Pilots Surprised They Overshot Airport

(AP)  Updated at 12:09 p.m. EST
A single call from a flight attendant to the pilots of the Northwest Airlines plane that overshot Minneapolis catapulted the cockpit crew from complacency to chaos.

Interviews with the flight crew and other documents released Wednesday by the National Transportation Safety Board indicate the pilots were completely unaware of their predicament until the moment the intercom rang — unaware that they had flown their Airbus A320 with 144 passenger more than 100 miles past their destination, that air traffic controllers and their airline's dispatchers had been struggling to reach them for more than an hour, or that the military was at that moment readying fighter jets for an intercept mission.

Timothy Cheney, the captain of Flight 188, said he looked up from his laptop to discover there was no longer any flight information programmed into the Airbus A320's computer. He said his navigation system showed Duluth, Minnesota, off to his left and Eau Claire, Wisconsin, ahead on the right.

The plane had been out of radio contact for 77 minutes as it flew across a broad swath of the country on Oct. 21, raising national security concerns.

Cheney, 54, and First Officer Richard Cole, 54, told investigators they had taken out their laptops and were absorbed in working on a complicated crew scheduling program that they were required to learn following Delta Air Lines' acquisition of Northwest a year earlier.

The tension of the moment was evident in the crew interviews.

According to a statement signed by flight attendant Barbara Logan, she called the cockpit around 8:15 p.m. CDT to find out when they would be landing. She was told they would land around 12 Greenwich Mean Time. "I said I did not know the time — he said I was hosed and hung up."

The lead flight attendant called to get gate information and was apparently also hung up on, according to Logan's report. That flight attendant later got through to the cockpit.

It turns out Flight 188 wasn't the only Northwest operation that was hard to reach that night. A controller who called Northwest Airlines' dispatchers to ask them to contact the plane first encountered a recording telling him the phone number had been changed. He dialed the new number, but the phone rang 10 to 20 times without being answered, he told investigators. He hung up, then redialed.

This time, someone at Northwest Airlines dispatchers' office answered the phone — and put him on hold for a few minutes. The controller said he stayed on the phone rather than try calling again because it had been so hard to get through.

Northwest Airlines dispatchers sent messages to the cockpit asking them to contact air traffic controllers, but there was no response.

The Federal Aviation Administration has since said the phone numbers controllers had for Northwest predated its acquisition by Delta and have now been updated.

[rwsmith29456]

I'd be upset too, If I neglected to control an aircraft full of passengers for well over an hour and would probably lose my job from stupidity and neglect.

[PR_in_Alabama]

know one was in danger... give them 6 month with out pay and a demotion...that will teach them a lesson....

[ALBrainTrust10]

THEY WERE ASLEEP!!!!

NO PILOT OF THAT TYPE OF PLANE IS OUT OF CONTACT FOR 77 MINUTES!!!

NO PILOT OF THAT TYPE OF AIRCRAFT DOES NOT ANSWER THE INTERCOM, PHONES, UPLINKS, ETC ETC ETC!!!!!

THESE GUYS FELL ASLEEP AND ARE NOT MEN ENOUGH TO ADMIT IT.

THEY COULD BE FORGIVEN FOR FALLING ASLEEP, BUT THEIR ALIBI IS BOTH UNBELIEVABLE AND UNFORGIVABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[cbsblogger]

Aftermath and tidbits:



Although these pilots filed an NASAP Report, which was designed to have pilots tell the truth about events, so the FAA could learn from them, they had their licenses revoked by the ATL F.A.A. even before they came out of their meeting with NTSB and NASAP meetings.

ATL FAA is really big on this new regulation which will allow pilots to take a short nap in flight so they will be rested for the approach...they were insistent that they were sleeping.

MSP FAA, Vance (do not know last name) was the person who handed Tim his revocation letter(which was leaked to the entire world by the ATL FAA). Tim said Vance had tears in his eyes and walked away, said nothing. It was later learned that the entire MSP FAA office did not agree at all with revoking their pilot's licenses, but had no jurisdiction over the matter, since ATL FAA had control because of the Delta merger.

The pilots have been to Wash. D.C., ATL and MSP for several meetings. In ATL, they met with the chief pilots and Tim said they could not have been nicer. They are working to resolve this, not to try and fire them. But of course, they will have to get their license back for Delta to consider allowing them to continue flying. The appeal has been filed for the FAA to reinstate their licenses or to settle on some form of punishment, etc.

When Tim and his wife were in MSP for a meeting with the NTSB, they happen to be staying at the same hotel as the NTSB. The next morning in the lobby, the NTSB official came over to Tim and said he did not know why they called them in for this event. There was no safety issue. Also, MSP Center informed Delta that there never was a problem and no aircraft were near their flight. Even without radio communications, they had been tracked and separated.

Yes, the company tried to contact them on ACARS, but the 320 does not have a chime...it has a 30 second light which then extinguishes.

Tim always has 121.5 tuned, but as we all know, it can get very noisy at times and we turn it down and sometimes forget to turn it back on. He told me this may have been the case.

There were many factors which caused this......properly checking in on the new frequency would have been the first one to eliminate the problem.

A note about laptops.....in NWA's A.O.M (I think it stands for airman's operation manual), it does not say we can't use a laptop, however in Delta's A.O.M., it does, we are transitioning now and we actually have pages from both airlines. When our union showed this to the attorney's, they could not believe the confusion put on our pilot group. But, D.C. F.A.A. put out a new possible ruling which will disallow all laptops......so stupid, don't they know Jet Blue has laptops on every aircraft and soon all airliners will, for the electronic Jepp charts.

These are the facts and again, Tim said he feels very bad for the company and the pilots and is hoping for a positive outcome on their appeal. With 24 years at NWA, 21,000 blemish free hours, it would be a mistake, in my opinion, to ruin his career over this.

Thank you,







FAA fails to brief new controller on duty (WSJ Article)



http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125677288976914581.html

[jschwendler]

Horsecrap. If they were on their laptops, their laptops will show the timed activity. Still, was the entire crew flying with their heads down, or somewhere else? Thoroughly and totally irresponsible and they deserved to lose their jobs. Passengers expect experienced, serious, well-trained, dedicated safety-oriented crews to fly them. These guys are knuckleheads and deserve everything they get for their choices. Stop defending irresponsibility and be glad there aren't plane parts permanently imbedded in Duluth.

[cbsblogger]

Someone sent me this. Is it realistic and is it true?

I had a one hour conversation with Tim Cheney yesterday and would like to shed some light on what happened to cause the over flight of their destination, MSP.

Before I begin with details, I wanted to say right up front that although there are many events that helped to cause this, Tim takes full responsibility and places no blame on anyone but himself. He is very humbled by what has happened and fully understands that as captain, he was responsible for the a/c, crew and passengers. That said, he wanted me to know how it all happened. Secondly, he has the full support of his neighbors in Gig Harbor, WA, as well has his church parishioners. One of his neighbors wrote a letter to the Star & Tribune in Minneapolis saying how great a family the Cheney's were, I agree.

On their flight from San Diego to Minneapolis, after passing Denver, the f/a called the cockpit to let them know Tim's crew meal was ready. Tim was the "flying pilot" on this leg, so he told his F/O that when the f/a brings the meal up, he will step back to use the restroom. When Tim returned, the F/A left the cockpit and he began to eat his crew meal. When a pilot leaves to use the restroom, it is customary for the other pilot to brief him on his return on "any changes", such as altitude, heading, course changes or atc center frequency changes, etc. In this instance, nothing was said.....even though the f/o had received a frequency change. The problem that occurred was that the f/o never got a response on the new frequency....it was not the correct frequency....it was a Winnipeg Canada Center Freq.

Now, Denver Center is trying to get call them because they never checked in, because the f/o had dialed in the wrong freq......that is who called them so many times....but, then there was a shift change at Denver Center and no one briefed the new controller that there was a NORDO A/C (non communications) in their airspace....so, in actuality, atc basically "lost" this a/c.....see Wall Street Journal article below.

Tim told me he heard atc chatter on the speaker and so never thought they were out of radio range.....but, of course, they were hearing pilots talk on Winnipeg Center. For non-pilots.....when we don???t hear anything for a long while...we ask atc if they are still there....sometimes they are and sometimes you are out of their area and need to find a new frequency. With this chatter going on, there was no concern that they were not being controlled.

Then Tim told the f/o that the new bidding system was horrible and that his November schedule was not what he hoped for. He mentioned that his son was going into the Army in Dec. and he wanted certain days off so he could see him off.....the f/o said he could help him, he knew more about the new bidding system. Tim got his lap top out and put it on his left leg and showed the f/o how he bid. He told me he had his lap top out for maybe 2 minutes. Then the f/o said that he would show him how to do it on his laptop. He had his laptop out maximum of 5 minutes.

Let's also add the 100 kt tail wind that they had to the discussion, not helping matters.

The f/a's called the cockpit on the interphone(no they did not kick the door, no, no one was sleeping, no, no one was fighting) and asked when they will get there. They looked at their nav screens and were directly over MSP. Because they had their screens set on the max, 320 setting, when the f/o called on the frequency, which of course was Winnipeg Center, he saw Eau Claire and Duluth on his screen. They asked where they were and the f/o told them over Eau Claire, which was not even close, but MSP had disappeared from the screen even though they were right over the city.

They were, as you all know, vectored all over the sky to determine if they had control of the a/c and Tim kept telling the f/o to tell them they have control they want to land at MSP, etc. They landed with 11,000 pounds of fuel (no they did not come in on fumes, but had 2 hours in an A320) and not but 15 minutes past schedule, even though they left San Diego 35 minutes late due to atc flow control.

In the jet-way awaiting them were FBI and every other authority you can imagine.

[rykatspop]

So today, so typical--nothing but excuses, defiance and arrogance. From Wall Street, K Street (D.C.) to the sky ways, accountability is dead. If you believe in accountability, then you will be ridiculed for it, too.

[flyboy459]

I wouldn't even let these two clowns fly the kiddie planes at Hershey Park.

[ksmit2]

I haven't been following the story lately, but have the laptops been
subpoenaed for content that may corroborate or conflict with the crew
version? Either way this sounds like a load of..
Now that they have had several weeks to compile a story, they still
sound like idiots. If these guys are flying again any time soon, I think
the public should go automobile, train, or bus as protest, for the forseeable future.

[bobnjersey]

[Cheney, 54, and First Officer Richard Cole, 54, told investigators they had taken out their laptops and were absorbed in working on a complicated crew scheduling program that they were required to learn following Delta Air Lines' acquisition of Northwest a year earlier. ]

this incident is a by-product of the mistaken belief that humans have a capacity to 'multi-task'.

they don't ... and have never had that ability. the proliferation of 'connected always' devices creates the illusion that this is possible ... when it's only really a recipe for 'not having a clue' ... which is outright dangerous in certain circumstances.

[nojoy01]

by bobnjersey December 16, 2009 5:35 PM EST

[Cheney, 54, and First Officer Richard Cole, 54, told investigators they had taken out their laptops and were absorbed in working on a complicated crew scheduling program that they were required to learn following Delta Air Lines' acquisition of Northwest a year earlier. ]

this incident is a by-product of the mistaken belief that humans have a capacity to 'multi-task'.

they don't ... and have never had that ability. the proliferation of 'connected always' devices creates the illusion that this is possible ... when it's only really a recipe for 'not having a clue' ... which is outright dangerous in certain circumstances.
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It's simply amazing to me how much someone who is "multitasking" resembles what we used to call "frazzled". :)

[dccarino]

Not only should their licenses be revoked, THEY SHOULD BE GIVEN A PRISON SENTENCE.

[Overruled1]

I think you people are all too extreme.
While they do have a responsiblity to the customers, I feel the concerns of terrorism have overblown the incident (if that's what its' called). Have you ever driven past an exit or two in error? Did anyone take your license away?
Of course not.

[nojoy01]

by Overruled1 December 16, 2009 5:48 PM EST
I think you people are all too extreme.
While they do have a responsiblity to the customers, I feel the concerns of terrorism have overblown the incident (if that's what its' called). Have you ever driven past an exit or two in error? Did anyone take your license away?
Of course not.
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Trolling for a little excitement, are we?