KUALA LUMPUR: An Indonesia AirAsia flight en route to Surabaya was forced to return to the Kuala Lumpur International Airport 2 (klia2) today due to technical problems.
According to a report in the New Straits Times, Flight QZ321 left klia2 at 9.35am but 30 minutes later the pilot turned around to return to Kuala Lumpur after noticing a technical problem.
The NST quoted a passenger, Rosdan Ramli, as saying that the captain made an announcement that they were turning back due to technical problems just as they were flying over the Straits of Malacca.
If you are a passenger on such a flight, where the pilot elects to RTB (Return to Base) or turns around to return to where the plane has taken off, be very glad you have a pilot who plays safe.
And when the pilot plays safe, you will be generally safe in his hands.
The danger is in those pilots who choose to carry on when it's not safe to do so, or when the aircraft systems or indications say it's not wise to continue.
The hazardous attitude of pressing on with a flight regardless of a technical problem/warning-indication or marginal fuel left or bad weather ahead, etc, is known in aviation circle as 'get-home-itis' or 'press-on-itis'.
The chances of such gung-ho pilots getting into serious air accidents are extremely high. It'll be your and my bad luck if we are ever on their planes.
There are strong and continuing suspicions that Air Asia (and its various regional joint ventures) cuts many dangerous corners on safety due to its unrelenting cost cutting focus.
ReplyDeleteA low cost seat should not be accompanied with increased risk of never arriving at your destination.
The Air Asia Flight 8501 which crashed in the Java sea had a history of flying 78 times previously with unresolved technical faults in its rudder controls. The plane for flight 8501 also had repeated reports of intermittent failures in its Flight Management Computer. Unresolved because the problem was intermittent, and Air Asia may have been focused on making sure the plane continued to fly.
On top of that Air Asia pilots have minimal training in flying the plane manually without the computer(that is the also the case for many other airlines today). On that fatal evening, the combination of a dodgy Flight Management computer, bad weather and a pilot who didn't really know how to fly the A320 manually lead to an out-of-control situation and ultimately crashed into the sea.
Since then, I never fly Air Asia unless there is no other way to fly to my destination.
I agree with some of your points, that some airline management seldom see the value of safety management. Safety management (flying with serviceable equipment, enough fuel, good support policies, pilots and cabin crew rests, etc etc etc) cost money and are generally and quietly (but never publicly) ignored if those cut-corners measure could be done, until accidents happen.
DeleteWhile I agree that Indon pilots do not have a reputation for safe flying due to the nature and history of their flying training ( in fact I do not want to fly on planes flown by Indon pilots) I must say Malaysian pilots espeically those trained or had served on the RMAF are good pilots.