Talk:Birgenair Flight 301

Contradiction
I know this run-on sentence has citation, but it's contradictory. "Investigators never found the pitot-static tubes of the crashed aircraft; entomologists suspected that mud dauber wasps built nests in the pitot-static tubes, blocking them; since the aircraft used had not flied in 25 days the wasps had an opportunity to build nests in the tubes."

If they never found the pitot-static tubes, then what evidence does anyone have that that's the cause? It seems more like conjecture or speculation than proper suspicion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.254.163.150 (talk) 13:17, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
 * There was good reason to believe a blockage was caused by the wasps, ie. wasps around the airfield. But it's not really a problem since the article never claims it is definite, and makes it clear it is a suspicion only. Gandygatt (talk) 17:26, 15 January 2009 (UTC)
 * It came from the episode of the documentary television series "Mayday" - While they never found the pitot tubes, they suspect that wasps caused it. WhisperToMe (talk) 21:55, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Accuracy
I am surprised how, with so much of this article based on the Mayday episode about the Birgenair crash, the author lays the blame on both pilots, like in "The pilots concluded that both ASIs were malfunctioning". Actually, it was the captain who made that conclusion, which happened before the stick-shaker warning btw. The author also fails to mention that during the investigation, it became clear that when things took a turn for the worse and the stick-shaker warning came on, it was the captain who became really confused then froze, and was completely unable to react to the situation, something the documentary clearly shows. The co-pilot and the back up pilot, in the cockpit jump seat, had both tried on several occasions to give their captain advice which, had he followed, would have saved the plane. The back up pilot mentions "ADI" several times, while the co-pilot told him "nose down" and "you can level off, our altitude is ok", but the captain didn't follow their advice. THAT is what caused the doom of Birgenair Flight 301. Even with the captain's pitot tube blocked, the flight could have easily been saved. The co-pilot didn't directly intervene because in certain cultures, it is inimaginable for an inexperienced co-pilot to take control of the plane from his much more experienced captain. 24.201.60.162 (talk) 19:47, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

For Aircraft Parts Experts Only?
The article brings up the pitot tubes w/o explaining what they are and how they relate to the ASI readings. Not even a link to an article on them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.68.70.186 (talk) 20:02, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I just added a few words to hint at the usage of a pitot tube.Gandygatt (talk) 17:36, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

How Does Boeing Avoid Responsibility
From the Mayday episode and the NTSB findings discussed during that documentary, the flight starts to get into trouble when the auto-pilot, using (only) the faulty data from the Captain's ASI, pitches the plane nose-up which leads to the abrupt slowing of the plane and then to the stall. Having done some process control programming (but not auto-pilot design), I know never to trust any single instrument reading in a chemical plant, especially if we're making critical valve adjustments. We always cross-check against other indicators and if we detect a contradiction, ask for human input.

The Boeing autopilot, or instrumentation management system, ought to have detected that the Captain's ASI was significantly different from the other two ASI readings and from the GPS velocity information and either warned the pilots and disengaged, or discarded the faulty reading. That the AP essentially flew the plane into a stall would appear to me to be a design defect of the AP -- i.e. Boeing's responsibility.

Obviously if the Captain had followed procedures or had his wits about him, he would have saved the plane (that the AP was putting into a stall), but the initial cause of the sequence of events that led to the crash was the design flaw in the auto-pilot. IMHO anyway. That Boeing was able to divert attention from this and pin the crash entirely on the Captain appears to be a victory of corporate interests over the truth.

One wonders if this flaw has been quietly fixed subsequently. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gep3 (talk • contribs) 00:08, 16 January 2010 (UTC)


 * As you said you "know never to trust any single instrument reading", let me tell you that pilots are taught this, too - especially if the single instrument that failed in this case is already known to have failed during the take-off run. Build a plane that even fools can fly - and you will have fools fly it, as in this tragic instance (pls excuse this personal opinion).
 * BTW, in reasoning about accidents we should refer to accident investigation results primarily, rather than to -ahem- journalism (the latter including TV as well as Tim van Beveren's book, by the way). For example:
 * Is there any reputable source (except BirgenAir's own statement) to confirm the assumption of a L/H engine stall, as mentioned in the article?
 * Is it really true that the B757 at that time did not provide any means to switch A/P to an alternate airspeed probe? (I didn't find that in the report and/or NTSB's recommendations - but I may be in error. Hard to believe, anyway. Source?)

-- mibo (talk) 14:19, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

To answer the latter question myself: The final accident report (section 2.2) explicitly states that the crew, by switching to "alternate source" could have used the copilot's ADC as well as the backup (stand-by) ASI as a speed reference for the autopilot's operation. Thus, Gep3's argument seems to be downright false. I'm going to comment out the corresponding para.

Furthermore, the article's statement that "Tests run on flight simulators found that even the most seasoned pilots were confused ..." does neither cite a source nor do I know of one supporting this. Comment out as well. -- mibo (talk) 18:55, 1 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Gep3 argument was that the autopilot only used one source for airspeed, and put the plane in a dangerous attitude because of this. It is a fact. Now, you may not find it's a flaw because the attitude was recoverable, the pilots could have done this or that, but the point remains that an autopilot designed differently would have used at least one other airspeed probe and would have realized something was wrong instead of acting on inaccurate information. As for the idea that this flaw has since been corrected, I don't know, but it could be, there has been a number of upgrades to the 757 fleet since then, including one pertaining to faulty overspeed indications. Aesma (talk) 20:04, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
 * This crash was recently depicted on Australian TV in the Air Crash Investigations programme. (This may be a rebadging of the MayDay programme, or it may be original content.) This show describes some of the changes that were made to 757 operations as a result of the crash. One big change was a new warning that the instruments disagree (shown on-screen as "IAS DISAGREE" in yellow text.) Also changes were made to make it easier to swap the A/P to a different pitot tube than the pilot's. The show also mentioned the simulator tests, and showed Robert Macintosh Jr, the NTSB investigator on this crash (an authoritative source?) saying "That would tell me that that Mach or airspeed warning horn, combined with a stick shaker, was a tremendously mind-boggling experience to a line pilot." The show uses the term "seasoned pilots" in reference to those who undertook the simulation, and says that the FAA issued a directive that simulator training for all pilots must include blocked pitot tube training.

DylanTusler (talk) 13:37, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Aeroperú 603 - Similarities and Differences
The Aeroperú 603 accident was similar in some sense (blocked sensors leading to crew confusion, resulting in fatal crash) but quite different. In the Aeroperú case, the static pressure ports were blocked by tape, rendering all airspeed indicators and altimeters (including the transponder's altitude indication to ATC) unusable. Contrast to this, Birgenair 301 had just one of its pitot probes inoperable, which affected airspeed only and could have been easily replaced by switching to an alternate source.

Being confronted with a true firework of alerts (as opposed to Birgenair), the Aeroperú crew recognized the failures immediately after take-off but (as the Birgenair crew) showed unable to handle them properly.

Despite their situation being far more demanding than in the Birgenair case, even the Aeroperú crew could have saved their day, had they Finally, Birgenair 301 lost control while Aeroperú 603 was a CFIT = controlled flight into "terrain" (the sea, in this case). -- mibo (talk) 19:42, 1 January 2011 (UTC)
 * 1) reverted to basic flying (as with Birgenair: familiar power setting plus familiar attitude results in familiar speed and gradient) and
 * 2) (additional difficulty NOT faced by Birgenair) used the radio altimeter to stay off the ground and/or water. Of course, radio alt is a limited and sometimes dangerous reference, but far better than nothing (remember Aeroperú 603 crashed into the sea, so terrain profile wasn't a consideration).

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Adding Pilot Error to summary
I believe Pilot error should be added to the summary as stated by the Probable cause on ASN: "The crew's failure to recognize the activation of the stick shaker as a warning of imminent entrance to the stall, and the failure of the crew to execute the procedures for recovery from the onset of loss of control."

American Airlines 965 vs American Airlines Flight 77
Why is there a reference to American Airlines Flight 77, as form my perspective it would be more accurate to reference to Flight 965. Why? because it was in similar times and the fatalites in both flight (301, 965) are all in flight compared to Flight 77 where have some onboard the aircraftv and some others on the ground. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Goldnas (talk • contribs) 01:18, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

OrbitalEnd48401 (talk) 09:54, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Bad revert
See MOS:NUMNOTES: "Comparable values nearby one another should be all spelled out or all in figures, even if one of the numbers would normally be written differently: patients' ages were five, seven, and thirty-two or ages were 5, 7, and 32, but not ages were five, seven, and 32." You reverted a lot of good edits, reverting the article to a much worse form in many places. The colon that I replaced with a dash was horribly misused, separating the subject of the sentence from the verb. Please check the style guide and discuss all the various issues at hand before making such a sweeping revert—FIVE reverts in one, covering all sorts of grammar, punctuation, and style issues. Thank you. Holy (talk) 00:54, 8 May 2024 (UTC)


 * Thank you for opening my eyes. I thought that numbers 1-9 are ALWAYS supposed to be written in words, guess not though. Sorry for the revert and I'll revert it again. CreatorOfMinecraftHerobrine (talk) 13:07, 8 May 2024 (UTC)