Failed Avionics a Possible Cause of BA038 Crash

Muhammar writes "As you may have heard by now, both engines of the Boeing 777 aircraft flight BA038 suddenly cut off without warning at very low altitude and low speed during autopilot-assisted landing at Heathrow. A prompt reaction of the pilots prevented the stall and saved all lives aboard. The crash landing short of the runway tore off the landing gear on impact, and the fuselage plowed a long, deep gouge in the grass. With the investigation ongoing, the available information points to an electronic control problem as the most likely cause of the sudden engine power loss."

Comments

BA are extremely happy about the crash

[Malevolent Tester]

They actually have a decent excuse for lost luggage for once.

Airplane Operating Systems

[Alien54]

"It might be premature to say that a software problem is the likely cause of failure..."

Unless it was running on an OS like Windows for Aircraft, "now with fewer crashes".

Yes, I know it's all custom designed. But thinking about the infamous Windows for Warships I couldn't resist

Re:Airplane Operating Systems

[Alien54]

unfortunately I can't mod up your reply to my comment.

But the idea of Windows for Airplanes is something that would strike fear into many a person's heart. Would you trust your aircraft to Windows for Airplanes?

Or your helicopter to Windows for Helicopters?

Re:Airplane Operating Systems

[Alien54]

2nd thought:

The Knowledge Base reports on Flight Simulator are scary enough as it is.....

the rest of the scenario writes itself

Damnit!

[DoofusOfDeath]

Now we're all going to be forced to re-learn Ada!

Re:Damnit!

[Sponge Bath]

I read it was actually MIX machine code converted directly to Java byte code by a drunken leprechaun.
Wikipedia is an awesome source.

Re:terrists?

[Hrdina]

Actually, it's more like "nucular", "gubmint", and "librul".

Re:Software?

[Technician]

If it is a software problem, then expect more public scrutiny of software based machinery.

That is not likely. More likely is they had a glitch from a strong RF field someplace. Knowing the timing, it is likely to be either a radar or other high power beam or a very near lower powered source such as a cell phone inside the farady cage. Very likely the radio source is from something like this; **RING** **RING** "Hi hon, we are landing now.. Oh no, somethings wrong.."

Typical

[pyrrhonist]

Once such a procedure was set, the plane would continue under automatic control until it reached an altitude of 250ft. Then a female computer voice would say, "Decide."

It's uncanny how they made the flight control system sound just like my wife.

As Coward stared at the controls, the autothrottle demanded more thrust.

That's a feature that is sadly lacking, though.

I found the bug

[bradgoodman]

It was a regular-'ol "single equals" bug:

if (engines = OFF) {
PrepareForCrash();
}

Made by Diebold?

[Hognoxious]

Their outputs are collected and examined by a voter

That's OK then, we all know that computers couldn't possibly have any problems counting votes.

Re:Are the pilots heros?

[arth1]

"Good airmanship" would be more apropos.

Yes, but it doesn't make for as a striking newspaper headline as Coward the Hero!.