Posts by user "za9ra22" [Posts: 88 Total up-votes: 0 Pages: 5]

As one of long standing prior to retirement, yes. Professionals, that's what professionals do.

I'd accept the possibility that vested interests could creep into an investigative team, but those advisors brought in from interested parties don't have much latitude or authority for that very reason. If the Boeing people (for example) in this case were claiming the switches couldn't be moved by accident, they would have been asked to demonstrate why they thought this to be the case, including dismantling the actual switches from the wreckage if that were possible. They bring technical expertise and documentation.

If I'm not mistaken, someone thoughtfully up thread somewhere posted an analysis which showed that pilot suicide is really not at all common, statistically. To which I'd add that for reasons also discussed up thread, this method would be totally atypical of previously chosen methods.

That said, I'd agree pretty much entirely that the probability of two, four pole/double throw switches failing within a second of each other is vanishingly remote too.

Of course, that dichotomy is why we are on the hamster wheel.

Also agreed pretty much entirely - and appreciate the time to add your thoughts.

I can't say I'm enamored of statistics much, because there's always room for the unexpected/unplanned/unthought of, but the things that puzzle me in this situation is that we don't have any evidence of aircraft faults or failures that could contribute to the circumstances of this accident, yet we also have no indications of medical issues with either pilot, and no historical pointers to the kind of mental health issues which could explain what happened. We also have an accident which is highly improbable as a suicide method, and switches that really are hugely UNlikey to have 'transitioned' to OFF on their own.

We do have lots of noise from media sources claiming knowledge which seems likely not to actually exist - if as one 'expert' claimed, the captain was known for mental health and/or behavioural issues - how does he know and the investigating team don't? And much uncertainty, coupled with sparsity of factual knowledge among the rest of us, which leads to wild theories feeding on themselves.

Personally, I'm not buying pilot suicide because it's such a totally improbable way to do it in the psychological sense - though I could see how it might have been the manifestation of an ideation, which was jerked back to reality by being asked why he pulled the switches. Ideations are a form of fantasy so can lead almost anywhere because the person doesn't really mean them to.

But there's also the potential for psychoses in one of the pilots, which often remain disguised and unknown, but can result in highly egregious behaviours when triggered.

All in all though, there's not enough 'knowns' to really make sense of it, and while we may gain better insights further down the investigatory path, there's a possibility that even when we know the 'what' of what happened, we may never get near the 'why' it did.

Demonstrating that statistics can tell us anything we want them to, your '47% chance of such an event in any given year' would mean that in the years 1982-2025, we ought to experienced around 22 or 23 pilot suicides. Yet there have been six confirmed, and some general assumptions otherwise.

6 confirmed in 22 or 23 years. To me that does seem to make it an 'unlikely event'.

Not really. They have released what data they see as pertinent to the investigation and the facts as they know them so far. They have not chosen to release only a portion of anything except that they were tasked with explaining how the event unfolded, as is common with preliminary reports. Data not included so far will be that which is not pertinent at this point, or not known... yet.

In other words, what they 'want known' is what happened. What they haven't said is why it happened, because that is so far not known.

There's a lot of 'ifs' and 'buts', a 'possibly' or several, and a few personal opinions, but not a single fact.

On edit: removed an unnecessary remark.

Might be that a good place to start would be to identify some real dots, because those links don't point to anything but the same unsubstantiated commentaries which don't give us facts, just conjectures based on nothing but gossip really.

The first link does confirm that the records for the captain were provided to the investigation (as would be expected) and nothing found:

• TATA, the parent company of Air India, pushed back, saying, “He did take bereavement leave in 2022 following his mother’s death, and his medical records were submitted as part of the investigation, and the preliminary report did not find anything noteworthy.”

To connect the dots, you first have to identify them, and to be honest, I'd be totally shocked if the investigation had not got to the question you are posing well before you did, and not found anything credible to go on. What do you think the team missed that you, sitting comfortably here, haven't? Do you know something about a causal link between bereavement leave and suicide, for example?

While I agree with your point entirely, I don't find it unusual or unexpected that there is resistance among many to accept or even acknowledge the possibility of suicide, but at the same time, it's no more fixated than the alternative camp which argues that suicide is the only possibility - and often promotes it via as erroneous 'evidence' as that suggesting the cutoff switches are faulty and the SAIB 'proves' it.

There's a genuine problem with understanding what 'evidence' means, and both sides seem to be suffering it.

This is certainly true, and as the preliminary report states in the 'progress of investigation' summary:
"At this stage of investigation, there are no recommended actions to B787-8 and/or GE GEnx-1B engine operators and manufacturers."

While possible (just) that the switches were so badly damaged that it was not possible to determine they would operate properly otherwise, it's a very long stretch to think the investigation would miss a potential fault in what is the singular focus of the entire incident.

I don't see any supportable basis on which it can be credibly argued these switches are causative.

That almost started so well!

But the report doesn't suggest one of the pilots moved the switches - it avoids that question entirely. Instead, as you correctly state, it says the switches 'transitioned', which is the strangest way to describe a pilot physically switching them off. I could see that as merely cautious phrasing, but it then describes them as 'transitioning' on again.

Admittedly, I'm a bit rusty with this kind of work these days, but I believe (and so does a former colleague) that the reason these actions are described in this way is that there is no evidence discernible (in time for the report) to identify how those switches were moved. Or even - just to be pedantic since they began in RUN and were discovered in RUN amongst the wreckage - that they moved at all.

I'm not drawing any conclusions, just saying that in the absence of any evidence they could report, they didn't report on any evidence, and 'transition' is the choice how to do that.

I seriously doubt the report fails to identify which pilot asks 'why' and which says 'I didn't' for political reasons. There is too wide a constituency of members of the team and no purpose to be gained, but there would be a possibility it isn't mentioned due to potential legal/criminal investigation if it weren't for the fact that it clearly doesn't actually have that effect at all, and isn't in the AAIB-India remit anyway. If they have no evidence of mental health conditions for either pilot, it's a moot question at this stage in any event.

The only way you can read the report as an investigator is that they itemise all the material facts they know, and omit what isn't yet pertinent or known.

Apologies for the delay in responding to your point, but as I explained previously, the preliminary report was almost certainly written to place on record everything pertinent that is known. If something wasn't included in it, then it either isn't known, or more likely at this stage, was not considered to be pertinent.

Given that we do not know what evidence there is, even as there is certain to be more to gather, some of us can happily speculate, though not with any authority. But this would basically tell us that if the investigators know who said what, that at this stage, in the context of what THEY know rather than we do, it wasn't pertinent to report that detail.

And really, in preliminary report terms, where the objective at this stage is to lay out WHAT happened, the question of who said what, when it would seem to be a single question and a single answer, isn't relevant in laying down the pertinent facts. That is unless (and until) there is reason to suspect a deliberate or actionable act by a member of the crew. There appears not to be any evidence of mental or physical health impairments which would lead that way at present and point towards the WHY, so no purpose in diverting their and our attention as yet from the WHAT.

I say this as someone who has done this kind of investigatory work, and authored reports from it, knowing that there is sometimes considerable tension between the need to investigate and be thorough and precise, and the public interest which reasonably demands and should have answers.

Admittedly, you have no duty to read the posts I have written, and it's my bad if they didn't make any sense, but I have explained - broadly - how these investigations work, why they work that way, and what they set out to do.

But basically, this is a preliminary report, not the final one. They are collecting evidence still, likely will be for some time yet, and are expected only to provide this kind of initial fact finding as a foundation for what is still to come. The who-said-what only matters when they need to determine why events unfolded as they did - and the absence of that detail at this point means they haven't got to that point yet... not that they won't.

The only problem with that argument is that (according to the WSJ and other musings), the pilot responsible HAS been identified, quite easily.

And in fact, I would be shocked if the pilot responsible didn't expect that his identity would be knowable in due course in any event - just as many here have supposed. Certainly, no life insurance policy would pay out on a claim until this was settled to the insurance company's satisfaction.

To add: This is pertinent because it really does show that if this were a suicide by pilot, the pilot either knew he would be identified and named, or didn't care.

This is only one of the glaringly obvious issues with a suicide theory in this particular case, though it doesn't preclude it. To my mind, there would almost certainly have to be other factors at play too, such that something in the moments beforehand triggered an impulse to 'do it now' rather than wait until the outcomes was totally certain. Or a psychotic behaviour which was always going to play out at some point.

Not sure why you would think the paragraph in the preliminary report was a red herring - it's a statement of historical context directly relating to the fuel control switches which the investigation had found in the FDR record as having 'transitioned' to OFF before 'transitioning' ack to ON.

To not detail the background would have been to omit a clearly pertinent fact which would have left others questioning the authority of the report for not covering it. The report itself then clearly states: "At this stage of investigation, there are no recommended actions to B787-8 and/or GE GEnx-1B engine operators and manufacturers." to ensure it is known that no defects were found at the time of the report being issued.

I suspect it is written as it is because at this point, there is no evidence the investigation can provide as to how the switches 'transitioned', let alone why.

In the report, it states: "The aircraft air/ground sensors transitioned to air mode, consistent with liftoff at 08:08:39 UTC."

I don't see any basis on which the aircraft seems to have been confused and thought it was in ground mode - unless there's a significant sensor or software fault which manifested after takeoff. There was no mention of such a thing happening.

Another collected set of 'maybe' and 'possible' with no actual foundation.

-He could not plan for his death in a situation where there is potential for survival.
-Any investigatory conclusion that the crash was the result of suicide or malfeasance would ensure no insurance payout would be made.
-He could not hope to disguise his actions from being recorded in both data and voice.
-The MayDay' call would cause more suspicion if he had NOT made it.
-A high altitude descent at speed would have been far more likely to end in death, and the cause be less possible to discern.

There's lots, psychologically speaking, wrong with this scenario too. I'd be much more convinced that this was an impulsive act or a psychotic one than that it was a planned suicide, meant to happen this way.

A pilot who can fly an aircraft around the world, operate it in however many situations he might face in the process, but doesn't know how the EAFRs work? Heavens above, we were talking about that in detail in the FIRST thread here before the smoke had cleared, and that involved people who don't know how to fly a passenger aircraft.

Yes, absolutely true. It has been mentioned before, but deserved to be again.

There was reasonable expectation that the front EAFR with battery backup would record some data, not least cockpit audio from at least one of the mics, but not the tail-mounted unit.

whether training explicitly covers it, only 787 pilots will know, but I would expect a pilot intent on crashing the flight would take the time to find out since it would likely be very relevant to that intent. It's one of the issues which clouds deliberate suicide as a probable cause of the crash.

Non-intentional behaviours or impulsive action... that's a different matter. In that instance, the pilot is likely not to have given it any thought - as per your post from which I partially quoted just now.

It appears they can't please anyone. To include a piece of pertinent data is to throw a red herring, and to not include it is to combust pprune in cover-up conspiracies.

They are telling you that the crash aircraft had no reported issues with the fuel control switches (since 2023, which was I think when the unit was replaced), and subsequently also confirmed that there were no defects to report.

I would say it suggests they have concerns relating to the accident which are not yet fully investigated, so don't want to include a factual statement which may not be fact. It is a preliminary report after all. It's job is lay out the sequence of material facts.