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Almost 1 in 3 pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses, aviation minister says
- rwc 6y agoStart at the 4 minute mark here: https://youtu.be/oUOn6FrDPwg?t=240 https://youtu.be/oUOn6FrDPwg?t=240 Infuriating series of events. It's not simply a matter of pilot error, it's criminal negligence.
- bayesianbot 6y agoThere's an updated video from the same channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zO5rXxJRmf4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zO5rXxJRmf4 I'd start at 4:50.
- ciarannolan 6y agoIs any cockpit audio removed from this? It's pretty damn silent for two guys who are about to smash an airplane into a residential area.
- ceejayoz 6y agoSounds like it's just the ATC. Cockpit recordings aren't typically released except in transcript form, I believe.
- taborj 6y agoYou're only hearing the transmissions they made (likely recorded via the ATC side). Any in-cockpit conversations/panic would not have been recorded, or at least not released.
- gus_massa 6y agohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zO5rXxJRmf4&t=4m50s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zO5rXxJRmf4&t=4m50s (If you don't remember how to add the time, you can use https://youtubetime.com/ https://youtubetime.com/ )
- ciarannolan 6y agoYou can also right-click any Youtube video and choose "Copy video URL at current time".
- macintux 6y agoNot available in all YT clients, though.
- pbhjpbhj 6y agoWhy doesn't ATC demand they come in to line, the copilot didn't appear to explain the very high approach (7000ft when they should be 3000ft) ... is there a benefit to it?? First thing I learnt on a flight sim: slow down or you can't extend gear. Is the co-pilot allowed to smash the pilot in the face and take over when they realise they're ignoring basic instructions?
- HeyLaughingBoy 6y agoWell, it's his life on the line, so sure he's allowed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crew_resource_management https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crew_resource_management
- tialaramex 6y agoThey're both pilots, or, if you want to put it that way, both co-pilots. The ranks are typically "Captain" and "First officer" and what ought to matter in a well-trained team is Pilot Flying versus Pilot Monitoring (sometimes other phrasing is used but that name scheme is pretty clear what's happening). It takes explicit training to overcome a human tendency to defer, and that means training for all crew and especially cockpit crew. This is called Crew Resource Management and it involves learning interpersonal skills that enable the team to prevent individual human errors from having grave consequences. CRM is most often important in the cockpit, in this example to get the pilot flying the plane to agree that this approach is bad and they need to try a fresh approach. But CRM extends beyond the cockpit because in some incidents it's vital to remember that the rest of the crew are experts too, just not in flying a plane.
- numpad0 6y agoIt took me too long to get this so I’ll leave it here: Colloquially we call all aviator people as “pilots” but technically the person on the left seat is Captain and to the right is First Officer/Pilot/Co-Pilot. Like on marine vessels, the original idea is that the captain has the full authority to his ship and his first officer steers it under his order. That extra hierarchy lead to several accidents so newer concepts such as PM/PF or CRM rules were conceived, but as far as terminologies go that’s what captain/officer stands for.
- jaywalk 6y agoFor every choice he had to make on the approach, he made the wrong one. He literally did everything wrong, and ignored every warning. It's almost inconceivable that someone could screw up as badly as he did.
- albntomat0 6y ago> For every choice he had to make on the approach, he made the wrong one. *As they did. 2 pilots, both ignored the warnings from the airplane, and the initial ones from the tower about approach speed and altitude.
- catalogia 6y agoUnlicensed pilots are very common in Alaska. There's an old joke that the FAA hopes to get at least 50% of the pilots in Alaska properly licensed.
- rwc 6y agoThose pilots wouldn't happen to be flying fully loaded A320s would they?
- catalogia 6y agoI hope not. I expect the vast majority are GA pilots, but given that they're skirting the law, it's hard to say. Edit: That was a semi-joke, obviously they don't have airbuses. Many are operating in a commercial capacity though, offering rides to customers or hauling freight.
- rwc 6y agoNo, no it's not. It's ridiculous to think unlicensed pilots from Alaska are somehow flying A320s for any airline carrier.
- mc32 6y agoYou mean flying certified aircraft or experimental aircraft and bush planes? It’s one thing to fly unlicensed and another to claim you have a proper license when you actually paid someone to take the test for you because you don’t have the necessary experience and you’re using that license to fly commercial airliners.
- catalogia 6y agoProbably some mix of both. But certainly many are flying typical GA planes, Cessna and whatnot, without regulatory oversight. Most of their planes probably don't get annual inspections.
- 8ytecoder 6y agoAlaska the state or Alaska Airlines?
- econcon 6y agoYea how are they even flying? Haven't read the article but I guess it's one of those things where the operator had the skills but isn't getting official stamp from some institution because of some agenda of creating artificial shortage or asking for money for stamp? These guys probably know how to fly right? Is flying very small part of overall pilot certification?
- redis_mlc 6y agoNo, the pilot or co-pilot would have to actually fly, but over time the fake pilot would pick up skills. Rumor was that in India, pilot licenses were $1000 at the back door of one govt building. Some accidents found one pilot would have the fake license.
- ceejayoz 6y agoThat'd make for an awkward conversation if both pilots had a fake license. "You know how to fly this thing?" "No, I hoped you would."
- numpad0 6y agoWhile the plane in the background is like ring ring ring ring goddamn cycle that gear lever pretty please ring ring ring ring
- redis_mlc 6y agoOften there's lots of chimes going off, and in the case of Airbus, lots of little menu windows to acknowledge first before some electronic systems are usable. Also, task saturation can result in humans hearing but not recognizing alarms, which is often found on black boxes. Then you have the emotional response of the pilots realizing their careers are over. Unfortunately, the passengers in back are just along for the ride and have no idea about all that - they just wanted to get from Point A to Point B safely.
- willcipriano 6y ago
- elchin 6y agoYet he doesn't do anything about it? Hmm...
- hugh-avherald 6y agoThey have been grounded.
- teruakohatu 6y ago"PIA has grounded all its pilots who hold fake licenses, effective immediately." I would have thought anyone with a fake license was already grounded. It sounds like they knew this was an issue and just looked the other way.
- albntomat0 6y agoIt's concerning that they have such a specific number of pilots with fake licenses. It's not like this is something surprising that they're rushing to respond to, at least that's the impression I got from the article.
- not2b 6y agoIf the issue is that someone else is taking tests for the fakers, how do they know who's a faker? They could flag the obviously incompetent people for extra testing, and possibly some of them have been informed on, but how do they know precisely who is a faker? Some of the pilots have a military background (flew for the air force) so those can be presumed to be real pilots, but the rest?
- VBprogrammer 6y agoI hope against hope that when they say they don't have a licence we're talking about something less egregious than 'never had any formal training as a pilot'. Something like didn't bother getting a type rating for the specific aircraft type or failed to renew their licence at the correct point.
- redis_mlc 6y ago> If the issue is that someone else is taking tests for the fakers, how do they know who's a faker? I can only talk about what I've heard in India. 1) No test is done. An official with access to blanks just prints another one for $1,000. The govt. could match up tests with the complete list of pilots with authorized licenses and get an exact count. 2) An impostor does the written and practical (flying) tests. This is common in IT also.
- yingw787 6y agoOlder article, but apparently Pakistan carts its nuclear weapons around in regular delivery vans: https://www.wired.com/2011/11/pakistan-nukes-delivery-vans/ https://www.wired.com/2011/11/pakistan-nukes-delivery-vans/ I personally think this is a bad idea.
- mauvehaus 6y agoThe Brits moved the plutonium or HEU (don’t remember which) for their first bomb around in quite ordinary lorries: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Qk_zpjK3cTo https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Qk_zpjK3cTo I’m not saying it’s a good idea, but there’s certainly precedent.
- floren 6y agoThe plutonium pit for the Trinity test was carried from Los Alamos to the test site in a 1942 Plymouth Special Deluxe: http://nuclearsciencemuseum.blogspot.com/2008/08/first-planes-no-trains-now-automobiles.html http://nuclearsciencemuseum.blogspot.com/2008/08/first-plane...
- catalogia 6y agoThe British still use trucks to transport their nuclear weapons. Search online for "TCHD Convoy" for some pictures. America also continues to use trucks, in some contexts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defence_Nuclear_Material_Transport_Operations#Nuclear_weapon_transport_by_road https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defence_Nuclear_Material_Trans...
- ceejayoz 6y agoThere may be substantial non-visible security assets nearby. The USSS has minigun-equipped SUVs, for example; you wouldn't necessarily know they're there until the six barrel gun pops out of the sunroof and opens fire. There's something to be said for subtlety. The US President travels around in a giant motorcade; the UK PM travels in an unmarked Jag with a couple motorcycle escorts.
- antisthenes 6y ago
- williesleg 6y agoFully 100% H1B's in the US lie over 90% of the content in their resumes. So what?
- alkonaut 6y agoYou'd assume that licenses are centrally managed, and always given out by authorities with good credentials that are hooked to the central database, and that this becomes even more true the "higher up" you get, e.g. for certifications on bigger planes.
- sriram_malhar 6y agoI heard this anecdote in India, and I'm not sure if it is apocryphal. There was a small airline flying turboprops to service a Himalayan region. Someone asked whether it was safe to fly these planes and the response was as hilarious as it was scary: "Yes, sir. It is very safe. They used to have 11 planes, 10 of them crashed and now they are really really careful with the one left" :)
- leemailll 6y agoSounds like Nepal airlines
- mav3rick 6y agoWay to take a joke and extrapolate it to the truth. Many friends worked hard for their licenses.
- saagarjha 6y ago> I'm not sure if it is apocryphal Seems likes they took it with a reasonable grain of salt?
- rurp 6y agoHeh, this reminds me of a flight my friend took from a small island country. The side of the plane proudly displayed in big letters "Fly is Safe". I don't think he was reassured... edit: whoops, can't spell "plane" this morning
- bathtub365 6y ago
- numpad0 6y agoThe use of the word “fake” is misleading, they seem to mean genuine certificates issued illegally, not downright Photoshop’d documents.
- emiliobumachar 6y agoI disagree. Paying someone else to take an exam in one's place definitely makes the resulting license fake, and definitely makes it not genuine. They just used a different process than Photoshop to produce the false document. Semantics. I must disclose that English is not my first language.
- elliekelly 6y agoRight, I think "fraudulent" would be a more accurate word.
- rjsw 6y agoTBF, Pilots not being qualified to fly commercially happens elsewhere too [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_English_Channel_Piper_PA-46_crash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_English_Channel_Piper_PA-...
- ciarannolan 6y agoDoes it happen at a rate of 30% of pilots not even taking the certification test elsewhere?
- albntomat0 6y agoAn single improperly licensed/underlicensed pilot in a small commercial business is vastly different than 30% of a nation's pilots, including major commercial airlines.
- easytiger 6y agoThat's not remotely the same at all
- sitic 6y agoFrom the preliminary report: 'At 500 ft, the FDR indicates: landing gear retracted, slat/flap configuration 3, airspeed 220 knots IAS, descent rate 2000 ft/min. According to the FDR and CVR recordings several warnings and alerts such as over-speed, landing gear not down and ground proximity alerts were disregarded. The landing was undertaken with landing gears retracted. The aircraft touched the runway surface on its engines. Flight crew applied reverse engine power and initiated a braking action. Both engines scrubbed the runway at various locations causing damage to both of them. [...]' I'm amazed that the airplane managed to become airborne again despite the engines being dragged down the runway with reverse thrust selected.
- VBprogrammer 6y agoThe fact that they where around 80 knots faster than they should have been probably helped a lot. That's a heck of a lot of excess energy.
- craftinator 6y agoThe excessive speed helped? Can you explain, I would imagine that going faster would cause more engine damage while being dragged.
- phire 6y agoMore engine damage, probably. But the excessive speed is what allowed the plane to lift off again.
- acta_non_verba 6y agoBut would also mean there was more energy to be converted to lift when the plane increased its attitude to take off again :)
- VBprogrammer 6y agoHelped is probably the wrong word. I mean't that the aircraft had a lot of excess speed to get back into the air again, had it been at a normal approach speed you would probably have slowed down enough that it wouldn't have been possible to get it flying again.
- seesawtron 6y agoOn a smaller but more widespread scale is the issue of fake licenses for driving automobiles. It is common knowledge how you can get these licenses easily in "some" (similar) countries without ever giving a driving test and/or going through any sort of written exam where you have to go through the rules of the road. Some argue that they are only endangering their own lives on the road but one can see how that is complete BS when you are on the road and come across such drivers. If people were put through an extremely arduous journey to get their driving licenses with the possibility of them being taken away when you break a certain degree of rules, people would have a strong motivation to not be negligent on the road.
- throwaway0a5e 6y agoAdding big hoops to jump through and lots of ways to lose the ability to legally do something that is more or less required to be a functioning member of society in many places does not seem wise to me. People wouldn't be breaking the law in order to drive if being able to drive wasn't a really big deal.
- albntomat0 6y agoI understand the point you're trying to make, but being given the ability to pilot a multi-ton vehicle at 70+ mph clearly needs testing requirements. They needn't be overly burdensome, but absolutely need to consistently apply. If someone has to search out a place with no literally requirements, as the parent comment states, they really should not be driving.
- wongarsu 6y agoWhy shouldn't people be able to loose the ability to steer high-speed vehicles if they choose to endanger other people's lives (by driving drunk, significantly speeding, disregarding right of way, etc.). Similarly dangerous behavior in other areas of life often carries prison sentences, so just loosing a license doesn't seem that bad.
- thrill 6y agoThey would also have strong motivation to never bother to get training or a license.
- andrewksl 6y agoI'm genuinely, in a completely non-judgmental way, interested to understand what systemic forces lead to such a staggeringly high percentage of this brand of fraud.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- xbmcuser 6y agoIn simplest of terms its corruption. When people stop believing that hard work will pay off they look for shortcuts or they leave the country.
- aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 6y agoPakistan’s Prime Minister reads Ayn Rand. https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/imran-khan-quotes-russian-philosopher-links-it-to-pakistans-current-situation-233922 https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/imran-khan-quotes-russian...
- techsin101 6y agoDecades of nepotism, which leads to corrupt courts and once law is up for sale everything rots
- kbash9 6y agoI grew up in Pakistan. Simply put, this is due to a culture of nepotism and corruption. There are thousands of credentialed pilots but very few pilot jobs in Pakistan. A job with the PIA is highly coveted and ensures life-long financial security and social status (this perhaps explains the overconfidence of the pilots when dealing with ATC). These jobs are usually handed out to people who have the right connections with the right people in power. Some of these candidates with the right connections only needs one of those thousands of desperate licensed candidates to sit in an exam for them. PIA is also said to have thousands of ground staff hired as favors by the ruling politicians all around the world. Also worth mentioning that it wasn't always like this - pilots and executives from PIA were behind the launch of Emirates which is one of the most successful airlines in the world. So it is really a sad story of decay and is a representation of the deterioration in other parts of the country's society. When the pilots fail to lower the landing gear, perhaps it is time to shut down the state-run airline that runs on a huge loss and serves the top one percent of the most poor populations in the world.
- tux1968 6y agoThe fact that the landing gear lever was pushed down into the extended position, and then the plane decided not to deploy the landing gear because of the overspeed issue is a horrible UI. The lever should refuse to budge unless moving it will in fact deploy the landing gear. These pilots are horrible, but that doesn't mean we can't improve the controls still.
- anon102010 6y agoUh? The UI was giving them plenty of warnings and alerts. They have supposedly been trained thoroughly on all of this.
- tux1968 6y agoThey were distracted. Why on earth would you object to the idea of better feedback? If the lever is locked until the plane is willing to engage the landing gear, it's more safe than the current UI.
- HPsquared 6y agoWhat if the gear lever erroneously prevents the pilot from lowering the gear when he needs to? Such a system introduces additional failure modes.
- fredoralive 6y agoWhat happens if the lockout mechanism breaks and prevents a pilot from selecting gear down when the landing conditions are right? (I guess they could go for the gravity deployment backup mode, but that would be rather extreme option for a broken solonoid (or so on) on a control lever).
- tux1968 6y agoAnything can break in a plane which is why you design redundancy into the system. You could provide a manual override switch too.. but at least it would be a conscious act done by the pilot who is aware of the situation. I can't believe anyone is defending the current UI given we have an obvious example right in front of us of how it can fail.
- thev4lley 6y agoI don't think most people appreciate the level of regulation that ensures safety and quality of life in Western countries. Go to many countries outside of that spectrum and you may still see beautiful architecture and more. Now did the team that worked on that project have the necessary experience to drive a safe and long lasting solution? Does the concrete and steel used follow good standards? This means that it may not have critical structural problems today, but in 5 to 10 years, you may have to reconsider your infrastructure. By doing shoddy work, you have a higher rate of catastrophic failure, larger carbon footprint and many other issues.
- HPsquared 6y agoIn the nuclear industry this is called "procedural use and adherence". It's one thing to have a written "de jure" way of doing things, but quite another to actually follow said rules.
- mav3rick 6y agoI like the stereotyping of the entire "East" as one incompetent shit hole. The last I checked infrastructure in the US is crumbling. Each new thing also costs an insane bloated amount leading to a refusal to build new infrastructure altogether. Being in the west doesn't guarantee many things and being in the east doesn't either.
- ta17711771 6y agoIt's crumbling because it hasn't been maintained since the 50s-70s, not because it's shittily built. To be fair.
- alistairSH 6y agoThe new Metro extension out of DC to Dulles airport is literally crumbling... concrete is failing, the maintenance yard is sinking into the ground, plus it's over-budget and over-time. For the concrete, the apparent answer is "we'll inspect it more" instead of holding the contractor accountable and making them replace it. Because reasons.
- yalogin 6y agoThis is quite scary actually, something I didn’t think would happen. I can see people faking engineering degrees or even medicine as they can then try to evade all work and get away by relying on the team. Pilot is not that, they have to fly it and they kill themselves too if things go wrong.
- kakwa_ 6y agoThe Pakistani situation is actually not unique. There are precedents, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Mexico_City_Learjet_crash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Mexico_City_Learjet_crash A Mexican government Learjet plane carrying the Secretary of the Interior crashed in Mexico city due to a mishandling of the landing approach by the pilots (they flew to close to a 767 and got blown away by wake turbulence). The pilots were in fact not qualified, and in fact got fake licenses to operate the Learjet from corrupt flying schools. > Pilot Martín Olíva and co-pilot Álvaro Sánchez, were not certified to operate the Learjet 45. The investigation concluded that both pilots had received fraudulent certifications: Captain Olíva lied about the number of training flights he had made, and had issues on the few training flights he did complete, while Captain Sánchez lied about being a Learjet 45 instructor. Both men had taken advantage of a corrupt system to get false training documents and some unsigned Learjet 45 certification forms from their flight schools. These revelations led Mexican authorities to suspend the licences of both flight schools.
- easytiger 6y agoAlso in SA: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-47420515 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-47420515
- tw1912112 6y agoThe one thing I have noticed about the PIA air crash is the effort some people have put into trying to explain the crash. Some of them have simulated the whole trip! It's quite depressing, especially since the errors are quite bizzare and the plane crashed into a residential area but thankfully no casualties in the areas. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUOn6FrDPwg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUOn6FrDPwg [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bM9ZrliDkNA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bM9ZrliDkNA
- danielschonfeld 6y agoA better question to ask is how many of those pilots have progressed in their careers and moved on flying as captains for other world airlines. Having based their privileges on fake foundations. This problem is ripe in aviation and it’s all over the world except mostly for western countries even though some Eastern Europeans countries have some variation of this.
- camelCaseCamel 6y agoThis is pretty racist not to mention Islamophobic.
- dang 6y agoTrolling HN will get your main account banned as well, so please don't do this any more.
- ketanmaheshwari 6y agoThey also let passengers stand in a flight once: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/02/pakistan-pia-probes-standing-passengers-incident-170225201715193.html https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/02/pakistan-pia-probes-s...
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- BurningFrog 6y agoMaybe I'm weird, but my first thought is that this is a great opportunity to compare accident rates between licenced and unlicenced pilots.
- 737min 6y agoProfessional and academic credentials in developing countries are often unreliable or outright fake. If this happend with pilot licenses, imagine CS degrees or medical schoold... Any immigration and H1B reform will need to address this while being fair and free of prejudice.
- actuator 6y agoI am not sure about medical school but isn't this what interview processes of companies like Google or Facebook do?
- 737min 6y agoYeah, they’re partially that, but the immigration process runs off degrees more than interviews. For medical specialties there are tests by licensing boards and mandatory retraining.
- nradov 6y agoThe US doesn't accept medical degrees from Pakistan, or most other countries either. Immigrant doctors have to redo much of their training which is why many of them choose to switch careers instead.
- selimthegrim 6y agoWeird, I’m pretty sure I’ve run into residents here from India and Pakistan. What you mean is that they have to take USMLE and have to redo their residencies.
- Neoxy 6y agoWhoa.. I heard the pilots were disusing Corona. how the license thing connected to license 'to kill'?
- m3h 6y agoA better coverage of this news and the initial report presented by the aviation minister for the PIA accident can be found here: https://www.dawn.com/news/1564911/initial-report-finds-human-error-on-part-of-pilots-atc-officials-in-pia-crash-aviation-minister https://www.dawn.com/news/1564911/initial-report-finds-human...
- amingilani 6y agoAlmost every time I see Pakistan on the first page it's because of something bad. Also not surprising because almost every time I submit something about tech related to Pakistan myself it's usually horrifying. It just makes me sad. Hoping it'll be better at some point.