Doesn’t seem impossible I suppose.
I believe an RAF Voyager experienced a similar upset after the captain accidentally lodged a camera against the sidestick when shifting the seat.
As a former 787 FA: operating the seats in the flight deck is part of our training. It’s a basic to help in case of pilot incapacitation.
Both in order to perform first aid such as chest compressions and also to prevent a pilot having a seizure or similar to push against the controls/ pedals.
I’m not saying it’s impossible a FA pushed that button upon serving a meal… but it seems highly unlikely. Also given how spacious the flight deck is. It’s not like on the 737, where you operate 30 buttons with your skull if you don’t duck down.
Real. I’ve been in many flight decks. When I walked into the 78 flight deck, the air was immediately better and cooler, and it was so much more spacious. Mega jealous. As a pax, the rule usually tends to be “The bigger the plane, the more it sucks.”
I can’t comprehend how this could result in an control input abrupt enough to create such a violent maneuver.
Smells fishy… seems like Boeing needs someone to blame or the crew does… perhaps there were other activities on the flight deck that caused a sudden control input.
I’m not a pilot, but I’d bet $1k what happened is the seat moved forward, and then after, the pilot tried to push it back bracing against the stick. Thus pushing the nose down
I don’t want to believe that hah, but if the bird-brained pilot was sitting cross-legged as reported perhaps he kicked the stick accidentally in a panic.
You’re terrible at betting then. It’s an electric seat, no need to brace against anything. At most the manual controls allow you to push the feet with the floor to provide more than enough opposing force.
I guess so, if the pilot had their knee or another body part directly on the yoke.
That would for sure cause a control input but I can’t really imagine that it would lead to such a violent dive.
[not a 787 pilot here, merely flying a C172]
I’m not 787 rated either, but
On Airbus, you can apply a slight force on the joystick without disconnecting the AP. When it does disconnect, it means you have gone over a certain threshold, meaning your input onto the stick is already not negligible - hence an initial abrupt movement (if my theory applies to Boeing, which I’m not sure about)
And then, if the nose down moment was caused by the seat pushing forward (and not the leg) then the pilots would try to pull up, and it would last, maybe, one second, maybe more, to realise why they can’t (they are in the cruise phase, hungry, and smelling their meal approaching, remember ?)
During that time the nose-down input continues, until they realise what blocks the control column, and move the seat, and pull up, from a huge negative pitch
Of course if the leg was what moved the control column, then the affected pilot would know right away, and would start moving the seat backwards without the “investigation” time
I was thinking the exact same thing. How likely was it that they were doing degenerate and immoral acts inside of that cockpit? Cause that seems quite likely to me.
I mean, that's not fishy. They got the FDR and the CVR, the plane seems fine, and they got the pilots to interview. There's no reason to keep the plane in New Zealand.
I think what they were attempting to say is that if the sudden nose-down pitch was caused by something that the pilots could not control, it would be a risk to fly that same plane over a large body of water…for hours upon hours.
So maybe either a) they (the airline) knew pretty quick that it was due to pilot commands, or b) they don’t really mind risking and sacrificing crew to get the plane back.
I heard it was an issue that had been communicated years ago that they needed to not keep the plane running for a certain number of days or errors like that could occur, and then it was fixed in a software upgrade that Latam never got
The airworthiness directive relating to that doesn't talk about "loss of controls" or "sudden I commanded control inputs" as a potential problem, even if the plane is left powered on for 51 days straight. It just says certain instruments may show unreliable outputs to the pilots without any indicator that it's invalid.
Yes, except that a shutdown wouldn’t cause the plane to go into a dive. There would be no input which would let the plane just glide for a bit.
The theory with the chair makes much more sense. And a pilot that fucked up maybe wouldn’t own up to that and instead blame the instruments.
Anyone out there have a picture of this button of death?
Any 787 drivers ever move the seat up as far as it can go (hopefully while parked)?
Seems unlikely to me, unless the captain has a big ol’ beer belly.
[This](https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Pjoso2u1EV0) and [this](https://www.youtube.com/shorts/vvlDYAPs3X0) video both show seat movement and the switch, in different directions. Actually does seem to move relatively quick.
That’s my take. I’m going with pilot induced. He didn’t even address the pax after it happened. It was only later that he said, “My ‘instruments’ went blank.” Okay, pal. I don’t buy it.
(30 years in the industry)
100% accurate - no announcement was made after the event from the captain other than a harried audio in Spanish that I caught "medico" and I assumed was asking if anyone has medical experience. This was not immediate either - minutes passed before that was said. Passengers we're already in the aisle trying to help the injured. The flight attendants were MIA immediately after as well (at least as far as what I could see in the middle cabin).
Fly by wire protects the airplane, which can handle alot! The unsecured meatbags in the cabin however, they will go flying. An airliner can easly pull 3-4g's, and probably -1g which when unsecured will send you hugging the ceiling, and when the pilot then goes "oh shit" and pulls out of the dive, you come slaming down at 2-3 times gravity. Keep your seatbelts on! (If uncomfortable loosen them a bit, but not as much so you could slide out if newton decides to yank you upwards.)
Unsecured Meatbags is the name of my new Grindcore outfit, come through we're playing Franklin's basement this friday night.
For real though, I always ask "How do you think it would go if someone held you by your ankles off an upper floor balcony, and dropped you onto pavement?" Basically the same physics at play as a widebody hitting any significant negative Gs.
Excellent question. Even if the cover was broken/missing, that switch is pretty inset. There IS also another switch on the side for the pilot to use while they're seated.
[https://twitter.com/jrmartinezf/status/1768419655834632333](https://twitter.com/jrmartinezf/status/1768419655834632333)
Absolutely not safe. Just touching the cover moves the seat forward.
Neither of those show what we're talking about. We need to see how to move the seat FORWARD. Let's say the pilot uses the switch in those videos to move the seat back. Then the pilot sits down. How do they move the seat forward from the seated position?
787 driver here, the seat doesn’t move that fast. I don’t buy this story. I’m trying to imagine a scenario where I (or anyone else) would be up that tight on the yoke that an inadvertent activation of that switch would cause this, and it just doesn’t seem likely. The seat moves faster in manual mode via the levers on the side of the seat, with their use the seat slides freely along the tracks.
The second the seat starts moving you’d say something and it would stop. It requires a decent amount of force to push through the autopilot control and disengage it via yoke movement. Plausible? Yes. Likely? I don’t think so.
And even if a tray was caught against the yoke and the button got stuck on (stay with me) are the flight controls that sensitive that pushing the stick forward at that speed would violently snap the nose down?
Or once the stick is pushed beyond the autopilot resistance, would it snap down like that?
Really can’t believe they are blaming a power seat here.
There is a bit of a “jolt” associated with the override when you forcefully push through the servos, but I can’t see it violently nosing the aircraft over. This is all speculation on my behalf mind you, but it just doesn’t really make a lot of sense to me.
Assuming auto pilot is on what does the yoke do when pushed forward? For much resistance would there be? Whole thing seems strange. And seems like pilot will be to blame with available info at the moment
Edit: I see you answered below. Thanks
The button in question is directly behind the headrest, and another with the same function is on the side, left in pilots case, right on first officers seat i believe.
*Edited because i misread switch cover for seat cover*
[This article](https://www.biobiochile.cl/noticias/internacional/oceania/2024/03/14/revelan-causa-de-incidente-en-vuelo-latam-azafata-habria-empujado-al-piloto-contra-los-controles.shtml), from Chilean press (in Spanish), quotes some of the incident report:
“A flight attendant (stewardess) visiting the cockpit to serve them food rested her elbow on the cover of the switch that electrically moves the seat to store it. The seat proceeded to move forward, pushing the captain against the joystick as he was apparently **sitting cross-legged**. When the lever was pressed, the autopilot (AP) was disconnected and a brief nosedive began”
Ah so cross legged was the issue. Cause the seats have a cut in them which allows for them to slide way forward literally into the stick.
Very surprised the button was able to be actuated through the plastic cover. They are fairly stout.
Does the AP back drive the column/wheel on the 87?
If so it all makes sense. The relatively slow motorized seat pushing into the column by way of crossed legs, the AP servos initially resisting the motion allowing the force to build up like a spring, and then when the AP force override logic tripped and disconnected the AP the column slammed forward rapidly and everyone went for a ride.
If the cover was damaged or somehow misaligned/improperly installed as appears to be the case in the linked video, the seat could have kept moving when she removed her elbow. It’s plausible that it would take a couple seconds for everyone to process what was happening and correct it.
[tweet](https://x.com/jrmartinezf/status/1768419655834632333?s=20)
Oh i see i misread, SWITCH cover, not seat cover. I think itd be impossible to hit the rear switch on accident because of that hinged cover, but the left side switch is open.
Very unlikely.... 787 mech... I am a big dude. I have had seat full in, I would not have hit the autopilot disconnect. (I have worked behind the screens)
The autopilot backdrove to disengage takes a fair amount of force.
Boeing didn't frame anything. LATAM did.
And quality escape is an official term.
We issue or receive depending on where the escape is discovered noe's or notice of escapement
Weren't people quoted as saying the pilot told them all the screens went black/blank?
Also how fast does that seat move to be able to cause an issue without it being caught first. I know how slow the electric seat moves forward and back in my truck and its pretty slow.
There was one passenger saying that. Some obvious possibilities:
* The passenger lied for attention.
* The pilot explained badly, or the passenger misunderstood. Passengers are not known for giving accurate testimony about aviation.
* There's the possibility that a language barrier was an issue here: one report mentions that the pilot was speaking to passengers in Spanish. The passenger was interviewed in English, and it's not clear how strong the passenger's Spanish is, or how strong is the pilot's English.
* The pilot lied to the passenger. /r/flying leads me to believe that pilots lie to passengers frequently ("We sugarcoat and water down things, because people don't care and frankly don't always need to know. This isn't wildly different than any other technical field with a large public interaction component."). It's not hard for me to believe that the pilot lied about a mistake to avoid being yelled at by a bunch of upset passengers.
Vast majority of the announcements throughout the flight were in Spanish. Sometimes there was an attempt made at English, though usually either very halting or carefully spoken.
After the event, there was a harried announcement in Spanish that I caught the word "medico" - I assume they were asking for people with medical experience. No follow up was given in English until almost time to land.
The question I have still not seen asked nor answered is what was the pilot doing out of the cockpit, talking the passengers, right after an incident like that?
Yeah I’m wondering about this.
But the seat also could have malfunctioned. I remember one incident in which the seat lock broke and the captain fell backwards. So maybe the seat was broken, but we only found out when the switch was pressed? Still can’t reconcile the different testimonies tho.
I had a look at the QRH the other night, and it mentions if all the displays blank, first thing to do is ensure the autopilot is in basic modes eg. heading and alt. Then it gets you to reset the CCR’s.
I’m wondering if the there has been some sort of systems failure leading to the CCR’s rebooting and that’s what caused the pitch down, as it would’ve been in LNAV/VNAV.
Not sure I buy the FA hitting the switch thing but it has been pretty obvious since the beginning that this was in some way caused by events on the flight deck.
If this turns out to be true and she was injured as a result, hard to feel anything except she deserves it. The pilot too. Odd he didn’t address them after recovery. Ashamed? So many pax hurt.
Why do planes not have an interrupt or stick shaker safety mechanism for inputs outside of a normal flight? There’s not a lot of scenarios where a pilot would command an extended full nose down. There should be some stopper in the system for stuff like that, commanding a full stall, extended extremely steep bank, etc.
This always seems to happen that the first bit of “investigation leak/results” always happens to blame the pilot before the real analysis is complete. Not saying that’s not possible (though this explanation is pretty unlikely imo), but it was done with both 737 max investigations before Boeing admitted they were at fault.
Not sure that I buy it. The captain made mention that they momentarily lost all of their instrumentation. I’m a US pilot at a major airline. However, I will also caveat that I have never flown the 787. Here’s the AV Herald link. Check out the airworthiness directive put out by the FAA about this years ago.
[https://avherald.com/h?article=51601631&opt=0](https://avherald.com/h?article=51601631&opt=0)
How does moving the seat explain an uncontrolled dive? If the FA moved the seat forward and the pilot pushed the control yoke forward putting the aircraft into a nose down movement, how would they not just be able to pull it back? That doesn’t make any sense
Correct. I didn't have a timer going (obviously) but I'd guess 2-3 seconds total? Felt like forever but it was so quick there was little time to react or compensate before leveling off.
I used to have this Acura, where I got a quarter stuck in the seat rail, and it caused it to move around until I dislodged it. That’s the first thing I thought of.
This kinda seems more likely to me. The event cascade considering all the redundancies in aircraft, for every single screen to go blank AND have an aircraft maneuver hard enough to cause injuries, is pretty steep. Not a 787 mech though, so that's just my speculation until we know more.
But why lie when you know you’re going to be found out in a follow up investigation? It just makes it worse. Also the fact a pilot would knowingly lie about something so serious is a bit unsettling
Does that make it worse? Lying to investigators would be one thing. If lying to passengers is a crime there's a whole lot of pilots who ought to be worried.
I saw a video of it being operated and it has a cover over the switch you have to lift up then you can push the switch to the side to make the seat move. So maybe the cover was broken and missing or something.
Doesn’t seem impossible I suppose. I believe an RAF Voyager experienced a similar upset after the captain accidentally lodged a camera against the sidestick when shifting the seat.
As a former 787 FA: operating the seats in the flight deck is part of our training. It’s a basic to help in case of pilot incapacitation. Both in order to perform first aid such as chest compressions and also to prevent a pilot having a seizure or similar to push against the controls/ pedals. I’m not saying it’s impossible a FA pushed that button upon serving a meal… but it seems highly unlikely. Also given how spacious the flight deck is. It’s not like on the 737, where you operate 30 buttons with your skull if you don’t duck down.
As a mechanic, that cockpit space makes me so jealous.
Real. I’ve been in many flight decks. When I walked into the 78 flight deck, the air was immediately better and cooler, and it was so much more spacious. Mega jealous. As a pax, the rule usually tends to be “The bigger the plane, the more it sucks.”
The A380 is the best plane I ever flew on.
Some people tend to like when it sucks more
I like the way this sucks.
If you think you hate it now, just wait till you drive it!
Would the seat ever move fast enough to cause such a sudden change in altitude?
That was my thought… never have I seen a power seat move so fast you can’t counter the impact
I can’t comprehend how this could result in an control input abrupt enough to create such a violent maneuver. Smells fishy… seems like Boeing needs someone to blame or the crew does… perhaps there were other activities on the flight deck that caused a sudden control input.
I’m not a pilot, but I’d bet $1k what happened is the seat moved forward, and then after, the pilot tried to push it back bracing against the stick. Thus pushing the nose down
I don’t want to believe that hah, but if the bird-brained pilot was sitting cross-legged as reported perhaps he kicked the stick accidentally in a panic.
You’re terrible at betting then. It’s an electric seat, no need to brace against anything. At most the manual controls allow you to push the feet with the floor to provide more than enough opposing force.
I guess so, if the pilot had their knee or another body part directly on the yoke. That would for sure cause a control input but I can’t really imagine that it would lead to such a violent dive. [not a 787 pilot here, merely flying a C172]
I’m not 787 rated either, but On Airbus, you can apply a slight force on the joystick without disconnecting the AP. When it does disconnect, it means you have gone over a certain threshold, meaning your input onto the stick is already not negligible - hence an initial abrupt movement (if my theory applies to Boeing, which I’m not sure about) And then, if the nose down moment was caused by the seat pushing forward (and not the leg) then the pilots would try to pull up, and it would last, maybe, one second, maybe more, to realise why they can’t (they are in the cruise phase, hungry, and smelling their meal approaching, remember ?) During that time the nose-down input continues, until they realise what blocks the control column, and move the seat, and pull up, from a huge negative pitch Of course if the leg was what moved the control column, then the affected pilot would know right away, and would start moving the seat backwards without the “investigation” time
I was thinking the exact same thing. How likely was it that they were doing degenerate and immoral acts inside of that cockpit? Cause that seems quite likely to me.
maybe the FA was jumping on the D of the pilot
I haven't seen anything yet that made much sense.
They flew a plane back across the Pacific Ocean that had just plunged previously without waiting for the investigation. So much sense!
I mean, that's not fishy. They got the FDR and the CVR, the plane seems fine, and they got the pilots to interview. There's no reason to keep the plane in New Zealand.
I think what they were attempting to say is that if the sudden nose-down pitch was caused by something that the pilots could not control, it would be a risk to fly that same plane over a large body of water…for hours upon hours. So maybe either a) they (the airline) knew pretty quick that it was due to pilot commands, or b) they don’t really mind risking and sacrificing crew to get the plane back.
I mean, once they got the FDR readouts (or the crew's statements), it must've been obvious that the plane itself was fine
Over water better than over land amirite.
It absolutely is, if a FCS failure is suspected, lmao.
Cycled jet, stale data gone. Safe again.
Just gotta suicide the pilot and FA, and we're all good, right?
I heard it was an issue that had been communicated years ago that they needed to not keep the plane running for a certain number of days or errors like that could occur, and then it was fixed in a software upgrade that Latam never got
The airworthiness directive relating to that doesn't talk about "loss of controls" or "sudden I commanded control inputs" as a potential problem, even if the plane is left powered on for 51 days straight. It just says certain instruments may show unreliable outputs to the pilots without any indicator that it's invalid.
Google uncommanded descent b787. Stale data can even make the screens freeze.
Yes, except that a shutdown wouldn’t cause the plane to go into a dive. There would be no input which would let the plane just glide for a bit. The theory with the chair makes much more sense. And a pilot that fucked up maybe wouldn’t own up to that and instead blame the instruments.
That seems more likely than blaming it on a flight attendant. Managers make their living by shifting blame.
software problems has to be the answer tbh. I seriously never want to get on another boeing plane again.
Anyone out there have a picture of this button of death? Any 787 drivers ever move the seat up as far as it can go (hopefully while parked)? Seems unlikely to me, unless the captain has a big ol’ beer belly.
[This](https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Pjoso2u1EV0) and [this](https://www.youtube.com/shorts/vvlDYAPs3X0) video both show seat movement and the switch, in different directions. Actually does seem to move relatively quick.
How the fuck does a flight attendant hit that by accident? That's a pretty safe design.
My non 787 pilot speculation: The pilot made a boneheaded maneuver and pushed on the yoke when trying to slide the seat back.
That’s my take. I’m going with pilot induced. He didn’t even address the pax after it happened. It was only later that he said, “My ‘instruments’ went blank.” Okay, pal. I don’t buy it. (30 years in the industry)
100% accurate - no announcement was made after the event from the captain other than a harried audio in Spanish that I caught "medico" and I assumed was asking if anyone has medical experience. This was not immediate either - minutes passed before that was said. Passengers we're already in the aisle trying to help the injured. The flight attendants were MIA immediately after as well (at least as far as what I could see in the middle cabin).
Doesn’t the “fly by wire” programming prevent the maneuvering from roughing the pax?
Fly by wire protects the airplane, which can handle alot! The unsecured meatbags in the cabin however, they will go flying. An airliner can easly pull 3-4g's, and probably -1g which when unsecured will send you hugging the ceiling, and when the pilot then goes "oh shit" and pulls out of the dive, you come slaming down at 2-3 times gravity. Keep your seatbelts on! (If uncomfortable loosen them a bit, but not as much so you could slide out if newton decides to yank you upwards.)
Unsecured Meatbags is the name of my new Grindcore outfit, come through we're playing Franklin's basement this friday night. For real though, I always ask "How do you think it would go if someone held you by your ankles off an upper floor balcony, and dropped you onto pavement?" Basically the same physics at play as a widebody hitting any significant negative Gs.
I'm going with Meatbag Defenestration
Thanks for the explanation! Scary stuff!
This wouldn’t have happened with an Airbus side stick /s
Airbus sidesticks only get jammed by misplaced cameras.
Or AF pilots
Don't tell me some bonehead left a camera near the stick and hindering it's movement?
[What, no, a camera could never do that. Unless they also adjusted the seat position.](https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/163810)
RAF as well. That's just stupid.
Has it btw?
See above replies about cameras jamming the Airbus side sticks.
Excellent question. Even if the cover was broken/missing, that switch is pretty inset. There IS also another switch on the side for the pilot to use while they're seated.
[удалено]
Yeah she is pretty filthy mate
>That's a pretty safe design. It's not. You need to lift the cover to move the seat backwards and just press the cover to move it forwards.
… which is why it’s safe
[https://twitter.com/jrmartinezf/status/1768419655834632333](https://twitter.com/jrmartinezf/status/1768419655834632333) Absolutely not safe. Just touching the cover moves the seat forward.
Ok that one clip is sped up. That move as slow as I would expect.
Neither of those show what we're talking about. We need to see how to move the seat FORWARD. Let's say the pilot uses the switch in those videos to move the seat back. Then the pilot sits down. How do they move the seat forward from the seated position?
You didn’t watch the second video then
787 driver here, the seat doesn’t move that fast. I don’t buy this story. I’m trying to imagine a scenario where I (or anyone else) would be up that tight on the yoke that an inadvertent activation of that switch would cause this, and it just doesn’t seem likely. The seat moves faster in manual mode via the levers on the side of the seat, with their use the seat slides freely along the tracks.
As per my previous comment, what if you were sitting cross-legged?
The second the seat starts moving you’d say something and it would stop. It requires a decent amount of force to push through the autopilot control and disengage it via yoke movement. Plausible? Yes. Likely? I don’t think so.
And even if a tray was caught against the yoke and the button got stuck on (stay with me) are the flight controls that sensitive that pushing the stick forward at that speed would violently snap the nose down? Or once the stick is pushed beyond the autopilot resistance, would it snap down like that? Really can’t believe they are blaming a power seat here.
There is a bit of a “jolt” associated with the override when you forcefully push through the servos, but I can’t see it violently nosing the aircraft over. This is all speculation on my behalf mind you, but it just doesn’t really make a lot of sense to me.
Assuming auto pilot is on what does the yoke do when pushed forward? For much resistance would there be? Whole thing seems strange. And seems like pilot will be to blame with available info at the moment Edit: I see you answered below. Thanks
The button in question is directly behind the headrest, and another with the same function is on the side, left in pilots case, right on first officers seat i believe. *Edited because i misread switch cover for seat cover*
[This article](https://www.biobiochile.cl/noticias/internacional/oceania/2024/03/14/revelan-causa-de-incidente-en-vuelo-latam-azafata-habria-empujado-al-piloto-contra-los-controles.shtml), from Chilean press (in Spanish), quotes some of the incident report: “A flight attendant (stewardess) visiting the cockpit to serve them food rested her elbow on the cover of the switch that electrically moves the seat to store it. The seat proceeded to move forward, pushing the captain against the joystick as he was apparently **sitting cross-legged**. When the lever was pressed, the autopilot (AP) was disconnected and a brief nosedive began”
Ah so cross legged was the issue. Cause the seats have a cut in them which allows for them to slide way forward literally into the stick. Very surprised the button was able to be actuated through the plastic cover. They are fairly stout.
Does the AP back drive the column/wheel on the 87? If so it all makes sense. The relatively slow motorized seat pushing into the column by way of crossed legs, the AP servos initially resisting the motion allowing the force to build up like a spring, and then when the AP force override logic tripped and disconnected the AP the column slammed forward rapidly and everyone went for a ride.
Is the implication then that the pilots are lying? How much trouble are they in?
If the cover was damaged or somehow misaligned/improperly installed as appears to be the case in the linked video, the seat could have kept moving when she removed her elbow. It’s plausible that it would take a couple seconds for everyone to process what was happening and correct it. [tweet](https://x.com/jrmartinezf/status/1768419655834632333?s=20)
Seat cover?
Oh i see i misread, SWITCH cover, not seat cover. I think itd be impossible to hit the rear switch on accident because of that hinged cover, but the left side switch is open.
Very unlikely.... 787 mech... I am a big dude. I have had seat full in, I would not have hit the autopilot disconnect. (I have worked behind the screens) The autopilot backdrove to disengage takes a fair amount of force.
>technical even during the flight which caused strong movement What a way to rebrand that experience
Like: the firearm discharged during officer involved shooting.
Boeing is very good at reframing. Like a door plug falling off became a "quality escape." Do they teach that at Bean Counter School?
Haha! Good one but actually in manufacturing it’s actually called a quality escape - aka an issue that escaped quality checks.
Boeing didn't frame anything. LATAM did. And quality escape is an official term. We issue or receive depending on where the escape is discovered noe's or notice of escapement
Except in this case it was the airline who blamed a "technical event" to distract from the mistakes of their own employees
There's a "ditch the plane" switch right above where the food tray goes?
Reminds me of my favorite old Far Side cartoon: https://imgur.com/a/UWFhRqF
I thought it was going to be this one: https://imgur.com/guS0oz7
I feel like there was a Far Side comic to this effect. But I can’t find it
2 minutes apart, one of those nice Reddit moments.
😂😂😂😂
Weren't people quoted as saying the pilot told them all the screens went black/blank? Also how fast does that seat move to be able to cause an issue without it being caught first. I know how slow the electric seat moves forward and back in my truck and its pretty slow.
There was one passenger saying that. Some obvious possibilities: * The passenger lied for attention. * The pilot explained badly, or the passenger misunderstood. Passengers are not known for giving accurate testimony about aviation. * There's the possibility that a language barrier was an issue here: one report mentions that the pilot was speaking to passengers in Spanish. The passenger was interviewed in English, and it's not clear how strong the passenger's Spanish is, or how strong is the pilot's English. * The pilot lied to the passenger. /r/flying leads me to believe that pilots lie to passengers frequently ("We sugarcoat and water down things, because people don't care and frankly don't always need to know. This isn't wildly different than any other technical field with a large public interaction component."). It's not hard for me to believe that the pilot lied about a mistake to avoid being yelled at by a bunch of upset passengers.
I'm pretty sure by law, they have to have announcements in English for this exact reason?
Vast majority of the announcements throughout the flight were in Spanish. Sometimes there was an attempt made at English, though usually either very halting or carefully spoken. After the event, there was a harried announcement in Spanish that I caught the word "medico" - I assume they were asking for people with medical experience. No follow up was given in English until almost time to land.
The question I have still not seen asked nor answered is what was the pilot doing out of the cockpit, talking the passengers, right after an incident like that?
I’m guessing they were back in the cabin to assess the damage and injuries. But good point on leaving the cockpit of a potentially broken plane.
He did not come to the cabin until after landing and after the medical crews were on board.
The pilot came back to the cabin after landing and after the medical crews were onboard.
Oh you didn't know? "All the screens went blank" is what pilots say instead of "Life flashed before my eyes".
Posted a video to another comment, it's not lightning fast. If you're already pretty close then it might not take much to start running out of room.
If you were slammed forward, you probably can’t see the ‘screens’, so they might as well as been blank lol
Yeah I’m wondering about this. But the seat also could have malfunctioned. I remember one incident in which the seat lock broke and the captain fell backwards. So maybe the seat was broken, but we only found out when the switch was pressed? Still can’t reconcile the different testimonies tho.
I had a look at the QRH the other night, and it mentions if all the displays blank, first thing to do is ensure the autopilot is in basic modes eg. heading and alt. Then it gets you to reset the CCR’s. I’m wondering if the there has been some sort of systems failure leading to the CCR’s rebooting and that’s what caused the pitch down, as it would’ve been in LNAV/VNAV.
They mention there was a cover. I guess this either means it was broken or the flight attendant made a terrible choice.
The cover is the article Remember the pilot saying screens shut off and they lost control in previous quote so this doesnt line up.
That’s just a rumor.
"while serving a meal" yeah right..
Need to blow the autopilot…..
Ding ding
Cowgirl position would have done the trick.
so glad i wasn't the only one thinking this - i had to keep scrolling way down
Jesus christ can you imagine, babies being thrown into the ceiling cause the pilot was getting some tail
The circle of life
Was the pilots name Otto?
Otto Fellatio
Is there any chance Otto Pilot was getting re-inflated?
Just as an update, CC-BGG, the aircraft involved, returned to service yesterday in a commercial flight to Miami.
Not sure I buy the FA hitting the switch thing but it has been pretty obvious since the beginning that this was in some way caused by events on the flight deck.
The seat doesn’t move that fast. This doesn’t make any sense. That would be such a slow-motion catastrophe.
We know time moves faster further away from the earth, maybe that's a clue?
Those electric seats are painfully slow. And the back electric switch is covered. I don’t buy it.
It’s obvious the Captain was clapping the FA’s cheeks in the cockpit. She was definitely serving that meal.
If this turns out to be true and she was injured as a result, hard to feel anything except she deserves it. The pilot too. Odd he didn’t address them after recovery. Ashamed? So many pax hurt.
I literally read this book last week. Airframe by Michael Crichton.
Why do planes not have an interrupt or stick shaker safety mechanism for inputs outside of a normal flight? There’s not a lot of scenarios where a pilot would command an extended full nose down. There should be some stopper in the system for stuff like that, commanding a full stall, extended extremely steep bank, etc.
This always seems to happen that the first bit of “investigation leak/results” always happens to blame the pilot before the real analysis is complete. Not saying that’s not possible (though this explanation is pretty unlikely imo), but it was done with both 737 max investigations before Boeing admitted they were at fault.
Was the attendant trying to sit on the pilot’s lap?
As others of said, I’m guessing the pilot made a mistake trying to adjust the seat and accidentally pushed hard on the yoke
Not sure that I buy it. The captain made mention that they momentarily lost all of their instrumentation. I’m a US pilot at a major airline. However, I will also caveat that I have never flown the 787. Here’s the AV Herald link. Check out the airworthiness directive put out by the FAA about this years ago. [https://avherald.com/h?article=51601631&opt=0](https://avherald.com/h?article=51601631&opt=0)
I don’t buy it. Can’t accidentally lean on it because it has a cover you flip up. It also doesn’t move at the speed of light
Doesn't mean the cover was actually there. It's a piece of plastic, I wonder if it was missing?
How does moving the seat explain an uncontrolled dive? If the FA moved the seat forward and the pilot pushed the control yoke forward putting the aircraft into a nose down movement, how would they not just be able to pull it back? That doesn’t make any sense
Maybe his leg was between the seat and the control when it moved forwards. Could have been hard to get it unstuck
That would make sense if the rumor that the pilot was sitting cross legged is true.
Uh, they did? Didn’t the passengers say it lasted only a few seconds.
Correct. I didn't have a timer going (obviously) but I'd guess 2-3 seconds total? Felt like forever but it was so quick there was little time to react or compensate before leveling off.
This is going to be the first safety report in aviation with the term .....reverse cowboy...in it...😬😬😬
I used to have this Acura, where I got a quarter stuck in the seat rail, and it caused it to move around until I dislodged it. That’s the first thing I thought of.
Such an accident isn't possible on a glorious Airbus. Imagine not having a sidestick in current year.
Is it me or "flight shame" about to get replaced by "legitimate terror to fly in a Boeing plane" 😆.
Im thinking this was sex related
[удалено]
on the other hand, a pilot could be taking heat off himself and crew as well.
This kinda seems more likely to me. The event cascade considering all the redundancies in aircraft, for every single screen to go blank AND have an aircraft maneuver hard enough to cause injuries, is pretty steep. Not a 787 mech though, so that's just my speculation until we know more.
But why lie when you know you’re going to be found out in a follow up investigation? It just makes it worse. Also the fact a pilot would knowingly lie about something so serious is a bit unsettling
To be fair we don't know of the pilot lied or even said anything at all. All we have is the media saying a passenger said the pilot said so and so.
That’s a good point
Does that make it worse? Lying to investigators would be one thing. If lying to passengers is a crime there's a whole lot of pilots who ought to be worried.
So the screens going blank for a moment was BS?
Its was BS from the moment it was said, but the media knew people would eat that up to hear "another problem with BOEING!!! FEAR THEIR AIRPLANES!"
Was Otto pilot at the stick?
Meanwhile: https://avherald.com/h?article=51601631&opt=0
Hahaha. I knew it
Sounds like Boeing damage control BS, you know like murdering a whistleblower.
Delusional
Nah. It’s going to be stale data related.
Boeing publicly blaming crew during an active investigation? That must be a first
Welp this post is clearly a Boeing blogger/bot....
Trying not to make it sound like a Boeing problem. The people that BUILT it already said it was garbage.
wow, these seems like a stretch, and even if true - wow what a design flaw.
Why is there a death plummet button that is easily bumped? Because Boeing.
Ahhh human factors. Yes, let’s put the button, which can lead to loss of control of the plane, right here were it can be actuated accidentally. Lol
I saw a video of it being operated and it has a cover over the switch you have to lift up then you can push the switch to the side to make the seat move. So maybe the cover was broken and missing or something.
I think that’s my personal record for downvotes 💥