Passenger Plane Crashes at Rostov-on-Don Airport in Russia

[Niall]

Confirmation that the plane came down at high speed:

'Flydubai plane piloted into ground at 600kph, flight records show'
https://www.rt.com/news/338898-flydubai-crash-records-nosedive/

Flydubai flight FZ981 was on manual control when the cockpit crew apparently sent it into a nosedive, resulting in a fatal crash in Russia, investigators have reported, citing flight recorder data. The plane hit the ground at 600kph and was at an angle of 50 degrees.

The flight records have been transcribed and provisionally analyzed, the Interstate Aviation Committee reported on Friday. The data showed that flight FZ981 made two landing approaches to Rostov-on-Don Airport, but on both attempts decided to cut short the process and perform a go-around maneuver. In both attempts the crew piloted the aircraft in manual mode.

The second approach was discontinued when the Boeing 737-800 was at 220 meters altitude, 4km from the runway. The crew switched engines into take-off mode and started ascending. They then apparently took a maneuver that resulted in the crash.

“At the altitude of 900 meters the crew pushed the yoke and at the same time a stabilizer was moved five degrees into nosedive position, which resulted in a rapid descent and a vertical acceleration of up to -1g,” the report said. “The consequent actions of the crew failed to prevent the aircraft’s collision with the ground. The collision happened at a speed of over 600 kmh and pitch angle of over 50 degrees.”

The committee said it is working on a full reconstruction of the disaster, with expert pilots from the US and the UAE contributing to the work. It is also working on transcribing the full two-hour voice recording form the cabin. The crew members communicated in English and Spanish, so the investigators are planning to use aviation experts from Spain to ensure accurate identification and transcription of the tape.

The investigators are yet to voice any official comments on the cause of the fatal incident, which claimed the lives of 62 passengers and crew members on March 19. Sources close to the probe, who spoke to the Russian media on condition of anonymity, said that pilot error is the most likely explanation for the cause of the crash.

Earlier, RT reported that numerous Flydubai pilots have been complaining for years that the airline uses exhausting rosters and turns a blind eye to employee complaints. Pilot fatigue could have been a contributing factor in the Rostov-on-Don crash, some of the whistleblowers told RT.

That's one heckuva 'pilot error', to suddenly angle the plane sharply downwards at an altitude of 900 meters... and approach the plane's top speed.

 

[Niall]

All Flydubai plane's systems were in working order during Rostov crash – investigators

RT, 20 April 2016

All ground and on-board navigation, landing and communications systems functioned as normal on the Flydubai passenger jet, which crashed in Rostov-on-Don this March, the Russian aviation watchdog said.

"At the time of the accident, the ILS, outer and inner markers, the lighting system and PAPI lights were operative and operated as per design. The aircraft flight recorders did not record any evidence of improper operations of navigation and landing aids," the Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC) said in an interim report issued on Wednesday.

"According to preliminary information, all aids subject to certification were holding valid operational certificates and were fit for operation in terms of assigned life and service time," the document added.

On March 19, a Flydubai Boeing 737-800 plane hit the ground while attempting to land at the Rostov-on-Don airport in southern Russia in bad weather conditions and poor visibility.

There were 55 passengers and a seven-member international crew, headed by a Cypriot captain, onboard. Nobody on board survived the crash.

In its interim report, IAC confirmed that the accident occurred as result of a nosedive caused by the commands of the pilots.

“At a height of 900 m there was a simultaneous control column nose down input and stabilizer nose down deflection from -2.5 deg (6.5 units) to +2.5 deg (1.5 units), as a result the aircraft, having climbed to about 1000 m, turned into descent with negative vertical acceleration of -1g,” the paper said.

“The following crew recovery actions did not allow it to avoid an impact with the ground,” it added.

However, the watchdog didn’t specify the motives behind the actions of the Flydubai pilots.

The report said that the investigators plan to examine the psycho-emotional and physiological condition of the crew in connection with their working schedule and rest time.

IAC stressed that their current paper “is preliminary and can be subject to clarification and amendment based on the pertinent examinations” ahead of the final report.

Shortly after the crash, pilots from Flydubai and another UAE airline, Emirates, contacted RT revealing mass overwork issues at the companies.

They said that they had to perform flights despite being exhausted, while complaints of fatigue were ignored or even met with threats by the management.

Flydubai is a low-cost airline that was established by the UAE government in 2008. It operates flights to fly to 95 destinations, including the Russian cities of Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Samara, Nizhny Novgorod, Rostov-on-Don, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kazan, Ufa, Krasnodar and Mineralnye Vody.

So the official story has settled on the plane being in perfect working order, and the crash being down to pilot error.

 

[angelburst29]

An update: According to reports, Interstate Aviation Committee had completed, together with the United Arab Emirates and the United States, transcribing the voice recorder from Flydubai's Flight 981 which crashed in Russia's Rostov-on-Don.

Voice Recorder From Crashed FlyDubai Jet Has Now Been Transcripted
http://sputniknews.com/world/20160516/1039679546/iac-uae-flydubai-crash.html

The Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC) said Monday that it had completed, together with the United Arab Emirates and the United States, transcribing the voice recorder from Flydubai's Flight 981 which crashed in Russia's Rostov-on-Don in March.

"Between April 28 and May 16, 2016 in the IAC headquarters in collaboration with USA and UAE representatives the CVR records listening and transcription (02 hours 03 minutes 49 seconds in total) was completed. A crew voices identification was done with participation of Flydubai airline pilots. The CVR transcript was provided to the Investigation team," the IAC said in a statement.

FlyDubai Boeing 737-800 crashed on landing at Rostov-on-Don airport in conditions of poor visibility on March 19, killing all 62 people on board, including 55 passengers and seven crew members. Pilot fatigue and lack of coordination have been suggested as possible causes of the accident.