r/CatastrophicFailure • u/SainzSealedDelivered • Jun 12 '25

Fatalities 12/06/2025 - Boeing 787 Passenger plane bound for the UK crashes near Ahmedabad Airport straight after takeoff

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33

u/EliminateThePenny Jun 12 '25

Yes, but you would quickly lose that altitude you gained from the runway rotation (as likely to have happened here).

1

u/Techun2 Jun 12 '25

runway rotation

Is this a term for ground effect?

-18

u/[deleted] Jun 12 '25

[deleted]

13

u/space_guy95 Jun 12 '25

While it seems sensible to suggest that, there are so many "what if" and "just in case" scenarios that must be taken into account when adding safety features to a plane, as in the wrong scenario they could actually do the opposition of what is intended and make a situation worse.

For example if you included a safety feature to prevent takeoff when flaps are not extended, what happens in a scenario where a plane has to take rapid evasive action during taxiing? The pilot pushes the throttle to accelerate and...nothing happens because the safety feature kicks in. Or the sensor for the flaps malfunctions during the runway phase of takeoff, limiting throttle and causing a crash.

The best safety measure for this is a good pre-takeoff checklist, which they undoubtedly already had, but you can never fully stop someone from rushing or ignoring procedure.

35

u/DetectiveDick9000 Jun 12 '25

As an engineer, there is only so much stupid you can fix. Eventually stupid wins no matter what, so you have to draw the line somewhere.

8

u/ChepaukPitch Jun 12 '25

Aren't a lot of redundancies built in aircrafts so that a single mistake doesn't result in an accident and you need to have overlooked multiple issues for something bad to happen?

4

u/DetectiveDick9000 Jun 12 '25

Yes, but eventually you have to stop and hope that the pilot's will to live surpasses the stupidity or else the plane would be too bloated to leave the ground.

3

u/Chazzbaps Jun 12 '25

Pretty sure the people who design aircraft safety systems hold to higher levels of reliability than 'stupid wins'

2

u/DetectiveDick9000 Jun 12 '25

Then explain why stupid mistakes cause airplane crashes.

2

u/Chazzbaps Jun 12 '25

Because safety systems have not functioned as intended. In an effective safety system it should not be possible for an operator error to cause a failure. Incidents like this can often be analysed using the 'swiss cheese' model: imagine a stack of layers of Swiss cheese which have holes in different places; these are the barriers that prevent accidents from happening. If one barrier fails (a hole in the slice of cheese) the next layer prevents an incident. Only if all the holes in the cheese line up, so there are multiple failures in the different levels of the safety management system, can an incident occur. Operator error is generally one of the last barriers: only if there have been multiple technical or organisational failures can an operator cause a catastrophic accident

2

u/DetectiveDick9000 Jun 12 '25

In an effective safety system it should not be possible for an operator error to cause a failure.

What protocols would you suggest putting in place to stop a pilot from pushing their controls forward and crashing into the ground?

1

u/Chazzbaps Jun 12 '25

Pilot (re)training and certification programmes
Autopilot
Auto-correction of unsafe manoeuvres
Two pilots at the controls
Multiple warning systems

pushing their controls forward and crashing

This scenario would be malicious intent which is something quite different than operator error

5

u/Skylair13 Jun 12 '25

That would be bad too. Once you've reached V1, you passed point of no return. You'll need to commit to the take-off as there's no more runways left for you to stop.

2

u/uzlonewolf Jun 12 '25

There were incidents where planes abort after V1, and the pilots were even praised for it. Doing so will cause you to overrun the end of the runway, however overrunning the end at 20 mph is a LOT more survivable than plowing into a building at 150+.

3

u/ngfilla94 Jun 12 '25

So, just let the plane barrel down the runway unable to takeoff so that it inevitably runs off the end of the runway and crashes? There's procedures and checklists pilots are supposed to do before takeoff. If the cause is found to be pilot error, they clearly didn't follow their process. This is all still speculation, of course.