Joining in the tinfoil hattery.
How do you think the CVR got turned back on after the engines were shut down after landing? Do you think the aircraft is haunted and a supernatural creature turned it on again or do you think it's more likely that a human being did it deliberately to destroy the pilots' discussions? If the pilots discussed the fault pre-takeoff (which surely they must have give that it was a documented fault), then the CVR contained evidence that they approved a flight on an aircraft with a fault that later turned out to be an extreme risk. That recording would almost certainly be used in court by passengers suing the airline. It's extremely suspicious that someone with access to the aircraft turned the CVR back on after the aircraft had been shut down, I cannot see how that would have happened by accident. Maybe a commercial pilot can explain that.
The Teamster's Union's opposition to CVRs is on the record. They oppose using them at all and the reason that U.S. aircraft only record for 2 hours is due to union opposition. The union is protecting its members from attempts to prosecute in cases like this where there is a plausible case of negligence. Yes, the fault was caused by Boeing but the airline and the pilots approved using the aircraft despite knowing there was a problem. A lawsuit against the airline and pilots is guaranteed in the U.S. Destroying that recording was in the best interests of the pilots and the airline.
I wouldn’t have much confidence in anything from the teamsters.
Yet they get to veto a safety issue like extended CVR recording time.
More loose bolts found in United Airlines 737’s:
https://www.npr.org/2024/01/08/1223517098/door-plug-boeing-737-max-portland-ntsb-faa
Yawn.
You are not...a pilot, an air safety expert, an air traffic accident investigator; not an expert in any form of travel and/or transport safety.
Taking that into account, why would anyone attach any credence or credibility to your views about an incident which you are completely unqualified to comment on?
It's like a dog barking at the moon.
As for the teamsters having a veto, that's nothing other than a perception of their (historic) relevance; they are irrelevant.
When the forum's experts - the pilots who fly passenger planes for a living - comment I may have more to say; until then, I'll leave you to your unfounded speculation.
You may be aware of the 4 Fs - First Find the **** Facts.
Facts, not speculation.
CZ - see page 2 above.
I doubt United will be the only ones.
First Find the **** Facts.
The facts are that somehow the CVR was left running and the data was overwritten. We've already had a commercial pilot on here say that the CVR on modern planes turns off automatically when the engines are shut down (which seems commonsensical). Those are facts.
So, taking those facts, either the pilots didn't shut down the engines and the CVR kept running too (which seems unlikely, but if a pilot assures me that it's normal to leave the engines running for hours after landing, I'll take their word for it), the pilots did shut down the engines but somehow bypassed the automatic shutoff of the CVR (which sounds unlikely to me), or someone turned the CVR back on after it had shut down (which seems the most likely due to the other possibilities being very unlikely).
Another fact is that U.S. airline pilots are opposed to CVR data being available for prosecution of pilots. In a case like this, it is in the interest of the pilots and the airline that CVR data not be recovered. So, somehow a recorder that should have automatically turned off and saved the data either kept running or was turned back on again by someone with access to the flight deck. I'm guessing it wasn't a poltergeist.
Another question for the real pilots. In the event of a depressurization do you wait for ATC clearance or just get after it?
Listening to the radio calls it sounds like permission (which I get from a not flying into other planes perspective) but at the same time seems like one of those times to get after it?
Also - do you not "squawk" emergency? Seems strange that every communication keeps checking it's an emergency.
I'm pretty sure no pilot gets into a plane where they are even remotely worried about the airworthiness..... Just not a conversation I can imagine professionals having.
Do you think that a poltergeist turned the CVR back on?
We’ve already had a commercial pilot on here say that the CVR on modern planes turns off automatically when the engines are shut down (which seems commonsensical). Those are facts.
They said more modern aircraft. Not all modern aircraft.
And given the 737 dates back to the 60s, it's not really a modern aircraft. It really wouldn't surprise me if simply turned on with the master power.
And going by discussions on a forum frequented by far many more pilots, none of them seem to know how to actually turn it off.
IANAE, but note that actual pilots have already commented.
I'm not sure why non experts are so confident that the CVR operates in line with the engines running, if that's the case why didn't the pilots discuss their 'illegal' flight plans prior to starting the engines? seems a bit dumb not to?
Is it not more likely that if the CVR is operating automatically it runs when the aircraft is energised, so if it is running from an APU it would continue to operate which is most likely the case here, as the circuit breaker wasn't pulled to stop it. Engines running or not is possibly an irrelevance.
Again, IANAE. but the conspiracy theory stuff here is lame.
That model of the 737 is quite modern. All the avionics have been updated (hence the auto-crash feature.)
And going by discussions on a forum frequented by far many more pilots, none of them seem to know how to actually turn it off.
You aren't understanding what happened with the CVR. The pilots did not turn it off, it was left on after the plane landed and the data was overwritten. If you just leave it running, it starts to overwrite the data after two hours. The data was erased because it was left running, not because someone disabled it.
If, as stated earlier, it turns off automatically when the aircraft is shut down, that means that someone turned it back on after it had been shut down automatically. It doesn't matter whether pilots know how to disable it, it wasn't disabled, the problem was that somebody turned it on when it should not have been turned on.
Who do you think turned it on, a poltergeist or a human?
CountZeroFull Member<br />More loose bolts found in United Airlines 737’s:
surely this means that all Boeing planes are going to be grounded, if at oeast 5 737 Max9s have loose or missing bolts it means other models will have too
Accident was at night wasn't it? Maybe it's as stupid as the APU was kept on after the landing to keep the lights on inside the aircraft. Doesn't have to be a malicious act as all the assumptions seem to be.
I haven’t seen any preliminary accident reports yet, so nothing I’m saying is based on official information.
When it landed, this aircraft was quite capable of moving under its own power, safely. If it was me, I would probably have taxied to the terminal to offload passengers via the jet bridge - far safer than evacuating by the slides, which will hurt someone.
When we park, ground electrical services get plugged in, and the aircraft stays powered. They rarely actually get turned off. The pilots first priority would’ve been safely getting the passengers off, then there would have been an avalanche of emergency services, managers, engineers, etc.
If, as stated, the CVR was overwritten due to the aircraft remaining powered, that is completely plausible and normal. The CVR is there to help work out what happened in disasters, not to trap every conversation on every minor issue.
@kimbers I assume whatever of that model type have the plug option will need to be checked
As for existing faults on that window, once again that is entirely possible to have happened legally and completely within the rules. We carry snags every day, including door sensors. There will be a procedure in place. The ide@ that the pilots were hatching some Machiavellian plot to illegally fly a dangerous aircraft likely to kill them both is a little far fetched and not understanding of how these things work.
or maybe because a big hole had appeared in the plane at 5000 metres in the air, normal procedure just wasn't followed; adrenaline, fear and soiled underwear can disrupt your routine
To be fair @Trekex8 it appears to be a one man obsession. Or it could be the poltergeist
The ide@ that the pilots were hatching some Machiavellian plot to illegally fly a dangerous aircraft likely to kill them both is a little far fetched and not understanding of how these things work.
Nobody said that. In the U.S., it's very easy to get sued and there will be lawyers all over this looking to file against anyone involved in the chain of decisions that lead to the incident. Even if the pilots did nothing wrong (which seems very likely to me), they can be bankrupted by the legal fees associated with a lawsuit. Their union knows this and that's a large part of the reason they oppose the use of CVR data in court. Even if they did absolutely nothing wrong, a recording of them discussing the fault pre-flight or ignoring a warning light after takeoff is probably all that lawyers need to launch a class-action lawsuit against them. "Forgetting" to turn the CVR after a serious incident is an easy way to reduce your chances of being bankrupted with legal fees while giving you plausible deniability. Pilots aren't stupid, their union has explained to them how damaging CVR data is and why it's essential to try to keep it out of evidence.
The airline will absolutely, definitely be getting sued over this. It's hard to explain to a jury of ordinary people why you kept an aircraft in service despite a known flaw and then that flaw turned out to be a door that blew off in flight. The airline will settle out of court, they will look ridiculous if they try to fight it in court. Not having the CVR data available makes their lawyers' jobs just that little bit easier. Very convenient for them.
Not sure why there’s an obsession with the CVR and trying to hang the crew?
I'm not trying to hang the crew, I'm saying that it's suspicious that the CVR data was overwritten. I think the crew probably did nothing wrong but, even if you did nothing wrong, it makes life much easier for the crew and the airline if that data is lost. If it's this easy to lose CVR data then the system needs to be improved to make sure it's not lost so easily, that hasn't happened because the pilots' union does not want CVR data available at all.
Yesterday we had pilots saying it was impossible for the crew to have deleted the data. Today we are hearing that it's really easy to delete the data by mistake. Which is it, impossible or trivial?
Also, running of the CVR has no bearing on that of the flight data recorder.
Did anybody say it was? Don't make things up.
Why would anyone want to trawl a CVR for a technical issue? They're there for accident investigation purposes. Techies pull from QARs which are pure digital objects in the cockpit / avionics bays & keep data for days, if not weeks. More like a car ECU's diagnostic log. The previous incidents will be in the QARs, checked out by ground technicians and entered in the technical log. Nobody in the flight crew will want to hide anything - it's not meant to be a blame culture.
This was quite an interesting thread until the tinfoil conspiracy shite.
There are at least 3 fully qualified actual real-life airline pilots - with experience on that type of aircraft - commenting on this thread.
But no, better to go with the random conspiracy crap and just dismiss any of the actual real expertise as someone who is probably In On It.
🙄
Nobody said that. In the U.S., it’s very easy to get sued and there will be lawyers all over this looking to file against anyone involved in the chain of decisions that lead to the incident. Even if the pilots did nothing wrong (which seems very likely to me), they can be bankrupted by the legal fees associated with a lawsuit.
1. There’s no point on suing people who will be bankrupted by legal fees.
2. Do US unions not cover legal fees? I thought that was one of the selling points of a union?
Even if they did absolutely nothing wrong, a recording of them discussing the fault pre-flight or ignoring a warning light after takeoff is probably all that lawyers need to launch a class-action lawsuit against them.
but you’d likely get far more money by suing the airline; although I think even if the airline is shown to be at fault since nobody received significant physical harm there’s probably not that strong a case. Obviously in the US a strong case and significant harm are optional but I’m not imagining is being that compelling a case for 177 small compensation claims - which would likely be settled long before a court room.
“Forgetting” to turn the CVR after a serious incident is an easy way to reduce your chances of being bankrupted with legal fees while giving you plausible deniability. Pilots aren’t stupid, their union has explained to them how damaging CVR data is and why it’s essential to try to keep it out of evidence.
pilots work with extensive checklists to help them slide Al with unusual situations. Not following the checklist is the sort of thing that gets you in bother. It’s possible they followed the checklist but the checklist has a missing - if the aircraft has been involved in a significant incident but parks normally - follow page X immediately.
The airline will absolutely, definitely be getting sued over this. It’s hard to explain to a jury of ordinary people why you kept an aircraft in service despite a known flaw and then that flaw turned out to be a door that blew off in flight. The airline will settle out of court, they will look ridiculous if they try to fight it in court. Not having the CVR data available makes their lawyers’ jobs just that little bit easier. Very convenient for them.
but your logic is that someone, a pilot, an aircraft engineer, etc intentionally left the recorder running to protect the airline, from a conversation that may or may not have taken place, which may or may not have been harmful to a jury’s perception in a case that will almost certainly not go to court never mind a jury? FWIW I don’t think Alaska would look ridiculous if they went to court - they’d bring in experts who would assure the jury that fault warnings happen all the time and there were no actual symptoms of a fault so it seems like a false alarm and never has any aircraft had this failure so it was not a forseable warning… they will either bring Boeing, as the engineering experts on the hardware, to say they did everything right, or they will cross sue Boeing for the fault.
The pilots lives were endangered by the issue, which if there is a design or maintenance fault the Union will see as a priority. Evidence that the aircraft survived because of the pilots not inspite of the them is actually good for the Union. Lots of people were getting on and off that aircraft to inspect / take pictures etc - the most plausible explanation is that the complete shutdown was not performed immediately because of that.
Nobody in the flight crew will want to hide anything – it’s not meant to be a blame culture.
In the U.S., it is a blame culture. You can face lawsuits even if you didn't do anything wrong. When things go wrong, the company's lawyers blame the workers. The union lawyers blame the company. The reason that the CVR limit in the U.S. is only two hours is because the pilots' union oppose the use of CVRs full-stop and will not agree to extending the duration of the recordings (this is their official policy that they publicly state). So, what we have is a situation where CVR recordings will be lost after two hours, so pilots who follow standard operating procedures and keep the aircraft systems running after landing will automatically erase those recordings.
Yesterday people were jumping up and down about it being impossible for pilots to erase the recordings. Now it turns out that the pilots' union and airlines have insisted on standard operating procedures that ensure those recordings are erased. And they oppose the really simple remedy used in other countries of just extending the duration of the recordings so they aren't immediately lost. And, they publicly state that this policy is because they don't want the recordings used in court. There's no conspiracy theory there, just the publicly stated policies of the pilots' union responding to a blame culture.
your logic is that someone, a pilot, an aircraft engineer, etc intentionally left the recorder running to protect the airline, from a conversation that may or may not have taken place, which may or may not have been harmful to a jury’s perception in a case that will almost certainly not go to court never mind a jury?
Based on a comment from a forum member who I think is a commercial pilot that the CVRs in modern aircraft automatically turn off when the engines are shut down. It seems that that comment was misleading. If that comment was correct, then someone would have had to have restarted the recorders. Now we have other people contradicting that pilot and saying the the recorders will keep running if the aircraft is connected to external power even if the engines are shut down.
This is the policy of the Teamster's Union who represent some pilots in the U.S. They don't want their members facing lawsuits, including from the airlines.
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, representing Atlas Air pilots, makes clear why they’re objecting to 25 hour cockpit voice recordings.
They claim that pilots have an expectation of privacy in the cockpit.
They believe that pilots ‘wouldn’t have agreed’ to any recording in the first place (as though it was their decision right) had they known these recordings would ever be made public.
Pilots might break airline rules, and voice recording would help prove their guilt
In a criminal matter, the FBI isn’t restricted in how it can use recording (umm… good?)
I think it's worth remembering that the US is a really really ****ed up place:
https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/deepwater-horizon-prosecution/
I can see some parallels between airline pilots and drilling supervisors. On paper they are the ones in charge but ultimately they are subject to the whims of upper management. If they exercise any judgment that would result in loss of earnings for the company it would be career suicide.
That doesn't stop management then trying to hold them 100% accountable if anything goes wrong.
I have no idea if that is the case here but I would expect people in the US to have a very much more paranoid outlook than those employed in Europe.
Too easy to become a Google expert though isn't it? Looking for 'fault' and either implying or explicitly apportioning blame and malfeasance. It's the very reason why good safety cultures are so hard to maintain.
Anyway, I'm off to the Ukraine thread for more defence hot takes from our resident OSINT experts...
NTSB briefing last night was really good. They exude professionalism, openness, humility and are clearly a close-knit team.
Key takeaway is that the door transited upwards releasing the locks, the guide tracks fractured (after it moved upwards), the bolts preventing it moving upwards have not been found.
Now we have other people contradicting that pilot and saying the the recorders will keep running if the aircraft is connected to external power even if the engines are shut down.
the NTSB implied it was an engineer (not the pilot)’s job to shutdown and preserve the recorder, they don’t seem to suggest that they were surprised it was not done as quickly as you expected. I am sure you will now suggest that Alaska specifically delayed the engineer.
I suspect the pilots Union is more worried about the recording getting used in sexual harassment and other “non safety” related matters than a pilot being personally sued for safely landing a plane after a mechanical fault.
Thols - Boeing/airbus big/small, new/old FAA/EASA - there is no industry standard for CVRs and how/when they record. <br /><br />
Im afraid you are also way off with regard to the legality of what/when can be done with faults.
You aren’t understanding what happened with the CVR.
I understand exactly what happened with the CVR. It's on a continuous 2 hour recording loop, and it never got turned off.
However you seem hell bent on saying that the pilots (or 'others') deliberately left it on, and mis-reading/understanding posts that say the pilots likely have no idea how they'd turn the CVR on/off. It's an item that they check is working, but don't actually know how to control, as they have no need to control it.
Would you be so hung up on the CVR if the flight landed 2h1m after take off, so nothing recorded pre-take off was till present?
Or would you then be claiming the pilots deliberately kept flying just long enough to have those conversations deleted?
Yesterday people were jumping up and down about it being impossible for pilots to erase the recordings.
Who said that? I just had a quick skim through to see and all I could find were pilots saying you can't disable it and / or have no idea how you would re-start it to deliberately overwrite it.
In the absence of any other information like does the APU count as an engine in the statement " aircraft pause the CVR after engine shutdown automatically." then the more likely scenario seems that they parked somewhere unusual, didn't get connected to shore power, and left the APU running to keep the lights on whilst evacuating and the plane was busy with people.
And surely actively doing something that would be difficult to pass off as a mistake to overwrite the data would be some sort of gross negligence and sackable?
Who said that?
Flaperon
Full Member
More modern aircraft pause the CVR after engine shutdown automatically.
It would make sense that different models of aircraft and manufacturers would do things differently.
However, what is notable is that in the U.S., the CVR data is going to be automatically deleted unless the aircraft systems are shut down fairly promptly after landing. In this case, the airline knew that there was some kind of fault with the aircraft and decided to not fly it over water. Surely the pilots had been informed and must have agreed that the aircraft was safe to fly. It's possible that the cabin pressure warning light came on after takeoff but that the crew decided to ignore it based on the earlier incidents that did not seem serious enough to ground the aircraft. That chain of decisions could have had fatal consequences so hearing what the pilots discussed preflight and after takeoff contributes to understanding why the decision was made to keep operating the aircraft. Sure, the physical evidence is more important but understanding why the crew made the decisions they did is also important. Having a CVR system that automatically deletes the data before there is time to recover it is ridiculous (seriously, what an utterly bizarre system), but it is there because the pilots' union do not want that data recorded in the first place. (That's their officially stated policy.)
I’m not trying to hang the crew, I’m saying that it’s suspicious that the CVR data was overwritten.
It really isn't.
Thols - watch that ntsb video someone posted a little earlier. It contains answers to some of your speculation about what errors or alarms were received - only the voice recording is not available. The data recording is available. It also explains the “don’t fly over water” rule was Alaska’s own rule, exceeded the FAA requirements, and that so far they have not found any correlation between the previous cabin pressure warnings and this failure. She also explains the cabin pressure system has triple redundancy and FAA permit flying with one of the systems out of action.
I don’t think anyone is arguing on this thread that 25h recorders would not be better. But one of the primary purposes of a voice data recorder is to provide evidence of the cockpit discussions when the crew are no longer here to do so. In this case, whilst there was an inflight emergency it was safely resolved so the crew are here to give their own account of what they did and did not do.
Thol how would you feel if your employer had a microphone that recorded your every word while at work, and didn't have any kind of failsafe way to ensure it was deleted at regular intervals?
the crew are here to give their own account of what they did and did not do.
In some cases, it's in the personal interest of the crew that their conversation not be recorded and it's in the public interest that it should be. Pilots are human and sometimes they will lie to cover up their mistakes. The reason that the data erasure isn't unusual in this case is because it's standard practice to erase potential evidence - that's the pilots' unions' reason for opposing CVRs. That's nothing to do with the public interest, it's purely because pilots and airlines don't want their mistakes to be recorded. So yeah, not suspicious, everyone deletes evidence as standard practice.
Not applicable to this event but it amazes me that the cockpit and data recorders don't live stream. Yes it's a huge data volume but there are significant occurrences of the recorders being very hard to locate. You might not get everything as the transmission may fail in an emergency but anything is better than nothing till the actual recorders were located. Could be deleted a week after flight completion.
Not applicable to this event but it amazes me that the cockpit and data recorders don’t live stream.
Pilots' unions would never agree to that. Pilots would have to stop talking about which of the cabin crew has the cutest arse, who they banged last night, etc.
Thol how would you feel if your employer had a microphone that recorded your every word while at work, and didn’t have any kind of failsafe way to ensure it was deleted at regular intervals?
I've been involved in some discussions related to safety critical equipment that I would really prefer had been recorded.
It's better than having to rely on what someone says they said after something has gone wrong.
I’ve been involved in some discussions related to safety critical equipment that I would really prefer had been recorded.
It’s better than having to rely on what someone says they said after something has gone wrong.
Exactly. But a union is not a public safety agency, it's there to promote the interests of its members. When those are in conflict with public safety, unions undermine public safety because they are doing their job of protecting their members' interests. I'm all in favour of unions but they shouldn't have a veto over public safety issues.
Hang out in a lot of passenger airliner cockpits do you?
I've been drunk with quite a few pilots over the years. Most are decent enough, a few are utterly appalling.
I'm not sure if the union is trying to protect the pilots from public scrutiny, so much as the union is trying to protect pilots from the decisions they are being forced into by management.
Like I said, my experience is Oil and Gas but I don't see why the airline industry should be any different. Basically the Supervisors are 'responsible' for the safety of operations, but management can and does exert pressure on these supervisors to not make decisions that cost money.
And then try to claim the blame when things go wrong lies firmly at the feet of said supervisor.
In some cases, it’s in the personal interest of the crew that their conversation not be recorded and it’s in the public interest that it should be.
but there will also be instances where it’s in the crews interest (to echo irate them), and where if may be in the crews interest but not the airline or manufacturers interest. The union has also suggested that unnecessarily interfering in pilot privacy may have consequential effects on flight deck relationships and therefore communications which could impact safety. Whilst my assessment is probably different from theirs, there could be legal safeguards that might address the Union’s privacy concerns.
Pilots are human and sometimes they will lie to cover up their mistakes.
and this seems to be your working hypothesis here despite it being clear that a big bit of plane fell off and there being no hint from the NTSB that pilot or crew were in any way to blame! Accident investigators and law enforcement professionals are quite good at working out when someone is lying. Multiple crew interviewed separately with the data recorder as an impartial arbiter of who is closest to reality along with carefully worded questions and you will trip up many a lie. When the two stories seem to match 100% is a sign that they conspired to lie too.
of course people lie; they also get confused or mistaken after a traumatic experience too. But an audio recording of someone running through a checklist is not necessarily that helpful either - it’s not a police interview where people are asked to speak up or vocalise their response “for the benefit of the tape” not would any conversation that you think was incriminating about the cabin pressure system actually be so explicitly “wrong” that it would not be open to the crews “explanation” of what they meant anyway.
The reason that the data erasure isn’t unusual in this case is because it’s standard practice to erase potential evidence – that’s the pilots’ unions’ reason for opposing CVRs. That’s nothing to do with the public interest, it’s purely because pilots and airlines don’t want their mistakes to be recorded. So yeah, not suspicious, everyone deletes evidence as standard practice.
you can call it erasure and deleting evidence but that is misrepresenting the reality. The data automatically over writes unless there is an intervention (powerloss, crash detection etc). The verbs erase and delete suggest it’s a conscious action.
for someone who is so worried about litigation in the US you seem quite happy to throw around accusations that there was wrongdoing by the flight crew. You’ve persisted to do so when others have pointed out they probably followed the standard protocol and did nothing wrong. You’ve changed your allegations slightly but still say it’s suspicious and imply some degree of professional misconduct. If I happened to be an Alaskan Airlines Pilot with US attorneys swarming around me and your post came to my attention - you’d be regretting it.
The verbs erase and delete suggest it’s a conscious action.
The union policy is a conscious action. They've deliberately set up a system where it's nearly impossible to retain the data. There's a very simple solution - just increase the recording time to 25 hours. The unions do not want that because they don't want the recordings to be used in court. They aren't trying to be secret about this, the data erasure is a deliberate policy intended to erase the data. So, no, it's not a one-off attempt at destroying evidence, it's a systematic policy of destroying evidence.
I don’t really think it’s in the interests of the pilot to be onboard a plane that crashes.
No, but when it comes down to the interests of pilots coming into conflict with public safety, the union's responsibility is to pilots, not public safety. Sometimes they will align, sometimes they will be in conflict. A union will always prioritize the interests of its members over outsiders, that's the very purpose of its existence.
Why don’t they live stream? Easiest to hear why from an instructor pilot.
Yes, but on a plane, the interests of the members exactly and always coincide with public safety. Destroying evidence relating to a safety incident absolutely affects pilots as much as it does the self loading cargo. More so in fact because pilots are flying all the time & therefore a far more exposed to risk. Sorry, as others have said, you really seem to have gone a bit bat-shit crazy over this one.
Yes, but on a plane, the interests of the members exactly and always coincide with public safety.
When I was offshore it was never in my interest to be on a rig that blew up. However, it was in my interests to keep my job and sometimes that meant compromising my own safety in the interests of not raising a stink when management were pressurising everyone to act in ways that were unsafe.
You can always convince yourself the worst isn't going to happen.
Yes, but on a plane, the interests of the members exactly and always coincide with public safety.
Not if the pilot is potentially facing a disciplinary hearing. A union's job is to protect their members, even when they are at fault. That makes it more difficult to sack pilots with drug or alcohol problems, for example. Some of the time, the union's job will align with public safety. Other times they are diametrically opposed. A union is not a public safety commission, not their job.
How many people here would accept every word they said during every day at work recorded by bugs inserted in their office by their employer, which are then published for the world to hear?
The CVR is a tool to aid accident investigators discover what happened in a crash, normally because the people speaking are no longer there to testify. It is most definitely in the interests of the flying public, that pilots feel able to have difficult safety discussions on the flight deck in an hopes and honest fashion, without fear of those conversations being taken out of context and viewed with 20/20 hindsight.
The AAIB and pilots have a very good trusting relationship, which allows investigators far reaching intrusive powers, in the knowledge they are using that information properly, rather than giving access to management/media/politicians. Our “Just Safety Culture” requires buy-in, faith and trust on all sides. I don’t know of any of my uk colleagues who worry about what is recorded on the CVR, so I reckon it works well.
What do you imagine the pilots deleted the CVR for in this case that they feared discipline about?
It's basically the first rule of being involved in a ****up. Try to eliminate any evidence that you were there. They don't have to have done anything wrong, it's just much easier if they don't have to explain their conversations. That's why it's union policy to oppose any CVRs. It's just automatic, don't be stupid enough to record yourself being involved in a problem.
How many people here would accept every word they said during every day at work recorded by bugs inserted in their office by their employer, which are then published for the world to hear?
For many virtual workers the answer is a lot of our words are recorded and would be made available to the world under certain circumstances although these are rare. We have some control over verbal meetings but a lot are recorded and all online chats/emails are held.
If being a pilot is anything like any other safety critical operation, you have a check list you have to sign off and document before you do anything.
FWIW, I don't believe there was any intentional cover up for this specific incident. However, the two hours thing suggests to me it's a general policy to avoid the conversations that go into checking off these requirements being made public.
If you, as the responsible person such as pilot, know there is an issue then the discussion centres around how you can downgrade the severity of the issue so that the operation can continue. The pressure to do this is generally not put in writing but it is there.
The proper solution would be to give the pilots the authority to make decisions without any impact on their careers. I don't see that being an option in America.
Therefore the union does what it can to protect its members from the results of the pressure put on them by management.
But yeah, I don't think anyone intentionally wiped anything here. Just that no one involved wants any of these discussions to be made public.
How many people here would accept every word they said during every day at work recorded by bugs inserted in their office by their employer, which are then published for the world to hear?
If I was in a safety-critical job such as surgery or flying a commercial aircraft, I would accept being recorded during the safety-critical parts of the job. That's not a "bug inserted in their office", it's a known recording done for public safety reasons. Pilots know the CVR is running, they aren't being bugged, they don't want to risk being prosecuted when they screw up.
I also assume at work that anything I say could become part of an official record. I try very hard not to say things that could get me fired or land me in court. What is it that you say at work that you really don't want anyone to know about?
It’s basically the first rule of being involved in a ****up. Try to eliminate any evidence that you were there.
If you think that the first reaction of a pilot who was involved in an incident that could have easily killed them & for which they are highly unlikely to be responsible is to try and deny all knowledge of being there, then I really wonder what you have been taking today.
And by the way, thanks for telling me what a Union's responsibilities are. In the 10 years I spent on the Branch Executive of an aviation union I may have missed it. In case you are wondering, there is no way we would ever.... ever prioritise a members interest over the safety of the public. Sorry.
The AAIB and pilots have a very good trusting relationship, which allows investigators far reaching intrusive powers, in the knowledge they are using that information properly, rather than giving access to management/media/politicians. Our “Just Safety Culture” requires buy-in, faith and trust on all sides. I don’t know of any of my uk colleagues who worry about what is recorded on the CVR, so I reckon it works well.
Do you work in the U.S. or the U.K.? In the U.S., pilot unions are adamantly opposed to CVRs. As in, they don't want any recording at all.
In the 10 years I spent on the Branch Executive of an aviation union I may have missed it. In case you are wondering, there is no way we would ever…. ever prioritise a members interest over the safety of the public.
Then you aren't representing the interests of your members. Pick a side. If you don't like that side, work for the other side. You can't be on both sides.
As Dan has said, the ‘Just Safety Culture’ requires buy in from all sides. We already use flight data to monitor every flight - anything that is unusual can be investigated and additional training/change in procedures can be arranged as required. There is trust between management and crew. The aim is to learn from incidents and reduce the chance of them recurring. But it’s not universal and shouldn’t be taken for granted.
I have friends who work for airlines who most definitely have a ‘blame culture’. I wouldn’t touch those airlines with a barge pole. There’s little attempt to learn from incidents, just an opportunity to sack the crew, problem solved?
If you lose the trust of the crew, you’ll find far more things are hidden, pushed aside and not learned from.
@thols2 what I find staggering is you speak with such an authority, a manner not even matched by the qualified and certified aviators in this forum.
You are exactly the sort of person who derails and compromises safety investigations alongside those who are arse covering.
It’s basically the first rule of being involved in a ****up. Try to eliminate any evidence that you were there.
If you think that the first reaction of a pilot who was involved in an incident
Read what I said, "first rule", not "first reaction". Don't make stuff up. Your first reaction is about immediate survival. After the incident, the first rule of saving your career is to try to minimize your responsibility. Eliminating evidence that you were involved is the first thing that experience (and lawyers and union reps) teaches you.
Eliminating evidence that you were involved is the first thing that experience (and lawyers and union reps) teaches you.
Really? My first thing after landing a plane missing something important would be a shower and changing my underwear.
Any good lawyer or union rep also wouldnt recommend that since, to take this case, making a mistake about a pressurisation warning is one thing but being caught trying to cover it up would be something else instead.
You have already decided this was a f&&k up. I’d say that’s far from certain.
Stuff breaks all the time. My job is to stop an incident turning into an accident. I’d say the crew here (pilots and cabin crew) succeeded in that aim, similarly to the JAL fireball last week.
@thols2 please just put down the spade and walk away from the hole.
There is a fascinating discussion being had about this incident, but “do pilots avoid their voices being recorded” is not it.
what I find staggering is you speak with such an authority,
I was right about how the door failed. Go back and watch the NTSB video. Note the part how they state that the bolts haven't been located and comment that they may not have been fitted.
I was told on this forum by a commercial pilot that CVRs turn off when the engines are shut down. They don't. Go talk to him about that. If they did, someone would have had to turn them back on to erase them. Unlikely to happen by accident. Turns out that the data erasure is because the pilots' unions want it erased. It's systemic, not a one-off.
The American pilots' unions opposition to CVRs is a matter of public record. It's nothing to do with public safety, it's to protect their members from legal issues.
Any good lawyer or union rep also wouldnt recommend that since, to take this case, making a mistake about a pressurisation warning is one thing but being caught trying to cover it up would be something else instead.
Never get caught trying to cover stuff up, always have plausible deniability.
If you are ever involved in a serious incident, never make a statement without your lawyer or union representative present. Their job is to determine what happened and what legal liability you might have. They will look at what evidence the other side has and try to discredit it. Whatever you do, do not provide evidence that can be used against you by opening your mouth, unlocking your phone, etc.
U.S. pilot unions oppose any use of CVRs because they can be used as evidence against pilots. The unions are doing their job, protecting their members. The system they have automatically destroys the evidence before it can be collected unless the flight crew or ground staff turn off the aircraft systems. That's a perfect case of plausible deniability, the evidence was destroyed but nobody could be expected to remember to save it given the circumstances. This didn't come about by chance, it's because pilot's unions want to prevent CVRs being used as legal evidence. It's not illegal but it's deliberate destruction of evidence. They deserve a bow for that, brilliant work on their part.
Then you aren’t representing the interests of your members. Pick a side. If you don’t like that side, work for the other side. You can’t be on both sides.
No. It doesn't work like that. The Union's responsibility is to protect their members in as much as they are acting in a reasonable & professional manner. The aim is to make sure that they are treated fairly. Aviation professionals spend their entire lives working to protect public safety, why should we then defend an individual who, by their behaviour, is working against that? As a Union, and as a Union rep, if there was a conflict between the performance of an individual & the safe provision of an air traffic service, there would not be a moment's hesitation about which side you'd be supporting. By all means try and get the best deal possible for the member (retraining or moving to a non-operational role or whatever), but the safety of the service is paramount. Do you really think it would work any other way? Oops! I forgot this is the internet.
"It’s basically the first rule of being involved in a ****up. "
They don't need to check the CVR to know who was driving the plane.
A question to the real, proper, qualified pilots – is it correct that, under European air regulations, CVRs are required to have a 25 hour ‘recording window’ and, if that’s the case, why is it only 2 hours under US regs?
The honest answer is I have no idea (or interest) in how the CVR recording happens. I can’t touch it, and it plays no part in any decision making process I carry out. There’s enough stuff to confuse myself with that IS relevant.
It’s basically the first rule of being involved in a ****up. Try to eliminate any evidence that you were there.
I'm glad I don't work with you.
…..or in USA generally!
The Union’s resposibility is to protect their members in as much as they are acting in a reasonable & professional manner.
The onus is on the employer to prove guilt. The union's job is to demand that evidence. Even if your member is as guilty as hell, your job is to protect their interests and insist on evidence of guilt. You're not a public safety commission, you're a representative for your members interests. Sometimes those will be in conflict and a union's responsibility is to its members.
