[Closed] Air France Black Boxes & Liability Claims

Doh found [url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Convention#Damages ]this[/url] which explains it I think.

There could be claims from AF against Airbus, if the aircraft was at fault. If it was the pilots, then a reverse claim could happen. Damage to reputation etc

I was concerned from the passenger point of view, and can see from that wikipedia link that they automatically get 140kusd compensation fro loss of family member. Which ain't much, shame. So I can see that families may want to sue for more which I think they can.

families may want to sue for more

... because as everyone knows, money for exotic holidays and a bigger house makes the tragic loss of a family member all better again 🙄

... because as everyone knows, money for exotic holidays and a bigger house makes the tragic loss of a family member all better again

or maybe the person killed was the families main breadwinner and a mother and three kids are left destitute because of it?

Or even a mother and father are killed? And the grandparents are left with an awful responsibility?

There are countless scenarios where the death of one person leads to hardship and suffering that a decent bit of cash could alleviate.

140kusd would last my family about 3 years.

That's why people with responsibilities should get life insurance...

Indeed, but sometimes these things go wrong, anyway the life insurance companies often find ways to wriggle out of it. Are you saying that it's your own fault if you get killed in a plane?

Anyway it's laughable that I am even discussing this with either of you. I don't care what you think, luckily the courts in most countries see it in a different light than you do.

How many members of your family were on the plane then?

None, how many of yours were?

That's why people with responsibilities should get life insurance...

Daft perpetuation of the use of insurance to justify poor safety/proceedure too.

None, how many of yours were?

None. But I'm not the one having a strop over it.

Anyway it's laughable that I am even discussing this with either of you. I don't care what you think

Scotchegg I appreciate your advice, thanks. In future I'll not comment on things I am interested in for fear of tweaking your moral compass.

or maybe the person killed was ... etc etc

Yes, I know. But I can't be bothered typing considered and well-thought-out discussions on an interwebs forum.

Plus it always strikes me as an odd thing that in situations like this somebody somewhere's trying to put a cash value on it. Bit like comments regarding the NHS - we're always quoted the cost of treating this and that, how much ill people cost the country etc etc.

Peoples lives and wellbeing always seem to be reduced to a pie chart by the bean-counters.

Alright then, one more time

[i]Anyway it's laughable that I am even discussing this with either of you. I don't care what you think[/i]

And yet here you are again...

OK joao3v16 now you have made more sense to me, I think we are on the same page here. I agree re bean counters etc, how will any amount of money replace your loved ones? I must have misread your post because rolling eyes ( 🙄 )seemed to make some kind of moral judgement about peoples desire to claim more from the airlines in the event of the airline killing their relative.

I think we are actually on the same page. Did you know that optional safety features on aircraft are based on this value placed on life?

So if a safety issue feature reduces the chances of a fatal crash, then a comparism is made between the cost of installing the feature versus the chances of it happening and the number of lives likely to be lost.

So if it costs more to install/operate than what they predict they will have to pay in compensation, then they will not install it. TWA800 made this fact a bit more public.

[b]Scotchegg alright then one more time[/b]. Sod off, you small minded moron. If you cannot contribute in a sensible fashion then keep your beaky moronic brain out of it.

Oh well, if you're going to take the intellectual high road...

coffeeking - Member
That's why people with responsibilities should get life insurance...
Daft perpetuation of the use of insurance to justify poor safety/proceedure too.

As for aeroplane crashes then sure negligence comes into play in a lot of them but there's also a lot that come down to either a combination of factors that are near impossible to foresee or are freak accidents (multiple bird strikes etc.)

So if a safety issue feature reduces that chances of a fatal crash then a comparism is made between the cost of installing the feature versus the chances of it happening and the number of lives likely to be lost

Never heard such rubbish in my life. You obviously are not involved in aircraft development!

LHS if you read my post you will note I said I said "optional". And yes I am not involved in aircraft development, from your reaction I can see you are not either.

And yes I am not involved in aircraft development

Quite obviously, and yes I am involved in aircraft development thanks.

Please name me one "optional" safety feature which the Air Worthieness authorities state is not required on modern commercial aircraft.

If there is a one in a billion chance of a catastrophic event happening to an aircraft then it is designed out, believe me the authorities are not interested in cost benefit analyses!

May I slope across to the rail industry for a mo (without getting told off...?).

IIRC, advanced train protection has been considered and rejected on cost grounds in the UK a number of times. It was considered 'cheaper' to pay out for the few fatal accidents they have in that industry rather than paying £B's to avoid them at source.

Surely there must be some sort of cost/safety benefit analysis going on in aviation. It's a competetive market and I'm certain manufacturers build planes that meet regulatory minimums whilst being as £££ competitive as possible?

boblo. That's exactly my point I once read about this whilst trying to cure my fear of flying, it just made me worse. I'm trying to find the link so I can tell LHS off.. Or he could open his mind and enter the discussion..

EDIT on re reading what I said I think I may have insinuated that that the value paid in compensation is used for this cost benefit analysis, when in fact it is what is known as the value of a statistical life (or something like that) which is much much bigger than this 140kUSD, and its value is constantly being argued over.

LHS will probably say the regulatory minimums are sufficient to make flying as safe as it can reasonably be.....

LHS just google "aviation safety cost benefit analysis" it is everywhere.

I like this site which is quite obviously biased [url= http://www.iasa.com.au/folders/menu/index.htm ]but it is also pretty informative.[/url]

LHS will probably say the regulatory minimums are sufficient to make flying as safe as it can reasonably be.....

Far from it, and in many ways there is never a minimum when it comes to the Air Worthieness authority. Nothing is ever classed as "sufficient" when it comes to safety. The rail and airline industry are very different industries. I have good friends who work at Interfleet, network and Angel and we have good discussions on the vast difference in terms of train carriage safety. In the rail industry the safety emphasis is placed more on the system control of the network rather than the trains themselves.

I'm not going to google anything, I work closely with Boeing, Airbus, Bombardier and a range of military platform providers so know exactly what goes on in the industry rather than read some un-informed garbage of the web.

You were going to give me an example were you not?

Surely there must be some sort of cost/safety benefit analysis going on in aviation. It's a competetive market and I'm certain manufacturers build planes that meet regulatory minimums whilst being as £££ competitive as possible?

No.

Yes there is [url= http://tinyurl.com/3epe92n ]lmgtfy[/url]

If you present a design to the air worthiness body and they tell you to re-design or add safety features due to a potential safety issue, its not an option no matter what you think, you're component / plane will not fly unless you comply.

OK. So how does one manufacturer ensure it is more competitive than another if there are no 'minimums' to achieve? Every standard has a pass point or qualification point, that is normally considered the 'minimum' requirement. Companies doen't usually go to great lengths to over deliver against these as it costs them dearly.

I think you're probably referring to the constant evolution of standards in aviation as a lack of minimum. It is clear the industry goes to great lengths to investigate incidents to ensure nil repeats.

However, if there really are no commercial imperitives, why did the A380 that lost vital bits over Bhatam recently find it was unable to land and stop properly? Surely if cost were no object (not just monetry cost but weight, competitiveness etc) they would have had more than 1 redundant system which would have allowed continued control of the bits that wouldn't work after the parts of the primary and secondary hydraulic systems were taken out by escaping Rolls Royce parts.

I'm interested by the way, not trying to be argumentative.

<edit> Just seen the above response. So a design is created to satisfy the Air Worthiness bods. That design will be the minimum a company can submit and still pass. It won't be gold plated, copper bottomed surely (unless a client requires it) or the resultant product will be more expensive than its rivals. Surely standard market driven design in a regulated environment?

I'm not going to google anything, I work closely with Boeing, Airbus, Bombardier and a range of military platform providers so know exactly what goes on in the industry rather than read some un-informed garbage of the web.

Can you not see how ironic this above is when you then write this below.

You were going to give me an example were you not?

There are countless documents there backing up what I say. You won't look because you don't want to back down. It's only an internet discussion, I've been wrong countless times, but you cannot convince me that every safety feature is installed no matter what the cost, none of us would be able to afford to fly.

for example here is a paper that discusses the whole concept (as related to govt policy, not just air transport, but it discusses air transport). [url= http://polisci.osu.edu/faculty/jmueller/stewarr2.pdf ]clicky[/url]

However, if there really are no commercial imperitives, why did the A380 that lost vital bits over Bhatam recently find it was unable to land and stop properly?

Or you could look at it from the other side that through a robust safe and multiple redundant design, even with the loss of critical functionality due to a catastrophic engine failure the A380 was still able to land safely.

OK. So how does one manufacturer ensure it is more competitive than another if there are no 'minimums' to achieve? Every standard has a pass point or qualification point, that is normally considered the 'minimum' requirement. Companies doen't usually go to great lengths to over deliver against these as it costs them dearly.

There is always a minimum to acheive, this is layed down by the air-worthieness authority, this is usually a combination of worst case material condition, worse case tolerancing, worst case environmental conditions and a multiple factor of the life of the aircraft, anything from 1.5 to 8.

Yes aircraft safety, and reliability is constantly improving, like any engineering solution. And as technology increases so the regulations need to get firmer too. Now for example, if you have multliple control computers for redundancy, they can't be identical due to the potential for common mode failure, in fact the company responsible for the design has to design two different types of hardware, code 2 different types of software with different resources just to ensure the 1 in a billion worst case scenario can never be realised.

Companies doen't usually go to great lengths to over deliver against these as it costs them dearly.

A companies reputation is built on its ability to stay out of the press by providing a safe and reliable design. If a single component failure brings down an aircraft then not only are the employees up on manslaughter charges, the whole company will be reduced to rubble overnight.

There are countless documents there backing up what I say. You won't look because you don't want to back down

Had a quick look at the top few, nothing in there which states a policy where safety is compromised due to a cost decision, in fact a lot of the policy, certainly the EU side of things are aimed at improving safety by getting companies to spend more on upgrading existing fleet and systems.

LHS - Member

And yes I am not involved in aircraft development

Quite obviously, and yes I am involved in aircraft development thanks.

I thought you were involved with making helmets? Wide ranging brief?

I thought you were involved with making helmets? Wide ranging brief?

I am a boring old fart with my hands in many pies.

LHS, that's a long and interesting post and none of it I would disagree with (apart from the 1 in a billion because I don't believe that). Unfortunately none of it contradicts the position that air safety is based on a cost benefit analysis valuing a human life against the cos of installing and operating air safety features.

LHS this statement by you proves that what I say is true

certainly the EU side of things are aimed at improving safety by getting companies to spend more on upgrading existing fleet and systems.

How can safety be improved by persuading companies to spend more, if they already incorporate all safety features no matter what the cost?

By retrofitting existing fleet with modern safety features. An aircraft is designed for 25-30 year life and so any new technology which is developed for new platforms could in some instances be retrofitted.

737, 747, 757, A318, 319, 320 etc don't have a lot of safety features that modern designs like the A380, 787, CSeries etc are incorporating.

LHS - Member

There is always a minimum to acheive, this is layed down by the air-worthieness authority,

Thank you. that's all I was driving at. The standards are laid down by the Air Worthiness bods and the manufacturers have to meet these whilst developing products people wish to buy.

The reputational point is slightly spurious as there's no point providing the 'best' (i.e. 'safest' but most expensive) product if no one buys it and the company goes belly up... F1 is a good example of development at almost any cost in a regulated environment however, they don't have to worry about selling their wares just winning. This could not apply to products people buy.

As far as I've read, the A380 was short of a number of vital controls when it landed (ailerons, flaps, thrust reversers and they had to drown a runaway engine) and it landed almost at the end of the paved runway section in Singapore. This 'may' not have been the case if additional redundancy was built in, over and above what the Airworthiness brigade wanted but would have added weight, complexity and cost. These things could adversly affect Airbuses ability to flog it against Dreamliner etc (assuming it ever goes fully into production).

To assume any commercial industry is totally immune to the power of the market is possibly a little naive. Sorry.

To assume an commercial industry is totally immune to the power of the market is possibly a little naive. Sorry.

Apology accepted, you would know more if you worked in the industry.

LHS - Member
How can safety be improved by persuading companies to spend more, if they already incorporate all safety features no matter what the cost?
By retrofitting existing fleet with modern safety measures. An aircraft is designed for 25-30 year life and so any new technology which is developed for new platforms could in some instances be retrofitted.

737, 747, 757, A318, 319, 320 etc don't have a lot of safety features that modern designs like the A380, 787, CSeries etc are incorporating.

You only answered

how can safety be improved by persuading companies to spend more

if they already incorporate all safety features no matter what the cost?

OK. I'm not looking for an argument. I don't work in aviation but I do work in business's in regulated environments.

I know what people do to be competitive and I cannot believe the aviation industry is any more altruistic than any other industry.

I'll go back to my orginal statement, the assumption is that when met, the Airworthiness requirements make flying as safe as it 'can be' within a framework that can actually operate and be managed. If manufacturers do any more, they risk making themselves extinct which is a highly unlikely scenario.

I'll go back to my orginal statement, the assumption is that when met, the Airworthiness requirments make flying as safe as it 'can be' within a framework that can actually operate and be managed.

Bingo.

It still boils down to what a life is deemed to be worth, vs the cost of saving that life.

My point is that as joa3v16 said it is horrifying that a life is just a financial transaction.

The funny thing is that you are more likely to die of a heart attack in an airport than in a plane crash, and I can easily accept CBA in health care, but it scares me rigid with aeroplanes..

Bingo.

It still boils down to what a life is deemed to be worth, vs the cost of saving that life.

You need to learn how to play bingo.

Lets agree to disagree as I am not sure you would let yourself be convinced to the contrary.

Sorry LHS I cannot agree to disagree, I'm going to find the proof, I think it was your "I work in the airline industry so you don't know shit" attitude which erased any benevolence I had for you. 😆

I thought your

don't care what you think

Thanks, I have good reason to be arrogant, despite not working directly in the airline industry I am bloody clever. 😆

Is, "I work in the airline industry and know more than you" somewhat arrogant? I don't mind if it's arrogance. I like arrogance. I don't like ignorance.

LHS - its very simple - are all possible safety features installed on aeroplanes regardless of cost of developing and installing them?

Or only the features the regulators deem essential?

Or something inbetween?

I think you (LHS) are taking the debate personally and from my perspective there is no need. We all have parameters we work within and they compromise our lofty ideals. I'm not suggesting your are somehow remiss in not going above and beyond the requirements you work within or are responsible for the cost/benefit trade off.

Ii is very likely, we have very little individual influence over the requirements set out by the Airworthiness bods and we have to assume, they are doing what is required on our behalf.

However, to assume the industry meets those requirements and goes beyond them for anything other than bottom line is really not very likely.

LHS - its very simple - are all possible safety features installed on aeroplanes regardless of cost of developing and installing them?

On new aircraft designs, yes all necessary safety features are intalled.

Thats not what I asked - all [i][b]possible[/b][/i] not all necessary - necessary means that someone made a value judgement

Or do we take it that toys is correct? Not all[i] possible[/i] are installed only those deemed [i]necessary[/i]

Not all possible are installed only those deemed necessary

Damn, he distil's me down to one line.

That is exactly it, necessary yes - a value judgement is made about what is necessary, other safety systems could be installed but if they don't meet the value judgement then they are not in.

Only those deemed neccesary by the Airworthyness bods who are a Govt dept? Presumably if they came up with a whacky new idea that all Brit registered/manufactured (OK, part manufactured) aircraft needed something that would make them uncompetitive, would they be subject to lobbying/political pressure?

You can't install all possible safety features into one aircraft as there would be contradicting performance, duplicated features or not enough space to house it all.

All necessary features means that all bases are covered, there is no design element where a failure would lead to a catastrophic event.

a value judgement is made about what is necessary

no, a safety judgement is made

The air worthieness authourity is that for where the aircraft is manufactured, so inventing some whacky new laws would not be in there interest.

But isn't airworthiness administered by the CAA - a quango? My point was their output may be influenced by elements that are not neccesarily in line with the best engineering solutions...

I'm pretty clear that business builds planes (that it can sell) to quango safety requirements. Quango's are open to influence from all sorts of external forces, many with 'interests' in how competitive the industry is.

Nothing is as simple as a pure engineering solution.....

You have CAA, FAA, TC, ANAC..... so no, they are independent.

If you look at the board of the CAA you will quite a few political appointments [url= http://www.caa.co.uk/default.aspx?catid=286&pagetype=90&pageid=796 ]clicky[/url]

Yep, there some very talented people who work around the world.

All necessary features means that all bases are covered, there is no design element where a failure would lead to a catastrophic event.

Since planes still fall out of the sky occasionally then it implies that for some reason (cost perchance?) A potential, non necessary but desirable feature has been omitted, no?

Since planes still fall out of the sky occasionally then it implies that for some reason(cost perchance?) A potential, non necessary but desirable feature has been omitted, no?

Really? Do you have an example? Must have missed all those catastrophic design failures and all the planes falling out of the sky!

How many aircraft are in the sky at any given time during the day? 20,000? How many flights are there each day around the world? 50,000?

How many accidents are there each day due to a safety feature on a plane?

It is often as a result of a series of unforseen events coming together in an unexpected/unprecedented way causing an, errrm, problem. I think they liken it to the holes in swiss cheese all lining up.

twa 800 was caused by chafing of wire that was routed through a fuel tank, it caused a spark, there was spark suppression system available but it was, at the time too expensive to install versus the likelyhood of it happening. ( I think it was nitrogen inerting)

There are many other examples.

I know it's military but Nimrod is a very good example. One exploded killing all on board even though they were aware of leaking fuel and had decided against fire suppression systems as used by the Septics (on cost grounds).

twa 800 was caused by chafing of wire that was routed through a fuel tank, it caused a spark, there was spark suppression system available but it was, at the time too expensive to install versus the likelyhood of it happening

Is one hypothesis. I believe the official conclusion to the investigation was:

An] explosion of the center wing fuel tank (CWT), resulting from ignition of the inflammable fuel/air mixture in the tank. The source of ignition energy for the explosion could not be determined with certainty. Theories range from a missile, bomb or short circuit.

The benefit is that there was a lot of research done into nitrogen inerting systems and revised lightning protection systems which were then incorporated into new aircraft designs.

I know it's military

Yes, its military, very different.

In 2009 Boeing advised the FAA that its new 787 Dreamliner could not meet the new safety standards. The FAA proposed to relax the safeguards for preventing sparks inside the fuel tank, calling them "impractical."

[url= http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/boeingaerospace/2008719843_lightning08.html?syndication=rss ]clicky[/url]

Why was this impractical? COST, otherwise it would be called impossible not impractical.

The NTSB investigation ended with the adoption of its final report on August 23, 2000. In it the Board determined that the probable cause of the TWA 800 accident was:
[An] explosion of the center wing fuel tank (CWT), resulting from ignition of the inflammable fuel/air mixture in the tank. The source of ignition energy for the explosion could not be determined with certainty, but, of the sources evaluated by the investigation, the most likely was a short circuit outside of the CWT that allowed excessive voltage to enter it through electrical wiring associated with the fuel quantity indication system.

In addition to the probable cause, the NTSB found the following contributing factors to the accident:
The design and certification concept that fuel tank explosions could be prevented solely by precluding all ignition sources
The certification of the Boeing 747 with heat sources located beneath the CWT with no means to reduce the heat transferred into the CWT or to render the fuel tank vapor non-combustible.

LHS that is the most blatant case of selective quoting I have ever seen, the complete quote is above. Can any cause be completely proven? No. To use your phraseology, If you you had much experience in engineering or science you would know of a thing called occams razor.

Why was this impractical? COST, otherwise it would be called impossible not impractical.

Improved technology of the lighting protection within fuel pipes (this is improved even further now with the introduction of CFRP fuel pipes), and on 787 they introduced a very expensive inerting system to their fuel tanks based on advice. This would have added a huge amount of cost to the design and weight which would have to be mitigated elsewhere, so no, cost would not have come into it.

toys, you seem to be getting quite angry so I think as per my previous post we should agree to disagree on this.

The Ford Pinto Case was perhaps the most notorious instance when a manufactuer calculated the value of loss of life and determined that it was more cost effective to pay for loss of lives rather than implement additional safety measures.
http://www.wfu.edu/~palmitar/Law&Valuation/Papers/1999/Leggett-pinto.html

This would have added a huge amount of cost to the design and weight which would have to be mitigated elsewhere, so no, cost would not have come into it.

Umm you said huge cost, and weight. Weight in the airline industry (you would know if you worked in the airline industry) always ends up with cost, more fuel essentially.

with the twa800 (iirc) the issue was actually the weight of the current suppression system proposed, it added too much cost to flying the plane, in extra fuel and reduced passenger capacity.

toys, you seem to be getting quite angry so I think as per my previous post we should agree to disagree on this

Don't be silly this isn't anger, how can you tell from my typing? No no I am enjoying this. Please don't back out now we are so close to you admitting you are wrong.

Umm you said huge cost, and weight in the airline industry (you would know if you worked in the airline industry) always ends up with cost, more fuel essentially.

This doesn't make sense.

Please don't back out now we are so close to you admitting you are wrong.

Ah, very good, nice try but I won't rise.

Out of probably 50,000 flights each day for arguments sake the last 20 years (how many hundred million flights is that?) you have quoted one incident which had no firm conclusion as to the cause of failure and certainly NO evidence of cost being put before safety.

You said you were clever?

I think you misunderstand me, saying 1 out of 365million flights doesn't matter, I'm not trying to say planes are not safe. I'm just pointing out the widely recognised fact that human lives are measured in cost by the airline industry (and pretty much all industry).

Surely the introduction of ejection seats for all passengers would lead to an increase in passenger survival in certain circumstances? The cost, complexity and reduction in payload would of course be immense, but if the industry was doing all it could to ensure passenger safety.....

A slightly ludicrous and extreme example, but proof that the industry is subject to cba's. 🙂

indeed, or parachutes for everyone..

LHS find me an NTSB report that does not end with "The board finds that the PROBABLE cause was...."

Only 4% of aircraft accidents occur during cruise, so seems a bit pointless spending significant time and money addressing this before tackling other areas - CFIT etc.

The modern Airbus is an intrinsically safe aeroplane through the nature of the fly-by-wire. Modern technology builds on this with EGPWS, better weather radar, PRNAV approaches, and systems such as Honeywell's SmartRunway and EADS' own Brake to Vacate.

Ultimately no amount of technology can protect against poor training, bad judgement, fatigue, and lack of cooperation between the crew, and consequently accidents will continue.

Most new pilots on the A320, for example, have less than 200 hours total time and just 6 landings outside the simulator before carrying passengers - this in itself is not unsafe (it's been like this for many years) but is a factor.

I think the debate is/was about whether the costs of additional safety/functionality is considered during aircraft design (once mandatory minimums are achieved). Obviously this may be extended to crew training which is what the above point is about. Obviously crews could fly with more hours/cycles etc but that costs more....

My personal opinion is that the investment should be made in crew training, instead of adding redundant redundancy at the design stage. You can't really make aeroplanes any safer than they already are with current technology.

The whole keep-a-dog-in-the-cockpit idea is nice in principle, but us 'uman beans can still outfly the computer in most situations, and the autopilot on the Airbus does its best to kill you on a fairly regular basis.