Southwest: This is funny(lost Nav LAX)
 

Whatever it takes it get in the front of the line:)
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LOS ANGELES — A Southwest Airlines jet lost its navigation system as it approached Los Angeles International Airport last week, forcing air traffic controllers to redirect several flights to clear the airspace as they guided the aircraft to a safe landing, a union representative said Tuesday.
The Federal Aviation Administration issued a statement saying only that it was investigating the flight and that controllers handled the situation professionally.
The Boeing 737 carrying 92 passengers and crew members was coming from San Jose when the navigation system failed around noon on Oct. 20, causing the jet to lose its positioning amid the clouds, said Ron Geyer, union representative for air traffic controllers at the facility that handles planes approaching and leaving Southern California airports.
"The weather was bad. The pilot had no visuals until he was below the clouds," Geyer said.
Geyer said controllers scrambled to redirect several flights so they could clear airspace for the Southwest pilot to get through the clouds until he could see the airport. He said controllers almost never encounter such a scenario.
"It was such a rare occasion, yet there was no impact to the system except we had to turn some planes around to make sure nobody was in jeopardy in case the plane got off course," Geyer said.
A Southwest spokeswoman said the captain's instruments failed but the copilot's remained intact, and emphasized that the plane landed safely and nearly on time.

"An aircraft like this is set up with redundant systems," Ashley Dillon said. "There are backups to backups to backups."

She said the outage occurred because a circuit breaker was flipped on the aircraft. She could not say how common the problem is.
Najmedin Meshkati, a professor who studies aviation safety at the University of Southern California, said he has read few reports of such failures on airliners compared with more frequent incidents like runway incursions. But he said that simply could be because instrument problems are not made public.
"It may not come to the surface that me and you would get to know about it," Meshkati said.

Sounds normal to me???? air traffic controllers redirecting other airlines to clear the airspace for SWA to be number 1 at the marker;)

So anyone have the "non-media" explaination of what happened here?

When it comes down to it, you should be able to fly around without affecting other traffic, on radar vectors, with an altimeter, airspeed indicator, and compass. Pretty bad situation if you don't have all of those, and I kind of doubt that was the case.

>>A Southwest spokeswoman said the captain's instruments failed but the copilot's remained intact, and emphasized that the plane landed safely and nearly on time.<<

It wasn't the instrument failure that was the emergency, it was that they were running late.


>>She said the outage occurred because a circuit breaker was flipped on the aircraft. She could not say how common the problem is.<<

Oh, I think we all know how common this is at SWA. ;-)

T

Well that explains it! I hate it when circuit breakers flip!

Here we go again
 

I hope this is not the start of another useless 39 page blog of SWA haters..

See" Does Southwest think this is funny"

nay.... there are more LUV'ers then haters; besides, who has time to read 39pages of "blog"?????

I don't know about that. SWA guys have been very arrogant lately and I think people are getting sick and tired of the purple speed bumps clogging the airways over the U.S. flying slower than the rest of the traffic. Got slowed WAY back the other night to allow a SWA flight put put into SEA and then he cut us off again on the ramp with his strobes on at night.... very annoying. If it was an isolated event, I wouldn't even mention it but, well, it wasn't.

And it begins!!!!
 

Let this tread die before it starts. As a profession is there nothing more interesting than weather you were cutoff by SWA? I know I have never made a mistake with the lights!!! I am so close to perfect my feet only just touch the ground :)

Only 92 passengers? Wow, you guys are slipping. That's only a 73% load factor!:D

I think it is funny that someone else (not participating in the other thread) went there. But you guys keep saying they're just a couple of isolated incidents and haters.

Do you just copy and paste this post from memory. I sure see it a lot.

Carl

Everybody loves to hate the top dog.

Brilliant!!!

Weather? Never mentioned the weather. Guess the 737 type counted for your 4 year degree?

[
QUOTE=IAHB756;891767]Weather? Never mentioned the weather. Guess the 737 type counted for your 4 year degree?[/QUOTE]

Yes you are right spelling has never been my strong point. My mom was right; I should have also taken typing in high school too. Note I also did not spell thread correctly.

I betcha (see more bending of the English language) there is one SWA captain speeding around the airports of America like a Korean housewife
(I can go there as I am married to one and she would agree to the analogy), cutting you all off and laughing maniacally

B-

Carl you are prolific
 

With as much as you are on here, APC, and all your post you much be 4 people!!!! Not a slam, just an observation.

Take Care Guys. I was looking to see if AT had posted their TA yet. Guess we will agree to disagree.

Off to the airport

SWA Lost Navigation LAX
 

What would make the B737 glass panels go blank on the captain's side? What else did they lose? It doesn't sound like they were down to the ISFD. Was this not a glass panel plane?

I'm curious why ATC didn't handle the aircraft normally, if the FO's stuff was working. Did the crew yell, "pan, pan, pan"?

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A Southwest Airlines jet lost its navigation system as it approached Los Angeles International Airport last week, forcing air traffic controllers to redirect several flights to clear the airspace as they guided the aircraft to a safe landing, a union representative said Tuesday.

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a statement saying only that it was investigating the flight and that controllers handled the situation professionally.

The Boeing 737 carrying 92 passengers and crew members was coming from San Jose when the navigation system failed around noon on Oct. 20, causing the jet to lose its positioning amid the clouds, said Ron Geyer, union representative for air traffic controllers at the facility that handles planes approaching and leaving Southern California airports.

"The weather was bad. The pilot had no visuals until he was below the clouds," Geyer said.

Geyer said controllers scrambled to redirect several flights so they could clear airspace for the Southwest pilot to get through the clouds until he could see the airport. He said controllers almost never encounter such a scenario.


"It was such a rare occasion, yet there was no impact to the system except we had to turn some planes around to make sure nobody was in jeopardy in case the plane got off course," Geyer said.

A Southwest spokeswoman said the captain's instruments failed but the copilot's remained intact, and emphasized that the plane landed safely and nearly on time.

"An aircraft like this is set up with redundant systems," Ashley Dillon said. "There are backups to backups to backups."

She said the outage occurred because a circuit breaker was flipped on the aircraft. She could not say how common the problem is.

Najmedin Meshkati, a professor who studies aviation safety at the University of Southern California, said he has read few reports of such failures on airliners compared with more frequent incidents like runway incursions. But he said that simply could be because instrument problems are not made public.

I have no idea what happened, but it may be more benign than the ATC Union is making it sound. If one of the IRS went down then they would be back to green world NAV, unable to proceed direct a fix (the Unable RNP MSG). If they were on an RNAV arrival (I have no idea what they were flying), they would have to ask for vectors or be sent to a different arrival. This would cause them to move some other aicraft around if they were given headings. It was the statements from the controller's union that seemed odd (IN CASE they got off course, the pilot had no visuals until below the clouds, there was NO impact to the system, etc). Not once did it say the pilots declared an emergency or asked for priority. IMO, sounds like a good story from the controllers about how an aicraft said they lost some of their instruments (required notification) and asked for vectors while the controllers helped save the day. I'm sure the full story will eventually come out, but the story appears very one sided.

wondering how 'bad' the weather was, whether sct at 120, or low ovc? Probably remnants of a baby seal got stuck somewhere!

now THAT is funny.

as long as you think that, then it must be true.
i guess neutering is out of the question?

[QUOTE=TonyWilliams;891813]What would make the B737 glass panels go blank on the captain's side? What else did they lose? It doesn't sound like they were down to the ISFD. Was this not a glass panel plane?

I'm curious why ATC didn't handle the aircraft normally, if the FO's stuff was working. Did the crew yell, "pan, pan, pan"?

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Lets see if this was not just SWA just trying to cut the line at the counter, again.

Capt's instruments go blank, my answer to the F/O - your aircraft, i am going for coffee. F/O's instruments working well, and they are on separate systems plus all the back up redundancy. What no MFD, no EICAS that has more than one function, what no standby instruments? What straight to ATC and sat this is SWA, one of my four instruments not working, need priority handling, want to cut the line.

Just like there new commercial, where can you only get those SWA prices, only at SWA .com, wonder why only there, hard to compare side by side without effort on your part with other airline prices.

This incident sounds like a total non event. It must have been a slow news day.

I don't care who you are, and mind you this concerns an airline whose shtick is we're funny and fun, but these jokes about do anything to be #1 are hilarious.

Gotta hate the new SWA commercial with the pilot dancing with the guitar down the street. I apologize to our profession, I didn't have anything to do with it.

FYI, SWA does not and has never sold tickets through third party vendors like Orbitz. In fact, SWA sued them for saying they advertised our lowest fares. If you really want to know why, look through the Unisys archive on losing control of pricing models when using a third party vendor. When United/Delta sells a block of tickets to these companies, they lose last-minute pricing power on their product. Good business.

Do you really think the dude playing the guitar is a real pilot or actor? And is that NYC or Chicago?

The Orbitz thing is probably so near equal in its pro's and con's that your justified not to do it or do it, either way it's a gamble.

What that video doesn't mention is that airplane was just taxiing out to the runway. :D

The guy playing the guitar in the current SWA commercial is a regular line guy based in MDW.

that girl is not only hot but she didn't even flinch when that 737 taxied by.

That "girl" is 70 years old.

But, except for raising her voice as the plane got closer, awesome job.

Man, talk about being disappointed. I thought that was a skirt until she walked away. :)

After blowing off a hold for traffic clearance.

Sounds like NATCA tooting their own horn how they saved the day. Non event.

Yeah.. that's it. I hear Anderson is leaving.. can you come work for DAL?
I'm sure he never thought about any of that.

"Center we are declaring an emergency".

" Aircraft with emergency standby, Southwest go ahead"

************************************************** *****
The Capt's instruments are on the #1 Electronic buss on the P18-0 panel
Many airlines have electronics buss switches also installed to turn off the Capt's and FO's instruments when overnighting (which doesn't help a darn thing), some still pull a bunch of breakers to disable stuff which in my opinion is also assinine because they actually Weaken the breaker over time and could cause problems like this as circuit breakers are NOT meant to be used as switches!! and adding switches only gives you ONE more thing to Fail. I've had that happen 2x in 10 years as a 737 controller and Both times it was the breaker that failed, either the P18-0 or the FO's #2 electronic Buss Breaker on the P6-1 panel ., Neither time was it Fun for Me or the Crew. Quickest way for a 737 Crew to Identify it? Look at the INS or Adiru panel to see which inertial is NOT working . Only during a CAT-3 autoland will either of the electric busses cross check themselves.
fly safe Guys!