A Reliance on Automation in the Cockpit

A Reliance on Automation in the Cockpit: The heavy Air France Airbus A330 is cruising high above the Atlantic Ocean at 35,000 feet, bumping around in the turbulent air common above the waters northeast of Brazil. Two co-pilots are currently at the controls while the Captain who is on a rest break sits in his rest quarters. The highest-time First Officer (David Robert) assuming role as pilot flying at the moment listens to the other First Officer (Pierre-Cédric Bonin) in the right seat talk about their course through the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) between waypoints SALPU and TASIL. As the aircraft plows its way through an area of moderate weather associated with this ITCZ, the aircraft begins to sustain heavy turbulence.

David reaches up and presses the flight attendant call button.

A flight attendant answers, "Yes, Marilyn."

The pilot in the right seat replies, "Yes, Marilyn, it's Pierre up front... Listen, in 2 minutes, we're going to be getting into an area where things are going to be moving around a little bit more than now. You'll want to take care."

Marilyn responds, "Okay, we should sit down then?"

"Well, I think that's not a bad idea. Give your friends a heads-up."

"Yeah, okay, I'll tell the others in the back. Thanks a lot."

Pierre adds one last thing, "I'll call you back as soon as we're out of it."

Outside ,there is a tremendous amount of precipitation in frozen form adhering to the aircraft. It begins to accumulate on the pitot tubes which are primarily responsible for airspeed, and this information is directly fed into the aircraft computers. However, as the pitot tubes become blocked with ice they begin to send erroneous information to the ship's brain, leading to conflicting information that the computer must now decipher. The smart A330 currently cannot figure out what pitot tube is indicating correctly, and in an attempt to save itself it decides to give control to the pilots. The cockpit sounds with the distinctive chime of the autopilot disconnecting. A red light blinks in the dark cockpit in front of both David and Pierre as the aircraft is now alerting the crew that the plane is now in their hands. Next to disengage is the autothrust.

Pierre blurts out in French, "I have the controls."


David Robert replies, "Okay."

What ensues in the next few minutes is frightening. Pierre reacts irrationally as he pulls back on the side stick to put the airplane into a steep climb, despite having recently discussed with David Robert the fact that the plane could not safely ascend due to the current weight of the aircraft and an unusually high external temperature at their current altitude.


Logically, for any professional airline pilot the first thing to do would be to compare the pilot's airspeed indicator with the co-pilot's and with other instrument readings, such as ground speed, altitude, engine settings, and rate of climb before making making such a rash decision to climb. Apparently that didn't happen.


Almost as soon as Pierre pulls up into a climb, the plane's computer reacts. A warning chime alerts the cockpit to the fact that they are leaving their programmed altitude. Then the stall warning sounds. This is a synthesized human voice that repeatedly calls out, "Stall!" in English, followed by a loud and intentionally annoying sound called a "cricket." The Airbus's stall alarm is designed to be impossible to ignore. Yet for the duration of the flight, none of the pilots will mention it, or acknowledge the possibility that the plane has indeed stalled—even though the word "Stall!" will blare through the cockpit 75 times. Throughout, Pierre will keep pulling back on the stick, the exact opposite of what he must do to recover from the stall.

Then what is interesting to note is that Pierre remarks, "There's no good... there's no good speed indication."


The Airbus is soon climbing at a blistering rate of 7000 feet per minute and reaches 38,000 feet. While it is gaining altitude, it is losing speed, until it is crawling along at only 93 knots, a speed more typical of a small Cessna than an airliner. David Robert notices Pierre's error and tries to correct him.


David yells out to Pierre, "Pay attention to your speed. Pay attention to your speed." He is probably referring to the plane's vertical speed. They are still climbing.


Pierre replies, "Okay, okay, I'm descending."


David, "Stabilize…"


Pierre, "Yeah."


David says, "Descend... It says we're going up... It says we're going up, so descend."


Pierre, "Okay."


Then one of the pitot tubes begins to work again. The cockpit displays once again show valid speed information.


David then remarks again, "Descend!"


Pierre replies, "Here we go, we're descending."


David yells, "Gently!"


Pierre eases the back pressure on the stick, and the plane gains speed as its climb becomes more shallow. It accelerates to 223 knots. The stall warning falls silent. For a moment, the co-pilots are in control of the airplane.


Then Pierre remarks, "We're... yeah, we're in a climb."


Yet, still, Pierre does not lower the nose. Recognizing the urgency of the situation, David Robert pushes a button to summon the captain.


David, "Damn it, where is he?"


In less than four minutes, the aircraft records its last position as it hits the ocean 350 miles off the northeastern coast of Brazil. The last recorded ground speed was 107 knots, and it was descending at 10,912 feet per minute, with the engines' N1's at 55%. Its pitch was 16.2 degrees (nose up), with a roll angle of 5.3 degrees left. During its descent, the plane had turned more than 180 degrees to the right to a compass heading of 270 degrees. The plane was stalled during its entire 3 minute 30 second descent from 38,000 feet.

Three years later I find myself in a similar situation above the Pacific Ocean in an Airbus A320. Although this is simulated, we are given similar aircraft symptoms that were presented to the crew of Air France 447. As we depart Los Angeles and climb toward the west and accelerate toward our flap retraction speed, the Captain calls for, "Flaps up" way before he is supposed to. In fact he wants me to raise the flaps some fifteen knots slower than what the aircraft is indicating to me, but not to him. I glance over at his airspeed indicator and it is increasing at an alarming rate. In fact, it is increasing so quickly that he sees a potential overspeed situation occurring with the flaps and slats still retracted for takeoff and initial climb. I then glance at the standby airspeed indicator and notice that it represents a value identical to my airspeed, but not the Captain's. Apparently the #1 pitot tube is blocked and is now acting like an altimeter as we climb higher into the sky. As we climb, his airspeed increases. Private pilot 101.

We quickly determine that his airspeed is bad and he gives me the aircraft. With valid airspeed and altimeter readings, we retract the flaps and continue our climb over the dark Pacific Ocean. Another minute passes and suddenly my airspeed begins to decrease. We still appear to be climbing so I glance at our aircraft's engine instruments to ensure the engines are still producing climb thrust. They are. Then suddenly the autothrust disconnects and my airspeed value disappears on my display. The Captain's airspeed still has no valid reading either. The standby airspeed doesn't seem to be working as well. Then the engine's EPR settings for thrust disappear, and multiple warning appear on our ECAM. This becomes alarming.

With no airspeed readout, we as pilots must revert back to our days of flying pitch and power. Just like the old days in a Cessna, pitch and power work beautifully for this scenario. For this exercise, we set our thrust in the climb detent, thus keeping our engines at a high power setting. Next, determine your altitude and adjust pitch accordingly. If you are close to the ground, pitch up 15 degrees. The engines are already producing climb power, so naturally the aircraft will climb. If you are below ten thousand feet, pitch up ten degrees. If the aircraft is above ten thousand feet, pitch up five degrees. Then use the stick and fly the aircraft manually.

I learned something that day from one of our older pilot instructors who has thousands of hours in Boeing 727s who said that, "It is not a bad idea to remember your engine and attitude parameters during different regimes of flight." I couldn't agree more. Even my father mentioned this to me a few days prior to training to visualize your engine instruments during different flight phases. "Fly attitude and thrust settings," he says. He is right. Listen to the wind noise. If it gets louder, you must be going fast.

So one thing to know is if you lose airspeed in a highly automated aircraft, you can:

* Fly a power setting: 80% N1 or 2400 pounds per hour per each engine at altitude for the A320.

* Fly attitude of around 4-5 degrees nose-up pitch.

* Keep the thrust in the climb detent. Adjust if necessary, but climb first. You never know when you may be near a mountain.

*Listen to wind nose.

As our aircraft become even more automated, there will be less reliance on basic scan techniques. This was never a problem in the round-dial cockpit days, but is increasing in the highly-computerized flight deck of today. Finally, with such a reliance on automation, it is extremely valuable to turn off the autopilot and disconnect those autothrottles and fly the plane from time to time. Don't let those basic airmanship skills erode. You never know when you may need them. It could have helped to mitigate the events precipitating to the crash of Air France 447.