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It turns out that the Northwest Airlines pilots who overshot their destination by 150 miles were using laptops.

The incident involving a Northwest Airlines Airbus A320, raised fears of a possible hijacking and there were 2 fighters ready to take off as all ATC (Air Traffic Control) attempts failed.

The 2 pilots, both of which have now been suspended, whose Northwest Airlines plane went 150 miles further than it should have on Wednesday, said they were using their laptop computers. The federal agency (FAA) investigating the incident quoted the pilots as saying they had “accessed their personal computers during the flight” and “had lost track of time” as they discussed staff rostering. The was no ATC contact with the Northwest Airlines for more than an hour before it landed in Minneapolis.

The initial speculation was that they had fallen asleep, but the initial rumour was that they got into a heated discussion and lost track of where they were.

They admitted that during their discussion, they did not monitor or respond to calls from air traffic control via voice and to messages relayed to the in-flight systems via text.

My Thoughts…
What I can’t understand is how 2 trained pilots could disregard ATC. If you start ignoring this, then you might ignore or be slow to respond to onboard alerts from other systems such as TCAS (Traffic Collision Avoidance System).

Could they have been asleep but covered it up with this – a less alarming story?

By now the black boxes of Flight AF447 pinging divices have certainly stopped sending out locator information. The investigators know the general location of the crash, but due to the vast size of the search area and the fact that the ocean is miles deep in those locaions, the black box, if found would be of little use. It could be corroded and the combination of the salt water and pressure would probably destroy the box before it could be found.

Investigators into the AF447 crash have made primary results known, blaming the pitot tubes, saying that they probably froze over and gave incorrect data to the auto-pilot.

Either way, the issues will need to be looked into.

I’m flying on Air France soon, I’m not overly worried as the Airbus is a superb machine, however, if the blog is not updated in the next 3 weeks, It could be, because I can”t get decent internet connection from beyond the grave

The findings of the official Air France Investigation report that Air France Flight AF 447 did not break up in mid air, instead, hit the water intact. The French Air Accident Investigation bureau (BEA) said that the aircraft appears to have hit the water in flying position with strong vertical acceleration.

The airbus hit the water belly first but with an almost vertical descent. Hitting the water very very fast, items at the front of the aircraft were pushed to the back. It is unknown if the pilots were in control of the aircraft before it crashed. At that speed, the G-Forces would have the pilots pushed back in their seats and would possibly be unable to move their arms etc.

The black box and flight data recorders still have not been found and it is now over 30 days since flight AF447 crashed – they will continue searching for 10 more days. Honeywell, who make the black boxes, say that they have a 100% recovery record for FDRs. I think it is highly unlikely that these will now be found, unless they are entangled in a large piece of fuselage. What wasn’t addressed in the press release was (a) the multiple error messages and (b) how much of the fuselage of the airbus has been recovered.

Until they are found we will not know for definite what caused the crash.