That's a nice one. I've seen a lot of these. Something so calm and graceful about them.

I’ll be doing that tomorrow night.

If I may ask, did the autopilot do the entire landing?

quote:

Originally posted by Gundog 64:
If I may ask, did the autopilot do the entire landing?

No the crew disconnects the autopilot and the cockpit alert sounds. 3:00 - 3:30 Marker.

quote:

Originally posted by 224VALMan:
No the crew disconnects the autopilot and the cockpit alert sounds. 3:00 - 3:30 Marker.

Makes me wonder about the quality of that practice...

My dad (33 years TWA) had a requirement in his cockpit to take the auto pilot off an hour prior to landing... he wanted himself and his copilots to have the feel of whatever they were landing well in advance of the event. The equipment was usually the L1011 or 747, though early on the 707 and Connie. That wasn't a TWA requirement, just his own. Makes sense to me...

Most of the large Airliners today have Autoland which can fly the approach and land the aircraft hands off. Sometimes pilots will use this on a Category III Approach.

Auto land is required in anything less than CAT 1 weather. CAT 1 is 200 a foot ceiling and visibility of 1800' RVR. (Roughly a half mile.)

quote:

Originally posted by Brad:

quote:

Originally posted by 224VALMan:
No the crew disconnects the autopilot and the cockpit alert sounds. 3:00 - 3:30 Marker.

Makes me wonder about the quality of that practice...

My dad (33 years TWA) had a requirement in his cockpit to take the auto pilot off an hour prior to landing... he wanted himself and his copilots to have the feel of whatever they were landing well in advance of the event. The equipment was usually the L1011 or 747, though early on the 707 and Connie. That wasn't a TWA requirement, just his own. Makes sense to me...

In the old days, lots of guys would click off the auto pilot at altitude, pull the throttles to idle and fly the entire approach by hand. You can't do that flying into LAX or almost anywhere these days.

If you're flying a 777, you have many thousands of hours of flying, and thousands of landings. These days you can't turn off the auto pilot "an hour prior to landing". Above FL290, you're in RVSM (reduced vertical separation minimums - 1000 feet vertical separation) - autopilot is required.

Hand flying skills are very important, but if a pilot is hand flying, the pilot monitoring now has his/her job made much more difficult. The terminal environment is way too busy to practice hand flying - until you are cleared for the approach and the airport is in your front windscreen. Keeping up with the frequencies, headings, altitudes and traffic is extremely difficult and you'd be crazy to hand fly a big aircraft throughout the approach.

Actual airmanship skills are a big issue. Most of us began our airline careers with thousands of hours of stick and rudder time. Problem is these days we are all retiring and the airlines are having a tough time filling the seats. Fly with good airlines, avoid the cheap seat shit bird airlines.

quote:

Actual airmanship skills are a big issue. Most of us began our airline careers with thousands of hours of stick and rudder time. Problem is these days we are all retiring and the airlines are having a tough time filling the seats. Fly with good airlines, avoid the cheap seat shit bird airlines.

No wonder.Look at what it cost to train a person to become a commercial ATP pilot today.
The starting wages for a first officer at a commuter airline is horrible compared to a lot of other professions. Some regional airline pilots probably qualify for Food Stamps. It is the Airlines own fault of why they are having difficulty filling cockpit seats.[ Pay More and Get More Pilots ]

http://thetruthabouttheprofess...-pilot-salaries.html

quote:

Originally posted by 224VALMan:

No wonder.Look at what it cost to train a person to become a commercial ATP pilot today.
The starting wages for a first officer at a commuter airline is horrible compared to a lot of other professions. Some regional airline pilots probably qualify for Food Stamps. It is the Airlines own fault of why they are having difficulty filling cockpit seats.[ Pay More and Get More Pilots ]

http://thetruthabouttheprofess...-pilot-salaries.html

The reality is that the usual business model for USA “regional jet” operators relies on low wages, and (mostly) hungry entry level pilots. ie: pay more and get more pilots.....but bankrupcy then looms, happens with regularity even without paying more.
- Mike, recently retired CAL/UAL 777

I am currently flying the 777. We hand fly it quite a bit. But there is a time to hand fly and there is a time to use automation. It’s really no different than back in the day when I was flying DC-8’s. What has changed is the complexity of the airspace we fly in now.

RVSM, RNAV VNAV arrivals and departures, RNAV RNP approaches. There is no room for any lateral or vertical slop.

I’d say that I hand fly 90% of my approaches and I have done a total of one autoland in the last year, which was due to an autoland expiration legality.

Now if you want to talk about autopilot cripples look to Asian carriers and some of the accidents they’ve had recently. Some recent automation accidents and incidents are not limited to Asia however.

I think I’ll start another thread on that subject. Look for it soon.

quote:

..but bankrupcy then looms, happens with regularity even without paying more.

Yeah, The Airline Management team uses Chapter 11 as one of many tools in the management tool box.
I know firsthand about Airlines filing C-11 and the beating that Airline employees take as a result.

Sure Strike...
Just out of curiosity..in your 777 at FL400 and more or less max gross what is the mach limit to stall spread?

quote:

Originally posted by 224VALMan:

quote:

Actual airmanship skills are a big issue. Most of us began our airline careers with thousands of hours of stick and rudder time. Problem is these days we are all retiring and the airlines are having a tough time filling the seats. Fly with good airlines, avoid the cheap seat shit bird airlines.

No wonder.Look at what it cost to train a person to become a commercial ATP pilot today.
The starting wages for a first officer at a commuter airline is horrible compared to a lot of other professions. Some regional airline pilots probably qualify for Food Stamps. It is the Airlines own fault of why they are having difficulty filling cockpit seats.[ Pay More and Get More Pilots ]

Kit Darby is finally right. We're facing a pilot shortage. Ab Initio training is being considered in the US. Even FedEx is considering a form of it. Amazing.

http://fedexpurplerunway.com

quote:

Originally posted by surestrike:
I am currently flying the 777. We hand fly it quite a bit. But there is a time to hand fly and there is a time to use automation. It’s really no different than back in the day when I was flying DC-8’s. What has changed is the complexity of the airspace we fly in now.

RVSM, RNAV VNAV arrivals and departures, RNAV RNP approaches. There is no room for any lateral or vertical slop.

I’d say that I hand fly 90% of my approaches and I have done a total of one autoland in the last year, which was due to an autoland expiration legality.

Now if you want to talk about autopilot cripples look to Asian carriers and some of the accidents they’ve had recently. Some recent automation accidents and incidents are not limited to Asia however.

I think I’ll start another thread on that subject. Look for it soon.

Concur 100%.

+1 on the above.....high density terminal area is no place for heroics.
- Mike

A-7D @ Myrtle Beach and later with NMANG

quote:

Originally posted by stubbleduck47:
Sure Strike...
Just out of curiosity..in your 777 at FL400 and more or less max gross what is the mach limit to stall spread?

Well that’s kind of catch 22 question. You can’t get FL 400 at max gross weight. You’ve got to burn off quite a bit of weight before you can get into the 40’s. It also depends on what model you are flying. The 300ER gets into the low 30’s as a max at high gross weight. The 200’s go into the mid 30’s initially.

Without having a flight manual and a performance chart in front of me I can’t tell you the exact weight/max altitude for each airplane because it’s predicated on Mach speed and ISA temp. You are looking for 1.5 G protection to be able to climb to a new max altitude.

With 1.5 G you are looking at about a 25 KIAS spread between VMO and aerodynamic stall buffet. It seems to me that you’ll be down around 600,000lbs ish on an ISA day before you are getting into the 40,s on a 300ER. Max taxi weight on that airplane is 777,000lbs. No joke 777,000 lbs on the big 777, even I can remember that one.

Wow!