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| 7/23/2007 | Smoke in cockpit is fairly common, pilots say | Smoke in cockpit is fairly common, pilots say
Smoke and hot gas were flooding into the cockpit of John Cox's small private plane.
"The engine heating system was overheating and started blasting smoke, oil and hot gas into the airplane," the pilot recalled. "There was a fair amount of smoke and it was hot and we needed to return to land. I declared an emergency.
"We landed, and a fire truck chased us out on the runway."
It was Montgomery, Ala., 1973. But the landing burns in Cox's memory. So do the other times he had to make emergency landings because of smoke in the cockpit.
There were the two times, as a commercial pilot, he was flying 737s full of passengers when galley fires broke out. Vents in the ovens used to warm food shorted, creating smoke.
Then, there was the time he was flying a twin-engine Piper, similar to the Cessna 310R that crashed in Sanford July 10, when he could see a fire in one engine. He was diverted to another airport and landed safely.
"I took a sailing class one time and the instructor said there is no worse place to have a fire than on a wooden ship," Cox said. "I thought, no there are two worse places: a wooden ship and an airplane."
Cox, an airline safety consultant in Washington, D.C., and other pilots don't think enough is being done to combat the problem of smoke in the cockpits of airplanes. As the former chairman of the Air Line Pilots Association International's safety committee, he and other pilots tried to push Congress into requiring cockpit smoke detection and safety devices on planes.
Cox said FAA figures show in-flight fires, smoke or fumes account for three precautionary landings of airplanes a day.
Smoke in the cockpit is so common that pilots even have a name for it: "burnt toast." Usually a pilot can find the source of the smoke and get rid of it -- much like unplugging the toaster at home -- but if not, smoke can have tragic consequences.
As federal investigators continue to search for the cause of the Sanford crash, they do know the pilot's call for an emergency landing was triggered by smoke in the cockpit.
Reports of smoke in cockpits are daily occurrences, but few result in crashes, said Robert Sumwalt, vice chairman of the National Transportation Administration, referring to the Sanford crash.
"The mystery here is what was burning with enough intensity to put smoke in cockpit," said Edward Booth Jr., a Jacksonville aviation attorney. "Usually if it is an electrical short, you can shut off the master switch and open the window. But there is something unusual here, like engine oil feeding the fire."
For pilots, smoke in the cockpit is the symptom of a problem, as in "where there's smoke, there's fire."
"Burnt toast is not that thick of a smoke, but any time you've got a burnt toast source that gets enough fuel, it can become a dense and continuous smoke," said Jonathan Parker, whose company EVAS Worldwide makes smoke protection devices.
The Daytona Beach News-Journal analyzed 184,516 reports in the FAA's Accidents and Incidents database between 1973 and June 25, 2007 to determine the most common causes of smoke in the cockpit. Smoke in the cockpit was reported in 742 accidents/incidents, causing 22 deaths and 89 injuries. The smoke was caused most often by electrical power problems.
An analysis of data on Cessna 310s, showed six reports mentioning smoke in the cockpit, including three on 310Rs.
The smoke was caused by problems with the heating and communications systems and the DC regulator on the plane's generator or alternator. No one died in those cases.
Cox said the Cessna 310R is not known as being "prone to fire."
Pilots are trained to deal with smoke because it is so common. Some fear the pilots who died in Sanford, Dr. Bruce Kennedy and Michael Klemm, simply had too little time -- two minutes from the time they reported the smoke until the plane dropped off of radar -- to do much. Or, they may have been rendered unconscious by the smoke.
"If you get an electrical fire, you shut off the master switch, but plastics, radios, transmitters and transformers can burn toxic fumes that would incapacitate you in a minute," said Max Berger, an experienced pilot and Cessna 310R owner in Port Orange.
Cox and other pilots would like to see airplane manufacturers required to install EVAS, which stands for Emergency Vision Assurance Systems, on all planes. The system allows pilots to see flight instruments through thick smoke in the cockpit. The device displaces smoke in the cockpit and inflates to cover the plane's windshield and instruments. Pilots lean their faces against the EVAS and can breathe through a filtered system so they won't lose consciousness.
The EVAS system, which is approved and certified by the FAA, is not required on all aircraft. It is not known whether the NASCAR plane included such a system.
There's no way to say whether the system would have saved the lives of the pilots or the three killed on the ground in Sanford, Cox said. No one will ever know. | |
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| 7/2/2007 | AOPA Air Safety Foundation To Release 'Glass Cockpit' Safety Report | AOPA Air Safety Foundation To Release 'Glass Cockpit' Safety Report
Aims To Show Benefits, Challenges Of Technologically Advanced Aircraft So-called "glass cockpit" aircraft deliver multiple safety benefits to general aviation (GA) pilots and have fueled industry growth, but pilot training must still evolve to address the safety challenges posed by Technologically Advanced Aircraft (TAA), according to a soon-to-be-released study of accident data by the AOPA Air Safety Foundation.
"TAA are neither as good as proponents say nor as bad as detractors contend," said AOPA Air Safety Foundation Executive Director Bruce Landsberg at M5, the fifth annual fly-in of the Cirrus Owners and Pilots Association (COPA). "These aircraft provide situational awareness tools that have dramatically improved aspects of GA safety. But those tools are not enough to overcome a pilot's faulty decision-making or a lack of experience in how those aircraft are operated."
Set to be released in July, the study analyzed accidents that occurred between 2003 and 2006 of new and existing aircraft designs that were outfitted with a glass cockpit. Manufacturers included Beech, Cessna, Cirrus, Columbia, Diamond, Mooney and New Piper. The study updates an earlier report published in 2004.
Landsberg said that industry excitement over TAA has reinvigorated GA aircraft sales and attracted more people to learn to fly. The new study finds that some TAA capabilities such as a moving map, fuel management systems and widescreen attitude indicator displays have helped to substantially reduce fuel management and maneuvering flight accidents as compared to aircraft equipped with traditional �ǣsteam gauge��� instrumentation.
However, the report shows that TAA fare worse than the non-TAA fleet in areas including landing and go-around accidents related to the high-performance aerodynamic design of many new aircraft. TAA accident data also were up to three times worse than the non-TAA fleet in weather-related accidents due in part to how many relatively new pilots use TAA in a wider range of conditions. The study found that weather-related accidents accounted for nearly 45 percent of all glass cockpit fatal accidents compared to 16 percent for the GA fleet.
"These accidents are not the fault of the airplane," said Landsberg. "As the famed aviator Antoine de Saint Exupery said, 'The machine does not isolate us from the great problems of nature but plunges us more deeply into them.' Instead, we as an industry are still playing catch-up on the training aspects of TAA. We are making progress but we don't yet have all of the tools."
Among the training challenges are teaching new pilots to be informed and efficient "systems managers" in addition to having sound "stick-and-rudder" skills and in using capabilities such as terrain proximity and datalink weather displays without becoming overly reliant on the technology.
"TAA are a continuing positive evolution, but not a revolution, in GA," said Landsberg. "TAA can give us better knowledge of the nature of flying. But the technology is not a panacea because human nature is still alive and well. We are addressing some fundamental issues in GA training but there is a lot more to be done."
The AOPA Air Safety Foundation is the world's largest non-profit GA safety organization. It was founded in 1950 solely to help general aviation pilots improve flight safety. ASF produces live seminars, online interactive courses, training DVDs, written Safety Advisors and other aviation safety materials for free distribution to all GA pilots.
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| 7/1/2007 | Jetliner safety bill fueled by TWA 800 fuel tank explosion | Jetliner safety bill fueled by Flight 800
Nearly 11 years after a fuel tank exploded on TWA Flight 800, killing 230 people off the South Shore of Long Island, a congressional committee voted yesterday to force the Federal Aviation Administration to act to prevent similar explosions.
The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee added language to the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act that would require the federal government to make so-called inerting systems standard equipment on commercial airlines.
If passed by the full Congress, the FAA would have to require the installation of the safety equipment on the nation's commercial fleet to begin by the end of the year [CORRECTION: An article Friday about congressional legislation that would require commercial aircraft to be fitted with fuel-tank safety equipment misstated when the changes would have to begin. The legislation would mandate only that the Federal Aviation Administration publish rules by the end of the year requiring the equipment, according to an FAA spokesman.
"Flight 800 was a tragedy, but to knowingly let it happen again would be an even greater tragedy," said Rep. Tim Bishop (D-Southampton), a key supporter of the legislation. "There have been two other accidents involving fuel tank explosions, and while there is no predicting whether it will happen again, prudence would demand that we impose a solution."
A vote on the House bill is expected later this summer. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) has introduced similar legislation in the Senate.
In August 2000 the National Transportation Safety Board found that an explosion in Flight 800's emptying the center fuel tank led to the jumbo jet's disintegration.
The board recommended that commercial jets be fitted with a system that replaces explosive air in partially empty fuel tanks with an inert gas.
But although U.S. military planes - including Air Force One - are required to have these systems on board, the FAA so far has not required them of commercial jetliners.
At a hearing last September, FAA associate administrator Nick Sabatini said the safety measure would become a requirement by this September.
But Bishop said the FAA had promised action before, and he wanted language that would hold the FAA to a schedule. | |
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| 6/24/2007 | EASA to demand more legroom for passengers | Cologne, Germany - The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) said Monday it planned to force airlines to offer more legroom to economy-class passengers, pointing out that customers are getting both taller and fatter.
Most airlines offer the cheapest class of seats with a a pitch, or distance from one seat edge to the matching edge in front, of only 80 centimetres, a spokeswoman said at EASA's office in the German city of Cologne.
The agency will insist that pitch is a safety issue because tight seats could hamper emergency evacuations. EASA prescribes that all occupants must be able to leave a plane using slides within 90 seconds.
It will also cite health grounds, with a lack of leg movement blamed for a greater risk of deep-vein thrombosis. Seat pitch is chosen by airlines when they buy planes.
The ordnance, which would follow consultations with planemakers and other nations' agencies, would affect any airlines flying to Europe.
'Our aim is to settle it in 2008 or even to incorporate it by then in plane-construction guidelines,' the spokeswoman said.
This would make greater legroom for all mandatory in both Airbus and Boeing airliners.
EASA could only enforce the rule for existing planes if its authority were increased. | |
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| 6/24/2007 | In-flight mobile gets air-safety green light | In-flight mobile gets air-safety green light
Go-ahead paves way for mobile phones on planes from July
The European air-safety body has given the green light for airborne GSM equipment to be fitted by airlines planning to allow passengers to use mobile phones in-flight.
The launch of in-flight mobile services by several airlines had been hit by delays in the award of the safety certificate by the European Aviation Safety Authority. Air France will now be the first airline to install the GSM equipment on an A318 Airbus short-haul aircraft and is due to start offering the service from July.
For the first three months of the six-month Air France trial passengers will only be able to use the connectivity for data, such as text messaging or sending emails from a BlackBerry or similar device. For the second three months passengers will be able to use their mobiles to make voice calls during a flight.
Later this year UK airline BMI and TAP of Portugal will also trial the in-flight mobile technology on a single aircraft before any wider deployment. No-frills airline Ryanair will be the first fleet deployment of the technology across its Boeing 737 planes.
The in-flight mobile technology has been developed by OnAir, a joint venture between Airbus and airline industry IT body Sita. The on-board equipment incorporates technology from Tenzing, the company that pioneered in-flight email, while Inmarsat will be providing the satellite communications.
A picocell located on board the Airbus aircraft will pick up mobile phone signals via a 'leaky cable' antenna running along the length of the plane. The signal is then converted, sent to a satellite and routed to the ground network. The service is expected to initially cost between $2.30 and $2.50 for making in-flight calls. For texts and emails, no formal pricing plan has been released by the airlines.
OnAir CEO Benoit Debains said in a statement: "This certification validates the integrity of the work that Airbus has done in developing and integrating technology from best of breed suppliers. This... is a major milestone in the process of bringing our service to market." | |
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