increasing the vibration levels, the captain’s decision to increase power on the left engine ultimately raised temperatures to the point where the engine shed “multiple components” including the low-pressure turbine third- and fourth-stage disks, says the NTSB. Some of the engine components were later recovered on the ground in Ben Franklin, Texas.

[single_swine_herder]

Nark:

One of those .... "Hey, count the bars" type of Captains that know all aircraft better than the Design Engineers, Production Test Pilots, and and Training Pilots.

I just never understood what is the problem with some people not accepting the concept of being trusted with a multi-million dollar piece of sophisticated equipment with many lives at stake, and being told by the owners .... "Here's how we want it used."

SSH

[cncpc]

Wow, great timing of this article. Sure glad no other Air Transat pilots have made the news lately.

You’ve never practiced that because running out of fuel over the ocean is not supposed to happen,” he added. “You don’t know how to do it.”

Hmmmm, I'd hate to be a Monday Morning QB, but wasn't there a massive breakdown in common sense (procedure?) not to X-feed fuel to a "problem."

No, there wasn't a "massive breakdown", but keep saying that if it makes you feel the better man.

What there was was Reason's Model in almost full operation in a first ever situation on a dark night over the Atlantic, initiated by a maintenance error, compounded by inadequate or non existent training for this type of event by the carrier, with what procedures there were subsequently being judged by the manufacturer as inadequate and in need of change, culminating with one of aviation history's greatest feats of airmanship, followed by the type of envious and bigoted horseshit that appears in this thread, saved only by the probably unwelcome contribution of Eric Jantzen.

The Reason's Model is below. There was not an accident. There was a limited window of accident opportunity with potentially catastrophic consequences. Ultimately, despite being to some small extent involved in the model upstream of the Defences stage, Captain Piche and his copilot, whose name is blackened in this thread by an anonymous poster, saved the aircraft and its passengers.

[Gannet167]

Flying over the Atlantic, I watch the fuel pretty closely. There isn't much else to do up there between position reports other than monitor the fuel. When I see a tank trending unusually and inexplicably low, AND the total fuel is less than it should be according to the flight plan which is normally amazingly accurate, I start thinking about ETP's and get an extra strong coffee going.

Transferring more fuel, and then more, and ignoring the other crew member's input and attempts at reasoning through the situation is, I believe, some sort of a breakdown. Sure, he pulled off a feat by gliding into Lajes and that was remarkable. But it's a fairly reasonable assertion to say that the plane should have diverted there much earlier and landed under it's own power with nothing more than a large fuel imbalance. A superior pilot uses superior decision making to avoid a situation that requires superior skill.

Diverting under power and finding out on the ground in Lajes that you only had a fuel probe failure but made the conservative decision to divert without any actual leak would be something to laugh about over beers later. Finding out that you actually do really have a real fuel leak, for real, when the plane goes dark and the RAT deploys, with over 300 people on board.... - yeaaahhh, that' a breakdown in my books. It must have been awkward when the right seat looked left and remarked "Believe me now?" Rumor has it, the fuel transfer only finally stopped after one crew member elevated their assertive directive communications with the cockpit fire axe in an effort to overcome the denial going on.

Airbus has changed a few things but I'd argue that's at least in part to protect from pilots doing dumb things. A great deal pilots have logged a great deal of hours in a great deal of aircraft types over oceans without Airbus's super-duper equipment and revised procedures, and figured out how to make good decisions.

I hope his talk with the Air Cadets focuses on decision making and discernment.

[atphat]

It was an incredible breakdown. Ignoring checklists and saying the computers were wrong. That doesn't makes anyone feel better. That's just what happened

[pelmet]

Rumor has it, the fuel transfer only finally stopped after one crew member elevated their assertive directive communications with the cockpit fire axe in an effort to overcome the denial going on.

Actually, after all that happened in the flight deck......click on this link and start watching at 5:53 for about 10 seconds and then you will know at what point the axe came closest to being used.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbH7jUL7o7k

[crazyaviator]

Rumor has it, the fuel transfer only finally stopped after one crew member elevated their assertive directive communications with the cockpit fire axe in an effort to overcome the denial going on.

This is roughly equivalent to having #1 engine fail and then shutting down #2 engine in a small cessna twin !!! HERO ? NAAAA

[cncpc]

Rumor has it, the fuel transfer only finally stopped after one crew member elevated their assertive directive communications with the cockpit fire axe in an effort to overcome the denial going on.

This is roughly equivalent to having #1 engine fail and then shutting down #2 engine in a small cessna twin !!! HERO ? NAAAA

No it's not roughly equivalent. You can try and make it sound like it is if you're all butt hurt because he's a French Canadian and when the news of this came out you began to question your own manhood, but that doesn't make your horseshit analogy valid.

[Gannet167]

You can try and make it sound like it is if you're all butt hurt because he's a French Canadian

No one said anything about his linguistic background. I don't see how that's relevant. Why would it hurt anyone's butt?

[Gannet167]

If my son or daughter was in Air Cadets, I think I'd rather have the co-pilot give them a talk. I'd love to hear what that guy's honest thoughts are.

[SheriffPatGarrett]

"Struggle to lose height and speed before landing"
[youtube]https://youtu.be/wbH7jUL7o7k[/youtube]
What? Struggle? It was their first flight? The former dealer and shit smuggler alky "Captain" dumped all his fuel overboard by cross feeding all his fuel into a leaky tank instead of having BOTH engines burn fuel from the leaky side...doing this, they would have had plenty of fuel!
Also, on DC-8 freighters, at night, top of descent, YOU CHOP OFF ALL FOUR ENGINES...and if you touch them again, you pay the beer to the rest of the crew. ALL FLIGHTS ARE DEADSTICK LANDINGS! That is if the traffic control does not disturb your flight path. DC-8 has ten tanks and any fuel level going down faster than normal get sucked dry immediately by all four engines...and that's one thing you watch there ALL THE TIME!
And this cretin bust all his tires on landing...Quite the crews Air Transat is using...They cant land without busting all their tires!
And this imbecile is a hero in Canada...Is he a President of COPA yet?

[SheriffPatGarrett]

ScreenHunter_928 Jul. 25 23.15.jpg (48.92 KiB) Viewed 2731 times

Eight tires busted for no reason whatsoever! They were overspeed on final...Morons never heard of "S" turns?

How come these buffons still have their operating license?

[Gannet167]

I wont Monday morning QB the landing too much, I wasn't there and everyone survived. I do find it a little funny they couldn't have S turned, side slipped or whatever, but hey, at some level the gliding was a bit of a success.

BUT, like the glide to landing or not, it was PURE dumb luck that the track were so far south that day and even allowed this to occur. On any normal day that time of year, the Z tracks are far further north and they'd have never glided anywhere but the scene of the debris. It was a bit of a fluke that they were so far south and I'd credit the passengers' lives to Lady Luck more than I would to his "miraculous" landing.

[cncpc]

You can try and make it sound like it is if you're all butt hurt because he's a French Canadian

No one said anything about his linguistic background. I don't see how that's relevant. Why would it hurt anyone's butt?

Ask Sheriff Pat Garrett. His seems to be on fire.

[pelmet]

I wont Monday morning QB the landing too much, I wasn't there and everyone survived. I do find it a little funny they couldn't have S turned, side slipped or whatever, but hey, at some level the gliding was a bit of a success.

BUT, like the glide to landing or not, it was PURE dumb luck that the track were so far south that day and even allowed this to occur. On any normal day that time of year, the Z tracks are far further north and they'd have never glided anywhere but the scene of the debris. It was a bit of a fluke that they were so far south and I'd credit the passengers' lives to Lady Luck more than I would to his "miraculous" landing.

Classic example of a pilot using heroic measures to get himself out of a stupid situation caused by himself. Air Canada did the same with their 767.

There is a saying about what makes a superior pilot.

That being said, we have tried the glide in to land scenario in the sim. You do want to be somewhat high and fast until quite close to the airport. So for both crews after the engines shut down, I would have to say...good job. Especially as I suspect neither one had practiced this before(subject to confirmation).