American Airlines Accident: What We Do and Don’t Know

By Scoot Mc Cartney

ItBy may well take months to learn exactly why an American Airlines 737-800 went off the end of a runway in Kingston, Jamaica, Tuesday night in heavy rain. Here’s a rundown of factors investigators will look at, and what we do and don’t know so far. We know, as my colleague AndyPasztor point out that runway overruns have become the most frequent type of airline accident in recent years. That may be a function of other types of accidents being reduced, while botched landings and runway issues remain a concern. What we don’t yet know is what actually happened to Flight 331, which was landing at about 10 p.m. from Miami, about an hour behind schedule. We do know that there was heavy rain at the airport at the time and thunderstorms in the area. We don’t know what role that played. We do know that sometimes planes go off the end of runways because they were traveling too fast or were too high when attempting to land. Those were factors in two Southwest Airlines runway accidents, in Chicago and in Burbank, Calif. We do know that sometimes the landing is simply botched. We do know that sometimes mechanical problems are at the root cause of the accident – brakes fail, spoilers and thrust reversers that slow down a jet don’t deploy. The autopilot malfunctions and pilots don’t properly recover. We also know that fatigue has contributed to past accidents, though we don’t know if these pilots may have been tired. "Get there-itis’’ is a major threat to all pilots – flying into an unsafe situation because of the pressure to get there – whether it’s pressure to get to a meeting, get to a bed for some sleep, or just meet a schedule. And we know that accidents are most often the result of a chain of events—bad decisions, bad information, wrong moves or equipment failures. Investigators will examine the crew’s decision to land, looking at the weather and runway conditions at the time. Did a thunderstorm move over the runway? Did the pilots fly a stabilized approach and have the runway in sight, or meet all the criteria for letting the plane’s autopilot land the aircraft? In short, did the plane function as it was supposed to, and did the pilots function as they were supposed to? Ten years ago, an American MD-80 crashed in Little Rock, Ark., killing 11 people. The approach was botched—the first officer testified he called for the captain, who died in the crash, to "go around’’ and abort the landing because they had lost sight of the runway lights and were off course. But the cockpit voice recorder never picked that up, and the captain pressed on with the landing. Spoilers on the wings that disrupt airflow and slow down a plane failed to deploy properly, contributing to the accident. The National Transportation Saftey Board blamed the flight crew’s failure to discontinue the approach when severe thunderstorms and their associated hazards to flight operations had moved into the airport area and the crew’s failure to ensure that the spoilers had extended after touchdown.’’ Among contributing factors, the NTSB said, was "the flight crew’s impaired performance resulting from fatigue and the situational stress associated with the intent to land under the circumstances.’’ Resources: http://blogs.wsj.com/middleseat/2009/12/23/american-airlines-accident-what-we-do-and-don%E2%80%99t-know/