Then pretty much all doubt was removed by the crash of AF447, in which the flight data recorders showed that Airbus' control systems were completely incapable of dealing with a situation that would have been routine for a conventionally controlled aircraft, and the pilots were equally unable to deal with it, since they had basically never been trained to truly fly the aircraft. Cookie Notice You are Captain Michel Asseline. But the take home message, why do you spend every day at work in the cross-hairs of numerous non-producers who cant do the job, but are stalking you? The crash was a great embarrassment to Air France and Airbus, a European company with deep roots in France. Pilots that make mistakes -- Where are they today? *Defects come in all shades. Guilty. His job was to find its limitations, but one slipped past him, and Airbus and all the designers and engineers. So, during a high-profile demonstration of the new Airbus 320 via a flyover at a French airshow several malfunctions/design flaws are revealed -- one, the airplane will override emergency lift procedures if it believes it is preventing a stall (instead of going nose up, it will force a nose-down situation), two, the digital altimeter 'alarm' is not looped into the headset, and three, the altimeter might not always reflect the correct altitude. Nor, then, were his passengers. The DFDR was read the same night by the Brtigny sur Orge Flight Test Centre: Investigators found that the aircraft had been airworthy, that its weight and centre-of-gravity had been within limits, and that there was no evidence of mechanical or electronic systems failure. Menu. TOGA power is applied. 12:44:45 - 'Flaps 3' is selected as the aircraft descends through 500 feet (150m) at an airspeed of 177 knots. It's kind of hard to prove that pilots and conditions WOULD have messed up if they had truly been in control of all flights all these years. Captain Michel Asseline served a year in prison. Captain Asseline, First Officer Mazire, two Air France employees and the sponsor of the event, president of the local flight club, were charged with the crime of involuntary manslaughter, of the group Captain Asseline was the only one who ended up in jail convicted to 10 months in prison, while the rest ended up on probation. Respond with some you can think of! Related news. I, personally, do not agree with the conclusions reached in this aircraft accident report. Help Center Contributor Zone Polls. Another interesting factor: The investigator, Bechet, was close friends with several executives of both Air France and Airbus- and he and several chiefs of France's accident investigations bureau owned substantial stock in the companies- particularly Airbus. Here's a story about me and you. If he and his crew, knowing the dangers that are inherrent in a low speed, low level flyover, want to, that is thier profesional decision. The flight would take 130 passengers and 6 crew aloft. I take my hat off to the captain. The fact is that this kind of statement does not negate the fact that he was breaking the rules. *Whos going to fly the goddamn airplanes in the future? [2], By this time, the fire had entered the right side of the fuselage through the damaged floor section between seat rows 10 and 15. Beautiful shots taken while the sun is below the horizon, Accidents He was a highly distinguished pilot with 10,463 flight hours to his credit. The pilot called out to the co-pilot for emergency power. Born Today Most Popular Celebs Most Popular Celebs Celebrity News. I'd give the pilot 30-40% responsibility for the crash. He was not given a map and route. (How can you see people but not trees?) The pilot pulled up on the yoke to ease the plane up over the hundred-foot-tall woods at the end of the runway. I don't think so. Guilty. It threatened to ruin the reputation of the A320, potentially losing many millions of dollars in sales. A flight attendant standing in the centre of the cabin at seat 12D was pushed into the aisle by a severely burnt passenger from 12F. I'm definitely beside the driver. Christian Roger, a professional pilot, complained energetically about the fact-finding process around the crash. In this instance, however, the pilots involved did not hesitate to fly the aircraft below its normal minimum flying speed because the purpose of the flyover was to demonstrate that the aircraft's computer systems would ensure that lift would always be available regardless of how the pilots handled the controls. Asseline should've used Radar Altimeter when flying at such a low level. I've been at my job 20 years - I know my job inside and out. I'm confident in my skills & my co workers often come to me with questions or for help and always no matter how busy I am I gladly help them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panintern Flight_112, https://www.welt.de/print/wams/vermisch Licht.html, http://www.feuerwehr-krummesse.de/einsa kensee.php, http://www.bea.aero/docspa/2009/f-cp090 .01.en.pdf, http://www.nytimes.com/1993/10/14/us/ai hance.html, http://www.avmed.in/2011/02/from-convic le-reborn/, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/fir -1.2605682, https://norj.ca/2014/04/pilots-fired-af ff-course/. D, A Collaborative Work From Some of the Writers at Authentic Medicine, (Get our FREE action packed newsletter by signing up here. He was leader of the French air force's aerobatics team and, later, a Boeing 747 Flight Captain with Air France. Unprofessional. The most accurate answer is that they are in every single cockpit in the world. [5][6], The plane's flight recorders were found still attached in the unburnt tail section. *Captain Michel Asseline got thrown under the Airbus. The aircraft fell to the ground. Now he was not planning on landing so these were of no interest to him.So then what safety reason would he have to go around? All the passengers were specially selected for the trip. Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Some passengers had difficulty unfastening their seatbelts because they were unfamiliar with the mechanism (which differs from the type used in car seatbelts). [1] If he was unaware that the plane's altimeter was in feet and not meters he still bears the responsibility of flying too low. Michel Asseline was the pilot in command of F-GFKC, Pierre Mazire was his first officer, when the aircraft overflew the airfield at 2 pm in wonderful sunny weather. But upon seeing the Aerodrome, the pilot saw that the audience were gathered elsewhere, on Runway 34R. However, while the pilots were trained in metric, this particular plane was in Imperial units. 3 people died due to smoke. He was never given the chance. They might be paid, or simply represent interest of a much more powerful players - Air France. Asseline was initially sentenced to six months in prison along with twelve months of probation. [3], It was also claimed by the Institute of Police Forensic Evidence and Criminology, based in Switzerland, that the flight data recorders may have been switched and were not the original ones in the airplane. Fly-by-wire was perfect for this precision maneuver of an aircraft. Props and jets from the good old days, Flight Decks 500 feet is the law it is not simple a suggestion. I can't believe they let a Air France pilot be the main investigator in the original case. A pilot in charge has the ability to abort, and having realized that he was given bad information, he should have.-- Asseline had to override a safety to perform the maneuver planned for the airshow.-- Asseline claims that he thought the trees were bushes. And we dont share your email with anyone. The plane crashed because of a design defect; but because it was software and not metal, it was ignored. Captain Michel Asseline served a year in prison. ALL pilots KNOW, that there is a spool up time on jetengines. Not only was he told to go there, he was told the wrong runway to overfly. [2], During the impact, the right wing was torn off, and the spilling fuel ignited immediately. ), The Prison of Precision by Stephen Vaughn MD, Ph.D. One simple mistake doesn't cause an airplane crash. [1] A training captain since 1979, Asseline was appointed to head the company's A320 training subdivision at the end of 1987. As for pilots at the start of their career they work for peanuts $20,000 by the time they get up to $100k they been living like poppers long enough and I want a confident pilot not some mousy week person that buckles under pressure. 2) he was slotted to fly over paved long runway and switched to short grass field where all the spectators were. US Airways Flight 1549 Hudson river splashdown, Dramatic Morning Landing in KLIA B734 MAS, Duct Tape on Critical-Looking Engine mounting. A website, http://www.crashdehabsheim.net/has been set up to analyze the scandal. [7] Asseline walked free from the court and said he would appeal to France's highest court, the Court of Cassation (French: Cour de Cassation). Why be a sucker? Captain Asseline was initially sentenced to 6 months in prison along with 12 months of probation . The computer didnt know he meant just to pop up a few hundred feet. There is a very good reason for it. However why were passengers allowed on this flight. Ultimately, there is one fact that is not disputed - Captain Asseline flew the aircraft into a stall. [ 1,292 more word ] Have you ever feared losing your job? It was far easier to have the pilot be the fall guy. Tail and Winglet closeups with beautiful airline logos. and the rule he broke was the defining factor that caused the accident. The engine spool-up time of about 5 sec was perfectly correct, given that they had been pulled right back to flight-idle. [2] Although the official investigation was written in French, the BEA released an English version on 29 November 1989. It may have. Air France was especially impressed with the A320, which was the first fly-by-wire airplane ever to carry passengers. 12:45:06 - the aircraft descends through 200 feet (61m) at an airspeed of 155 knots. We thank you for your support and hope you'll join the largest aviation community on the web. You are Captain Michel Asseline. Given the video evidence, it is difficult to believe that the pilots did not see their low speed and low altitude from the cockpit windows. Accident, incident and crash related photos, Air to Air Asseline had to disengage the autothrottle and the alpha floor function which he was used to applying in high altitude flight. The door opened partway, and the emergency escape slide began inflating while it was stuck partly inside the fuselage. Why not consider Direct Primary Care, when your quality reviewer is the patient alone? Aside from the strong evidence that Air France, Airbus and the nation itself may well have had a hand in falsifying data related to the crash, there are several very important points to take away in this very sad and tragic story. It threatened to ruin the reputation of the A320, potentially losing many millions of dollars in sales. Today, the captain, Michel Asseline has lost his French pilot license for 8 years. After the rush of people had left and the interior was fast becoming toxic, she stood at the front door and called back into the cabin. Most of the crash sequence, which occurred in front of several thousand spectators, was caught on video. This is a clear case of giving a good dog a bad name in other to hang it.Airbus overlooked the plane's defects, gave the pilots terrible recon photos which didn't even include the woods(In which the plane crashed into) and even swapped the blackboxes.Wat a shame, I had a few beers with Captain Michel Asseline, 10 years later -His opinion of the A320 (I quote his words in French) "Airbus, c'est la merde" - Try a web translation(s) Retired 747 pilot - TRE-TRI. In the US it's called ASAP. But it's all about me and you. This particular flight was the A320's first passenger flight (most of those on board were journalists and raffle winners). The pilot is responsible for the safety of his aircraft and passengers. [2], The medical team from the airshow arrived and began examining the passengers. His craft was the third Airbus ever built. Here's one I remember seeing a few years ago in Canada. the aerodrome about ten nautical miles away with his First Office r Maziers. I am appalled that the court found fit to blaim teh air carsh mainly on Captain Michel Asseline, as so many faults were made (like the height instructions, missing of the forrest, etc.). Finally, the aircraft would return to Paris. Mayday also looks at the theory that it was the computer at fault, not the pilots. The transcription was later clarified with the assistance of the pilots involved. Moderators: richierich, ua900, PanAm_DC10, hOMSaR, Military Aircraft After reading all this & watching NatGeo's Air Crash Investigation episodeI'm convinced that the pilot is innocent and he did his best to save the plane French administration & Airbus are the real culprits.. He should never have put it into that situation. Everyone airminded in France knows that Michel Asseline, who was an Air France chief pilot instructor at the beginning of the Airbus A-320 era and PIC in the A-320 that crashed at Mulhouse-Habsheim airfield in June 1988, resumed his career some years after the accident as a Boeing-737 pilot in Australia. They said the plane was not at fault. A lot may have to do with corporate, national or ethnic culture, the severity of the incident, if the country the crash/incident has an attitude of criminalizing the acts of pilots (like in Brazil) or prior significant acts of error of the pilot in question. Then, as she was helping another passenger whose clothes were on fire, she was carried forward by the surge of people rushing to escape. Nor, then, were his passengers. Michel Asseline (Captain) After being sentenced, was temporarily banned from flying in France as part of a court agreement, moved to Australia and flew 737s. He knowingly took it into a dangerous situation where the aircraft had to take measures to protect itself (which most planes don't). Incidents with no casualties but with damage to the ac? I thing, there was no evidence, that captain Asseline made a fault before crash of plane. But now that the aircraft was performing its flyover at only thirty feet, the crew noticed the aircraft was lower than the now-identified hazard that they were fast approaching. They cannot possibly convict him of manslaughter when the black boxes were switched and there are 8 seconds missing from the recording. Asseline had total confidence in the aircraft's computer systems. If we come down hard on anyone who makes an error (I'm looking at you, airlines who "resign" flight crews over errors), we're asking for errors to continue unchecked until an aircraft gets binned. ", I thought a little more broadly. 3 passengers died in the accident and about 50 were injured. I just saw the nat. Captain Michel Asseline asserted that the altimeter read 30m (100'). Sorry but the pilot is at fault. [2], Habsheim aerodrome was too small to be listed in the aircraft's flight computer, thereby requiring a visual approach; both pilots were also unfamiliar with the airfield when they began their descent from 2,000 feet (610m) only 6 nautical miles (11km) from the field. I have no doubt the pilot was to blame, and the conspiracy theorists (tampering with a black box?) Privacy Policy. no! show at Mulhouse Habsheim in France. I have seen TV shows where he was even interviewed. Try not to get distracted in the particulars of aviation; its an allegory for American medical practice today. Who went to prison? His job was to find its limitations, but one slipped past him, and Airbus and all the designers and engineers. [2] The cockpit voice recorder recorded the first officer's call: The crew applied full power and Asseline attempted to climb. Fly-by-wire, only previously used in military craft, was a sophisticated design in which the software could override human inputs to prevent pilot error. I mostly blame the French courts for adding insult to injury and imposing a prison sentence on a man who may have faults, but definitely is not guilty of manslaughter. He was not given a map and route. He is in a wheel chair now, but thats gotta be a tough one to be the one and only survivor and its because of an error on his part. He exposed multiple anomalies, not to say lies, in the experts' evidence and in the data of the crash all of which pointed to a very high level, state inspired plot to whitewash the aircraft in the crash and confirmed what the pilot had been saying all along. He joined the pilot's defense team. French investigation says that Asseline was trying to do an overly-ambitious maneuver and made critical errors. Some faceless desk-pilot added on a trip to a tiny airfield on the day of the flight but did not bother to do the hard work of preparing the particulars necessary to do so. Traduzioni in contesto per "had the endorsement" in inglese-italiano da Reverso Context: I hope the Commission will pay very serious attention to them since they have had the endorsement also of the Regional Affairs Committee. The combination of these issues and possible pilot error results in a crash into a nearby forest that kills three passengers. Captain Asseline, who maintained his innocence, would go on to serve ten months of prison and a further ten months of probation.[3]. The press was aboard. [2], The pilots had each had a busy weekend and did not receive the flight plan until the morning of the flight. The first crash that comes to mind is the one where that CRJ2 crashed because it took off on the wrong runway and the only survivor was one of the pilots. He had been charged with ``involuntary homicides and injuries.. Even if no one had died even if there had been no accident he would have and should have been charged with endangering the safety of the passengers. The captain, Michel Asseline, disputed the report and claimed an error in the fly-by-wire computer prevented him from applying thrust and pulling up. Do you think the safety override crashed the plane when it forced the nose down, and the crash was inevitable? There was no reply and the thick black smoke made a visual check impossible, so she exited the fuselage. Big business wins in the end and Captain Asseline took the fall. 12:44:14 - the engine power is reduced to flight idle. passenger, journalist, Airbus A320 family, aircraft pilot, airplane | 34K views, 176 likes, 1 loves, 48 comments, 47 shares, Facebook Watch Videos from. But the truth is that the new technology has caused some crashes as well. 12:45:30 - nose-up attitude increases to 7. Captain Michel Asseline got thrown under the Airbus. This is a sad but fundamental truth lying at the heart of human nature. If you change the pilots cap for a lab coat, arent you Captain Michel Asseline, too? Captain Michel Asseline got burnt doing a routine, everyday maneuver that his plane just couldnt handle, one that an open-cockpit biplane could. The third was a woman who had reached the front door and then returned to help the girl. Therefore, Captain Asseline has to also take some responsibility for those that died and those that were maimed for life. Air France didn't inform the crew of this critical change (yet the crew voices are recorded on black boxes, and they use imperial units). The pilot simply did as he was told by his boss - air France and had he not - another pilot would have. Ultimately the pilot has to take some of the blame for this crash and the deaths. I am Captain Michel Asseline. Today, they would perform a flyover at the Habsheim Air Show at the Habsheim Aerodrome and go on to a sightseeing tour of Mont Blanc. A very unfortunate event in history! This is NOT to say the Airbus' control system has not prevented plenty of crashes. However, the Captain is also to blame because he should have never agreed to take passengers along on such a dangerous flight. He was President of the leading French pilots union, the SNPL, at the time an Airbus A320 crashed into trees at Habsheim in Eastern France in June 1988. Any experienced pilot, or physician for that matter, smells disaster. The captain made a last-second turn and approach to overfly Runway 34R. He has admitted these mistakes and paid for them. Case Study 9: Leap of Faith Summary: In the case study, Captain Michel Asseline piloted the brand new Airbus A320 for the airshow in France. However the fact he had never flown to this airport previously. I don't agree at court are idiots. The low-speed flyover, with landing gear down, was supposed to take place at an altitude of 100 feet (30m); instead, the plane performed the flyover at 30ft (9m), skimmed the treetops of the forest at the end of the runway (which had not been shown on the airport map given to the pilots) and crashed. This OEB stated that the barometric altitude indication on the A320 did not always function properly. But because of the forest, only the smaller vehicles were able to reach the wreckage. I think it much more likely that he applied power well before that, as he claims. Asseline fcuked up big time and killed 3 people. He was however given a plane that would not climb properly when he tried to and this also contributed to the crash. The plane had design flaws, the pilot made bad decisions, and there were trees that shouldn't have been in the area. It threatened to ruin the reputation of the A320, potentially losing many millions of dollars in sales. Facts: 1) new plane (model/style) = bugs still to be discovered & pilots not familiar w how plane functions (new technology / automation) 2) pilot was not familiar w air field not shown air field and only given a map of it (inaccurate map showing no terrain) right before the flight 3) air France never should have had people on the flight except crew knowing all these factors. Pilot was sentenced to imprisonment for about a year. He was supposed to conduct a low-level pass over the runway at . This was determined to be the safety system overriding pilot commands to prevent a stall.-- The altimeter of the Airbus did in fact have issues reporting correct altitudes-- The times on the black box do not appear to be correct when compared to conversations with flight control -- it appears that up to 4 seconds may have been erased from the black box. Captain Michel Asseline got burnt doing a routine, everyday maneuver that his plane just couldnt handle, one that an open-cockpit biplane could. -- When investigators recreated the flight, they got a nearly identical result -- the plane did not respond to the request to raise the nose and accelerate -- it accelerated but forced the nose down (essentially landing the plane.) [1], At the time of the incident, only three of the new aircraft type had been delivered to Air France, and the newest one (in service for two days) had been chosen for the flyover. A court in Colmar, in eastern France, also sentenced pilot Michel Asseline to 12 additional months, which were suspended. According to French law, Asseline was required to submit himself to the prison system before his case could be taken up by the Court of Cassation. However, while the pilots were trained in metric, this particular plane was in Imperial units. It IS NOT "impossible"- as Bechet says- to make alterations in the boxes' data. 16-ago-2021 - Captain Michel Asseline, 44, had been a pilot with Air France for almost twenty years and had the following endorsements: Caravelle; Boeing 707, 727, and 737; and Airbus A300 and A310. He says that when Airbus realized that this would be a PR disaster, that they tampered with evidence to make it appear that he had not taken corrective action soon enough. He was destined to fail. His choice to put the safety of the passengers at risk was and is the defining point I wish to make. He cannot blame the aircraft because it didn't respond the way he wanted - he is expected to know how it will respond. Mazires was given a twelve month suspended sentence. And how is it possible that the flight deck crew did not look into the obstacles around the airport with flying this low??? After takeoff, eight minutes away, the Aerodrome came into view. He did none of this which can be fine given he contacted the tower first. It was piloted by a premier captain of Air France, Captain Michel Asseline, with over10,000 air hours, and led the training division of Air France for qualifying pilots on the Airbus 320. Do you feel that Captain Asseline should have aborted the flyover? This and another point i wish to make the fact that most pilots would have performed a procedure called a go around when approaching an airport that you are unfamiliar with. To confirm, a close friend and colleague worked with M. Asseline for a simulator acceptance, and assessed him also as over-confident to the point of being arrogant. Yesterday, I watched the tv document of disaster. Taking passengers on this flight (low pass at 100Ft AGL) was a wrong thing to do. Less than five seconds later, the turbines began ingesting leaves and branches as the aircraft skimmed the tops of the trees. 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