Passengers on Qatar Airways flight to Dublin hit by extreme turbulence
Twelve people were hurt in the incident, eight of whom were taken to hospital upon landing in Dublin with shocked travellers describing how flight attendants were tossed into the airwww.dailymail.co.uk
2 in one week now
There were also 100,000s of flights that flew without issues.Passengers on Qatar Airways flight to Dublin hit by extreme turbulence
Twelve people were hurt in the incident, eight of whom were taken to hospital upon landing in Dublin with shocked travellers describing how flight attendants were tossed into the airwww.dailymail.co.uk
2 in one week now
I spent the first 20 year's of my working building Aero engines at Rolls Royce...but am terrified of flying as a result of a horrible night flight back from Italy years ago.At a push I will do a 2 hour holiday flight but that's my limit.
Funnily enough my eldest Daughter who lives in Sydney and is with us right now loves flying and takes numerous internal flights in Aus for her job....she pesters me constantly to visit Australia but I've told her I would need to be put under for the duration of the flight !!!.
Really bad thunderstorm and horrendous turbulence, felt that death was imminent .What happened if you dont mind me asking? Feel for you with your daughter being so far away and you having a fear of flying
I’d imagine you could get something off the doctor to help you out. I find the larger planes have much less turbulence and you don’t feel everything as you do on the smaller Ryanair type planes.Really bad thunderstorm and horrendous turbulence, felt that death was imminent .
Luckily we can "face time" regularly these days so it's easy to keep in touch,plus I have another Daughter and Sons locally so not all bad... hadn't seen her in the flesh for five years,not too ashamed to admit I cried when she arrived at our house last week.
The first time I flew I was really looking forward to it, grabbed a window seat and then spent much of the flight trying not to have a panic attack. I'm perfectly fine if the plane is close to the ground and I can make things out but as soon as I'm above the clouds, no ta. I spent the entire holiday dreading coming back and 15 years later I can't see myself doing it again.
On the subject, why are flights exponentially more expensive than 5 years ago? Appreciate inflation etc but I could get a flight to Spain for £60 or so, now generally £250+.
I nearly passed out buying our flights for Florida for the six weeks in august. Haven’t been for 10+ years. Economy class too. Staggering tbh.
It’s absolutely fucking insane at the momentOn the subject, why are flights exponentially more expensive than 5 years ago? Appreciate inflation etc but I could get a flight to Spain for £60 or so, now generally £250+.
On the subject, why are flights exponentially more expensive than 5 years ago? Appreciate inflation etc but I could get a flight to Spain for £60 or so, now generally £250+.
I'm sure there'd be the excuse of environmental impact and paying to offset the damage, but it'd be bullshit. It's profiteering for shareholder benefit.It’s absolutely fucking insane at the moment
A lot of these companies that lost money during the pandemic are now just on a money grab to make up for it
The preliminary report into the incident is out: Transport Safety Investigation Bureau Preliminary Investigation Findings of Incident Involving SQ321The information being released is pretty amateur, so I am just coming up with realistic theories based on the data and also what people have said (which is interesting as most people are clueless about flying, even the ones on the plane it happened with, so it isn't really reliable). That said, a few things don't match up. Going by one passenger's own account, people got hurt and were doing cartwheels during the '6000 ft drop' (which was part of the actual descent) this was after the so called severe turbulence. Looking at the data, the pilot-instructed descent happened 14 minutes after this period of severe turbulence (where the flight bounced around quite badly for a minute or two - and it did according to FR24 data). Another passenger has also said that this wasn't too bad however.
Singapore Airlines will know exactly what has happened, but the fact they aren't saying anything useful whilst the media are getting things wrong or giving the microphone to unqualified people is a bit suspicious at worst, frustrating at best. There's potentially some criticism coming the way of the airline or flight crew, and given that they have a fatality, are probably being appropriately quiet.
Another factor is that the altitude and vertical speed (which was pretty typical for a B777) may not paint such a full picture over a shorter period of time, especially in an area where ADS-B coverage isn't great (this is what Fight Radar 24 uses). Spikes happen regularly, for example, and their blog is always full of people posting stuff about planes dropping out of the sky, when in actual fact there was a lag or poor data for moments here or there.
I still suspect something is off about this. 'One dies during turbulence' doesn't sit right with me, especially as it seems like he had a heart attack. Either the diversion was attempted due to medical emergency aggressively without much warning to the passengers (which caused the wreck to the cabin and the actual turbulence is a bit of a red herring), or simply the turbulence was actually bad, but the weather should have been clear, but not acted upon and avoided. I'll be watching it unfold with interest!
The preliminary report into the incident is out: Transport Safety Investigation Bureau Preliminary Investigation Findings of Incident Involving SQ321
Seems the decision to divert the plane wasn’t taken until after the bad turbulence, so I don’t see how the theory of the pilot being to blame holds up. The plane was on autopilot at the time and “likely” flying over some rough weather.
Think that’s a little harsh re: the seatbelt sign! They switched it on 11 seconds after encountering the first bit of turbulence (which caused a “slight vibration”), and before the main turbulence event. Of course, with the main event happening eight seconds later, it didn’t leave much time at all for people to react! But I don’t know how easily/early the flight deck can predict these things.The report doesn't really say anything we don't already know. The key points I was making previously were that one possible option was that the plane may not have routed around bad weather (in many circumstances even flying above it can also be dangerous due to updrafts from cumulonimbus clouds). Given the access to weather charts and the level of technology there is, saying it was 'likely' flying over some rough weather is a massive red flag for me. I would say that almost certainly means it was, and having checked the playback, it was.
Some other key points:
- They disengaged the autopilot to stabilize the aircraft, this probably made things worse
- The seatbelt sign was not on when the plane first hit the turbulence. Given that they were flying over bad weather, that is pilot error not to also switch the seatbelt sign on (not to mention routing round the weather)
- The diversion was instructed 14-17 minutes after the turbulence - (not that it makes any difference on the end result, but that's incredibly slow). Aviate, navigate, communicate is the correct process, but over that time span is a bit questionable.
The second point is key here. If bad weather was not appropriately avoided, the correct protocols were not followed in order to keep the passengers safe (that's seatbelts). They can confuse the media and public pretty easily, but I think the flight crew take some responsibility here.
Think that’s a little harsh re: the seatbelt sign! They switched it on 11 seconds after encountering the first bit of turbulence (which caused a “slight vibration”), and before the main turbulence event. Of course, with the main event happening eight seconds later, it didn’t leave much time at all for people to react! But I don’t know how easily/early the flight deck can predict these things.
Also I’m not sure you’re right on the timing of the diversion - the descent was initiated 17 minutes after the turbulence, not the decision to divert. It’s not clear from this report exactly when the decision to divert was made, but it comes before the pilot’s descent.
Either way, I think these initial findings cast serious doubt on any suspicions you had that it was actually the pilot’s decision to divert the plane rather than the turbulence itself that caused the damage to the cabin, right?
With respect, you don't know what you are talking about.
The flight deck can and should have spotted the weather, they didn't, or they choose to fly 'through' it and didn't put the seatbelt sign on in advance enough. During this period of the flight, it is pretty quiet, the crew aren't that busy - so it's pretty inexcusable and asks further questions of their attentiveness.
The timing of the diversion was slow, as I said, it probably doesn't make a huge difference to the end result, but given the route to Singapore they were on, they had to make corrections to their course as well as a decent; neither of these things happened until the timings pointed out by both myself, the report, and the FR24 data. Of course, air traffic control could have been napping and slow to react, but that's almost certainly not the case.
I'm not sure what you are on about in point three really, I provided a couple of theories based on the data at the time, and one of them is almost certainly correct at this point regarding the weather and the way they handled it. The theory that an aggressive descent caused it was something that was being said by multiple passengers onboard, who turned out to not know what they were talking about. I pointed this out in my statement and alluded to the vertical speed that was being used in the descent as normal, and made this clear. However, combine the passenger statements alongside the caveat that the ADS-B data may not be 100% accurate, and it was an early credible theory.
I know you are trying very hard for a 'gotcha' moment, but you are coming across as very uneducated in this area.
You're definitely getting offered out for a charity boxing match........I assume with all this you are a commercial pilot or ATC yourself?
You're definitely getting offered out for a charity boxing match........
Just dont understand how anyone can say 'you dont know what you're talking about' on aviation unless you're an actual pilot of at least a 737
Yes, I am. Not a 737, but I am a qualified private pilot. Commercially rated on instrument too for a few other type aircraft, but it is a long story.
My bad experiences flying were on the flight deck. Can't really go into it as it has hung over me for years and I didn't really want to say anything, but it is really frustrating seeing some SBT experts trying to pull the same shit they usually do on a subject like this though. This isn't the Brexit or sack the manager thread.
No, I'm not going to call you out for a boxing match, but I will frown anyone who peddles shit on here trying to sound clever when everything they write is literal evidence they don't have a clue.
Off the back of the bad experiences does it put you off flying completely now?