PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Discuss issues and news related to PIA, Pakistani airlines and Pakistan's civil & military aviation.
Frostbite
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Frostbite »

I agree with AB7 that it seems some vital information was not being shared with ATC by the cockpit crew. Let's assume that if landing gear issue was intimated to ATC by the cockpit crew then as per SOP and a precautionary measure, ATC would have had emergency services deployed on standby even if the intention was to just conduct a low fly past for landing gear observation purpose. The crash survivor (M. Zubair) has also stated on record that the only a routine landing announcement was made prior to first attempt. I would imagine that the crew would have passengers in brace position and cabin prepared for an emergency landing as a precautionary measure. One can deduce from the afore mentioned sequence that even if there was a landing gear malfunction, the flight crew chose to withhold that information from both ATC and passengers. A recent example: Virgin Atlantic flight VS43 bound for Las Vegas with a malfunctioning nose landing gear had to return to LGW and make an Emergency landing in December, 2014. This incident was covered live by UK news channels and the passengers were kept informed all the way and properly prepared for an emergency landing which turned out to be a success and no casualties were reported.

The hot and high descent cannot be ignored. As this lead to increased workload in the cockpit during the approach. The missing piece at the moment is if the first landing attempt occured with gear up. The fact that both engines managed scrape the runway further strengthens this gear up theory. The absence of landing gear lead the engines to be the only surfaces of the doomed plane that came in contact with the tarmac. My money is on the landing gear totally being forgotten among the chaos of catching up with the baulked approach. It only dawned upon the flight crew when the only parts of the aircraft that came into contact with terra firma was not actually the landing gear but the engine pods.

Rest of the events that eventually lead to the crash after the botched Go Around attempt are more easier to piece together.

To a vast degree I agree with SM and Inam855's comments on here. Gilgit ATR and the more recent LHR -ISB B777 radio silence incidents come to mind where both had the potential to be catastrophic. The latter incident suddenly became overshadowed by Covid-19 allowing the culprits to.almost get away with it. I hear that an enquiry is still ongoing. Both PIA and CAA are notorious for delaying tactics. They tend to take advantage of the fact that we tend to have short memories and yesterday's news very quickly becomes out of fashion. If the culprits responsible were punished accordingly and made an example of then probably we would not have seen repeat incidents of negligence and unnecessary loss of innocent lives and equipment. Same analogy can be used for the national cricket team. If the big fish were banned for life during the 90's the later generation of cricketers would have thought twice about going down the spot fixing route.

Findings from the CVR should be published without delay. As this would certainly help ascertain what lead to the hot and and high approach to start off with which unleashed a series of irreversible events that eventually lead to the tragic crash.
nopy99
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by nopy99 »

Updated analysis posted from Blancolirio on Youtube. His updated theory is that the gearboxs may have been damaged during the ground scrape impact, ultimately leading to engine failures during the second landing attempt.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFhGnCOtcc8&t=25s

Jamshed
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Jamshed »

Why some forum members are getting personal and judgmental about everything?

Stay calm, and wait for the investigation to complete. Yes, you have right to discuss the available information, evidence(s) etc but not to point your finger directly towards anyone not here to defend. Human errors are the part of aviation industry, even at Airbus, Boeing and NASA too.

Believe me, the people handling/investigating with this tragic accident are more professionals than the forum members.
H Khan
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by H Khan »

Could any please post the profiles of the deceased pilots: how many hours on the equipment and if anyone of them came from the AF
H Khan
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by H Khan »

At present, I feel that there were multiple humans errors.

Also, I have zero trust on those four air force investigators.
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Abbas Ali
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Abbas Ali »

Captain Sajjad Gul had joined PIA in 1996, according to PTV News.

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Valuables including currency notes, mobile devices and jewelry recovered from crash site handed over to PIA by Pakistan Rangers.

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Abbas
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umar744
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by umar744 »

Please tell PIA please do NOT buy or lease A320CEO NO more because A320CEO is rubbish but I have been flew A320CEO many times other airlines. New A320NEO upgraded new engines & new cockpit better than old A320CEO. Please tell me how how how did PIA old 737-300 NEVER crash except AP-BEH & AP-BCE safely landed wheels damaged.never mind it happened accidentally
pk363
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by pk363 »

DA

Why their hasn’t been any statement from Airbus and the engines manufacturer do far? And how they can constitute an investigation board without including these two critical stakeholders?

The composition of the investigation board is already being questioned by PALPA and other sensibles, which is all PAF without any commercial aviation representation?

https://www.dawn.com/news/1559253/quest ... omposition
Inam855
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Inam855 »

pk363 wrote: Sun May 24, 2020 5:13 am DA

Why their hasn’t been any statement from Airbus and the engines manufacturer do far? And how they can constitute an investigation board without including these two critical stakeholders?

The composition of the investigation board is already being questioned by PALPA and other sensibles, which is all PAF without any commercial aviation representation?

https://www.dawn.com/news/1559253/quest ... omposition
A representative from the manufacturer is always included in the final report & findings, just because it hasn't been announced yet due to any number of reasons, no need to make assumptions.

Reservations aside, I would also like to question PALPA's role and steps to strengthen the civil aviation accident investigation infrastructure and what time they have spent constructively contributing to the country's aviation industry. Have they produced a dozen, leave that a handful of accident investigators from their ranks? Do they encourage pilots to be trained for management roles/accident investigation roles? Name ONE single PUBLIC event that PALPA has organized to enhance safety in the past 2, 5, 10, years?

Lastly, a person without any so called commercial aviation experience has managed to turn around the airline (on paper at least). For the first time, cash flows are positive and things are looking up. Something must be working since many thriving on benefits from PIA are now shouting with anger and demanding the death of the air marshal on this very forum. We all know what a fine job the 30+ year commercial airline experienced captains did at the helm of things. If the government trusts these 4 officials' skills and knowledge to investigate, and they have sufficient credentials, then let them do their job.
Last edited by Inam855 on Sun May 24, 2020 6:52 am, edited 1 time in total.
AA
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by AA »

I would like to try and share some of what I know about the A320, to the best of my memory - please do keep in mind I can be completely wrong.

1. It is not possible to forget to extend the landing gear on an A320 aircraft. If the plane detects you are trying to land and the landing gear is not yet extended, there is an unmissable warning well in advance to alert you to that fact. I believe this would be a repetitive aural alert “too low gear, too low gear”.

2. The warning bell heard in the background during the Pilots missed approach transmission is not a warning bell specific to an unsafe landing gear scenario. It is a generic warning bell known as a ‘Master Warning’, alerting you to a major fault or failure on the aircraft. It is not unique to any one particular system.

3. In an Airbus when you perform a missed approach after having touched down already and you are still accelerating down the runway, you will hear the Master Warning bell (“ding ding ding ding...”) because the flaps are in the landing configuration and the plane detects you want to take-off. You can still take-off but the warning bell is very distracting and can grab most of your attention.

4. There have been some reports of a bounced landing followed by an early retraction of the landing gear, causing the engines to impact the ground. On an A320 plane, there is a weight-on-wheels switch. If you try to retract the landing gear while the struts of the landing gear are compressed (weight-on-wheels), the landing gear will not retract and will remain extended. This is a safety feature to prevent someone inadvertently raising the landing gear when the plane is on the ground. In order to successfully retract the landing gear, the wheels would have to be off the ground at that particular moment.

I would be glad to try and answer any other questions anyone might have. My knowledge is rusty so forgive me if I say something that is not accurate. I’m happy to be corrected on anything.
Inam855
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Inam855 »

Jamshed wrote: Sun May 24, 2020 12:37 am Why some forum members are getting personal and judgmental about everything?

Stay calm, and wait for the investigation to complete. Yes, you have right to discuss the available information, evidence(s) etc but not to point your finger directly towards anyone not here to defend. Human errors are the part of aviation industry, even at Airbus, Boeing and NASA too.

Believe me, the people handling/investigating with this tragic accident are more professionals than the forum members.
Jamshed, no one is pointing fingers, what everyone (on and off this forum) is pointing out is very basic deduction based on the available evidence. Thank you for acknowledging the human factors element.
Flyer1015
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Flyer1015 »

A lot of armchair quarterbacking in this thread the last several pages. Curious, how many of you are actual airline pilots?
Inam855
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Inam855 »

Flyer1015 wrote: Sun May 24, 2020 6:51 am A lot of armchair quarterbacking in this thread the last several pages. Curious, how many of you are actual airline pilots?
That is what happens on internet forums, all members are free to discuss Their thoughts and possible scenarios with each other.

I didn't realize being a pilot was a requirement for doing that, but since it seems to be a requirement for everything other than landing an airplane and reading a checklist in Pakistan, then I will share I have been a proud pilot in the US & the Middle East for 12 years now. I also teach air accident investigation and human factors at a four-year college if that serves any purpose.
rvlhassan
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by rvlhassan »

What I don't understand is the need for swearing and arguing...
We are all supposed to be on the same page here, trying to figure out what happened to those 99 passengers and crew
Inam855
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Re: PIA Lahore to Karachi Airbus A320 Flight Crashes

Post by Inam855 »

Just heard PIA spokesperson and thought I'd update:

1. Landing gear was NOT partially/fully deployed on the first approach

2. SOP for any emergency/anomaly was not announced/declared by the crew.

3. The pilot was "most likely" not "mentally prepared" for a belly landing and went around upon the realization that the engines were scraping the runway.

I'd just like to add that IF the spokesperson is to be believed, then the CRC/Master Caution was likely not due to HYD failure but due to a possible overspeed caused by excessive RoD. This can then be taken further: in an effort to cancel the repeated overspeed warning, perhaps - just perhaps - the MLG config warning was also cancelled/overlooked.
Last edited by Inam855 on Sun May 24, 2020 7:56 am, edited 1 time in total.