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I'm not a pilot and don't know much about aviation, but isn't the point of still having human pilots on board that they should be able to fly the plane without
by trompetenaccoun 4y ago
I'm not a pilot and don't know much about aviation, but isn't the point of still having human pilots on board that they should be able to fly the plane without issues in case of an autopilot malfunction. Was this really an emergency that necessitated returning to the airport? It was a 2 hour national flight. Can't commercial pilots fly plans for even just 2 hours anymore?
This isn't criticism or a rant, I'm genuinely curious to know.
- Eisenstein 4y agoPilots follow checklists. In case of anything ever going wrong or even just getting in the aircraft they go through a checklist. The error popped up and the checklist said 'try x' and 'x' didn't work so it probably said 'if you can divert, do that', so they did.
- rezonant 4y ago> The crew subsequently declared emergency advising they had no autopilot trim and no electrical trim system on their brand new aircraft and needed to trim the aircraft manually I would assume the bigger problem was loss of the electrical trim system. From what I understand, manually trimming a 737 (or any large commercial jet) is a physically demanding task, even with both crew members doing it in tandem. That will add a lot of workload to the pilots that could cause further delay in reacting to new problems as they arise, and there's always the chance that can happen. When a malfunction like this occurs, it is absolutely safest to land as soon as possible so the issue can be assessed on the ground, especially when relevant failure checklists or company policies indicate it.
- trompetenaccoun 4y agoThat makes sense, thanks! I'd missed that part when I scanned the page and the headline is misleading in that case, since it only mentions autopilot when it should be the other way around.