investigation

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    NTSB TO ASSIST AFGHAN AUTHORITIES WITH INVESTIGATION INTO BAGRAM CARGO PLANE CRASH


    The National Transportation Safety Board will lead a team to assist the Afghanistan Ministry of Transportation and Commercial Aviation in the investigation of a cargo plane crash at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan.

    NTSB Senior Air Safety Investigator Tim LeBaron will be the U.S. accredited representative. He will lead a team of three additional investigators from the NTSB as well as representatives from the Federal Aviation Administration and The Boeing Company.

    The private cargo plane, a Boeing 747-400 operated by National Air Cargo, crashed just after takeoff from the U.S.-operated air base at 11:20 a.m. local time Monday. All seven crewmembers onboard were killed and the airplane destroyed. The seven crew members were all American citizens. The accident site is within the perimeter of Bagram Air Base.

    The international cargo flight was destined for Dubai World Central – Al Maktoum International Airport, Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

    The Afghanistan Ministry of Transportation and Commercial Aviation is leading the investigation and will be the sole source of information regarding the investigation. According to the International Civil Aviation Organization, they can be reached at (873) 68 2341450 / 49 or by fax at (873) 68 1280784.

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    Air France Flight 447


    Air France 447 went down over the Atlantic in 2009.

    The fly-by-wire A330 incorporates technology that prevents the airplane from entering a stall, but during a complete loss of airspeed information, however, the system reverted to manual control.

    The final report said said the pilots were “completely surprised” by technical problems experienced at high altitude and engaged in increasingly de-structured actions until suffering “the total loss of cognitive control of the situation.”

    CEO of the Flight Safety Foundation has been recorded said pilots generally manually manipulating the controls for only three minutes:one minute and 30 seconds each for take-off and landing.

    “We are moving towards automated operations where the pilot isn’t even permitted to fly. That means the first time in your career you will ever feel what an aircraft feels like at 35,000 feet is when it’s handed to you broken.”

    See a video examination of the Air France 447 flight

  • Politics and the Art and Science of Crash Investigation

    Should art be mentioned here? Art is the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination. Surely this applies to investigation. It is only through imagining the sequence of what happened that what actually happened can be determined. Theoretically, scientific experimentation takes place in a vacuum, or at least in a neutral area where the laws of nature can be observed to run in a natural fashion, after which, conclusions are drawn. Attempts are made for the hypothesis to be untainted by factors such as “opinion,” “bias,” and “prejudice.” But it could not exist without human imagination.

    But imagination is far from “imaginary.” Accident investigation is not scientific experimentation, but it is supposed to be based, like science, on handling conclusions based on neutrally observed but hard facts. The problem of course, is that the accidents being investigated do not occur in the careful measured neutrality of a lab, but in the messy, busy, interactivity of the real world. The search for the truth is a crucial thing, one of interest not only to the victims or families of the victims, but also the insurance companies, banks, aircraft manufacturers, airlines, future airline passengers…the list grows. The climate in which investigations take place is far from neutral, in spite of attempts for investigators to be professional.

    If you look at the Comoros crash you can see the effects of clashes between the governmental institutions of Comoros and France, replete with name-calling, bias, and politics. This is equally true in the Air France 447 case, where political pressures exert invisible pressures. Consider the stake the country has in Air France, and in Airbus. In any investigation, it may be that the lives and careers of some very powerful people hinge on how an investigation goes, and even more so when a country like France adds the aspect of criminal proceedings.

    The well-known world regulatory organizations over aviation industry trade groups (IATA, ICAO, AEA, ATA) have developed highly regulated procedures for investigation. We can only hope that the highly regulated and complex process of investigations can continue in as even a keel as possible, in spite of the turbulence coming from all interested parties. The world waits for answers, but politics inevitably set the stage, and like the observed but unseen air currents in weather, play a part, whether invisible or obvious. While there are some protections in place, (for example, NTSB reports can not be used as evidence lest the integrity investigation be compromised), we can never fully know what goes on behind the scenes.