Latest news with #ShawnPruchnicki
News.com.au
2 days ago
- General
- News.com.au
Aviation experts weigh in on commercial airline safety after latest devastating Air India crash
The latest horrific airline crash that claimed the lives of all but one passenger has renewed calls for tighter aviation standards and safety. Air India Flight AI171, a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, was carrying 242 passengers when it crashed and exploded into flames shortly after taking off from Ahmedabad airport in India's west on Thursday. Among those killed include passengers on the flight, and people who were inside the BJ Medical College and Hospital hostel when the plane crashed into it. 'Approximately 294 have died. This includes some students as the plane crashed on the building where they were staying,' Vidhi Chaudhary, a top state police officer, told Reuters. The flight was headed to London Gatwick Airport and there were 169 Indian nationals, 53 British, seven Portuguese and one Canadian on-board, according to the airline. Aviation safety expert and former pilot Shawn Pruchnicki believes incidents like Flight AI17 are part of a larger trend. Now an assistant professor in Ohio State University's College of Engineering, Pruchnicki has decades of experience investigating crashes and understanding systemic failures. 'The safety buffer has eroded in recent years,' Pruchnicki told the Daily Mail. He pointed to previous high-profile crashes, including the Boeing 737 MAX disasters in 2018 and 2019, as examples of how design flaws can go unaddressed until tragedy strikes. 'Standards at airplane manufacturers dropped, leading to the deaths of 346 people in two crashes,' he said. Pruchnicki also raised concerns about the density of traffic in controlled airspace. 'If planes come within a couple of miles of each other, we start to worry,' he said. He recounted a personal experience where a decision not to cross a runway likely prevented a collision, illustrating how razor-thin margins can separate routine operations from catastrophe. Another factor compounding safety risks is a growing shortage of air traffic controllers. 'They are overworked and overstressed,' Pruchnicki said, noting that these workers carry the burden of thousands of lives daily. He also warned of airlines promoting under-experienced pilots too quickly, especially in smaller regional carriers. However, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the five-year average fatality risk rate improved from 0.28 (2011–2015) to 0.10 for the period 2020–2024. This means that, statistically, an individual would need to travel by air every day for over 15,000 years to experience a fatal accident. In 2019, the Aviation Safety Network estimated the fatal accident rate at one per nearly 2 million flights, highlighting significant improvements in aviation safety over the years. However, data from the Bureau of Aircraft Accidents Archives indicates that the number of aviation incidents and fatalities can fluctuate year by year. For instance, in 2019, there were 578 fatalities from 125 incidents, while in 2020, fatalities decreased to 463 from 90 incidents. 'Alarming impact' on aviation industry Another aviation expert suggested earlier this year that the Covid years that engulfed the world has a lot to answer for when it comes down to what experience is left in the air. 'You want to go back and look at the effect of Covid,' Neil Hansford, who has more than 30 years experience in the aviation industry, told 'That two years really precluded pilot training, and it wasn't only the pilot training that didn't get done … but the older folk chose to either be furloughed or retire. 'So a lot of experience at the top end of the scales disappeared out of the industry … you lost a hell of a lot of training too.' Meanwhile, researcher Dr. Rajee Olaganathan from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, released a string of findings in 2022 around the relationship between the Covid shutdown and pilot skill. Her findings essentially focused on how those two years had an 'alarming impact' on pilot proficiency. 'What surprised me was the level of skills deterioration over such a short duration,' said the study's principal investigator, adjunct professor Dr. Rajee Olaganathan, citing a 50 per cent increase in pilot errors following the pandemic-related shutdown of summer 2020. 'Skill knowledge is acquired slowly through related experience and practice. When flying hours are reduced, it will have an effect on the pilots' skills.' The highest reduction in global flight operations during the pandemic occurred in May 2020, when services reduced 70.6% compared to the level of service one year prior. In the United States alone, that translated to a total of 532,834 fewer flights than in May 2019. 'Covid has got a lot to contribute to worldwide standards,' Mr Hansford said. 'In Australia we are well through it and well on the other side, particularly because we don't have the weather excesses. 'Because of the size of the country, we fly a lot of sectors and people have to get a lot of experience. That's why you find Australian pilots, everywhere you go, the Aussie expertise is sought after, 'It's hard to get a licence here. We are so strict on our student pilot standards to get their commercial pilot licence. Virgin and Qantas, they have such high standards.' 'But losing those two years to Covid, has put a load on all levels of training whether it be manual training or pilot training. The world lost two years.' Sole survivor's miracle escape Forty-year-old Vishwashkumar Ramesh, a British citizen and father of one, emerged from the rubble in an astonishing turn of events after his plane crashed into a fireball. His family have said he has 'no idea' how he survived. It's been reported Mr Ramesh's brother was also on the doomed flight. Indian Home Affairs Minister Amit Shah has visited Mr Ramesh in hospital. Footage from the incident showed a man walking away from the crash site with blood on his face but seemingly superficial cuts and bruises as well as torn clothes. A boarding pass from the scene shows Mr Ramesh was in seat 11A of the Dreamliner. According to Air India's seat map this is in the first row on economy right next to an exit. 'Thirty seconds after takeoff, there was a loud noise and then the plane crashed. It all happened so quickly,' Mr Ramesh is reported as saying by new outlet The New Indian Express. 'There were dead bodies around me. I got scared. I got up and ran'. 'There were pieces of the plane everywhere.'
New York Times
2 days ago
- General
- New York Times
For recovery and investigation of Air India crash, authorities contend with the risk of struck sites collapsing.
Based on images of the Air India crash that killed over 200 people in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad on Thursday, experts predicted a difficult recovery and investigation operation exacerbated by the risks of unstable structures and gas leaks. Recovering victims, searching for any trapped survivors and seeking clues into the cause of the crash will all depend on how quickly crews can stabilize the buildings that were struck by the plane shortly after takeoff. 'This is a very long process,' said Shawn Pruchnicki, a former airline accident investigator and aviation expert at Ohio State University. He said that the recovery effort might take up to a month. Emergency medical workers will need to balance speed with care in dislodging large parts of the plane from buildings, including the Boeing Dreamliner's tail, which appeared to be jammed into a building. While the immediate priority will likely be looking for potential survivors who may have been in the buildings when the plane crashed into them, clearing the debris may cause those buildings to buckle or pancake. That means the authorities may need to bring in cranes to hoist large pieces of debris out the damaged buildings near the B.J. Medical College, where five students in a dining hall were killed. Then, emergency responders may need to build temporary cribbing to support weakened parts of the building as they look for any survivors, or more bodies. Stabilizing the building will have to be done before investigators can sift the debris for clues about why the flight went down shortly after takeoff, said Mike Boyd, an aviation expert at Boyd Group International. That includes unearthing the plane's so-called black box, which contains the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder. Reviewing that material may take a few days, Mr. Boyd said. The location of the disaster poses particular complications. 'Plane crashes pose new hazards when they occur in areas as densely packed and urban as Ahmedabad,' Mr. Boyd said. Responders have to contend with more people hurt, more buildings affected and more infrastructure damaged. There is also the risk of ruptured has gas lines.
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- General
- Daily Mail
Why so many planes are crashing right now, pilot reveals
An Air India flight bound for London Gatwick has crashed shortly after taking flight from the northwestern Indian state of Gujarat, carrying 242 passengers and crew. Here, we're republishing a piece from February by former commercial pilot and crash investigator Shawn Pruchnicki, which exposes the dangers within the aviation industry in 2025. Another day – another near miss. It's a sickening reminder of the American Airlines regional crash with a military helicopter in DC that killed 67 last month – and of a spate of other accidents these past weeks. As a former commercial pilot, crash investigator and expert in accident causation, I have seen the safety buffer that took decades to build steadily eroded in recent years. It started with declining standards at Boeing – turning out planes with defects, such as the Boeing 737 Max, that led to the deaths of 346 people in two crashes in less than six months in October 2018 and March 2019. Last January, a door-sized panel blew out in a 737 Max mid-flight with near-catastrophic consequences. But the truth is the experts have been raising the alarm for years. We have watched in horror as planes come within a few hundred feet of each other – on the runway or in the air. If planes come within a couple of miles of each other, we start to worry. Any distance noted in feet counts as within a hair's breadth of disaster! Pictured: Hearing on "Examining Boeing's Broken Safety Culture: Firsthand Accounts," at Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on April 17, 2024 I had a near miss experience myself when flying as a pilot for Delta Connection. I had just landed at JFK and a 747 was coming into land on a parallel runway. The control tower asked the pilot if he would be able to stop short of our location and he said that he could which meant they cleared us to cross the runway. We had a gut feeling that this pilot – who possibly wasn't familiar with the airport - couldn't do what he said and so we decided not to cross and to stay where we were. A few moments later the 747 blasted through right in front of us, hurtling past at a high rate of speed. If we'd crossed the runway as directed, there would have been a collision. So, I'm sorry to say that when news broke on January 29 that a commercial airliner had been struck by a Black Hawk helicopter in the skies above DC's Reagan International Airport, I wasn't surprised. I have long feared that it wasn't a matter of 'if' such a catastrophe would happen but 'where' and 'when.' A key contributing factor to the problems we are experiencing in our airspace system is the chronic shortage of air traffic controllers. I feel for these controllers. They are over-worked and over-stressed – they know that if they make a mistake someone could die. That's not to say that planes are falling out of the skies. Air travel is still the safest mode of transport we have. But, unfortunately, several dramatic incidents in the last year have rattled public confidence in safety. Within 48 hours of the DC crash, a small medical jet crashed into a Philadelphia neighborhood killing all six on board and claiming the life of another on the ground - another awful and dramatic moment. On February 6, a small, chartered aircraft carrying 10 crashed in Alaska. Nine days later, a Delta Connection flight from Minneapolis with 76 passengers and 4 crew collapsed as it struck the runway, flipped and caught fire, losing its tail and a wing. Mercifully, everyone survived. I don't think that either the Philadelphia or the Alaska crashes would have made national and international news headlines had they not happened in such close proximity to the two crashes involving commercial flights. But its undeniable that the buffer of safety in which we once felt so secure has been eroded. Another valid concern is that regional and national airlines are hiring pilots and promoting them through the ranks with less experience than ever before. I'm not aware of any studies that focus on the impact of limited experience on flight safety, but the truth is that, without positive measures to address the problems in our skies, accidents will keep happening and more frequently. We need more qualified candidates in the pipeline for air traffic controllers. When the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recommends changes in the wake of their incident investigations they must be implemented. If the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) needs more funding to make this happen then they must be given it. We need to continue to develop and invest in technology that will help pilots and air traffic controllers do their jobs – not to replace them but to assist them. Make no mistake there is still a pretty good safety buffer in place in our skies but it's shrinking, and we need to act now if we want to stop it from shrinking further. Shawn Pruchnicki is an Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University in the College of Engineering. He was a Delta connection pilot for 10 years and trained in accident investigation at the NTSB Academy. He has testified to the US Senate on the current Boeing safety culture and manufacturing problems and his research into aviation safety has been published including by NASA and the FAA.
New York Times
06-02-2025
- General
- New York Times
A Runway Switch, a Vague Alert: What Pilots Heard Before Fatal D.C. Crash
Just after 8:43 p.m. on Jan. 29, an air traffic controller at Ronald Reagan National Airport in Washington, posed a question to the pilots of American Airlines Flight 5342: Could they land at a different runway? There was nothing unusual about the request or the pilots' assent to it. But the decision to switch runways was fateful, bringing the plane closer to the Army Black Hawk helicopter that it would collide with in a crash that killed 67 people. Exactly what happened is still being pieced together. The National Transportation Safety Board is recovering and examining wreckage from the icy Potomac River. The safety agency is expected to publish a preliminary report in the coming weeks, but a more thorough accounting probably won't arrive for a year or two. But, based on the details that have emerged so far, the pilots in the American regional jet appear to have acted as expected, according to aviation safety experts and half a dozen airline pilots who have flown to and from Reagan airport. There appeared to be little that they could have done differently, these experts told The New York Times. 'There wasn't anything to do. It was a normal day at Reagan,' said Shawn Pruchnicki, a former airline pilot and an assistant professor at the Center for Aviation Studies at Ohio State University, who said that he has piloted aircraft into Reagan National more than a hundred times. Investigators are likely to focus on understanding why the helicopter entered the plane's flight path and whether the air traffic controller handling both aircraft that night could have or should have done more to keep them apart. The airport is among the country's most congested and demanding for airline pilots. To fly there, pilots need extra training typically reserved for airports near mountainous terrain. That's because departing or arriving planes must assiduously avoid the skies above the White House, Capitol, National Mall and vice president's residence, which are heavily guarded, particularly since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Dulles International Airport, a large airport with hundreds of domestic and international flights a day, is about 25 miles away, filling the region's skies with even more planes. Of course, there are no mountains in Washington. But the limits on where planes can be effectively makes flying to and from there as challenging as flying in, say, Alaska, said one senior airline pilot, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters. Sam Lilley, one of the pilots of the American flight that night, understood the demands of operating in the area, according to his father, Tim Lilley, who is also an airplane pilot and earlier in his career flew Black Hawk helicopters for the Army. Mr. Lilley said that he and his son had discussed the challenges of the Washington airspace. Sam Lilley was proud that he flew there regularly. 'You feel accomplished when you've conquered that challenge and that's the way we both looked at it,' Mr. Lilley said. Sam Lilley, who was 28, was a first officer at PSA Airlines, an American Airlines subsidiary, which he joined more than two years ago, his father said. He had hoped to amass enough hours in smaller jets to graduate to flying much larger planes to international destinations. Mr. Lilley, who was engaged to be married this fall, had already used his corporate perks to visit Japan, Ireland and Iceland, and wanted to continue traveling the world, his father said. On the night of the crash, Mr. Lilley and his co-pilot, Capt. Jonathan Campos, had departed Wichita, Kan., on a small regional jet carrying 60 passengers and two other crew members. Around 8:15 p.m., they began descending toward Reagan airport from 37,000 feet, the N.T.S.B. said over the weekend, citing black box data. That data also includes audio from the cockpit, and the N.T.S.B. said the times it provided were preliminary. About 25 minutes later, the pilots were cleared for a standard approach to the airport's Runway 1. A few minutes after that, they were asked — and agreed — to switch to Runway 33. That runway is short, making it less suitable for larger jets, which require longer stopping distances. But it is considered long enough for regional jets like the CRJ700, made by the Canadian company Bombardier, that the pilots were flying. Pilots and safety experts said that diverting smaller planes to Runway 33 can allow air traffic controllers to better space out aircraft at busy times. Pilots can decline such a request, but after a brief discussion, Mr. Lilley and Mr. Campos agreed to the change. Around 8:46 p.m., a radio transmission could be heard in which air traffic control informed the helicopter of the presence of an airplane just south of the Woodrow Wilson Memorial Bridge at about 1,200 feet, circling to Runway 33, according to the N.T.S.B. Almost two minutes later, after the plane dropped below 500 feet elevation, the controller can be heard asking the helicopter pilots if they had the plane in sight. The airplane pilots could hear those communications from air traffic control, but not the responses from the helicopter because the two aircraft were transmitting on different frequencies. The controller was communicating on both. At that point, the airplane would have been moments from landing, and the pilots would have been sharply focused on reaching the ground safely, experts and other pilots said. One of the pilots would have been flying and guiding the aircraft toward the runway, while the other would have played a supporting role, including monitoring plane systems. The landing gear would have been deployed. 'Normally, one pilot is looking straight ahead outside and the other pilot is focusing inside,' said Robert E. Joslin, a professor at Embry‑Riddle Aeronautical University and a top former adviser and test pilot for the Federal Aviation Administration. 'They need to focus on landing.' Neither pilot would have been expected to be scanning the area for other aircraft. Even if they had, the helicopter could easily have blended into the city lights behind it or it may have been out of view altogether, experts said. But right after the airplane descended below 500 feet, the pilots received an automated message: 'Traffic, traffic.' That alert is not uncommon, but it would have caught their attention, the experts said. The message is intended as a warning that there is another aircraft nearby. Such alerts so close to an airport would be disconcerting, but would not require immediate action beyond trying to identify the source. The warning was produced by the Traffic Collision Avoidance System, known as TCAS, which is widely credited for substantially reducing midair collisions over the last four decades or so, experts said. At low altitudes, one of the system's most important features would have been suppressed — a feature that instructs pilots on how to separate two aircraft that are dangerously close by telling one to climb and the other to descend. That's because at lower altitudes, an incorrect warning instructing pilots to make quick changes can be risky. Even if that feature had been on, it would have worked only if the helicopter were also equipped with TCAS, which it most likely would not have been. And while the traffic alert might have concerned Mr. Lilley and Mr. Campos, they might also have quickly been put somewhat at ease. Seconds later, another transmission came through: Air traffic control was instructing the helicopter to pass behind the 'CRJ,' according to the N.T.S.B., using a nickname for the type of plane the pilots were flying. It is not clear, and may never be clear, what the airline pilots were thinking at that moment. But experts said it might have provided the pilots, who were focused on landing the plane, some reassurance that air traffic control appeared to be helping to resolve the cause of the traffic alert. About 16 seconds later, just before 8:48 p.m., the airline pilots can be heard verbally reacting to something, according to the N.T.S.B. In that moment, the plane's nose began to pull up. Then, crashing sounds could be heard, and the recording ended.
Yahoo
31-01-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Aviation professor, pilot weighs on on D.C. plane crash
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — Local experts are weighing in on the many questions surrounding Wednesday night's deadly plane crash between a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines regional jet in Washington D.C. Shawn Pruchnicki is a professor at Ohio State University's Center for Aviation Studies and spent 10 years as a pilot. During his time flying for an airline, he was also trained in accident investigation at the NTSB Training Center and investigated several airline crashes. Student, attorney among Ohioans killed in D.C. plane crash 'There's questions about were they at the correct altitude,' Pruchnicki said. 'If not, why? Maybe they were supposed to be a little lower. I don't know. We don't know yet.' According to a report by the Federal Aviation Administration obtained by the Associated Press, one air traffic controller was responsible for coordinating helicopter traffic and arriving and departing planes when the collision happened. 'At smaller airports where it's not as busy, that's very common and it's not so much a big deal,' Pruchnicki said. 'At an airport like Reagan or Laguardia or Kennedy or something like that, those airspaces are way too busy for something like that.' Pruchnicki said air traffic control staffing is a problem that's been around for a while. Deadly D.C. crash reminder for central Ohio woman's close call 'We've had some near midair's here in the United States over the last five or seven years and we've been able to attribute many of those to controller shortages,' Pruchnicki said. 'We have controllers working six days a week, 12-hour shifts because of the shortages, and a lot of those near-misses has been because of controller fatigue.' According to Pruchnicki, the concept of 'see and avoid' is a common practice in aviation. He said that's where controllers become so saturated that they can't give every plane a direction to turn to stay away from other aircraft, so they hand that responsibility off to the pilot. 'The helicopter pilot was asked, 'Do you have the CRJ in sight,'' Pruchnicki said. 'And he replied, 'Yes,' and then usually what they say is maintain visual separation with that airplane.' Though, apparently that wasn't the case this time. 'It sounds like the helicopter never got a chance to say that,' Pruchnicki said. 'We don't know exactly why that was, how close they were. Those are all the questions.' What we know about the DC plane crash victims Pruchnicki said it's also important to keep in mind that pilots have large blind spots on a plane. This can make it especially difficult at night. 'Especially when we're down low because the airplanes are a little harder to see with lights in the background, maybe the airport or city lights and it can be easier to lose them especially when you're coming towards the side of them because they're not well lit on the side,' Pruchnicki said. Pruchnicki said once the NTSB completes its investigation, he'll be interested to see if the FAA will be responsive to its recommendations. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
