As a 747 pilot, seeing
something like this really hits close to home. And you're probably wondering how does this 747 end up in
the grass missing an engine? As pilots we do lots of training
in very expensive simulators and we spend months
in the schoolhouse just so we never
have this problem. And normally in these videos, I give you just my reaction
straight off of the facts of what I hear in the audio
or what I see in the video. But this one had something that didn't
really make sense that required me to do a little bit of research. And you'll see
what I mean later. Halifax tower good evening Sky
Cube 4854 heavy for the ILS 14 Sky Cube 4854 heavy
Halifax tower good day. Runway 14 wind 260 at 15 altimeter
29.67 information Tango number 1 Roger that, we have... Sky Cube 4854 heavy current
wind is 260 at 16 gusting 21. Just confirm runway
14 is still acceptable? Affirm, still for 14. You've heard me talk about
a crosswind landing before. That is when you see
a plane flying like this. This is a 747. As you can see, it's not going straight
towards the runway. It's coming at an angle. And that's because
there's a crosswind that's pushing it and making
the plane come in at an angle, which we call crabbing. Now that's something that we learned since
the very early days of flight school. But when a controller says this. Tower good day. Runway 14 wind 260 at 15
altimeter 29.67 information Tango number 1. My thought as a pilot is wow, 14 and 26? That's a big difference. Usually you want those
numbers to be very close together. Or if you have, me as a pilot, you want it to be
exactly the same number. If you're landing here on
runway 14 and the winds are 140, it's coming right down
the pipe as we say. But if you're landing runway 14, and the winds are coming
at 260, like it is right now, that means it's
coming from over here. You want the wind to be coming directly
at your nose because your plane doesn't care how fast it's actually
going across the ground. It cares how much air
is going over its wings. So in this scenario here
where the wind is coming 50 knots directly at
the nose of the plane, it means you can fly a little bit
slower as you're coming into land. And when you're
flying a big, heavy jet, you wanna be able to come in as slow
as possible because you wanna stop. That also means that if you're
flying with the wind coming from here, you're gonna have to be
flying extra fast over the ground, which means when you touch down, you're going faster than
you wanted to be going. My first thought, when I'm landing on a specific
runway and I hear a wind number that's significantly different from the
direction I'm planning to land is wow! That's a really big number. And while I didn't do
very well in high school, fancy math like trigonometry. I crushed it in third grade. So I know 26 minus 14 is 12, which means it's 120 degrees
off the nose of my plane. And that's not the
way I want to be landing. Also for those of you
that are wondering, no, this was not
me in third grade. I sadly don't look
that good in orange. Now you heard the controller
say information Tango, but listen to what the
response is from the pilot. Tower good day. Runway 14 wind 260 at 15
altimeter 29.67 information Tango number 1 Roger that, we have... He told the pilots that it
was information Tango. At the airports every hour,
they update the weather. And instead of giving a
time of when they did it, they just give a letter to it. That letter was Tango. So that way they can say
information Tango, instead of saying, Hey, the weather at this time, it just makes it easier. So he says, we have information Tango now and
you heard the pilot respond with nothing. Here's an example
that I pulled out of Miami. This is basically what
would print off in the plane. And you can see here at the very
beginning, it says information Echo. When you check in with the controller
and he says that the current information is Tango, but you know that that paper that you had
just printed off says Sierra on the top, when you check in
with him and he says, your current
information is Tango, your response is gonna
sound something like this. Roger that, we have... Usually as a pilot, you'll respond
and say something like, oh, let me grab Tango. And you just have to hit
a couple quick buttons. And there was a third pilot up
there so that pilot could have done it. But you would just get that
new weather generated right now with that information so you
can see if there's any changes. However, he
chose not to do that. Then you hear the controller verify
that runway 14 is still acceptable. Sky Cube 4854 the winds now
260 at 16 gusting 21. Just confirm runway
14 is still acceptable? You're landing
on a short runway. That's something
to be cautious of, but it's still
absolutely doable. But you have a
quartering tailwind. That should be a red flag. Then it just got windier. That's an even greater red flag. And you'll know because you've
already looked at this airport chart that you're on this very short runway and
there's a very long runway option there. Then the third red flag is when
the controller asks and hints Hey, are you sure that
14 still acceptable for you? That should be something
that you should be thinking: Okay. He's seeing something that I'm
not seeing but they just continue. Listen what happens next. Sky Cube 4854 heavy. Tower roger wind is 260
at 16 gusting 21, cleared to land runway 14. Cleared to land - cleared to land
runway 14 Sky Cube 4854 heavy Roger. Wind 250 at 15 gusting 21. First I wanna talk about
something that I don't think I've ever talked about
in any of these videos and that's this
noise right here. This is something that you'll
only typically hear in the US. Sometimes you'll
hear it in Canada. That double click is
basically an acknowledgment. Instead of saying roger
or okay or I understand, you'll do that double click. And that's your way of letting them
know you understood what they said. I don't think that
that's an official thing. You don't really hear
that anywhere else. I don't recommend you do it, but just because it happened there,
I thought I would explain it to you. Then you hear the controller update the
wind just as they're getting ready to land. Listen here. Wind 250 at 15 gusting 21. That's normally
something that you'll see when you have any type
of an adverse condition. Low visibility, really windy
gusty days, things like that. The controllers obviously want you to
be safe and successful in what you do, land your plane. So they're going to
update you. Not always. It's not something
that they have to do, but it's slow, I
guess at Halifax. So he's just giving
this pilot an updated, Hey, this is your current
weather condition. If the winds are calm or there's nothing
going on, they're not gonna do that. So that should be another
thing that you should be thinking. Why is he updating me
with the winds 15 gusting 21? He's probably saying, Hey, you have some adverse condition
that you're gonna be dealing with here in just a second. Watch what happens next. Sky Cube 4854 do you read? Halifax tower Sky Cube
4854 is off the runway. Requesting full
emergency assistance. Sky Cube 4854 roger
emergency has been activated. Ground south 52 you have the
crash emergency been activated? South 52 affirmative. What's the situation? Halifax... South 52, no response
from the pilot... Sky Cube 4854 requesting
full emergency support. Sky Cube 4854 ground say again? I've mentioned before that humans
are bad monitors of things and that's why plane manufacturers
do things like when the autopilot goes off, it makes an alarm. So on a Boeing plane, when the autopilot or the
auto throttle is turned off, whether done by the pilots or
the plane itself, it makes this sound. And they have that so just in case you have me as
your pilot staring out the window, which is something I love to do. And my teacher said I
would never get paid to do. But staring out the window, if your autopilot goes off,
then your plane has alerted you. Hey, this is something that. This is a noise that sounds
like it needs attention. Well, air traffic control
has the same thing. I don't know if you heard it. Listen to this clip. Sky Cube 4854 do you read? I think that's a
really cool feature. It's obviously something
that I never really get to hear, but just in case your
controller is busy or staring out the window
or playing on TikTok, something happens at his airport,
they're gonna be alerted to it. That noise sounds like, Hey,
you need to pay attention. But in this case, the pilot did the right thing. 4854 is off the runway. Requesting
full emergency assistance. The max tailwind a
commercial aircraft can have is usually about 10 to 15
knots depending on the plane and with the direction
that the wind is coming from and the gusts that
they're encountering, this plane is getting very close
to their max tailwind component. Something you never wanna
have is a very short runway and a very strong tailwind especially
when you have this big, long runway where the wind would
almost be off your nose. So why would they choose to
land on that very short runway? I will tell you my initial gut when
I first heard about this situation is that I thought possibly
they chose a shorter runway because it was
gonna be a shorter taxi. That's just, when I first heard about
it out on the line flying someone said, Hey dude, a 747 just went off the end
of the runway in Canada, I thought Really? How short was it? And then he said, oh, he
chose this really short runway but there was not a lot of
information of how it all came about, but my thought was maybe this
runway was closer to his parking, but as you can see, there's
no parking down here. Which made me think, why did they do this? Luckily for me, the Canadian investigation
team put together a nice little summary, which made it very easy for me
to see exactly what happened. Do you remember
when they checked in? And the controller said
information Tango is current. And the pilot said this. Roger that, we have... Well, that was because the
pilots only had information Sierra. And as you can guess,
information Sierra said, we're currently landing on runway
14 and we're taking off runway 23. And on information Tango, it said we're taking off
and landing on runway 23. So has it happened to me
when I'm getting close to land and the weather has changed
and they update me and they say, Hey, this is the current weather and I didn't have
it at that time? Absolutely. That's
absolutely happened. The smart thing you should do if you're
the one that's working on the radios at that time, and there's someone else
that's sitting behind you, like there was in
this case is tell them, get the weather. That lets them do something because
their job is there just to help you. One of the things about being
a pilot that is really important is your ability to delegate other
tasks that people that they can do. So that way, you as the pilot, who's talking on the radio can be as
focused of everything that's going on. And that third
person that's there, they're your assistant, but they need you to tell them, get the weather. So that person can
now get the weather, have a light on. Back behind there, there's a little
spot where you can look at some light because it's nighttime
when they're landing and say, Hey, this is the updated
information of the airport. Now that maybe something like no big changes or the new
barometric pressure is this, but that person back there, their job is to now
update both of you. Hey, this is a situation. And had that person
printed that off and he said, Hey, now they're
landing on runway 23. The crew could have said, okay, Hey, let's do that because we got a
quartering tailwind on a very short runway. Let's go to 23. That could have been and
what they should have done. But the information the pilots have here
is they're looking at information Sierra and it's saying this: Winds are 230 at 10 knots. Now a 10 knot direct crosswind because that's 90 degrees off
from the direction they're landing on a 10 knot direct crosswind
is really not a big deal. There's no... I've done that. I'm
much windier than that. It's not a big deal
to land in that. But if you have the option to land on a
longer runway where it's going directly at your nose, that is
something that you should do. You've heard me talk
about pilots being lazy. Well, this would be the time we're being
lazy works to your advantage because instead of having to work
hard, land on the short runway with the crosswind, I mean, in something
like Halifax, see if they'll let you land
on the big, long runway, which has the wind
going directly at your nose. That just makes logical
sense to ask for it. You know, like they say, you never get the
sail you don't ask for. And for all of you av geeks out
there who might be wondering because the clouds were low, maybe they were thinking they couldn't
get in on that approach for runway 23, the clouds were at 500 feet. And as you can see here, no matter which
approach they did, they would've been able to
get underneath the clouds. These altitudes right here, show how far above the ground they would
be when they would have to go around. But unfortunately the
pilots didn't ask for that. They also didn't update
their performance. Meaning before you land, you put in the current
wind, the runway, all the conditions
that you're dealing with and then your plane spits
out some information to you. It says, yes, you can
land on that runway. This is the brake setting that you need.
And it gives you all that information. Now the pilots didn't put
that new information in because they were
behind the airplane, trying to get everything
done, trying to land. So they didn't put that
information in there. Had they, they would've seen
that they could have still landed. And been fine and
stopped in time. But there's some other
things that happened. This knob right here
controls the auto brakes and most bigger
planes have auto brakes. And by using the auto brakes,
which we almost always use, you delegate that task to your
aircraft of braking in the most efficient way possible because it
can see how the brakes are working. If it hits a patch
of ice or whatever, it can handle that a lot
better and react immediately compared to you who
can just add pressure and unadd pressure like... You can do it, but you're plane, your
machine is gonna do it better. It's trained to do
this exact thing and it will give you the amount of
brake stopping distance that you need in order to stop the most
efficient way possible without you ending up like this. But if the pilot who's flying makes a
mistake and does something like adds power, Well, your auto
brakes are gonna think, well, you don't wanna
be stopping anymore. So it's going to turn off. Something else you're gonna
lose is your speed brakes. These things come
up automatically as soon as you land to help
push your plane towards the ground and make your
braking more effective. But of course, if you add power, then your speed brakes
are going to go down. Your plane is going to
do what you tell it to do. Now, there is a thing that comes up on
the screen when the auto brakes go off. It says auto brakes. Now the pilot that's not flying. That's sitting there
that's working the radios is supposed to
say auto brakes off. So that way the pilot
that is flying can know, Hey, that's not
what I intended to do, to have the auto brakes go off. I had this situation
happen in the simulator. I don't know about a year ago where the guy in the
back of the simulator, who's doing all the stuff
that set us on fire and trick us and try to see, to make sure that we're paying attention
to all the things that was going on. We did that. We came in and we landed
and there was a lot going on. I don't even remember what the
situation was, but I said auto brakes off. And then the other
pilot didn't mean to, because the auto brakes off
indication that shows up on your screen will also happen when you
purposely take the auto brakes off. So I didn't know if that
guy did it on purpose because I can't see
what his feet are doing. So it's my responsibility. No matter how fast
we're going is to say auto brakes off. When I said that the pilot,
in this case that was flying, then jumped and manually
put his feet on the brakes because he didn't mean and didn't want for the
auto brakes to go off. So he put his feet on the brakes
and we stopped and it was no big deal. And the guy running
the simulator said, Hey, great job that
you caught that. And so that was the reason that
you always say that, no matter what, it's just a reflex. You're going five miles an hour. And the auto brake
thing shows up there. You say, auto brakes off. You're going 130 miles an
hour. You say auto brakes off. It's just one of those things that
you say, no matter what you see it, you say it. That way, the other pilot can react to
it because they're busy flying the plane. But the pilot that was
responsible for that was distracted by the fact of the hard landing and probably how fast they
were going down the runway, because of the tailwind. Now while it's ultimately the pilot's
responsibility when they're flying the plane, and when we're flying to make
sure that that plane lands safely, there's something that I wish the
controller would've done differently. In this part right here. Just confirm runway
14 is still acceptable? I really wish the controller would've
said something more along the lines of Runway 23 is also
available if you want it but you can stay on
runway 14 if you prefer. An then read the
winds to the pilot so then they can
make that decision. The pilots didn't
have that information that that runway
was even an option. Now have the
controller said that I think he was thinking
that because he said, Hey, is that still a good
runway for you, runway 14? But if he had said, Hey, runway 23 is also an option
for you. And the pilots had said, no, no, we'll do runway 14 which is very possible that they would've
made that decision and said, yeah, we'll do runway 14 anyway. But had the controller
told that to the pilots? And then they said, yeah, we're doing runway 14. I would've been even more
disappointed with the fact that they would
make that decision. But the controller had the
option to let them know runway 23 was an option even though
that it was on information Tango, that's one of those times that your
controller could really help you out and say, Hey, this is an
option for you if you want it. If they really think that that's
gonna be a better, safer option than he should have said that. But 100% of the time, something like this happens,
the pilots made a mistake. I also feel it's important to mention
that these pilots had a few fatigue things that came up in the report and I
never have a problem reporting fatigue. If I have done everything that I
could to get my rest and I exercise, ate something. I have like a little
routine that I'll do if I have to sleep in
the middle of the day, I've learned all these things
over the years that I'll do. But if I've done those things
and I couldn't go to sleep, I have no problem ever
calling in and saying, Hey, I'm not fit to do this
flight for whatever reason. And that's because I never
want to be in a situation where I've created an
incident or an accident because I failed to make
a call about being tired. I've only flown with a US carrier,
but I can tell you that inside the US, if you ever call fatigue, as
long as you're not abusing it or, or being ridiculous about it, you’re never gonna have
any push back from your airline because your abilities as a pilot
are gonna be significantly degraded when you're tired. And that's why they have this rule because
there's been accidents where people have died as a result of being
tired and making poor decisions. It's the equivalent
of being drunk. You're going to be thinking slower and
you're going to be making poor choices. So they made this a rule. So pilots can call fatigue
anytime that they want. Now, if you're doing it
every week or every time you have something
that you don't wanna do, okay, well maybe you're
gonna be in trouble. But you're gonna
fill out a report. And they're gonna look
at all the information. What caused this
person to be fatigued? And your airline gonna be
upset that you called in them fatigue and they've had to delay the flight
and they've had to call the customers or maybe alert the passengers. Yes, they're going to be
upset about all of those things, but they're going to be a lot more
upset if something like this happens. 4854 is off the runway. Requesting
full emergency assistance. The final piece of what cause
this accident you can see right here. It seems the pilot probably
accidentally added power. Meaning these speed brakes would actually
go down and the auto brake would go from here trying to stop
the plane to doing nothing. And with the first officer being
distracted, he didn't alert the captain the brakes were off. It took over eight seconds for the
pilot to put his feet on the brakes to manually stop. But max braking didn't
occur until 15 seconds later. It's important to mention that all three
crew members and the passenger that they had on board all
gotten safely and unharmed. If you enjoyed this video, check out these two over here. I look forward to
hearing from you. Until then, keep the blue side.
