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Yeti Airlines ATR72 Crash Nepal


J.O.

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Black box and cockpit voice recorder from plane that crashed in Nepal found

 
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The black box and cockpit voice recorder of the plane that crashed in Nepal have been found, a Kathmandu Airport official has said.

The ATR 72 aircraft, operated by Yeti Airlines, was carrying 72 people when it crashed.

Rescuers called off their search on Monday evening local time with two people still unaccounted for, and the operation will resume on Tuesday, according to an airport official.

Video on local media showed thick black smoke billowing from the crash site as rescue workers and crowds gathered around the wreckage of the aircraft.

Teknath Sitaula, a Kathmandu Airport official, said the so-called black boxes "are in a good condition now. They look
good from outside".

The data on the recorders may help investigators determine what caused the plane to crash.

Nepal declared Monday a day of mourning and has set up a panel to investigate the disaster and suggest measures to avoid such incidents in future.

The plane, on a scheduled flight from Nepal's capital Kathmandu to Pokhara, the gateway to the scenic Annapurna mountain range, was carrying 57 Nepalis, five Indians, four Russians, two South Koreans, and one person each from Argentina, Ireland, Australia and France.

Pokhara police official Ajay KC said the search and rescue operation, which stopped because of nightfall on Sunday, has now resumed.

He said: "We will take out the five bodies from the gorge and search for the remaining four that are still missing."

The other 63 bodies had been sent to a hospital, he said.

As it crashed the aircraft's fuselage was split into multiple parts which were scattered down the gorge.

Tek Bahadur KC, a senior administrative officer in the Kaski district, said he expected rescue workers to find more bodies at the bottom of the gorge.

Gaurav Gurung, a witness, said he saw the aircraft spinning violently in the air after it began to attempt a landing.

He added he saw the plane fall nose-first towards its left and then crash into the gorge.

"The plane caught fire after the crash. There was smoke everywhere," Mr Gurung said.

Nearly 350 people have died since 2000 in plane or helicopter crashes in Nepal - home to eight of the world's 14 highest mountains, including Everest - where sudden weather changes can make for hazardous conditions.

Experts say air accidents are usually caused by a combination of factors, and investigations can take months or longer.

 
 
Sun, January 15, 2023 at 11:15 p.m. MST·2 min read
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The pilot of the downed flight had lost her husband – a co-pilot for the same airline – in a similar crash in 2006, according to a Yeti Airlines spokesperson.

Anju Khatiwada had decided to become a pilot after the death of husband, Dipak Pokhrel, and used the insurance payout money to travel to the US for her training, Sudarshan Bartaula told CNN. She had been with the airline since 2010 and had more than 6,300 hours of flight experience.

“She was a brave woman with all the courage and determination. She’s left us too soon,” he said.

Khatiwada was a captain and was flying with an instructor pilot for additional training at the time of the crash, Bartaula added.

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On 1/17/2023 at 11:25 AM, Kip Powick said:

Khatiwada was a captain and was flying with an instructor pilot for additional training at the time of the crash, Bartaula added.

Not often you hear of a crash with an instructor as a crew member.

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On 1/20/2023 at 11:02 AM, Seeker said:

Not often you hear of a crash with an instructor as a crew member.

The only case I heard about was the AC  DC-8  training accident at YOW back in 1967  . I believe the IP was a Captain, occupying the right seat, and I think both his "students" were high time pilots as well but I guess they were probably transitioning to the DC-8 

I was based in YYB at the time and we did fly over the crash site a few days later as we did many flights to YOW and YUL.

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6 hours ago, Moon The Loon said:

TC lost a Twin Otter in February 1981. Instructor pilot in right seat failed an engine with the fuel shut-off. Pilot flying reached up and feathered live engine. Insufficient time to restart shut down engine. Both pilots killed.

Hi, Moon' - I remember that time. There was a third inspector on board who survived, though badly injured. I believe he'd scramnbled to the back of the aircraft.

My recollection is hearing that the second engine was also shut down by fuel cutoff. A feathered-but-running PT6 will unfeather fairly quickly, but when the fire's out in both ...

IAC, it did generate some discussion (and reflection) for many of us involved in instructing, and in-aircraft airline training, about how 'realistic' those scenarios and configurations really needed to be. & IMO, no abnormals should ever be simulated on the line (& no indication so far that happened here).

Cheers, IFG - 🍺

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7 hours ago, J.O. said:

That was a tragic day. I had met John Miller a few times around the flight school, very nice guy.

John was a prince of an inspector for flight training institutions. Inspector O'Brien had his own reputation. The third pilot observing was on his first flight after being involved himself in a previous crash where he was severely injured. This was a re-intro flight for him.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

From AvHerald:

On Feb 6th 2023 Nepal's AIC reported that both flight data and cockpit voice recorders were successfully read out in Singapore. According to first analysis of the flight data recorders both propellers of the aircraft went into the feather position. The reason for the feathering of both propellers is still being determined, human factors as well as technical factors are still under investigation.

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5 hours ago, W5 said:

From AvHerald:

.... According to first analysis of the flight data recorders both propellers of the aircraft went into the feather position. The reason for the feathering of both propellers is still being determined, human factors as well as technical factors are still under investigation.

Interesting, to be sure - but if so, there's a lot more to the story. For the non-pilots:  both props feathered (if indeed that occurred prior to impact) renders the aircraft a glider, but does not itself explain total loss of control. 

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6 hours ago, IFG said:

Interesting, to be sure - but if so, there's a lot more to the story. For the non-pilots:  both props feathered (if indeed that occurred prior to impact) renders the aircraft a glider, but does not itself explain total loss of control. 

Non-pilot here: is feathering both engine props a normal procedure prior to landing? Does it need to be manually commanded by the pilot, or is there an auto-feathering mechanism that could do it? (I’m only familiar with gas-turbine powered aircraft.)

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1 hour ago, conehead said:

Non-pilot here: is feathering both engine props a normal procedure prior to landing? Does it need to be manually commanded by the pilot, or is there an auto-feathering mechanism that could do it? (I’m only familiar with gas-turbine powered aircraft.)

No, it is not  a normal procedure. Feathering a prop in flight results in the pilots having to fly a one engine aircraft vs a twin engoine propeller aircraft and it is basically an emergency procedure.

Pilots would only feather one prop, the affected one, if there was a problem with that particular engine. I am pessimestic  about the comment of both props feathered  while inflight. That statement would hardly be reasonable seeing the aircraft was nose high and stalled to the left. If both were feathered I would imagine the then "glider:" would want to be flown straight ahead.

I don't know about "auto feather" because I never flew anything that had that procedure ...if there is such a thing.The only scenario, that I can think of was that one engine had a problem, the pilots feathered the engine and for some reason during the procedure they feathered the other engine as well.

Hopefully the complete analysis of the  FDR and CVR will clarify what really happened during  this tragedy. 

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Not an ATR person, but modern turboprop aircraft have an auto feather function. Occasionally the system fails and what is called "an uncomanded auto feather " occurs. 

 

 A fairly common occurrence on the Dash 8 classic. Depending on the power settings, this can be catastrophic for the affected engines. I have never heard of both engines doing it at once. 

 Conehead,  May I suggest that you go slumming and check out a turboprop 🙂. There are twice as many engine controls in the cockpit.  A power lever and a condition lever. Power lever controls power levels. The condition lever controls fuel on and off , and propeller pitch angle including feather. It would be possible to inadvertently feather both engines in flight if you actuated the wrong lever.  🤔

 Feathering a prop at high power settings causes extreme over torque. Engines get destroyed. 

$ .02 🤔

 

 

 

 

 

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Never flown this type:  What happens if a pilot thinks they are rapidly reducing thrust but reach for the condition levers instead?  I saw a variation on this once when a Captain was new to the training position in the right seat. 

 

 

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Quick replies, but a caveat: I have quite a bit of PT6/7 time, but many years have elapsed. No hard feelings if anything I say needs correction :P

13 hours ago, conehead said:

Non-pilot here: is feathering both engine props a normal procedure prior to landing? Does it need to be manually commanded by the pilot, or is there an auto-feathering mechanism that could do it? (I’m only familiar with gas-turbine powered aircraft.)

Generally manually feathered in securing a engine shutdown (PT6/7 are feathered during normal shutdown too). Auto feather is for take-off, to improve the runway and climb-out limitations wrt engine failure on take-off (by speeding up the immediate procedures), and selected off shortly after take-off.

11 hours ago, Tango Foxtrot said:

.... A fairly common occurrence on the Dash 8 classic. Depending on the power settings, this can be catastrophic for the affected engines. I have never heard of both engines doing it at once .... Feathering a prop at high power settings causes extreme over torque. Engines get destroyed. 

I also know of one unsolicited double auto-feather in a twin otter, due to corrosion in a wire bundle that shorted the auto-feather circuits when prop deice was selected. I never spoke with the crew, but I understand that the prop de-ice was intuitively and immediately selected back off, so they did come out of it OK. [leading to my own facetious suggestion that the first recall item for any surprise emergency should be "Undo That Last Thing You Just Did!"]

4 hours ago, Vsplat said:

Never flown this type:  What happens if a pilot thinks they are rapidly reducing thrust but reach for the condition levers instead?  I saw a variation on this once when a Captain was new to the training position in the right seat. 

I'd say that's pretty unlikely (different grips, detents etc), but probably not impossible.  I can't help wondering about on-line 'training' scenarios tho'. 

11 hours ago, Kip Powick said:

.... I am pessimestic  about the comment of both props feathered  while inflight. That statement would hardly be reasonable seeing the aircraft was nose high and stalled to the left. If both were feathered I would imagine the then "glider:" would want to be flown straight ahead.

I don't know about "auto feather" because I never flew anything that had that procedure ...if there is such a thing.The only scenario, that I can think of was that one engine had a problem, the pilots feathered the engine and for some reason during the procedure they feathered the other engine as well.

Hopefully the complete analysis of the  FDR and CVR will clarify what really happened during  this tragedy. 

Not sure why the "pessimistic", Kip. The aircraft remains completely controllable with both feathered. I guess we'll have to await the report, but I'm inclined to think (IMHO!) that there'd be a chain of questionable airmanship between unsolicited auto-feather and a stall, if that turns out to be what happened. Controllability comments not referring to prop malfunctions involving beta or reverse, of course.

IAC, a tragedy all round

Cheers, IFG - :Scratch-Head:

Edited by IFG
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  • 10 months later...
Quote

3.2  Probable cause 

The most probable cause of the accident is determined to be the inadvertent movement of both condition levers to the feathered position in flight, which resulted in feathering of both propellers and subsequent loss of thrust, leading to an aerodynamic stall and collision with terrain.

 3.3  Contributing Factors  

The contributing factors to the accident are:

o  High workload due to operating into a new airport with surrounding terrain and the crew missing the associated flight deck and engine indications that both propellers had been feathered. 

o  Human factor issues such as high workload and stress that appears to have resulted in the misidentification and selection of the propellers to the feathered position.  

o  The proximity of terrain requiring a tight circuit to land on runway 12. This tight circuit was not the usual visual circuit pattern and contributed to the high workload. This tight pattern also meant that the approach did not meet the stabilised visual approach criteria.
                     
o  Use of visual approach circuit for RWY 12 without any evaluation, validation and resolution of its threats which were highlighted by the SRM team of CAAN and advices proposed in flight procedures design report conducted by the consultant and without the development and approval of the chart by the operator and regulator respectively.  

o  Lack of appropriate technical and skill based training (including simulator) to the crew and proper classroom briefings (for that flight) for the safe operation of flight at new airport for visual approach to runway 12.  

o Non-compliance with SOPs, ineffective CRM and lack of sterile cockpit discipline. 

Final Report on the accident of ATR72/212A version 500 that occurred on January 15, 2023 near Pokhara International Airport

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