China has just published a report into what was dangerously unprofessional conduct by a China Southern captain with a candour that shames the ATSB report into a similarly serious Jetstar incident in which the actions of a first officer almost certainly averted a disastrous crash.
In the China Southern incident a 737 flight approaching Wuhan in poor visibility ripped out parts of the ground navigational system antennas before climbing away from the airport after the captain had repeatedly ignored calls by the first officer to go around.
In the Jetstar incident a captain distracted by text messages on his phone while approaching Singapore Airport in an A321 was eventually overruled by the junior pilot who made a last moment go-around after the jet, flaps incorrectly set, had sunk to a low altitude over the runway.
The ATSB report and the inaction of CASA in relation to that incident (at least in public) is as much a scandal as the on-going saga of the now exposed cover up of critical information in relation to crash of a Pel-Air medical repositioning flight near Norfolk Island in 2009.
However in China at least, its civil aviation authority has published an unvarnished summary of the incident, one that puts the performance of China Southern in that incident up in lights.
A China Southern Boeing 737-800, registration B-5192 performing flight CZ-3367 from Guangzhou to Wuhan (China), was on a NDB/DME approach (minimum 1200 meters visibily required, MDA 430 feet) to Wuhan?s runway 04 in visibility of 1500 meters occasionally reduced to 1200 meters in light rain and light fog and cloud ceiling 690 feet. The aircraft had been configured for landing before reaching the final approach fix and was maintaining 1800 feet when the aircraft reached the final approach fix at the outer marker 5.1nm before the runway threshold. The aircraft descended with the captain being pilot flying, when descending through 1000 feet the captain disengaged the autopilot. When the aircraft reached 430 feet there was no visual contact with the runway, the first officer called for level flight, reset the flight director and selected the go-around altitude into the master control panel. Still no approach lights were seen, the aircraft appeared low. A ground proximity warning ?too low? activated, the first officer called for a go-around without response from the captain, another GPWS ?too low? sounded, this time the captain called ?go-around? and initiated the go-around, unusual sounds however occurred while the aircraft was still rotating up and it became obvious the aircraft had hit obstacles, but the aircraft climbed out to safety. The crew subsequently decided to divert to Hefei for a landing without further incident.
The event became known through rumours that surfaced on China?s Weibo service (similiar to Twitter) in February and got confirmed by a preliminary report by China?s Civil Aviation Authority (CAAC) on Mar 5th 2013.
The CAAC reported that the aircraft sustained damage (penetrations and dents) to the left main gear door and left main gear gear proximity cover actuator, the left main gear outboard tyre received cuts. The antennas of the southern NDB ?D? and inner marker were damaged, two other antenna pillars were damaged as well. The CAAC annotated that the approach was continued below MDA without necesssary visual reference putting the aircraft below the approach profile, in addition the crew did not initiate the go-around after the first ground proximity alert.
China Southern is expanding is Australia services and is reported unofficially to be considering using one of its Airbus A380s on the Sydney-Guangzhou route later this year.
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