AvTalk Episode 203: United’s disturbing dive after departure

On this week’s AvTalk, a United Airlines 777’s steep dive after departure and other recent incidents lead to FAA calling for a safety summit. We dig in to what’s happened and what regulators want to do about it. We pick apart the preliminary report on the crash of Yeti Airlines flight 691 in Nepal. And Air India goes shopping, with letters of intent for more than 500 aircraft. Safety first, second, and third Last Sunday using data supplied by Flightradar24, The Air Current broke the news that a United Airlines 777 had descended to less than 800 feet above the Pacific Ocean shortly after departing Maui in December. The NTSB opened an investigation on Tuesday. Also this week we learned about a runway incursion in Honolulu at the end of January, also involving a United 777. The NTSB also released its preliminary report on the runway incursion between an American Airlines 777 and Delta Air Lines 737. And in front of Congress this week, FAA acting administrator Billy Nolen issued a call for a safety summit in March, laying out the work various arms of the FAA will engage in to promote safety. Yeti Airlines flight 691 preliminary report The preliminary report from Nepal’s accident investigation board on the crash of Yeti Airlines flight 691 highlights the propellers being feathered and the resulting lack of thrust as the ATR 72 was attempting to land in Pokhara. Air India’s HUGE letters of intent Air India’s long rumored, massive aircraft order was finally announced this week. But there’s a big asterisk next to the announcement. Both its order for 290 Boeing aircraft and 250 Airbus aircraft are letters of intent, not firm orders. Lufthansa isn’t having a good week An IT outage affected all Lufthansa Group flights earlier this week and trade union Verdi is on strike Friday, leading to the cancellation of nearly two-thirds of all flights in Germany. What else is happening? More 737 MAX are back in service in China or will be soon. Beta Technologies’ eVTOL made its first piloted test flight in the New York City area this week. The last 747’s first flight after delivery was back to Paine Field. Amsterdam will once again limit passenger numbers this summer as it hopes to stave off the long lines of last summer. Help out Martin with his thesis, fill out this survey Martin is an avid AvTalk listener and a masters student in psychology. As part of his thesis, he’s conducting a survey of civilian pilots about their stress levels. If you’re a civilian pilot and you have 20 minutes to spare, please help Martin and fill out the survey. From Martin, “I’m writing my thesis about the influence of stress on decision-making processes of civilian pilots and I would like to ask you for help with completing my research. As we have repeatedly seen, cognitive functioning, situational awareness and decision-making efficiency are a major factor in aviation safety and can be a decisive factor between an incident and a catastrophe. In order to study this issue I’m conducting a short (max. 20 minutes), completely anonymous survey of civilian pilots (be it private or commercial). As I’m determined to reach out to as many pilots as possible all around the world, I would like to ask you for help! If you are a certified pilot please consider filling out my survey and help me in reaching my goal.” Thank you for listening! Thank you so much for listening to AvTalk! Like the podcast?