Flight Engineer Ill-prepared, Says Report
The Age
Tuesday September 24, 1996
Canberra.
An Ansett airlines flight engineer who caused a jumbo jet to land with its nose landing gear retracted was undertrained and unprepared for flight operations, a Bureau of Air Safety Investigation inquiry has found.
A bureau report said the engineer, who was on his first non-training flight, was not confident of his ability to operate the engineer's panel on the aircraft and had failed several test flights.
"There is evidence that his preparedness for . . . flying was marginal," it said. "Evidence from interviews with his . . . trainers revealed that he exhibited an elevated level of anxiety in some situations, did not react well to pressure and lacked confidence in his ability as a B747 flight engineer."
The report found that the opinions of his trainers, who believed the engineer was not ready to be included in flight operations, were not recorded in his weekly training reports.
"If the appropriate supervisors had spoken to the line training and checking flight engineers who had flown with the flight engineer . . . they may have recognised that he lacked confidence and needed more training," it said.
The aircraft landed at Sydney Airport on two of its three sets of wheels on 19 October 1994 after aborting a trip to Osaka, Japan, when an oil leak forced an engine to shut down.
The pilot made a textbook landing on three engines without realising the front wheel was not extended.
The nose was lowered to the tarmac and the aircraft's front fuselage received substantial damage.
The report said the flight engineer told the pilot that all landing gear was in place, despite a warning light on his instrument panel showing the nose gear was retracted.
"An experienced flight engineer would be expected to have a mental picture of how the panel would look for a normal situation and would be able to instantly recognise an abnormal panel," it said.
The report found that pressure on Ansett's management and flight crews to introduce a new Japan route contributed to the crash.
"A review of events associated with the introduction of the B747 indicated that organisational factors involving both Ansett and the Civil Aviation Authority led to a situation where there was increased potential for an accident of this nature to occur," it said.
In a prepared statement, Ansett said the accident had prompted a detailed review of its safety standards, including upgraded cockpit resources management training.
© 1996 The Age