文学城作舟博客
作舟转译：
美联社数小时前发布了有关韩亚客机失事的最新细节，尽管还不是“结论性”的东西，但起码是美国方面与航空公司担当责任的调查。
失事韩亚客机靠自动驾驶功能控制机速，但降落时驾驶员发现机速过慢、飞行高度过低
美国交通安全管理局主席何子曼女士（Deborah
Hersman）和相关调查人员今天在向媒体公布最新调查结果时透露，失事的韩亚波音777客机在旧金山机场降落时使用的是“自动驾驶系统”控制飞机的速度，当驾驶员意识到速度和高度对降落不符时，太慢和太低，重新升高和放弃降落已经来不及了，所以导致失事。
SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — The pilots
of Asiana Flight 214 relied on automated cockpit equipment to
control the jetliner's speed as they landed at San Francisco
airport, but realized too late they were flying too low and too
slow before the aircraft crashed, investigators said Tuesday.
The new details were not conclusive about the cause of Saturday's crash, but they raised potential areas of focus: Was there a mistake made in setting the automatic speed control, did it malfunction or were the pilots not fully aware of what the plane was doing?
One of the most puzzling aspects of the crash has been why the wide-body Boeing 777 jet came in far too low and slow, clipping its landing gear and then its tail on a rocky seawall just short the runway. The crash killed two of the 307 people and injured scores of others, most not seriously. Among those injured were two flight attendants in the back of the plane, who survived despite being thrown onto the runway when the plane slammed into the seawall and the tail broke off.
National Transportation Safety Board chairman Deborah Hersman said the autothrottle was set for 157 mph and the pilots assumed it was controlling the plane's airspeed. However, the autothrottle was only "armed," she said.
两个第一次
美国交通安全管理局主席还透露两名韩国飞行员的“第一次”。机长是第一次驾驶波音777在旧金山国际机场降落，而他在波音777的训练尚未完成，只训练了一半儿。副驾驶是第一次作为“驾驶指导”飞行。
这很可能是导致两人在降落前的刹那间没有达到完全默契的原因之一。调查显示他们在飞机降落前没有确认自动油门和仰俯模式的状态，即“你以为我搞定了；我却以为你搞定了”。
Hersman said the pilot at the controls,
identified by Korean authorities as Lee Gang-guk, was only about
halfway through his training on the Boeing 777 and was landing that
type of aircraft at the San Francisco airport for the first time
ever. And the co-pilot, identified as Lee Jeong-Min, was on his
first trip as a flight instructor.
Autothrottles typically have three settings – off, on and armed. An autothrottle that is armed but not on will remain at its previous speed, which was probably near idle, said Doug Moss, a pilot for a major U.S. airline and an aviation safety consultant in Torrance, Calif. Pilots will frequently shift to idle off and on when preparing to land in order to descend faster.
The pilot flying the plane had turned off his flight director, while the training captain had his flight director on, Hersman said. The flight director computes and displays the proper pitch and bank angles required in order for the aircraft to follow a selected path.
In most airliners, an autothrottle will not turn on if one
flight director is off and one on because it has to work in harmony
with the flight directors – both need to be either on or off, Moss
said.
交通安全管理局主席说，在飞机着陆前的紧急时刻，机长才意识到自动油门没有在控制飞机速度。资深飞行安全指导莫斯认为，这种“不确定”是飞行员和整个飞机制造业面临的挑战和复杂性，就是在使用自动系统和需要变换为手动时会出现想不到的疏忽，而飞行是不容许丝毫疏忽的。
Only moments before the crash did the training captain realize the autothrottle wasn't controlling the plane's speed, Hersman said.
"This is one of the two hallmarks of complexity and challenge in the industry right now," Moss said. "It's automation confusion because from what Deborah Hersman said, it appears very likely the pilots were confused as to what autothrottle and pitch mode the airplane was in. It's very likely they believed the autothrottles were on when in fact they were only armed."
Their last second efforts to rev the plane back up and abort the landing failed, although numerous survivors report hearing the engines roar just before impact.
"We just seemed to be flying in way too low. Last couple seconds before it happened the engines really revved into high gear. Just waaah! Like the captain was saying `oh no, we gotta get out of here.' And then, boom! The back end just lifted up, just really jolted everybody in their seats," said crash survivor Elliot Stone, who owns a martial arts studio in Scotts Valley.
While in the U.S., drug and alcohol tests are standard procedure
after air accidents, this is not required for foreign pilots and
Hersman said the Asiana pilots had not undergone any
testing
A final determination on the cause of the crash is
months away and Hersman cautioned against drawing any conclusions
based on the information revealed so far:
Seven seconds before impact, someone in the cockpit asked for
more speed after apparently noticing that the jet was flying far
slower than its recommended landing speed. A few seconds later, the
yoke began to vibrate violently, an automatic warning telling the
pilot the plane is losing lift and in imminent danger of an
aerodynamic stall. One and a half seconds before impact came a
command to abort the landing.
没有紧急通知警告
何子曼强调现在做结论为时尚早，最后的真相可能数月后才能水落石出。
何子曼女士说，出事前七秒钟，驾驶舱内的一名驾驶员要求加速，意识到那一刻的飞行速度相对着陆太慢了。几秒钟后，感到飞机的剧烈震动。出事前一秒半，系统指令“放弃着陆”。
调查还透露当时机长没有发出任何警报。美国飞行员协会事故调查员约翰福克斯说，大多数的民航客机配备四名驾驶员，除了机长和副驾驶，其他两名驾驶员会起到监控的作用。
There's been no indication, from verbal
calls or mechanical issues, that an emergency was ever declared by
pilots. Most airlines would require all four pilots to be present
for the landing, the time when something is most likely to go
wrong, experienced pilots said. In addition to the two pilots, a
third was "monitoring" the landing from a jumpseat, while a fourth
was in the rear of the cabin.
"If there are four pilots there, even if you are sitting on a jump seat, that's something you watch, the airspeed and the descent profile," said John Cox, a former US Airways pilot and former Air Line Pilots Association accident investigator.By Tuesday afternoon, the third pilot's interview was complete and the fourth was underway.
In addition, authorities were reviewing the initial rescue efforts after fire officials acknowledged that one of their trucks might have run over one of the two Chinese teenagers killed in the crash. The students, Wang Linjia and Ye Mengyuan, were part of a larger group headed for a Christian summer camp with dozens of classmates.
遇难的中国女孩儿
韩亚航空总裁今天从韩国飞抵旧金山，并向受伤的乘客、家属等道歉。另据报道，韩亚总裁在韩国见到了中国遇难女孩儿的父母（转机时），遇难女孩儿的父母们被形容为“悲愤”，没有完全接受他们的道歉。
Asiana President Yoon Young-doo arrived in San Francisco
from South Korea on Tuesday morning, fighting his way through a
pack of journalists outside customs.
___
美联社：
Lowy reported from Washington, D.C. Associated Press writers
Jason Dearen, Terry Collins, Paul Elias, Lisa Leff and Sudhin
Thanawala in San Francisco and Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul also
contributed to this report.
请阅读更多我的博客文章>>>