In my opinion, ATC is also culpable (though much less so). They could have and should have ordered a go around, but instead, they re-cleared the airplane to land.
That's not how ATC works. The tower controller is responsible for the runway environment. The only reason they can tell a plane to go around is if there is a traffic conflict or the runway is not available, and they're supposed to give the pilots a reason for the go around instruction.
A go around for an unstable approach is 100% the decision of the pilots, because they have the complete picture. They also know the stability requirements of the operator and speed limits of the plane, ATC doesn't know those.
So while ATC can think "wow he is very fast for an A320" or "that looks too high" they cannot see what the actual airspeed is, they cannot see whether the gear is down or not or what the flap settings are. And they don't know the speed limits for each specific type. All they know is roughly how fast the typical plane of that type normally goes.
One of the truly astonishing parts of this report is that the pilots do not actually appear to have been in direct contact with the tower controller at any point during the initial, gear-up landing.
If you read the report, it seems they were in contact with the approach controller who contacted the tower for landing clearance on their behalf.
If the controller thought they were having an emergency (which I guess he did based on the strange approach and all the warning sounds he heard on the radios) it's not that uncommon to hold on to them. Happens because it reduces crew workload if he's not telling them a new frequency.
Tower and approach have a button to talk directly in each other's headsets, so it's easy for approach to give you a landing clearance on behalf of the tower. Or the other way around, tower could get you radar instructions from approach in case you have a problem right after take off and want to return immediately.
But in this case it was a very bad decision to do that.
While you're probably right apparently the tower didn't tell the pilots that they saw a fire/sparks on the plane when it hit the pavement. Not that the pilots were listening anyway.
The final authority in flying an airplane safely is always in the hands of the pilot. The pilot is always responsible. ATC may not have all the information, not know specifics of the aircraft or this specific flight. It is just not practical to have procedures where the ATC is the final authority for every single flight, with all the various different airplanes, so the pilot always is.
Exactly as Erlich_Bachman wrote. Also want to add one more reason: The pilot's neck is always on the line, while the ATC usually won't get physically hurt. The incentives are better aligned if it's the pilot who has final authority.
Sure, the pilot is the final authority. If it is unsafe, the pilot should declare an emergency, and ATC must get out of the way. Otherwise, if ATC says, "go around," the pilot should go around. And in this case, ATC should have said, "Go around."
This is an aviation rule that everyone lives by. There are many reasons for why that is the most sane and sensible approach to this problem, in addition to what is mentioned, the pilot's attention span is always under attack from various events that they have to correctly and swiftly respond to. This does not happen sometimes, this happens all the time during flight. Everyone has to be prepared for it. It is part of the job. You have to train for it, you have to prepare for your attention to be overflown, and you still have to make the most important decisions even under those conditions.
And this has an important consequence: ATC is at the end of that list ("communicate"). They are at the bottom of the attention span chain of the pilot, and it is better for everyone if ATC knows this and acts like it. In other words, leaves the final decision to the pilot.
I understand your point, and it is entirely possible that the accident would have played out exactly as it did even if the ATC performance was impeccable. However, ATC performance was not impeccable. The preliminary report indicates they did not follow established procedures. In my opinion, because the aircraft did not follow the published approach, landing clearance should not have been given. They weren't even talking to the tower controller, but to approach. Why weren't they switched over? Not enough time? They should have been told to go around. If the pilots still attempted to land then it is on them.
Please don't get me wrong. The pilots bear the majority of the responsibility. But it does not sound to me like ATC did their job properly, either.
> If the pilots still attempted to land then it is on them.
It is on them regardless. ATC performed badly, and it blew one or two chances to say something that might have saved the day, but it was the pilots who actually caused the accident, through their own free choices of action - nothing that ATC did influenced their decision-making (quite the opposite, in fact.) ATC deserves criticism and blame, but it is different in kind to that which belongs to the pilots.
Pilots have trained for years on flying in general and the specific performance characteristics of their aircraft.
Controllers on the other hand has years of training about traffic patterns, communications, managing airspace, etc. Most controllers are not pilots, although a significant number are, even those are not likely to be flying around A320s recreationally. Needless to say they deal with thousands of types of aircraft every day and may have only general ideas of how those aircraft may perform.
So, who is in a really good position to quickly know what the critical speeds in a landing are?
The accident report confirms that neither the pilots nor controllers followed established procedures. This is not simply my idle speculation. The plane was not on the proper published approach for the airport. The controller attempted to give vectors to the aircraft to give it room to descend. The pilot declined to follow the instructions (possible violation). At this point, in my opinion, the controller should have said, "go around." Instead, the controller said, "cleared to land."
Yes, the pilot is in control of the aircraft, but unless and until an emergency is declared, ATC is in control of the airspace, and the pilots should obey any safe command.
Don't get me wrong, the pilots bear the majority of the responsibility, but ATC did not do their job properly, either.
The pilots busted their approach clearance. ATC could certainly have rescinded their landing clearance and ordered a go-around.
That said, ATC's responsibility is to keep planes from hitting each other and maintain an orderly flow of aircraft. They are not any way responsible for the safety of the flight. That is what the second pilot and all of the automated alarms are for. The crew just ignored all of them.
It takes a basic standard of professionalism to fly a jet airliner, and unfortunately neither of the crew members on this flight had it.
The approach was so bad that they were above the maximum gear extension speed when they tried to put the gear down, and so the Airbus refused to do it, and continuously yelled at them that it was doing this, but somehow they failed to notice.
Monitoring airspeed on approach is about the most basic thing a pilot does, and if you're off on speed and/or altitude by much less than these guys were, the absolutely clear requirement is to go around and try again (before you slam the engines on the ground and destroy them).
So, having twice ignored the ATC instruction to turn left to 180 away from the approach, you think there is a good reason to believe they would've heeded a direction to go around?
If ATC is to blame in this, it is primarily in excessive deference to the PIC.
No I don't think there is a good reason to believe they would have heeded a direction to go around. That doesn't mean that the direction should not have been given.
If ATC is to blame in this, it is primarily in excessive deference to the PIC.
My point, exactly, though it sounds like there may have been other irregularities in the procedures followed.
> reporting they had lost both engines (CFM56) and repeatedly declaring Mayday about 5 minutes after the go around, the RAT (RAM Air Turbine) deployed. Tower cleared the aircraft to land on either runway 25 (25L or 25R)
ATC should have said "go around" to a plane with no functioning engines?
I think you misread the dynamic of the incident.
The pilots were in an unstabilized approach, didn't go around, landed with landing gear up and applied reverse trust, at which point they figured all those sparks were not supposed to be flying around, brilliantly decided to go around and pressed the TOGA switches. Surprisingly the plane was not able to complete the go around, lost both engines, and crashed. This is the stuff of nightmares.
"ATC should have ordered a go around" implies some authority that is not there. The commander (captain) has final responsibility for the safety of the aircraft. ATC effectively has an advisory role; they issue instructions rather than orders and the commander can ignore any ATC instruction if they believe it to be necessary for the safe performance of the flight.
What do you mean? If I approach KORD in my Cessna 172 (as I've done), and ATC instructs me to go around, I would. Of course the pilot is the ultimate authority and can deviate from any instruction in an emergency, but ATC can, in my understanding, instruct an aircraft to go around for any number of reasons that the pilot of the aircraft is not privy to.
In this case, according to the preliminary report, `“Karachi Approach” advised repeatedly (twice to discontinue the approach`. Had the cowboy pilots followed that instruction, the unnecessary deaths might have been avoided.
Yes, they can instruct. They don't issue orders, though. In your example, as the commander of your aircraft, if you felt that going around would compromise the safety of your flight (unlikely, but you can imagine some scenarios), you can and should disregard the instruction.
In the case here, approach instructed them to abort the approach, and the pilots should have. Well, they paid the ultimate price for their mistakes, taking many people with them.
That’s not how ATC works - atc ALREADY went beyond what you normally see w their suggestions for a go around. ATC is focused on traffic (keeping it separated), pilots are in charge of flying their planes. In fact communicating with ATC is low on list of things to do when their are problems. Priority is aviate, navigate then communicate. And these controllers went above and beyond w their warnings already
The accident report indicates that ATC also didn't follow procedures, so no, ATC did not go above and beyond.
The main criticism in the report seems to be that they did not report the lack of landing gear or the subsequent engine strike back to the aircraft.
My criticism, having listened to some of the recording, is that ATC were not more insistent in their instructions. Every other ATC recording I've listened to, ATC instructs and pilots obey. In the rare cases where pilots disobey without immediate good reason, ATC usually gets quite heated. They don't generally just acquiesce.
So, don't get me wrong, the pilots bear the majority of the responsibility, but pilots and ATC are a team, and ATC didn't do a great job either.
ATC get's bothered if you put other planes / people at risk (entering class B airspace without clearance, not maintaining separation etc etc). That is ATC responsibility. And yes, they will punish you with a notice of pilot deviation and then action on your license.
They don't bother you in terms of how you fly your own plane. That's captains responsibility in the US at least. The controller was getting into the go around game here (too high / too fast stuff). The CAPTAIN is supposed to monitor and establish the stabilized approach.
The crew was never in contact with the tower controller that was in a position to see that gear were not down, or that the aircraft had landed on its engines.
For reasons that are not clearly explained (probably everything happening too fast and muddled), they remained in contact with approach during the landing after the approach controller got their landing clearance from tower on the phone.
Tower did report the gear-up landing to approach, but approach did not relay to the crew.
