this American Airlines flight just took off from Portland and within a few minutes of departure they had to declare a mayday mayday mayday mayday we are uh single engine at this point the controller in this video does something I hope never happens to me but I think if it did I would probably have a different response but here's the full audio americ 1625 2.2 clim 7000 okay this has nothing to do with this video but I just have to say this this 2.2 climbing 7,000 the climbing 7,000 is correct this 2.2 is a habit that I've seen Pilots get into I probably did it at the Regionals as well but you say 2.2 climbing 7,000 if you get that habit really built up and you go fly International especially if you're in an emergency situation and you say something like that they're not going to know what you're talking about because English isn't their first language so they're hearing 2.2 and they're trying to think like is that a frequency like what's he saying they're expecting to hear 2,200 and when you say 2.2 you're in the habit of saying that that's what you're going to divert back to in an emergency so if you ever plan on flying International professionally don't get in that habit of saying that otherwise climbing 7,000 that's better than 2.2 for four which is what I hear a lot of guys on the radio say domestically don't get in that habit that's even worse so I'm just I don't know something I thought i' mention here's the rest of the audio andure American 1625 yeah we got an issue uh we' like to level at uh four or 5,000 there if we can [Music] m000 level at 5,000 we'll let you know we're take a look at it 25 we'll need to uh return to Port when we've got to shut down a uh an engine here Z On The Heading maintain 5,000 American 20 1625 American 1625 arecy do you want ready for yeah affirmative M mayday mayday we are uh single engine at this point so yeah if you want to roll the equipment for us we appreciate it okay for you nervous Flyers out there that watch these videos that understand what's going on on the flight deck you can hear he's at 5,000 ft and he declares his Mayday with his three mayday mayday mayday calls which is the right way to do it and you can hear he's not freaking out so this is with an engine failure and we're about to find out exactly what was causing it but he's got this engine failure situation they're at 5,000 ft which is not like way up at Cruz that's pretty low to the ground relatively speaking and and they're not freaking out up there so just something note after he declares the mday he tells the controller what he wants americ 1625 mayday mayday mayday we'll need to uh return to P when we've got to shut down a uh im here so he's doing everything correct here we have a mday this is what we want so it's no uh what do you think would be the best no this is the thing that we want to do so the controller knows exactly what the pilot is to want now you as a passenger sitting in the back you've heard this engine start making a noise or something going wrong they shut down that engine now the pilots are busy flying the plane but you in the back are thinking why aren't they telling me what's going on what's Happening why aren't they making an announcement and that's because they're busy up there flying the plane talking with air traffic control trying to make sure the plane flies safely and I understand you're in the back you've heard an engine shut down you're freaking out and thinking he's not making announcement because he knows we're going to die and he doesn't want to freak us out I can assure you that is definitely not the case you're about to hear all the things that happens when a pilot declares a Mayday like this but what is really confusing to me is the controller asking this american2 are you deing emergency so there's two different ways you can declare an emergency that was the old way to do it declaring emergency now they have a Mayday and a pan pan so Mayday is like hey this is life or death this really needs immediate attention pan Pan's like uh we got a situation that we're dealing with but it's not life or death so let's say I have an engine failure just a normal engine died for whatever reason on a 747 that may not even be a pan pan but let's just say you could call that a pan pan if you have an engine that fails and you only have two engines well that could be a mday now we're talking life or death if that other engine doesn't work it's a real problem so it's just different for different planes different scenarios does your engine fail because it just fell apart if you're on a 747 and your engine exploded well that's a Mayday because you could have part of your wing damage or it damaged another engine or you don't know is there stuff hanging off you don't know what's going on out there so that could be a Mayday and those really just come to Pilot discretionary calls so the pilot does the right thing he declares a mday the controller says uh just confirm you have an emergency well declaring an emergency isn't something that we say anymore one but he just said Mayday three times so yeah I would go ahead and say there's a big deal right now with the controller asking that he says Mayday a second time yeah affirmative mayday mayday mayday we are uh single engine at this point now if that were me I would be thinking oh man maybe I didn't transmit it in in the heat of battle I'm busy doing everything and I didn't transmit it so he didn't hear my Mayday call that's what I would be thinking if I was that pilot because Pilots tend to put the responsibility on enough if something goes wrong we think okay we messed up we did something wrong here so I I'm guessing he made that Mayday call a second time thinking I must not have transmitted it if he was 100% sure he would have said yeah I declared a Mayday like 30 seconds ago yeah we're we're in a bad situation here we need some help but he declares the mday a second time thinking maybe I didn't transmit it the first time and to make sure there's no doubts that he needs priority handling here's what happens next 6 25 uh how many Souls on board remaining uh we got the 56 Souls on board and we've got uh 18,200 lb fuel turn right heading 2 all right right turn 250 American 1625 165 Al 9 36 326 all right one Z right and 3026 on the uh on the meter American 162 now something to remember here and I've heard people get trained this way is that when you declare your MAA you can do it with the souls on board and the fuel in time not in weight so mayday mayday mayday American 123 we need to return back to Portland 156 Souls on board and then he says 18,200 uh pounds of gas so that's what he said right so he could have done all that and got that call out of the way because they're always going to ask for fuel and they're always going to ask for Souls on board here's the thing to keep in mind is that instead of looking at the actual weight you need to tell them what you have in time meaning that 18,200 lbs of gas for them might be 4 hours but that I work in on my plane the 74 we work in tons so that's like um a little over eight tons of gas now for me eight tons of gas pucker Factor right I'm not feeling good inside no warm and fuzzies I I I'm very nervous and so we have like a basic very rough just to give an idea to air traffic control we just move the decimal point over one that lets us know roughly in hours what we have so let's just say I got 150 tons of gas on the plane I got about 15 hours of gas right so that's just a a a rough way that we can throw some numbers out there so if I got 8 tons of gas you move that decimal point over I got 08 of an hour so I don't even have an hour worth of gas we're getting close to the 30 minutes which is the MayDay Fuel and I'm definitely getting in the priority handling where you can't take any undue delayed vectors so when you tell them your fuel instead of telling them the weight they don't know like 18,200 lb of gas means nothing to me if you say hey I I got 40 minutes of fuel he knows uhoh we need to really move quickly if you say I got 4 hours of fuel okay that's great now he kind of knows what he's dealing with and every plane is different but it's good to just kind of figure out a a basic simple math trick for your plane so you can quickly look at it unless you're a wizard and I'm no wizard so that's for me the easiest move the decimal point point over one even someone with my intelligence can figure out how to say we got less than an hour great now they know we got to get you on the ground so instead of saying this 18,200 lb fuel say we got 4 hours of fuel if that's what it is that will let them know exactly what to do with you now the controller does do something that I really like and that's where he gives them the weather right here that's because the pilots are required to have current weather on the field in order to land now reality is they're probably going to send off for that weather and they're going to print it off and they're going to put it in the flight computer and they're going to get all their performance information probably that's all going to happen anyways but by that controller giving him the weather of what's going on hey this is the weather of the field you know what Runway you're landing on you know what weather is there and if you were an emergency and you did need to come in and land you have a basic rough idea okay wind is coming pretty much down the runway and it's windy and Gusty so you you have a good idea and it's not like you're dealing with this fire or emergency or whatever the situation is and you're like send off for the weather and wait a few minutes and now what do I do so I really like when controllers do that not when they go hey current information is Alpha let us know when you have it that's like you're not helping me here they're going to be coming around here and landing on one zero right and the winds are coming from this angle right here so it's more or less on the nose nothing to be worried about but it is definitely windy and Gusty cuz when you take off from an airport you get that same weather information but it's kind of like you take off and you now just dump that information unless it was just wild you'll dis dump that information you're like great now on the next days of flight so 5 10 20 minutes later it could be foggy the weather could have gotten better or worse so he gives him that which is great what he does next this controller is the part that starts to irritate me listen to this american2 and what was the reason for the shut we had a number one reverser unlock in our procedur call for a shut [Music] down 280 on the heading americ 1625 we will need some delay vectors out here [Music] we preer to stay five if we could [Music] to hold the controller needs to know the nature of the urgency right and that's pretty common hey what's going on so that way he can relay to the fire crew because the the pilot are asking for the fire which is going to come out anyways you don't really have to ask that they're anytime you declare Mayday all the fire guys they're they're ready to go they've been sitting in that fire house for weeks waiting for for this moment and they are ready to do something so that's always going to happen but they need to know the nature of the emergency is the plane on fire is there a huge hole in the side of the plane what is going on so they can start having an idea and getting prepared for what they're going to be seeing in a few minutes so that makes sense and that's totally normal and I really think that that is very helpful because if you do have a fire that's going on right now you want them to be geared up and ready and putting on all their firit stuff so that way they can get you out of your plane that's on fire makes sense but the pilot says that they have this reverser issue here we had a number one reverser unlock and our procedure call for shut down the which is super rare I i' I've heard of it in a few random scenarios but it's it's very very rare especially on takeoff because your your throttles aren't at idle there's a lot of things that normally need to be in place in order for those reversers to open up now he didn't say that it deployed so I don't know exactly what stage it was in it could have been that the previous flight they landed and it somehow didn't clip on all the way I don't know I'm not an engineer he didn't say it fully deployed but it sounded like something wasn't right and then they had to shut down the engine which makes sense the reversers are these things that move as soon as you land the casing comes back and it just helps to keep the engine from pushing the plane forward and helps the brakes not have to work as hard when you're trying to stop you can imagine those coming out and fly would be a real serious problem if it went full deployment like you saw there when you see a full deployment that is really to help assist but if you have it working on one side and not the other side you have asymmetric power or thrust so you if you have one engine pushing you forward and one engine pushing you back it would look like this and this is not what you want when you're trying to fly your plane especially to climb away from the ground so immediately he went into a book that we use when you have an emergency like this and you follow the company procedure which is something if you do the comedy procedures you can never really get in trouble you said hey uh this happened I went into your book I did exactly what you told me to do and this is what it said to do and it's going to say something like shut down that engine because the plane can fly fine on one engine it cannot fly very well if the other engine is working against your one good engine and making your plane rotate that that's going to be more detrimental than beneficial there are cases where your plane let's say has an engine that's on fire but it's still producing thrust and let's say you're in the mountains and you're trying to get away from the mountains that plane engine that's on fire but still helping push your plane to get away from the mountains you might just let that thing burn out there and get away from the mountains and that may not be procedure but neither is hitting the mountain in this case shutting down that engine and stopping it from pushing your plane backwards and causing your plane to rotate more that obviously makes sense so they go ahead and go about shutting down that engine which is their company procedure and I suspect this controller is asking them about getting above 5,000 ft because of this section of the airport here the minimum safe altitude is 6,000 but on this section the side that they're on they'd actually be fine at 5,000 now let's talk about the part which would really irritate me if I was these pilots in this situation he tells him to go direct scapo which from the comfort of your home and looking at this approach chart is really simple it's right here on one Z right and then tells him to hold is published so he's essentially telling these Pilots to fly directly to this point and then fly this oval track here until they're ready to come in and land here's the problem they're super loaded up with taking care of securing that engine doing the checklist probably talking with the flight attendants letting them know hey we're going to be going back in to land Pro so that way they can start prepping anything that they need to prep in order to get ready maybe making an announcement talking to air traffic control following all the checklists that are on the plane and then this controller is saying oh go direct to this point which isn't going to be on their flight pan plan and then they're going to be obviously they weren't even looking at the plate as far as for coming back so now they got to go through probably their iPad cuz hey it's 2024 and find that but you're when you get told when you're flying direct to this point you're looking further down your flight plan they may not have already loaded up that they're doing one zero right so that might not even be up there or they did one zero right but they didn't go the all the fixes they just did the first two fixes I don't know but this controller is basically saying hey go over here and hold and by putting the pilots in that hold in that section he now he's kind of like cool problems off me you can turn circles over there until you're ready which is great except for the pilots may not know what that is and then when you load up a hold you have to check a lot of things he says hold is published so you got to verify that the inbound course is the right way that you're on the right side that you're entering the right way for example if you loaded it up the wrong way and this is how he wants you to hold here on the chart and you're holding this exact same way on the other side you could be messing up somebody else that's trying to come in and land so instead of getting on to the PA and making an announcement to little Susie who's in the back of the plane literally freaking out right now you're busy looking in your flight computer in order to try to find this fix so you can get in there and hold so makes a controller's life a lot easier and I guess in theory makes sense they can stay in that hold and he doesn't have to Vector them but the task level for the pilots in this situation is very very high so this controller I think is really doing them a major disservice by giving this them this other task of having to find it load it check it because they're also doing everything else that they need to do in order to get on the ground as quickly as possible you're not even though your engine is secured it's not a big deal you could fly around for a couple hours like that you don't want to nobody wants to be up there on one engine I wouldn't want to be up there on one engine I'd be like let's get on the ground sooner than later but you're taking up their time by having them look for that try to figure out where to go load it check to make sure all the stuff matches the right inbound course and they easily could have just been given vectors like turn left turn left turn left or turn right or whatever over the airport and that would have been easier cuz if you're flying let's say 360 and he says turn right heading 090 and lets him go for a couple minutes you can just go right 090 and then go back to whatever you're do and get a new performance to land that's a lot better in my opinion so this is what happens to the pilots when he says [Music] that to scaffold it was for American 1625 all right we looking for okay SC hold [Music] 156 okay first things first I really love that the Pilot's being really cool about this situation sounds very calm through the whole thing while dealing with an emergency that I've honestly never seen before and I doubt he'll ever see again in his life really rare so he's sounding cool and remaining calm the control controller is as well he's doing stuff that's helpful like hey here's the weather on the field plan this Runway that stuff he's probably rattled as well because it's not every day that you get an emergency and have an engine revers or deploy or come out or whatever happen in real life I I don't know so he's handling it the best that he can but giving them the hold when they're dealing with 80 other things that's sucking up time for them the controller's job here should be tell everybody on the ground to just stop stop doing departures let me just focus on leave this guy over here for a minute so we can get everything sorted out with him and then the people that are trying to get to uh Tulsa Oklahoma can leave 10 minutes later it's not a big deal but he's going okay go over here go hold here so now I don't really have any responsibility which I don't I don't think it's great he was helping them with the Adis he told him what Runway without them asking that's all great because lets them kind of get ahead without them having to transmit what Runway are we going to so he's doing thing that's helpful but this holding thing not helpful at all and that's why you heard this where you could hear them where they were looking for it and then the controller had to step in and tell them where to go and find [Music] it now those Pilots could have just said unable to hold give me vectors and the guy probably would have done it it doesn't sound like he's being difficult but they could have just said unable unable to go hold just give me vectors and I'll tell you when I'm ready which is probably what I would have done because I'm a big fat crybaby but he found it and loaded it and did a I think a turn and a half or something in the hold and then they were ready to come in and land and so it all worked out fine for everybody but these are the things that when you listen to them especially if you ever plan on becoming a pilot that you can think what would I do what would I do differently if I was a controller I would do this what would I do differently if I was a pilot I would do this like if I was a pilot in this situation I would hope I would remain that calm cuz that guy sounds like cool as a cucumber but what I would definitely do is not take holding like just give me Vector somewhere and let me spend circles over there so I can be busy what I'm doing and get stuff sorted out I know what you're thinking well he can just do circles and he doesn't have to keep talking to him about turning right turning right turning right but the mental effort that it takes to go right heading 090 is that I don't have to think about it whereas a hold you're having to look verify check check your plate because he's saying hold is published so you got to verify all that stuff it's it's a higher workload it's a higher stress load and if you've already loaded up the approach without that in there you have to reload the approach reload a hold and do all that and that's not helpful but again I'm a big cry baby so what do I know I look forward to hearing from you until then keep the blue side up
