Air Canada Crash

[rayneeny]

I woke up to this today..

Air Canada AC624 crash lands in Halifax, at least 23 sent to hospital - Nova Scotia - CBC News

We did have blizzard conditions at times last night,just glad no one died.




Ray

 

[novascotian]

There is a lot of controversy surrounding this crash but one thing is for sure, the aircraft was landing on a runway that does not have ILS, it only has a localizer, which means that there is no transmitted glideslope signal to guide a pilot vertically.. the localizer only does the horizontal. The other direction of the runway (23) does have ILS but of course the pilot had to go with the wind conditions and apparently he or she was within the weather guidelines.

I should say that the other end doesnt have ILS any more, as the airplane took all of that out. The ILS antennas indicating glideslope/glidepath are at the far end of a runway that has it, so runway 23's ILS equipment is right at the beginning of the other end of the runway, i,e. at the beginning of runway 05 which is the one the plane was landing on, and all of that now has to be rebuilt, and I bet recalibrated, so will be a long time...

I have seen a release pointing out that the runways that have ILS (23 and 14) are the busiest ones, but muy feeling is that the opposite direction of them (05 and 32) are also very busy. I guess it comes down to money but I think there should be complete ILS at Halifax Airport..... and let's see what the enquiry recommends..

 

[chippie]

There is a lot of controversy surrounding this crash but one thing is for sure, the aircraft was landing on a runway that does not have ILS, it only has a localizer, which means that there is no transmitted glideslope signal to guide a pilot vertically.. the localizer only does the horizontal. The other direction of the runway (23) does have ILS but of course the pilot had to go with the wind conditions and apparently he or she was within the weather guidelines.

recommends..

If the runway the plane landed on has only a localizer and no ILS, doesn't the plane have instruments to tell their altitude at least? I don't understand how the pilot came up so short of the runway.

 

[zz0468]

If the runway the plane landed on has only a localizer and no ILS, doesn't the plane have instruments to tell their altitude at least? I don't understand how the pilot came up so short of the runway.

I saw one article about the crash that said winds were gusting to over 60 mph at the time. It could be wind shear, where the true airspeed fluctuates enough to affect the sink rate of the airplane during its approach.

Suddenly my signature line seems most appropriate!

 

[novascotian]

I am no pilot but it is my understanding that while aircraft have altimeters and as well ground proximity warnings, the ILS glideslope is more precise and along with the localizer will lead them right in to pretty much the right spot. Put it this way, if they went to the trouble and expense of putting ILS in on two of the runways, there must be something better about it, same all over the world.

I just flew back from Florida in early February on an A320! to arrive to wintery conditions though not horrible, and as soon as I saw we were going past the airport to come in on 23 I was happy... though really I was not thinking anything bad could ever happen. I did have shoes on though, and a jacket handy.... but not because I thought we would be on the runway for an hour, but because I knew I would have to leave the terminal at some point!

It does seem like something went wrong... well, duh... I mean these are well qualified pilots and many times I hear such pilots try a couple of times and then go off to Moncton or Montreal, even though it will inconvenience the passengers and cost the company money. They were probably quite confident they could carry out the landing but then as I say, something happened. I think the wind shear comments have a lot of merit. Time will tell.