The ATSB always saves its best for the full reports, not the summary page, and if you feel like a gripping read, its clinical dissection of what happened in the cockpit on that day makes the full extent of how an initial data entry error lead to a disconcerting series of assumptions, actions and stuff ups abundantly clear.
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The ATSB said “it found that when setting up the aircraft’s flight management and guidance system, the captain inadvertently entered the wrong longitudinal position of the aircraft”.
It said: “This resulted in a positional error in excess of 11,000km, which adversely affected the aircraft’s navigation systems and some alerting systems”.
An Air Asia pilot may want to consider an extended holiday after flying his plane to the south-eastern Australian city of Melbourne instead of the (very different) South East Asian country of Malaysia.
However, the ATSB also noted that the crew had “a number of opportunities to identify and correct the error” but did not notice it until they had become airborne and started to track in the wrong direction.
Citing the findings of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) published today, Guardian said the problem occurred when faulty earmuffs prompted the captain and first officer to swap their usual pre-flight checks.
Air Traffic Control was forced to hold up an aircraft on another runway when the AirAsia X plane turned in its path.
The ATSB praised the performance of Air Traffic Control for “reducing the risk to the aircraft and other aircraft in the area”. However, bad weather meant that was not possible.
The aircraft was instead radar vectored to Melbourne, Victoria and the flight completed in visual conditions.
The captain manually flew the aircraft to Tullamarine, with the autopilot and autothrust systems becoming unavailable during the earlier attempts to restore the system, and with the aircraft’s flight control system reverting to “alternate law” from “normal law”.
File image of an AirAsia X A330 on approach to land at Melbourne. Kuala Lumpur is 6,611km northwest.
According to The Guardian, the ATSB reportedly said “even experienced flight crew are not immune from data entry errors” and advised AirAsia to upgrade its flight systems.
“However, carrying out procedures and incorporating equipment upgrades recommended by aircraft manufacturers will assist in preventing or detecting such errors”. “This is especially the case when there is limited guidance available to resolve the issue”.
The incident happened in March past year, but the findings of an air safety investigation have just been released.
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The low-priced carrier also developed a training bulletin and package for its flightcrews that “emphasised the correct operation and alignment of the air data and inertial reference system”.
