At the outset, let us all pray to God Almighty, that there may be some survivors not yet found. After all, in the past, there have been many similar accidents that had miraculous survivors, although it is also true that they were all swiftly rescued. Our thoughts and prayers are with all family and friends of those on board QZ8501. Arguably, aside to all sorts of speculations and theories, there are couple of key concerns at this stage: o Weather was indeed challenging but not extremely bad. There were many other aircraft that had passed the same path, within a narrow clearance window, before and after this specific plane. The Airbus A320-200 has a pretty good record with bad weather, including thunderstorms, severe turbulence and all sorts of lightning strikes. o According to ATC screenshot, the plane was at 109 East, which is completley odd for a plane heading to Singapore or back to Surabaya. o The leaked ATC screen-shot and all other currently available aviation information has raised some doubts about the expertise of the flight crew. The flight commander had a total of 6,100 flying hours (pretty low compared to SQ standards) and the first officer had a total of only around 2K flying hours. One can recall Air France flight 447 a few years ago where the pilots messed up, putting a perfectly sound aircraft into the ocean. o Aircraft lost contact with Jakarta air traffic control at 6:17 AM local time. According to some reports, Indonesian Air Force despatched a 737-200 MPA for search only after around 4 hours after the incident while Singapore had swiftly offered the services of two RSAF C-130 and navy ships near Indonesia, within the first two hours of the reports. Regretfully, it was only at 1430 hours that the Indonesian Govt officials and Defence Minister Ryamizard Ryacudu accepted the offer of key help from neighbouring RSAF. India, Malaysia, South Korea and Australia have also put multiple ships and many maritime surveillance aircraft on standby for assistance in the search operation, yet there was not a single word of acceptance from Jakarta. India has also offered the most advanced P-8I aircraft, used for maritime reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare operations. Incidentally, by the evening, many crucial hours after the first reports, Indonesia managed to deploy eight ships, two helicopters and three airplanes in a large search area that focused on waters near Bangka and the island of Belitung east of Sumatra. Sadly the search had to be called-off within just a few hours due to nightfall. While the Indonesian Govt was so inexplicably late in accepting vital logistics support from Singapore and other countries, after sunset Spores Air Accident Investigation Bureau proactively offered specialists & underwater locator beacon detectors to assist with search. For the record, by nightfall, President Joko Widodo’s office indeed released a statement that he was welcoming assistance from neighbouring countries. o Assuming aircraft crashed, it has to be off the Belitung Islands. Shockingly, based on available reports, no navy or air force resource or emergency medical personnel were dispatched within the most crucial first two hours of the incident. o Based on what little is known so far, most of the experts wonder if the incident was weather-related or some kind of a high-altitude stall due to human error. However post 9/11 security measures, while terrorism is unlikely, it is important to make a note that east Java’s capital of Surabaya has been a hot bed for terrorists. The fugitive leader Santoso’s East Indonesia Mujahideen network is very active. The security at the airport is definitely not fool proof. It used to be pretty common to experience the surreal sight of passengers continuing to pass through the ineffective scanners when the electricity goes off. o Pilot was asked by ATC to level at 38,000 feet. Last elevation reported was 32,000 feet, 469 kts. What prevented them from complying? Was there any incident inside the aircraft that disturbed the pilot? It is extremely rare for a total lack of any sort of distress signal in such a modern aircraft (A320-200), since apart from the manual distress alert, a lot of these emergency signals are automated based on critical on-board parameters. The detailed analysis of cockpit voice recorder will be most crucial. o If aircraft indeed crashed, it is almost impossible for the ELT not to activate instantly. Strangely, none detected so far. o Let us hope the Indonesian Air Transportation, Investigation Authorities and the Airline are already in touch with the international and US agencies for access to all the intricate satellite data from multiple-satellites hovering over the busy shipping and strategic area. o BTW, not a single message or tweet or expression of regret or sincere prayers from the CEO, until after lunch time on a post-Christmas Sunday, that too after many tweets questioning his silence. It was only late in the evening a press conference was called. Definitely not a great example of crisis management or PR. o Obviously, it appears like not much has been learnt after MH370. It is also questionable if key recommendations were really implemented by certain Countries, Officials and Airlines.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Dec 2014 14:16:13 +0000
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