Varifrank: Flight 1549 and the A320 flight simulator

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Flight 1549 and the A320 flight simulator

From the BBC via Charles Martin:

I spent a big part of the weekend studying the A320 Pilot Manual and running simulations on a PC based flight simulator. I found the exercise to be a fantastic learning exercise for the novice pilot, such as myself. I am in no way cockpit qualified for any aircraft of this complexity, but the flight simulator and the checklists in the pilot manual helped to make clear the sort of decisions that the flight crew were faced with when their aircraft became a glider over the bronx.

So the big question for some of you is "Was I able to land the A320 on the Hudson"? Well, it took 10 attempts for me to just finish the engine out checklists before I hit the ground, so I think I will be hanging on to my day job for awhile. After I was more familiar with the procedures I was able to complete the checklists and still have altitude enough to safely land, which I defined as being at slightly below stall speed on the Hudson itself. I started the exercise by departing LGA and at 3,000 ft, pulled power to simulate the strike. At that point I began to run through the "Engine out and relight" checklists. With practice and effort, I eventually settled out at about 1,600 ft. on the other side of the Bronx.

Its my opinion based on my little tests that there was no way they could have made it back to land at LGA and I think that had the strike occurred at any lower altitude, even as little as 500 feet that there's really no way they could have made the water landing as it occurred, they would have ended up in some part of the Bronx or in the water off LGA, but certainly not the Hudson.

Where I deviated from the professional results that came from Flight 1549 is that I kept choosing to land north of the GW Bridge, rather than south towards Manhattan. By going north instead of south I was able to "land" without too much trouble, but in reality this choice would have resulted in half the passengers dying of exposure before their rescue. My raw inexperience and gut instincts told me that it was a bad idea to fly towards the congested city where their training, experience and professionalism told the crew that landing on the Hudson was only half the job, the second job was getting rescued after the ditching. The presence of the Ferrys on the river, which I looked at as a hazard, turned out to be exactly what the doctor ordered and made that choice far superior to all other options.

The lesson is now learned, and stored for future use...

Posted @ January 19, 2009 10:59 AM | Aviation