Alaska Airlines goes green with iPad

As part of an ongoing effort to use technology to enhance flight safety, improve efficiency and protect the environment, Alaska Airlines is issuing iPad tablet computers to its pilots. The 1 1/2-pound iPads replace up to 25 pounds of paper flight manuals that pilots are required to carry when they fly. The iPads are being distributed to all Alaska Airlines pilots, a process that will be complete by mid-June. This follows a successful trial by 100 line and instructor pilots and Air Line Pilots Association representatives, who evaluated the feasibility of using iPads as electronic flight bags this past winter and spring.

Alaska Airlines is the first major domestic airline to use the iPad to replace paper manuals. "We've been exploring the idea of an electronic flight bag for several years, but never found a device we really liked," said Gary Beck, Alaska Airlines' vice president of flight operations. "When the iPad hit the market, we took one look at it and said this is the perfect fit." The iPads contain an app called GoodReader that is loaded with PDF versions of 41 flight, systems and performance manuals, reference cards, and other materials. The electronic manuals include hyperlinks and color graphics, enabling pilots to find information faster and easier. Updating these reference materials can now be accomplished with one tap on the iPad screen instead of the former, labor-intensive process of replacing individual pages with new ones. The iPad is considered a Class 1 electronic device, meaning it is stowed during takeoff and landing under Federal Aviation Administration regulations.

In conjunction with replacing paper manuals, Alaska Airlines is exploring the replacement of paper aeronautical navigation charts with electronic versions on the iPad, eliminating the need for every pilot to carry their own copy. The two initiatives, dubbed "Bye, Bye, Flight Bag," will save about 2.4 million pieces of paper. The cost of the project is expected to be offset by lower paper, printing and distribution expenses and reduced fuel consumption as some weight is removed from the aircraft. Further savings are expected from fewer back and muscle injuries caused by pilots carrying flight bags that can tip the scales at 50 pounds or more fully loaded.

Etihad road show in South East Asia

Etihad Airways Pilot recruitment team will be touring South East Asia throughout June 2011 in search of new First Officers. Etihad is looking for qualified first officers for its fleet of A320, A330,A340 and B777, all based in the Capital of the UAE, Abu Dhabi.







The schedule of the road show is as follows.

City	Date	Time	Location
Jakarta	07.06.2011	09:00 - 15:00	City DateTimeLocationJakarta07.06.201109:00 - 15:00
Singapore	09.06.2011 10.06.2011	09:00 - 15:00	Swissôtel The Stamford, 2 Stamford Road
Kuala Lumpur	13.06.2011 14.06.2011	09:00 - 15:00	Doubletree by Hilton, Kuala Lumpur, The Intermark, 182 Jalan Tun Razak
Manila	16.06.2011	09:00 - 15:00	Mandarin Oriental Makati Hotel, Makati Avenue, Makati City 1226
Hong Kong	19.06.2011	09:00 - 15:00	Novotel Citygate Hong Kong, 51 Man Tung Road
Ho Chi Min	21.06.2011	09:00 - 15:00	Sheraton Saigon Hotel & Towers, 88 Dong Khoi Street, District 1
Bangkok	24.06.2011 25.06.2011	09:00 - 15:00	Golden Tulip Hotel, 92 Soi Saengcham. Rama 9 Road

Data recovered from the Air France A330 FDR

Investigators trying to determine why an Air France plane crashed mysteriously two years ago have recovered the complete contents of the flight data recorder and the last two hours of cockpit conversation, they announced Monday.It will take several weeks to analyze the data, French air accident experts said.All 228 people aboard Air France 447 were killed when the Airbus A330 belly-flopped into the ocean June 1, 2009, in stormy weather. The cause of the crash is still not known.

Discovering that there was data on the recorders "is excellent news. It is really going to help us work out what happened on that plane," said Martine Del Bono, spokeswoman for France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA). The cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder were found at the beginning of May after an unprecedented series of submarine searches of a mountain range 3,900 meters (12,700 feet) under the ocean. They were brought to the surface and taken to Paris by ship and plane.

The investigators also recovered two bodies from the fuselage -- after finding only about 50 bodies in the days immediately after the crash.

They will not bring more bodies up from the ocean if they cannot identify the two they already have, they said Thursday. Those two bodies are being examined to see if there is enough DNA to identify them, investigators said, adding that they hope to have results by Wednesday. If they can identify the remains, they will consider bringing up other bodies from the wreckage. The bulk of the plane was located earlier this year and contains many more human remains, according to investigators.

Recovering more bodies will be a difficult task, with miles of cable required to bring each one up over a period of three hours, they said. Investigators also brought an engine and an avionics bay containing computers to the surface, they said. The pilots of Air France 447 lost contact with air traffic controllers on June 1, 2009, while flying across an area of the Atlantic known for severe turbulence, officials said. But exactly what caused the plane to plunge into the ocean remains a mystery.

The plane slammed into the water while en route from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to Paris, falling so fast that air masks did not have time to deploy. The fuselage was discovered in April with bodies still inside, investigators said.Some relatives of those who died have expressed reservations about remains being brought to the surface.

Last month Robert Soulas, head of a support group for families of flight victims, said: "For me, personally I would like to leave the bodies of my children, my two children, on the seabed." Other relatives have called for the bodies to be recovered.

Solar Plane makes its first International flight

A solar energy plane began the world's first international flight powered by the sun on Friday to show the potential for pollution-free air travel.The Solar Impulse took off from an airfield at Payerne in western Switzerland on Friday morning and was due to land at Brussels airport 12 hours later."The objective is to demonstrate what we can do with existing technology in terms of renewable energy and energy savings," project co-founder and pilot Andre Borschberg said by phone midway through his flight.

Borschberg believes such solar-harnessing technology can be replicated to power cars and homes."It is symbolic to be able to go from one place to another using solar energy," he said.The Solar Impulse project began in 2003 with a 10-year budget of EUR€90 million (USD$128.6 million) and has involved engineers from Swiss elevator maker Schindler and research aid from Belgian chemicals group Solvay.

The plane, which requires 12,000 solar cells, embarked on its first flight in April 2010 and completed a 26-hour flight, a record flying time for a solar powered aircraft, three months later.With an average flying speed of 70 km per hour (44 miles per hour), Solar Impulse is not an immediate threat to commercial jets, which can easily cruise at more than 10 times the speed. A flight from Geneva from Brussels can take little more than an hour.

Project leaders acknowledged it had been a major challenge to fit a slow-flying plane into the commercial air traffic system.Friday's flight, which took off at 0640 GMT, is Solar Impulse's fifth. Previous flights did not leave Switzerland.A larger prototype is scheduled to fly around the world in 2013.

Air France crash - black box located.

Investigators have located and recovered the memory unit of the flight data recorder of a 2009 Air France flight - a remarkable deep-sea discovery they hope will explain why the aircraft went down in a remote area of the mid-Atlantic, killing all 228 people on board. France's air accident investigation agency BEA said a search by a submarine probing some 3,900 meters (12,800 feet) below the ocean's surface located and recovered the unit Sunday morning. The unit is now aboard the ship Ile de Sein, the statement said.

The statement also included photos of the recorder - a red cylinder partially buried in sand on the sea floor. Judging from the photos, the unit appeared to be in good condition. Last month, the agency said the undersea search had identified the "chassis" that had held the recorder, but said the memory unit was still missing. The flight data recorder stores data from the flight. Another so-called "black box" records cockpit conversations.

Investigators hope Sunday's remarkable discovery will allow them to determine what caused the June 1, 2009 crash of Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to the French capital, Paris. The aircraft slammed into the Atlantic northeast of Brazil after running into an intense high-altitude thunderstorm. Automatic messages sent by the Airbus 330's computers showed it was receiving false air speed readings from sensors known as pitot tubes. Investigators have said the crash was likely caused by a series of problems, and not just sensor error.

The crash site was so remote and in such a deep area of the Atlantic that the bulk of the wreckage was only recently discovered, thanks to a deep-sea search. Experts have said that without retrieving the voice and data recorders there would be almost no chance of determining what caused the crash - the worst disaster in Air France's history.

FAA approves IPAD's in cockpit

Apple's iPad has won approval from US regulators to display navigational charts for some charter pilots, a step that may see the end of paper maps in the cockpit. With the Federal Aviation Administration endorsing iPads in a test project at Executive Jet Management, a unit of Warren Buffett's NetJets, the way is open for others to seek authorisation for, said Les Dorr, an agency spokesman.

IPad use by professional pilots would support Apple's goal of winning more business buyers. The company's total corporate sales may rise 51 per cent to $11.3 billion (Dh41.50b) in 2011, said Brian Marshall, a Gleacher and Co analyst in San Francisco. Revenue was $76.3 billion last year. "This is mission-critical computing," said Marshall, who has a "buy" rating on Apple. "For them to win this type of approval speaks volumes about the level of sophistication of what can be accomplished with the iPad."

Charts showing data such as airports and radio frequencies for a state or region have been staples of US flying since the 1930s. But so-called electronic flight bags, computers configured for aviation use, began winning FAA approval for use at airlines in the last decade, superseding paper charts. A unit from Milwaukee-based Astronautics Corporation of America weighs 8.2 kilograms, 12 times as much as the iPad.

Apple's tablet wasn't cleared as a navigation device in a professional cockpit until FAA's February 1 approval to Executive Jet. While the decision only covers Executive Jet, commercial carriers now have a citable case for iPad use, according to Jeppesen, the Boeing map and accessory business that designed the application used.

Pilots at Alaska Air Group's Alaska Airlines, which uses only paper charts in its 116 aircraft, are testing iPads for some functions, said Marianne Lindsey, a spokeswoman. AMR's American Airlines and American Eagle rely on paper charts in its 900-plane fleet, said Ed Martelle, a spokesman. Delta Air Lines, the world's second-largest carrier, is still paper driven, according to Gina Laughlin, a spokeswoman. Delta is pursuing approval to test iPads and other tablet devices next quarter, Laughlin added.

"Many air carriers have been using electronic flight bags for years, but they've been carrying the paper with them as well," said Alison Duquette, an FAA spokeswoman. The iPad's touch-screen and illumination display could be an advantage over folded paper in finding information such as an emergency-landing site, said John Cox, a former US Airways pilot who is now chief executive officer of consultant Safety Operating Systems LLC in Washington. "It's easier to sort through the charts that you need."

Indigo's troubled lady pilot arrested for forging her Licence

A woman pilot has been arrested in the capital for allegedly using a forged marksheet of the DGCA test to procure a commercial pilot licence. Parminder Kaur Gulati, a suspended pilot of Indigo, was apprehended by a team of Delhi Police's crime branch yesterday following investigations into a complaint filed by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). Gulati allegedly produced the forged marksheets of DGCA Airline Transport Pilot Licence (ATPL) test to get the commercial pilot licence. With ATPL, one can become a co-pilot; and to get a full-fledged commercial pilot licence one should have ATPL with adequate flying hours.

Sources said Gulati had allegedly produced forged marksheets of the ATPL examination conducted by the DGCA. She holds a valid commercial pilot licence. Last year, during a flight landing in Goa by Gulati, technical errors were noticed and DGCA had constituted an enquiry to look into it. Sources said, during investigations it came to light that Gulati had allegedly forged marksheets of the ATPL examination, following which she was suspended by the airlines.

Russian air traffic controller talks to an UFO

Air traffic controllers in Siberia claim to have been buzzed by a high-speed UFO with a female sounding alien speaking to them in an unintelligible cat-like language.The object had suddenly burst onto flight monitors over the remote Russian diamond capital of Yakutsk, and it was shown flying at a speed of slightly over 6000 mph, and rapidly changing direction.The UFO was logged at a height of 64, 895 feet above sea level and appeared to interfere with aviation frequencies.

A YouTube footage showed an air traffic controller trying to make contact with the UFO, while a radar showed the UFO moving rapidly through the skies surrounded by planes that were travelling at a much slower pace."I kept hearing some female voice, as if a woman was saying mioaw-mioaw all the time," the Daily Mail quoted the air traffic controller as telling the pilot of a passing Aeroflot flight. The air traffic control monitor automatically designated the UFO as "00000" because it did not have a flight number. At one point the UFO is shown moving away from Yakutsk at great speed before turning and heading back towards the city. 

Lady Pilot??! - Passenger denies to take the flight

After the chilling incident last month were a Indigo A320 almost crashed in Goa International airport by its lady Captain, a passenger of the same airliner refuses to take the flight just because his Captain was another lady pilot.

A Mumbai-bound flight was delayed by one-and-a-half hours at the Delhi airport yesterday morning -- first by fog and then by a passenger who did not want to travel on a plane piloted by a woman. Passengers on board had a curious story to tell as to why Indigo flight 6E 179, supposed to depart at 8.10 a.m., could not take off before 9.40 a.m.  "First the flight was held up by a slight fog. Then, just when we were about to fly, the doors were opened again at around 9 as a middle-aged man seated a couple of seats away from me objected to a woman piloting the plane", one of the passenger on board flight 6E 179.

The man apparently turned jittery after the customary flight announcement was made, giving the pilot's name - it was a woman."The man first started grumbling to co-passengers, 'I don't want to die! She can't take care of the house, how will she take care of a plane?' . "He called the airhostesses and objected to the woman pilot. Ground staff were called and they took him out of the plane. This situation did not change for nearly 40 minutes even as other passengers became restless and upset." The man relented only after he was told he would be taken off the plane -- with his check in baggage.

Indigo's lady Captian who can't land the plane

On January 11, when IndiGo Airlines’ flight 6E 333 had a bumpy touchdown at Goa International Airport, it was a close brush with disaster for over 100 passengers aboard the A 320. The woman pilot in command landed the plane on its fragile nose wheel — an erroneous manoeuvre that could have even led to the flying machine disintegrating and catching fire.

Alarmingly, an inquiry conducted later by the Director General of Civil Aviation ( DGCA) revealed that on 15 to 20 earlier occasions, Captain Parminder Kaur Gulati landed the aircraft at an angle indicating that the nose wheel may have touched the tarmac first. This is unheard of in aviation circles. Aircraft normally land on the main landing gear ( MLG), comprising the two sets of rear wheels. After these bigger — and sturdier — wheels touch the runway, the speed of the plane is reduced. This is followed by the already opened nose landing gear ( NLG) — the smaller front wheel just below the cockpit of the aircraft — coming in contact with the surface.

Flight 6E 333 took off from Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi and was bound for Goa. Abhas Gupta was Gulati’s copilot aboard the aircraft. Captain Gulati appeared to have been so oblivious to the abnormal and highly risky touchdown at the Goa International Airport that she just reported the incident as a “rough landing”. Not only did the steep descent leave the passengers’ hearts in their mouths, it went against the recommendations of aircraft manufacturer Airbus, too. This was not the end of the matter.

After the rough landing in Goa, Gulati and the engineer concerned merely carried out an inspection of the aircraft and reported that everything was normal. The airbus was, therefore, cleared to fly back to Delhi. The Indigo flight 6E 332 — with passengers on board — started its return journey to Delhi. But midway through, the plane’s electronic systems signalled a problem in the landing gear. The warning related to the nose undercarriage being internally damaged.

The electronic signal that flashed in the cockpit showed that the landing gear didn’t retract because it was stuck in the “ down position”. The Indigo aircraft had to then return to Goa to offload the passengers. Later, it took off from Goa without the passengers and landed at IGI Airport. The combined probe carried out by the DGCA, Airbus and IndiGo confirmed that the aircraft had landed on the NLG first, followed by the MLG. “This is a non- conventional landing,” the report accessed by MAIL TODAY said.

Gulati’s flying history came under the scanner of the investigators. An analysis of the digital flight data recorder ( DFDR) of the aircraft she previously flew pointed out that in her 15- 20 earlier landings the ‘ touchdown attitude’ was 3.8 degrees, which went against the recommended attitude of 5.8 degrees. Though within the safety zone, this increased the chances of the nose wheel touching first, the report stated.

The standard glide angle followed by an aircraft during descent is 3 degrees and the nose of the aircraft should be at 2.5 degrees at the horizon level. Just before touchdown, the latter is increased to 5 degrees. However, in the IndiGo flight’s case, the pilot gave a negative pitch attitude and reduced the angle to 3.8 degrees resulting in the aircraft landing on the NLG. The report disclosed that the auto pilot was disconnected at 311 feet above ground level. At 100 feet, the captain gave a pitch- up command to ensure that the MLG touched the runway first.

“At the last moment (around 10- 20 feet), the captain gave a nose- down input. This resulted in a negative pitch attitude during touchdown,” the document revealed. The regulator (DGCA) and the investigation board recommended that the pilot should be sent on correctional training. IndiGo CEO Aditya Ghosh admitted that the pilot had landed the aircraft on its nose wheel. He further claimed that all the recommendations made by IndiGo pertaining to the incident had been accepted by the DGCA.

“Indigo conducted an investigation and the inquiry board recommended that the captain should be sent on training to correct her landing technique. She was also advised to undertake a cockpit resource management refresher course as well as a route check. She has already undergone these procedures,” Ghosh said.

Significantly, the lady captain has earlier been counselled for a serious error in the go- around approach during a landing at the IGI Airport. Commenting on the incident, aviation expert Captain A. Ranganathan said: “The nose wheel can’t take the impact of landing. The pilot’s landing on the plane’s nose could have led to serious consequences. The episode shows there was a deficiency in training.” Former DGCA Kanu Gohain also felt that it was a very serious incident since the NLG is the weakest part of the aircraft and not designed to handle its landing weight. For the passengers, it was nothing less than a miraculous escape.