Flydubai

Flying through dangerous airspace

David Learmount Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Emirates flies an Airbus A380 schedule from Dubai to Moscow, the route normally used passing through Iranian and Russian airspace that is subject to European Union Aviation Safety Agency Conflict Zone Information Bulletins, a form of advice backed by the International Civil Aviation Organisation.

The CZIB is not legally enforceable for Emirates, and anyone boarding the flight in Dubai has, presumably, made a choice to fly there, whether they know the risks or not.

But a couple of weeks ago a retired airline pilot boarded an Emirates flight at Dubai, destination Oslo, Norway (EK159) and – not surprisingly given his professional history, he took an interest in his routeing. He was surprised to find himself flying through Iran, Western Turkmenistan, Western Kazakhstan, Russia and finally Estonia, before heading out over the Baltic Sea toward his destination.

Knowing there are efficient alternatives to that routeing, he was surprised that the crew flew a track that passed close to the south-west of Moscow. It was not the flight path he would have chosen for a flight under his command, because of the multitude of military conflicts currently affecting the Middle Eastern region, and particularly Iran and Russia.

Alternatively, for example, if the aircraft were to route from Dubai north-west up the Gulf, then fly through Iraq, Turkey, Romania, Poland and Sweden into Norway it could operate the whole time in conflict-free airspace. The advantage, however, for any airline willing to take a calculated risk, is to fly through the much less busy Iranian and Russian airspace. Routes skirting – but staying outside – Ukrainian and Russian airspace to the south and west are very busy indeed.

If you watch operations through CZIBs in the region, using Flightradar24, airlines that regularly fly through Iranian airspace include Emirates, Etihad, FlyDubai, and Turkish Airlines. Interestingly, the other big long-haul Gulf carrier, Qatar takes the routes that avoid Iranian airspace.

Russian airspace is used regularly by Emirates, by Russian domestic and government flights, and Chinese carriers like Air China and China Eastern.

How much of a risk is it to ignore CZIB warnings and fly through conflict zones?

Judge for yourself. Here are the accounts of three flights that ignored conflict zone warnings. All those on board died on two of the flights, and most of the passengers in the third. There are other such regular conflict zone events in different parts of the world, but these are the most relevant here:

17 July 2014. A Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200ER (MH17) was shot down and destroyed in Ukrainian airspace by a Russian Buk ground to air missile system fired from Ukrainian territory held by pro-Russia militias in the country’s eastern sector near the Russian border. All 298 people on board were killed. This was the result of a deliberately launched missile, but probably the militia who launched the missile did not know – and certainly did not care about – the identification of the flight that they shot down.

8 January 2020. A Ukraine International Airlines Boeing 737-800 was shot down by an Iranian military surface to air missile while climbing away from Imam Khomeini international airport, Teheran, Iran, bound for Kyiv, Ukraine. The shoot-down was probably the result of target misidentification by Iranian military during a nervous stand-off between Iran and American military in the area. All 176 people on board died.

There is a nervous stand-off between Iran and a major American military task force in the Gulf, Red Sea and Mediterranean right now.

25 December 2024. An Azerbaijan Airlines Embraer ERJ-190, flying en route from Baku, Azerbaijan to Grozny, Russia was hit and badly damaged by military action in airspace where there was active conflict between Russian and Ukrainian forces. Some 38 of the 67 people on board were killed when the damaged aircraft eventually crashed because the crew had practically no remaining control of the flight path.

There is another relevant local event, but it took place in airspace that had not been declared a Conflict Zone despite the fact that there was, as now, a stand-off between Iran and the American military.

3 July 1988. An Iran Air Airbus A300 operating a scheduled flight from Bandar Abbas to Dubai was shot down by a missile fired from American frigate the USS Vincennes, killing all 290 people on board. The crew of the Vincennes misidentified the flight as a hostile threat to a small task force of American frigates in the Gulf.

As evident from these events, conflict zone shoot-downs are almost always the result of misidentification. But the results are just as terminal.

More data from Flydubai crash

David Learmount Uncategorized , , , ,

Russian investigator MAK has revealed that a nose-down push on the Boeing 737-800’s control  column coincided with a nose-down movement of its horizontal stabiliser as the aircraft transitioned from a go-around climb into a steep, high-speed dive to impact.

The aircraft, operating the 19 March scheduled flight FZ981 from Dubai to Rostov-on-Don, Russia, was smashed into tiny pieces by the impact, and there were no survivors among the 62 people on  board.

Earlier the MAK had stated there were no mechanical or systems failures revealed by the flight data recorder, but says it is still recovering components of the aircraft’s longitudinal control system to check there were no undetected anomalies.

The fatal approach to runway 22 took place at night in convective weather and windshear near the airport. MAK says a go-around was initiated at 220m altitude, and the nose-down yoke push and pitch-down motoring of the stabiliser occurred at 900m, while the cloudbase was recorded as 630m.

With each MAK data release, more similarities with the accident involving a Tatarstan Airlines 737-500 crash at Kazan in November 2013 are being revealed.

Flydubai accident update from MAK

David Learmount Uncategorized , , , , , , ,

Russian accident investigator MAK has released preliminary information from the flight data recorder suggesting that there was no mechanical or aircraft systems fault in the Flydubai Boeing 737-800 at the time it appeared to go out of control and crash on final approach to Rostov on Don (see details in blog entry for 20 March).

Also since the previous blog story was written, video imagery has been released indicating that the final trajectory of the aircraft to impact was a nose-down high speed dive, which matches closely the flight profile of a Tatarstan Airlines 737-500 before it crashed on approach to Kazan, Russia in November 2013 (see also 20 March story for details).

If the MAK confirms these details in a fuller release soon it will highlight a need for the industry to train crews better for all-engines go-around manoeuvres because of the potentially dangerous combination – especially at night or in IMC – of the strong pitch-up moment caused by go-around power from underslung engines, plus “somatogravic illusion” in the pilots. Somatogravic illusion is the feeling induced by rapid forward acceleration that the nose has pitched up when it has not.

Another factor in this lack of crew familiarity with all-engines-go-around risks is believed to be that the go-arounds most practiced during recurrent training involve an engine-out abandoned approach, in which the power, pitch-up moment, climb rate and airspeed acceleration are all much more gentle.

The Flight Safety Foundation has been alerting airlines to this risk for many years now, and some airlines have modified their recurrent training accordingly.

Pilot groups in Dubai are also alleging that crew fatigue may have played a part in this accident. If this is true, it will emerge in the MAK final report.

Flydubai FZ981

David Learmount Uncategorized , , , , , ,

A Boeing 737-800 attempts to land in windy weather in the small hours of the morning at Rostov-on-Don, Russia on a runway approach notorious for its windshear .

The crew fails to stabilise the aircraft on its first approach either because of windshear, or because it fails to make visual contact with the runway lights in time for a safe landing, and decides to climb away and circle, waiting for an improvement in the weather.

On its second attempt to approach the same runway – 22 – using a category 1 instrument landing system for guidance, it crashes short of the runway. There was no emergency call.

But this is no ordinary crash of the type that would have occurred if the crew – now under pressure to land because fuel is getting low – had made the decision to continue the descent through decision height, despite not being able to see the runway. If that had been true large sections of the aircraft would have remained intact.

This aircraft hit the ground about 300m short of the runway 22 threshold with such force it was shattered into tiny pieces which were scattered across the airfield. How could that happen?

Information from flight tracking service FlightRadar 24 suggests that the crew also abandoned this second approach, climbing away, but then disappearing.

On 17 November 2013 a Tatarstan Airlines Boeing 737-500, en route from Moscow to Kazan, abandoned a poorly executed night approach at its destination airport, applying full power for a go-around. The nose pitched up to 25deg and the speed rapidly dropped because of the steep climb. The crew, becoming disorientated, pushed the nose down hard, putting the aircraft into a dive at an angle of 75deg just before impact. The aircraft was shattered.

On 12 May 2010 an Afriquiyah Airways Airbus A330-200 carried out a go-around from the approach to Tripoli airport’s runway 09 at dawn, the crew lost control because of disorientation and the aircraft crashed. There was one survivor among the 104 on board.

There have been  many documented cases of crews nearly losing control when carrying out an all-engines-operating go-around.

This does not pretend to be the definitive answer to what happened to Flydubai flight FZ981 on 19 March, but it does pose the question as to what kind of event could cause the wreckage to be so badly fragmented.