China Airliner crashes

[Homerboy]

Boeing 737s just don't seem all that reliable.
Granted, maybe this is just a numbers thing? Not sure about the percentages of 737s vs other aircraft?

Chinese airliner carrying 132 people crashes in southern Guangxi region | CNN

A China Eastern Airlines jetliner carrying 132 people crashed in the mountains in southern China's Guangxi region on Monday afternoon, according to the country's Civil Aviation Administration (CAAC).

www.cnn.com

 

[sdifox]

400M air passengers in China in 2020 so it is bound to happen.

 

[brycejones]

Boeing 737s just don't seem all that reliable.
Granted, maybe this is just a numbers thing? Not sure about the percentages of 737s vs other aircraft?

Chinese airliner carrying 132 people crashes in southern Guangxi region | CNN

A China Eastern Airlines jetliner carrying 132 people crashed in the mountains in southern China's Guangxi region on Monday afternoon, according to the country's Civil Aviation Administration (CAAC).

www.cnn.com

The 737 is considered a very reliable plane. Also don't draw conclusions without knowing the cause of the crash.

 

[Dulanic]

Planes are still safest method to travel. With that said, it is also the most terrifying if something was to go wrong....

 

[HomerJS]

Was it a 737 Max?

 

[brycejones]

Was it a 737 Max?

No, it was a 737-800.

 

[Dulanic]

Was it a 737 Max?

No 737-89P.

ASN Aircraft accident Boeing 737-89P (WL) B-1791 Tengxian, Guangxi (aviation-safety.net)

 

[Fenixgoon]

I hope China's FAA-equivalent will do a thorough investigation. Airline travel is incredibly safe, so any error, let alone one that results in loss of craft/life, is a huge deal.

Terrible loss for the affected persons and families 😥

 

[Captante]

"The 6-year-old single-aisle jet is part of the NG, or Next Generation, era that preceded the 737 Max, which was subjected to a global grounding after two deadly crashes. The NG has one of the best safety records among all aircraft, with just 11 fatal accidents out of more than 7,000 planes delivered since 1997, according to aviation consultancy Cirium."

"NG models had just 0.07 fatal crashes per million flights as of 2019."

~ ripped from Bloomberg.com

 

[hal2kilo]

Was it a 737 Max?

I heard, no link, it was an 800.
I should have looked ^^^^

 

[manly]

I hope China's FAA-equivalent will do a thorough investigation. Airline travel is incredibly safe, so any error, let alone one that results in loss of craft/life, is a huge deal.

Terrible loss for the affected persons and families 😥

I think the NTSB is in charge of accident investigations.

Considering how the FAA became a subsidiary of Boeing in rubber-stamping the 737 Max regulatory review, we do not want an FAA-equivalent evaluation anyway.

 

[Fenixgoon]

I think the NTSB is in charge of accident investigations.

Considering how the FAA became a subsidiary of Boeing in rubber-stamping the 737 Max regulatory review, we do not want an FAA-equivalent evaluation anyway.

You are technically correct. The best kind of correct!

 

[eelw]

The way the plane was almost vertical, looks less likely to be equipment failure and sadly more on purpose human action.

 

[purbeast0]

The way the plane was almost vertical, looks less likely to be equipment failure and sadly more on purpose human action.

I don't really know anything about airplanes, but I always thought that a plane couldn't really get into that position unintentionally.

My definition of "nose dive" and what that video shows are a lot different. Mine was more at like a 45 degree angle to the ground, not pointed directly at the ground.

 

[Zorba]

The way the plane was almost vertical, looks less likely to be equipment failure and sadly more on purpose human action.

My first thought too. Outside of the Max, all the vertical entry accidents I can think of have been pilot suicide. If there was a runaway stab problem on the NG it most likely would've been discovered by now.

 

[Dave_5k]

The way the plane was almost vertical, looks less likely to be equipment failure and sadly more on purpose human action.

Yep. Even in China, there is a stunning amount of public information now available for amateur investigators or just the morbidly curious.

Both reported CCTV footage and raw FlightRadar24 data show this being basically a near-vertical dive - and the FlightRadar data implies it was diving at full throttle, albeit with a brief pull-up, before resuming hard vertical dive. Engine failure would not lead to a vertical dive, and would certainly not accelerate into that dive - plane was already flying faster than terminal velocity & accelerated into that vertical dive at several multiples of any possible natural terminal velocity.

 

[Captante]

I don't really know anything about airplanes, but I always thought that a plane couldn't really get into that position unintentionally.

My definition of "nose dive" and what that video shows are a lot different. Mine was more at like a 45 degree angle to the ground, not pointed directly at the ground.

Roll, pitch and yaw - How things fly (Smithsonian)


There have been quite a few cases of a severe mechanical problem causing the elevator to jam in essentially the same position as full stick-forward forcing the plane into a near-vertical dive.

The same kind of thing can happen as a result of severe rudder-problems although it will usually result in more of a near-vertical "spiral" dive rather then straight down.

There have also been documented cases of loss of throttle-control in airliners resulting in either sub lift-maintaining velocity so they literally drop out of the sky or the opposite, uncontrollable speed which exceeds the limits of the air-frame.

(I watch a lot of "Air Disaster" type documentaries exploring why planes crash)

 

[Exterous]

Supposed video of the crash

https://twitter.com/x/status/1505874346652405760

Insane...

 

[HomerJS]

Roll, pitch and yaw - How things fly (Smithsonian)


There have been quite a few cases of a severe mechanical problem causing the elevator to jam in essentially the same position as full stick-forward forcing the plane into a near-vertical dive.

The same kind of thing can happen as a result of severe rudder-problems although it will usually result in more of a near-vertical "spiral" dive rather then straight down.

There have also been documented cases of loss of throttle-control in airliners resulting in either sub lift-maintaining velocity so they literally drop out of the sky or the opposite, uncontrollable speed which exceeds the limits of the air-frame.

(I watch a lot of "Air Disaster" type documentaries exploring why planes crash)

I watch a lot of those too. Did you see the pilot suicide one where the pilot locked the co-pilot out and shut off the FDR? I'm sure they will check that possibility

 

[brycejones]

Supposed video of the crash

https://twitter.com/x/status/1505874346652405760

Insane...

Granted it's just a vague shape but the vertical stabilizer appears to be missing in that video. The rear part looks irregular like the tail section has already been ripped off. That could have happened during that short ascent at about 8000 ft and the forces on the airframe were too great causing the second plunge. All speculation on my part.

 

[Pohemi]

Planes are still safest method to travel. With that said, it is also the most terrifying if something was to go wrong....

For most, sure. I'd rather go out in a plane wreck than in a ship sinking in the open ocean. But that's my personal fears talking.

 

[Dulanic]

For most, sure. I'd rather go out in a plane wreck than in a ship sinking in the open ocean. But that's my personal fears talking.

Let's chalk both up to horrible ways to die lol

 

[pmv]

Planes are still safest method to travel.

Surely it depends where you are traveling to? I'm pretty sure I'm safer walking the couple of miles to my friend's place than trying to do it by plane!

I always found air travel extremely stressful - it's the extent to which the risks are all entirely out of your control that makes it so. Not just the danger of crashing or hijacking, but far more mundane fears like losing your luggage or catching some nasty disease from the recirculated air, or your flight being massively delayed or diverted.

Last flight I ever took (a very long time ago) involved aborted (half-way-through) attempts to land at three different airports (due to awful weather) before finally managing to land at the other end of the country to where I was going, just as they were running out of fuel. Since then have managed to avoid ever flying anywhere.

 

[Atari2600]

Granted it's just a vague shape but the vertical stabilizer appears to be missing in that video. The rear part looks irregular like the tail section has already been ripped off. That could have happened during that short ascent at about 8000 ft and the forces on the airframe were too great causing the second plunge. All speculation on my part.

There have been problems with Vstab/rudder failures before on both Boeing & Airbus.

If the pilot cyclically goes full yaw on the rudder, they'll rip the Vstab off.

AMR 587 was an A300 that did it.

Boeing had a string of rudder problems on the 737 in the 90s, thought they were mostly rectified though (and on the classic rather than NG).


There are also prior events of failure of rear fuselage pressurisation resulting in loss (or partial loss) of the empennage.

 

[Atari2600]

I always found air travel extremely stressful

Since then have managed to avoid ever flying anywhere.

I find aircraft fine, when on them and they are moving.

But airports are a real pain in the balls.

Hence why I hate taking a plane anywhere.

I've often thought that surely the airport experience can be improved on the absolute sh!tshow it is.


[said as a now quite experienced (aka old ) aero engineer!]