Where do you think this went wrong? Why did this Air India Flight AI one seven one? Why did it come down?
Do you think, Well, we're still trying to work that out. There's a little bit of information available and more come. We can tell that the aircraft wasn't able to stain flight, and that could be because the engines weren't producing enough thrust, or the lift devices might not have been producing enough lift, or the extra drag of the landing gear may have overcome both. There's a complex set of circumstances we're still waiting to find out.
Malcolm Gladwell and his book talks about when you have aviation disasters, it's not one thing, it's up to seven things that may have caused this. Does that seem to work in this case?
I think there'll be a lot of different circumstances it contributed to whatever's happened. There'll be some pretty obvious direct causal factors, and there'll be lots of other things in the background that may have caused or contributed to that situation. So that, yeah, there's a lot to find out. We're looking forward to finding out some more information.
So what's your theory. Do you think that it's something to do with the plane's wing flaps and the landing gear. I mean, I'm ridding so many different things here.
There are a lot of theories, for sure, and it m'd be pretty hesitant to speculate. Of course, we do know that the aircraft wasn't able to sustain flight, and that's most likely because it didn't have enough thrust to overcome whatever other influences the aircraft had on it. And we don't know why that is, but we'll find that out soon.
If you could talk me through this based on what you know, how did it manage to get up in the air in the first place.
Well, that's the interesting concern. It had enough power to get as fast as it needed to ground, enough lift to get off the runway, and then for some reason it wasn't able to continue flight. And there'll be something that occurred or a set of factors that occurred to result in that outcome, and we just don't know at this stage.
There's been a lot of talk about how the flight beforehand on that plane, the air conditioning wasn't working. In flight, TV wasn't working, and that's been directly attributed to that particular plane, and I think the flight going into India, wouldn't that have been a warning sign for people on the ground.
Well, like it could have been. That may well indicate something to do with the electrical systems on the aircraft may not have been working as well as they could have been, But they could just be isolated incidents that are not directly related at all. And we know that aircraft from time to time have different parts of systems not working, and sometimes it's okay to fly with them
and sometimes it's not. They're very strictly defined in operating procedures that are approved by the regulators, and we expect that their India would have met its obligations there of course, so we just don't know at this stage.
And I understand it's not your position to speculate, but from an aviator's point of view, for us that are layman, would there have been anything on the instrument panel that would have said something's wrong here?
Depending on which which part of the flight, whether it's at the start of the takeoff or after the aircraft became airborne, almost certainly there would have been warning signs. What they were specifically in relationship of the aircraft systems, It's hard to know, but the aircraft will almost certainly have been telling the pilots some things about what was going on that they could interpret.
So one, are the pilots at that stage in the flight when you've got issues and he's putting out a may day? Could that have helped?
In that circumstance? The may day was probably a last ditch resort to tell people that something was terribly wrong and that they were facing imminent danger. It doesn't directly help solve the problem, but it lets everybody else know that there's a problem and for them to be aware and to enable the aircraft to do whatever it wants to try and save itself.
From And how much information can they get out of the black box? Does that wudle it down to the ins degree? Will it give you an exact idea of what might have happened here?
Yeah, there's a couple of different recorders. There's the flight data recorder, and that records information about all the aircraft systems and the configuration and some of the environmental conditions that the aircraft was flying in. And that'll certainly help understand whether certain systems are working, what was selected or dialed or switched at the time, and how much thrust the engines were producing, what selections were made, and whether
those selections were achieved. And then a copy voice recorder, which apparently has been found as well now will tell us what the pilots were saying and hearing, and that will be very helpful as well.
And there's been a lot of talk about the miracle survivor in seat eleven A, and I've read since this occasion everybody now is trying to book their seat on seat eleven A, which is interesting because I always was led to believe the safest place to be was down the back of the plane. And I did notice that when I saw the incredible pictures that the rear of the plane, which was sticking out of a building, was, apart from you know, obvious scorch marks and dents, seemed
to be pretty intact. Is that true that the back of the plane is always safer than somewhere like ELEBNA and this was just an anomaly.
I think it was ahenomenally And we don't know whether ELEVENA is the ex seat for every flight. It would definitely depend on the circumstances of the accident as to whether you want to be in the tail or up the front. That's probably a personal opinion of course on that, and this is purely just conjecture. But how do you think he managed to survive? Is that right near a door?
Could that door of popped open? Yeah, he said he was seated near an emergency exit, and what I read from what he said, he's kind of thought he was dead.
He woke up and.
Walked out of the aeroplane. So yeah, it was quite miraculous, Like you said that, who was able to survive that situation.
But now people obviously whenever there's an a crash like this, people immediately get really concerned about aviation safety. But is it still fair to say that aviation safety is among the safest of any kind of transport. Yeah, that's right.
The data and the facts represent well that aviation is a safe way of traveling, and we'd certainly pause to consider which airlines you'd fly with from time to time, and more often than not, you're going to be safe as any other type of transport.
Mate, good to talk to you. Tell us a little bit about your company aviation projects.
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