SW Airlines catastrophic in-flight engine failure

the landing

"Normally a 737 on final approach would deploy its wing flaps to their full extent, to reduce landing speed to around 140 mph. But Captain Shults’ skills and experience forewarned her that an airplane flying that slowly with its flaps fully extended and with asymmetrical power could become fatally unstable in the final stage of the landing, so she used a minimal flap setting to maintain a higher speed and stability—taking the risk that the landing gear and particularly the tires could survive a higher speed impact...Captain Shults faced another problem with the speed of the landing: She could not deploy the airplane’s engine thrust reversers to help brake the speed after touchdown because of the damage to her left engine." Daily Beast linked above.
 
interesting discussion

Trebuchet said:
Here's a video by a 737 pilot discussing the incident.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzkfYj6SBxo
Click to expand...
Both the link and your comments are helpful. Thank you. The person doing the video (Mentour Pilot) made the point that one doesn't ordinarily train for two things at once. Also there was an indication of fire, which was probably in error. So the crew might have had to decide to disregard the fire warning.
 
Last edited:
One of the things I spent quite a lot of time on at Boeing was separation of systems so that an uncontained engine couldn't take out enough to bring down an airplane. I believe we had to design for a fan blade or 1/3 of a turbine or compressor disk. I've actually seen photos of a 767 with 1/3 of a disk protruding from the fuselage -- on its way out, having passed through from the other side. There's a LOT of energy there.
 
"Normally a 737 on final approach would deploy its wing flaps to their full extent, to reduce landing speed to around 140 mph. But Captain Shults’ skills and experience forewarned her that an airplane flying that slowly with its flaps fully extended and with asymmetrical power could become fatally unstable in the final stage of the landing, so she used a minimal flap setting to maintain a higher speed and stability—taking the risk that the landing gear and particularly the tires could survive a higher speed impact...Captain Shults faced another problem with the speed of the landing: She could not deploy the airplane’s engine thrust reversers to help brake the speed after touchdown because of the damage to her left engine."
Click to expand...
:thumbsup: Respectfully, that took some balls of steel.
 
On the track of 'why people can often sound eerily calm in high stress.' That's a mark of good, rigorous training. In that situation, your mind is focused on the process you've drilled in rather than generating verbiage to go on and on about, concentrating on inflection and intensity of speech to indicate the priority nature, etc. So you end up with a very 'flat' delivery that reads as remarkably under control.

In that context, knowing you are part of a system where other people have also trained for their tasks in those situations, you just deliver a few technical points and some key words you know will get the ball rolling on the other end.

Cockpit recordings, on the other hand, can be quite excited and rambunctious, even in cases where the ATC comms sound cool and collected.

This is where the tapatalk signature that annoys people used to be
 
Some comments from Sullenberger

"The plane landed at a higher speed than usual because the pilots were concerned they might not be able to control the plane, according to Sumwalt. The plane landed at about 190 mph rather than about 155 mph, he said. “The higher speed is because they landed with a lesser flap setting than typical,” Sumwalt said. Sullenberger called the higher speed a shrewd choice because doing a controllability check testing whether damage to the wing and fuselage had diminished their controls at a higher altitude would have taken longer to land." USA Today
 
More details:
A passenger who was onboard Southwest Airlines flight 1380 Tuesday emotionally described Thursday how he and others tried to save the woman who died when she was sucked outside the plane when one of its engines exploded in midair.

Jennifer Riordan, a 43-year-old bank executive and mother of two from Albuquerque, was seated in row 14 when she was sucked through a 10-by-14-inch window that had been broken by pieces of the disintegrating engine, two familiar with the investigation said.
Click to expand...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/loca...976a82b05a2_story.html?utm_term=.f4b5db48117c familiar with the investigation said.
 
Last edited:
Skeptic Ginger said:
:rolleyes:
And maybe her years as a fighter pilot?

Have you looked at that pilot's resume? Not to mention she would have been aware of the decompression fairly soon as she took action for that.


Look, professionals like pilots and the team in the ICU or ED are trained to stay calm, you practice, you make yourself not get excited. That's what you do.
Click to expand...

I am an airplane nut.

I love airplanes and pilots.

She did her job well.

I think when we hear her story of the events, we will learn a lot.
 
Chris_Halkides said:
Would someone care to comment on whether the flying skills needed were routine or exceptional?
Click to expand...

As someone else has said the Captain had been highly trained for each of the problems experienced. However, not the combination of single-engine, probable wing/airframe damage and loss of pressurization combined. The training in the simulator attempts to overwhelm the crew, which acclimates them to intense pressure with various combinations of critical emergencies. I doubt this specific combination had been practiced, however, thinking under pressure was undoubtedly experienced and that's what counts.

No exceptional flying skill as that was not particularly needed, none the less they planned and executed proper procedures and correct actions under intense pressure, which is to be commended.

The flying skill needed to fly a fighter, particularly as an instructor requires more skill than an airliner under most circumstances.

The crew performed admirably, which is why they get paid big $$....
 
LTC8K6 said:
I am an airplane nut.

I love airplanes and pilots.

She did her job well.

I think when we hear her story of the events, we will learn a lot.
Click to expand...
Great. So why the hell did you say this?
I would guess that much of her calmness, at least in the recordings I have heard, is related to believing that she just has an engine out.
Click to expand...

Because it wasn't true, she was calm throughout the event, and which sounded like you were saying she was calm because she thought nothing was seriously wrong.

Maybe you didn't mean it to, but it came out incredibly dismissive of the pilot's talent, which some might justifiably question as sexist.
 
a_unique_person said:
This is one scenario they practice all the time. She did exactly what she was trained to do.
Click to expand...

I believe it's more complicated than that. There were at least 2 scenarios here (loss of engine, cabin depressurisation), with a potential 3rd (fire), each of which they train for individually, but which they aren't trained to handle at the same time.
 
LTC8K6 said:
Yes, but that occurs long into the recording. For most of the recording, she only reports that they are "single engine", and even adds "that's it" at one point, meaning that's the only problem.
Click to expand...

"We have part of the aircraft missing" comes at only a minute and a half into the recording I posted, which certainly isn't the beginning of the incident but seems to be the beginning of her conversation with the TRACON.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Great. So why the hell did you say this?

Because it wasn't true, she was calm throughout the event, and which sounded like you were saying she was calm because she thought nothing was seriously wrong.

Maybe you didn't mean it to, but it came out incredibly dismissive of the pilot's talent, which some might justifiably question as sexist.
Click to expand...

She reported in an entirely calm, controlled voice that she understood that some portion of her plane was missing and a person had been pulled out.

It reminded me: one time I saw a transformer fire on a railway gantry. I called it in but was struck by my sudden inability to control my voice, which was shaking as if I was in a complete panic. I mean yeah, it was kinda serious, but nobody was hurt.

So, yes, two thumbs up for steely professionalism.
 
MikeG said:
I believe it's more complicated than that. There were at least 2 scenarios here (loss of engine, cabin depressurisation), with a potential 3rd (fire), each of which they train for individually, but which they aren't trained to handle at the same time.
Click to expand...

The potential fire is mostly irrelevant. The engine would be shutdown anyway regardless if there were fire indications or not. That's a benign procedure. A fire either goes out or not.

The most critical problem was the sudden loss of the engine and the recovery. Again, it did not require super human skill and they had been trained for that. The depressurization problem combined with the engine thrust loss were not contradictory problems. One doesn't affect the other significantly. Once they recovered from the engine thrust loss, the rapid descent for decompression issue should have been no problem. However, remaining calm and following correct procedures is not for the faint of heart. Knowing there's a potential significant in the passenger cabin adds to the intensity of the situation.

They did a fine job and should be commended for their actions under intense pressure as they were expected to do.
 
I found this statement from pilot to tower to be misinformed and curious...

"They said there's a hole and uh... someone went out."

It's misleading to say that a blown out window is a hole. That's because a blown or broken window would be specifically described as that.

It's misleading to say that someone went out because that conveys the idea that they were completely separated from the plane and fell to their death. It doesn't describe a person hanging out or one that was pulled back in.

I wonder if she was given inaccurate information from the crew or if she herself mucked up the info.
 
Also, the media is reporting several different versions of this quote and I wonder which one is exactly what she said.

"They said there's a hole and uh... someone went out."

Some versions don't have the "they said" part.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom