jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Because no one was killed or injured in these events, neither the FAA nor NTSC investigated. The planes recorded all the data, but it took a while for those in authority to become aware. In other words, hundreds of people were almost killed, but it was kept secret.

On December 18, a United 777 took off from Hawaii. After reaching 2,200 feet, it took a rapid plunge toward the sea, at about 250 MPH. When it got to 740 feet - traveling at 250 - the pilots were able to pull up steeply. This generated about 2.5 Gs, which is above the design limit of the 777, so it should have been inspected immediately. There is no investigation, so we'll never know the whole story.

In a similar incident in Qatar, after a plane took off and got to 1,800 feet, it dove to around 800 feet before recovering. In that case, the previous aircrew had set the autopilot to zero because they were landing, and it was not reset before take-off. At 1,800 feet, the pilot flying turned on the autopilot, and the plane did what it was told - headed for ground "zero."

There is at least one more similar incident, but without an investigation, we'll never know what happened. One strange incident is an anomaly; several are a trend.

This guy is very good. He's a commercial airline pilot, so he knows what he's talking about. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1B9mQQnZg_8

fredfinke Loc: Denver

Was this item on major news networks? Doesn’t seem appropriate on this site.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

It's in the "General Chit-Chat (non-photography talk)" section, perfectly fine......

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

It wasn't on the news because it was more or less kept secret. And that's a problem. When a plane flies to 750 feet of the ocean at 250 MPH, I'd like to find and correct whatever caused it.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Shellback Loc: North of Cheyenne Bottoms Wetlands - Kansas

And yes, it's on the major news --- United flight from Hawaii plunged to within 800ft of Pacific Ocean

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Thanks.

"resulted in the pilots receiving additional training.” I should hope so. So, it was pilot error and not a problem with plane (mechanics error).

rdemarco52 Loc: Wantagh, NY

I saw a report on the Hawaii incident on Fox, along with a report on lowering of standards for flight crews due to diversity. Very scary stuff.

cbabcock

It may be that the incident had nothing to do with "lowering of standards for flight crews due to diversity" and this report was tacked on because of some agenda. I did a brief search, found only an opinion piece from the Heritage Foundation that said many years ago the Air Force dropped GPA and previous flight experience from its selection criteria in order to encourage diversity.
The flight crew on this United flight was reported to have 25,000 huurs of flight experience.

maxlieberman Loc: 19027

Failure to use checklists.

LDB415 Loc: Houston south suburb

Watch the program "Mayday" on KTBU. You'll see many such stories you never heard of. Part of the problem is automation. Pilots don't fly the planes anymore. They supervise the automation. Remove the autopilot and you solve the one issue mentioned. If the pilot was flying it's likely they wouldn't have dived for the deck.

fourlocks Loc: Londonderry, NH

This was on the news the other day. Sounds like an autopilot issue as others here described. Naturally, the "news" gave the only the briefest sensational snippet of a story rather than bothering with a little investigating to try to find out what happened.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

And yet...

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Turning on the autopilot with the wrong setting would result in almost identical situation to that flight in Qatar. Since there was no investigation, we'll never know.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

What I find scary is a crash investigation that finds major problems with the pilots going back to their training days. They passed, but just barely. I wouldn't want a brain surgeon operating on me if he had graduated with a C average.

Not long ago, a pilot's problematic history was not available to prospective employers, so an airline could hire a pilot who was fired because of incompetence. Now there is a database that employers are supposed to check.