Article by Terry Tozer
Click here for update posted on publication of the preliminary incident report 17th March
| The fatal crash of a regional airliner at Cork last week is the repetition of a sad and unnecessary sequence of events. We won't know the detail as yet of course, as no investigator will publish hard information until they have examined every angle, but we know enough to see what the background events were that set this flight up for an accident before it even took off. Manx2 is not an airline - some call it a virtual airline - it is a ticket selling business that contracts out its flights to at least three subcontractor airlines in this case Flightline BCN based in Barcelona. These airlines are at the very bottom of the food chain in the commercial airline world. They have various contracts that pay the minimum amount possible, requiring day and night operations, often in elderly unsophisticated aircraft, and flown by relatively inexperienced crews of multiple nationalities. It is the bottom rung of the career ladder and an unpleasant place for a pilot to be. This is not the first fatal crash that Flightline BCN have had. In this case the aircraft in use is an uncommon type with demanding handling characteristics and, given that no simulator would be available for crew training, we can assume that the training given to this crew would be restricted to what it is safe to do in a real aircraft ie, pretty limited. My own experience of airlines of this type tells me that it was likely to be the minimum training necessary to be legal, simply because training costs money. This will be a very basic operation indeed and in this case neither pilot had a great deal of experience either on type or in total. The obstacles to a safe operation that all this added to their day is considerable, and yet there may be even more. They were of different nationalities a Spanish captain on his first revenue flight after promotion and a British first officer (co-pilot) and so the cultural and linguistic differences may not have helped the operation; we may discover more about this once the voice recorder is examined. The aircraft had been flying much of the night carrying mail bags; were these pilots the same crew? If so they must have been feeling pretty jaded by the time of the crash and possibly excessively tired. Were they under pressure from their company in any way? For example to carry minimum fuel, thus limiting their options? We dont know but it would not be an unfamiliar pressure if this were to be so. I understand that their employer (Flightline BCN) would have been liable for the costs of any diversion, rather than Manx2 who the passengers purchased their tickets from. This seems a highly questionable practice if true, as it adds yet more pressure to pilots already carrying a heavy burden. The authorities have said that the aircraft appears to have been functioning normally prior to the crash and so one must assume there were other factors. If I were to speculate, I would wonder if tired, multinational and inexperienced crew, who were possibly under pressure contributed to events. Certainly there is no obvious reason why a serviceable aircraft would have any problems in the weather at the time. If the weather was below acceptable limits for landing and, if holding overhead whilst awaiting an improvement was not an option, then normal practice would be to divert to an alternative destination where the weather is good. This is a daily issue for professional pilots and not a drama under normal circumstances, unless there are other factors at play. This episode has the hallmarks of a similar fatality at Buffalo airport, New York in February 2009, in which a commuter aircraft crashed on approach. Ostensibly a Continental Airlines flight it was flown by a subcontractor with a crew of limited experience on type. The US authorities appear to have noticed on that occasion, albeit rather belatedly, and have taken some action. It is a disgrace that such operations exist, given that professional pilots have known of these elephant traps for years, yet the regulators and governments consistently allow commercial priorities to rule where common sense dictates otherwise. My reluctant prediction is that nothing will change as a result of this accident; it never has before. |