Polish President and wife killed in Tu-154 crash

[Geebee]

Some more info:

Sergei Ivanov, Russia's first deputy prime minister, said the black boxes were "absolutely functional and recorded absolutely all the information, sound as well as parametric [information], till the moment of crash".
"It is reliably confirmed that warning of the unfavourable weather conditions at the North airport and recommendations to go to a reserve airport were not only transmitted but received by the crew of the plane," he added.

Also, I confirm that - in contrast to statements of what had been communicated by Russian ATC representative - the PIC was fluent in Russian.
Below the translation of the gazeta.pl transcript:

The pilot of the Tu-154M governmental plan, which crashed near Smolensk, well knew the Russian language. He knew also the same airport. That is what his superiors and colleagues of the 36th wing stated about the captain, Arkady Ivanovich Protasiuku. This is a response to suggestions from Smolensk flight controller, which appeared in Russian media. He said that the captain Protasiuk did not deal with the Russian language.

One question. It seems to me that when they hit the 20 m high antenna 1km prior to the runway a 'controlled' crash might no longer have been possible. Witnesses stated that the left wing was hanging lower and hit the trees first. Is it fair to speculate that the left wing might have hit the antenna first, hereby totally destabilizing the plane and making any attempt to abort or opt for a controlled crash impossible. This said, with the antenna 20 meters (66 ft) of height and the trees 10 meters (33ft) and 1km from the landing strip it is all a matter of seconds before the events evolve. In an aborted landing, while so low, it probably takes more time/energy to gain momentum and lift the plane, correct? (just trying to understand like many of the non-pilots on this forum).

Added comment: the antenna appears to be the NDB in fact.

[justLOT787]

Language was not a problem and like it said they landed at that airport 3 days earlier and they have been there plenty of times before. Last evening I was watching cbs or nbc in Chicago where I’m from and they had a computer made the last seconds of the flight and how it was coming in for a landing and it clipped a very tall radio tower with its left wing and that was the cause of that crash in theory. There are like 20 different stories out there of this crash but one of them will be true.

[EconomyClass]

Today's story says the airport had no regular ATC crew since it was irregularly used.

[zathras]

Today's story says the airport had no regular ATC crew since it was irregularly used.

I don't think so. It's controlled by the military and afaik it's not available for all civilian traffic, that could cause the mix up. On sat photos it looks like some kind of transport squadron is stationed there.
And about this version with the DME tower, I heard on the telly the other day that some soldiers serving there saw the plane actually hitting it and smashing it pretty bad. On the other hand the earlier reports told about plane destroying lighting mast. I guess we'll have to wait for the final report... Let's hope it won't be classified like the Su27 accident during the airshow last year.

--
Greetz.
Zathras

[justLOT787]

One thing is that this is a notional tragedy and people would like to know what really happened on April 10, 2010 so they will demand an answer to this accident. But on the second hand its government and they don’t need to tell people any thing. I think if this accident was caused by the Russian side then we probably wont find out much about that and I thin if it’s the crew mistake then we will know. I hope that Russians and Poles wont cover this one up and make excuses like the black boxes didn’t work or got lost! I’m really curries as what the heck happened it these final minutes.

[Alessandro]

I wonder why the aircrafts weren´t fitted with winglets?
Anyway the engines seemed to be in working properly according to the crash investigator

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2010/04/13/340573/crashed-tu-154s-engines-were-operational-before-impact.html

Also from Flightglobal, the three different airports where offered to the pilots, two in Belarus and one in Russia.

[Gabriel]

I mentioned the QNH and RadAlt thing because this accident has a very strong smell of intentionally busting the minimums.

It was a non-precision approach, so the minimms can't be very low (likely in the order of 400ft above the ground).

If a mistake is done while setting the local pressure at sea level (QNH) on both sides of the panel, then the normal altimeters will display a wrong altitude. A wrong pressure setting can have a huge effect in the indicated altitude (for example 29.92 vs 29.29 mm of Hg makes for about 600 ft of error).

However, a Radio Altimeter should detect that error. Even if there were trees, the RadAlt would not be erratical beyond the altitude of the trees.

And the altitude of both the antena and the trees must have a good margin so even if you descend to the MDA (minimum descent altitude) you have a good safety margin over the obstacles.

So a somehow erratical RadAlt reading (due to the trees) can in no way explain why they descended so low.

If this airplane had a GPWS (ground proximity warning system), then it had a RadAlt (it's a required part of the GPWS).

Yes, the GPWS would not have issued a warning, since the airplane did not deviate from the glide slope (because there was no glide slope) and the plane was slowly and controllably descending in landing config (the GPWS can't know if you are landing on a runway or on a forest).

There are countless of possibilities (for example the pilots loosing control for something else and crashing against the antena just by chance), but for me the smell of intentionally busting the minimums is strong.

IF that's the case, then we have the question already posted by someone:

How does a very experienced pilot taking the top of the government and military on his plane, and after receiving repeated advises from the ATC to divert because the weather was below minimums, still attempts the non-precision approach, and even further decides to go on after busting the minimums?

There is only one answer for me to that: more pressure than he could handle (or a murder/suicide)

[Highkeas]

Pilot Pressure to Land

Here is a sanip from the Washington Post:

Even up against tough weather and tight schedules, pilots are supposed to have the last word on when, where and how to land their aircraft. But aviation veterans, trying to make sense of the fog-shrouded crash that killed Poland's president, say pressures on pilots to keep VIP passengers on schedule can sometimes override safety considerations.
"There are certain CEOs and bosses - you are going to get them to where they want to go, and there aren't any ifs, ands or buts," said David Weitz, a pilot who has flown many corporate and union leaders.
"It plays on the pilot's mind," said Weitz, of Leesburg, Va. "He may go to some heroics that maybe he wouldn't normally do, if there's some pressure from the back of the plane."
Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...041203467.html

[ArmchairPilot]

Could have been plain bad luck

If we accept that the pilot was going to land regardless of weather, internal or external pressure etc, perhaps making four circuits of the airfield indicates that he went about in a cautious and systematic manner: gradually circling downwards in a shallow glide slope until visual contact was made (and maintained) with the ground – certainly not something you'd want to tell the ATC, hence the report of radio silence in the last few minutes.
fficeffice" />> >
He might just have succeeded if weren't for that 66ft antenna which the plane hit with the left wing, slewing to the left. With no margin of height or speed to regain speed and control they flew into the ground. One could almost say, bad luck.
> >
Just a thought.

[guamainiac]

With that approach that Armchair is suggesting, I am indeed a lightweight by any and all definitions but flying around in cloud/fog or whatever in a "systematic approach" sounds not only willy-nilly but insane in any airport environment. Perhaps the pilot had the same syndrome that affected that poor fellow in the movie "Beautiful Mind".

What Armchair is describing is just one cut short of the old and early US Air Mail Service whey they were flying Jennies (JN-4's and a great story a girl getting named Jenny ... "Is it short for Jennifer? ... No, it's long for JN-4) ... but the legend and lore have the old air pilots, if they had cloud at the destination ... enter an intentional spin and then they hoped and prayed that they had time to arrest it when and if they broke out of cloud.

Fuel status? Had to wonder is there any information or guess on this. I remember an aircraft, (Avianca), from some South American country that crashed on Long Island while attempting to make it into JFK about fifteen years ago. They did a few (3?) missed approaches and never once squawked that they had a fuel emergency. The last approach found Avianca 15 miles short the runway and out of fuel. Did this flight, like the flight to JFK, encounter and wind or other conditions that would have burned up the reserve?

[Evan]

There is only one answer for me to that: more pressure than he could handle...

I'm leaning to that conclusion. But pressure built up over time, conditioning due to demanding VIP's. Kaczynski had already basically called him a coward, and he is said to have have suffered psychologically from that experience. Maybe he just wasn't willing to suffer another insult.

I'm pretty certain that this a/c had GWPS and therefore radalts, so, unless they were acting up, the crew were deliberately busting minimums. Perhaps they wanted to maintain visual contact with the ground on final. One question in my mind is: did they have accurate approach plates for this airstrip? The antenna should have been clearly demarcated. Or maybe it isn't.

[Gabriel]

I'm not sure if a 60ft antena has to be charted. You can very well have trees that tall, and trees are not charted (not typically at least).

One thing to remind. The PIC (pilot in command) is the king on the plane, and noone has authority over him. A PIC is legally allowed to take any measure that he judges necessary for the safety of the flight, and that includes braking rules, not following ATC instruction, or disobeying his boss (including the President and the Air Force Commander).

The pressure might have come from others. The decision was his.

[Victor M]

non-seen befor shooting

http://z25t.ru/news/20-pervye-minuty-posle-padeniya-ne-bylo-po-tv.html

[SYDCBRWOD]

One thing to remind. The PIC (pilot in command) is the king on the plane, and noone has authority over him. A PIC is legally allowed to take any measure that he judges necessary for the safety of the flight, and that includes braking rules, not following ATC instruction, or disobeying his boss (including the President and the Air Force Commander).

The pressure might have come from others. The decision was his.

All very well to take the textbook approach Gabriel, but in the real world life does not work like that. People in power generally get there by steamrolling bulldozing or cajoaling out of the way all obstacles in their path. On that plane there were any number of people very used to getting their own way - it doesn't take much of a search to find many of societies 'high flyers' who seem to think the rules are just for the 'little people' and don't apply to them. Maybe the president was thinking about the media coverage and how well the event would play for his up coming elections? Maybe the head of the airforce sent a message to the cockpit stating that he, the president a poland would have looked very bad had the aircraft had to divert because they would then be late... Even if there was no direct order to the pilot to land the plane, there would perhaps have been more subtle inferences made about competence etc that may have ended a pilots career.

So yes, you are totally correct at the end of the day it is the Captain's decision, but to ignore or dismiss the other factors is wrong. A woman recently killed her husband - she did not go to prison, but was released. The reason was that whilst she did sink the knife into him several times (yes, she murdered him), she was subjected to all kinds of abuse from her husband and the courts basically excused her act as a form of justifiable homicide. I see parrallels here - yes as the pilot he is ultimately responsible, but if he was under undue coercion then that needs to be examined before blame is apportioned.

[EconomyClass]

I dunno what we are talking about, but the news has revealed all sorts of pressure and places where it is practiced. In America, we even have government leaders bold enough to commit treason just to punish anyone who crosses them. So, it is well to remember even kings sometimes find their hands forced.