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Fly By Wire

 

Last week I mentioned William Langewiesche's recent writings that attribute Hudson River landing success to the Airbus's fly-by-wire system. Since then, I have had time to do a quick read of his new book. It is amazing to me that a writer who poses as an expert on aviation does not even know what it means to "flare" an airplane. As I have said before, the Airbus landed in the Hudson at three times the descent rate the plane was built to withstand, and the aft fuselage failed, allowing water to flood the aft cabin and put passengers at risk. The reason it hit so hard is that Sullenberger did not flare; he did not raise the nose slightly as he should have starting at about twenty feet above the water so as to contact the water at a reasonable descent rate. At least Langewiesche's book sheds some light on why this happened. Langewiesche wrote that at two hundred feet above the water, Sullenberger reduced the speed of the plane. Actually, the speed was reduced too much. There was no speed left with which to accomplish the flare.

 

Amazingly though, Langewiesche's book has a chapter titled "Flare" in which he said Sullenberger flared at two-hundred feet. There is not such thing as a flare at two-hundred feet! Flare is done below twenty feet. just before landing. Anything that might be called a flare higher than twenty feet is not a flare but a screw up! In fact, when I was flying the 727 as a captain at United, a new copilot flared the plane at forty feet. I had to take control of the plane and apply full power to avoid an extremely hard landing. And, I had to report what had happened. The copilot was fired. It is unacceptable to flare at even forty feet, and nothing done at two-hundred feet can qualify as a flare.

 

When you consider that a writer regarded as an aviation expert is clueless about what it means to flare, you can see why it is necessary to dismiss anything you read in the media about aviation or an accident.

 

No pilot wants to face another pilot doing Monday morning quarterbacking after an accident. It is easy to sit at a desk and say what another pilot should have done, and in the same situation, the person criticizing might have done worse. But the fact that Sullenberger, who years ago had flown fighters and gliders, allowed the Airbus to slow to the point that no speed was left with which to flare leads me to fault - not Sullenberger - but the automation of the Airbus which has made flying so easy that the skills a pilot gains when originally learning to fly become lost, or dulled.

 

When using the joy stick to fly the Airbus, the pilot merely puts the
plane's nose at a certain angle and the wings at a certain amount
of bank, and the plane stays there. It is like having not only cruise control in your car, but cruise steering as well.

 

We had a
similar system on the F-105 fighter that the pilot could select. But
when flying the F-105, that mode was used only temporarily to hold the
plane in the needed position so the pilot could momentarily focus on
something else. Thus, with the F-105, only one percent of the time was
spent in that mode, and the rest of the time, the plane was being
actively flown by the pilot. Flying skills never deteriorated. But with
the Airbus, this system is operating one-hundred percent of the time, so flying skills deteriorate.

 

This brings to mind, also, the Airbus that crashed between Brazil and France. Based on automated reports from the plane, the automation of the Airbus 330 failed in a way that it has failed a number of times. And, up until that flight, pilots were able to handle the problem. Some standard flying skills are no longer needed when flying an automated plane. In time, those skills atrophy. But when automation fails, the pilot needs to revert to the old way of flying. After enough years on the automated Airbus, those basic flying skills may not be available.

 

With the most extreme arrogance, the Airbus chief engineer designed the Airbus fly-by-wire system so pilots could never override it. This brave new world of fly-by-wire was supposed to prevent pilot-error accidents. However, the Airbus accident rate is not one bit better than the safety record of non-fly-by-wire airliners. And now, though I may be wrong, it could be because as pilots fly the Airbus, their skills languish to the point that when flying skills the pilot originally had are needed, they are not up to the task.

 

My belief in the correctness of this is supported by reading about the experience of a captain who had flown the A-320 for a few years and then was assigned to fly the 737. He said he found, after flying the A-320, it was very difficult for him to fly the 737.

 

But wait. Is that light I see at the end of the tunnel? When reading about fly-by-wire in Wikipedia. It says, " . . . Airbus A380 will allow the pilots to switch off all primary (PRIMS) and secondary (SECS) flight computers, placing the aircraft into "direct law" where the flight control surfaces are directed from the side-sticks through a backup control until (BCU)without flight envelope protections." Well how about that. Airbus, in its latest model, has adopted the Boeing philosophy. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_flight_control_system

 

Please don't misunderstand. I'm not saying you should avoid flying the Airbus. I'm saying the experiment in which fly-by-wire which does not let the pilot override did not provide greater safety. Now, I believe we can look forward to unprecendented safety as the newest planes, the Boeing 777 and the Airbus 380 have the best possible system: fly-by-wire to prevent pilot error, but can also be deliberately pushed aside if the pilot sees the necessity.

Patrick has also written about this subject in his column at http://salon.com/tech/col/smith/2009/11/19/askthepilot342

 

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A Description Of How Awful Flying Can Be (Written Before She Did SOAR)

 

A client sent something she had written in 2005 about how awful flying was for her. She no longer feels that way, now that she has done the SOAR program. I asked her if it was OK to share what she wrote. I thought some of you who believe nothing will help will find your own experiences match her feelings before she did SOAR.

 

I haven't slept properly for days.  My disrupted sleep is punctuated by odd dreams.  Nausea occurs when I try to eat.  Today is d-day.  As I walk towards the door of the tin death chamber, anxiety overcomes me. 



The thin metal glistens in the sunlight and the smiling woman in red and black encourages me in.  I take baby steps trying to prolong the feeling of life.  Much like a scheduled execution, it feels as though I can pinpoint the time of my death.  The fear and anxiety are palpable.  I am cold and yet my palms are sweaty.  I am thirsty and hungry yet the churning of my stomach prohibits me from letting anything past my dry lips.  Sleep continues to allude me.  TACA flight 586.  Destination Boston.  It is so easy to say.  Everyone around me is calm, laughing, enjoying the flight that will take them towards their family and friends, their homes, their future. 



I can't see a future.  All I can see is this tin can that apparently is the safest way to travel.  My hypochondria, my doubts about my future path, all disappear.  Nothing matters right now except getting through each minute, safely, of this terrifying experience.  Lest you think this is the first time, I have lived abroad most of my life, forcing me to fly whenever I could no longer avoid it.  I would take a train for 36 hours to avoid a 2 hour flight within Europe, but getting home to visit my family meant swallowing my fear.  Somehow, miraculously, even to myself, I have managed to do this on dozens of occasions.  Each time I land safely, I promise myself that I will never put myself through this terror again.  And yet somehow, I find myself a few months later buying yet another airplane ticket.  Flying is a necessary evil in my life, a constant companion that I keep trying to rid myself of.  I could just choose a domestic life near my most cherished family and friends and avoid all this nonsense, but my wanderlust always gets the better of me.



My non-phobic acquaintances quote the statistics.  A 1 in a 5000 chance of dying in a car crash, a 1 in 8 chance of dying of breast cancer, a 1 in a million chance of dying in a plane crash.  Before embarking on this latest journey from hell, I searched the Internet.  TACA has flown 370,000 flights since its inception and seems to have had few problems.  It doesn't matter; someone has to be that 1 in a million, why not me? 



Nonsensically, the parts of flight that scare me fly in the face of fact.  Yes, takeoff is terrifying, but the adrenaline rushing through my body almost turns phobia into euphoria.  Landing most often incites excitement, knowing that in 15, 14, 10, 5 minutes I will be home or be with my loved ones.  These 2 portions are where 70% of accidents happen.  Yet, it is the interminable bit in the middle where my life flashes before my eyes, where every little bump shouts death, when I can't take my eyes off the window, not even for a second, thinking that somehow my vigilance will keep the aircraft afloat. 



Very occasionally on a clear sunny day, my sheer terror can briefly give way to euphoria.  For a split second, I find myself marveling at the wonders of man and nature, the beautiful landscapes, the sun, the cotton white clouds, but the slightest bump or cloud cover abruptly brings me back to reality.  During these 4 hours and 40 minutes of hell, I can't read, I can't watch TV, I can't eat.  I simply can't do anything but wait it out, tease the fear, play little games to keep myself sane.  I plan times when I can go to the bathroom just to give myself something to do.  "If I make it through the next 30 minutes, I will reward myself with a trip down the aisle".  I prolong these activities hoping that somehow they will make the minutes tick by faster.  I note with pride when I have made it through ½ the trip as the minutes tick by on the other side, down rather than up. 



"You have nothing to fear but fear itself."  How true this is.  A plane has never hurt me (knock on wood because you can't go saying things like this) and yet the fear makes my heart race, makes me eat poorly, and fills my body with anxiety.  I am probably statistically more likely to die from a fear induced heart attack than a plane malfunction. 



You may have noticed that this story is all about me, not about the people traveling with me, not about the airline and not even about the plane itself.  This is the thing about this phobia, it doesn't matter.  It is primal, every man for himself.  I am so focused on the fear, the terror, that none of the other stuff even exists. 

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