Comments on: Human Factors: Crossair Flight 850

By: Fear of Landing » PULL UP PULL UP: Garuda Indonesia flight GA200 in Yogyakarta

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 09:11:26 +0000

[...] Human Factors: Crossair Flight 850 [...]

By: John Koch

John Koch — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 09:28:03 +0000

Nice article.Being a pilot is a difficult profession. It really needs a good training in a good training center to avoid some errors especially in landing. Landing is the most dangerous moment for any pilot.

By: Anna

Anna — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 11:44:10 +0000

A further thing that comes out of the accident report (which I just didnâ€™t have the space to include) is that the pilots had not had any training on decision-making skills. The report doesnâ€™t cite this as a cause but clearly they felt it was a contributing factor to the initial failure to gather more information.

Surely under JAR-Ops, CrossAir crew would have been given CRM training, which involves Decision Making as part of its core curriculum. I wonder how the airline failed to give such basic and legally required training to their flight crew.

The last report I read with this much of a SNAFU was the British Midland 737 crash at Kegworth, which was the final nail that got the CAA (then JAA) onto CRM in the first place.

It makes me want to weep that twenty two years on, some lessons still haven’t been learnt.

By: Sylvia

Sylvia — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 18:36:25 +0000

Gwen, I couldn’t help but think how easy it seemed for it all to start snowballing. It makes me feel a bit better about my obsessive overplanning, though! ;)

By: Sylvia

Sylvia — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 18:32:56 +0000

I can only imagine the pilotsâ€™ momentary relief at finally landing safely turning to sheer horror when they spotted the earth wall coming up fast.

Yeah, I wince just thinking about it.

A further thing that comes out of the accident report (which I just didn’t have the space to include) is that the pilots had not had any training on decision-making skills. The report doesn’t cite this as a cause but clearly they felt it was a contributing factor to the initial failure to gather more information.

By: Gwen

Gwen — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 18:29:33 +0000

Given the massive amount of misinformation and confused communication, it’s amazing that they all walked away from this one. Thanks for sharing – good reminder to know the weather, know the alternates, and to remember that it’s always on the pilot to make the safest decision!

By: Anna

Anna — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 17:58:46 +0000

So often, the cause of an accident isn’t one catastrophic failure, but a whole series of small failures that add up to something significant. This was a really fascinating read demonstrating not only a series of breakdowns in communication, but an apparent lack of CRM leading to loss of situational awareness. It’s incredible that after all that, only one person was injured.

I can only imagine the pilots’ momentary relief at finally landing safely turning to sheer horror when they spotted the earth wall coming up fast.

Thanks for sharing this.