A plane carrying the Polish president and dozens of the country’s top political and military leaders to the site of the Soviet massacre of Polish officers in World War II crashed in western Russia on Saturday, killing everyone on board.
President Lech Kaczynski’s plane tried to land in a thick fog, missing the runway and snagging treetops about half a mile from the airport in Smolensk, scattering chunks of flaming fuselage across a bare forest.
The crash came as a stunning blow to Poland, wiping out a large portion of the country’s leadership in one fiery explosion. at the moment that Russia and Poland were beginning to come to terms with the killing of more than 20,000 members of Poland’s elite officer corps in the same place 70 years ago.
According to other reports, basically their entire leadership was on the same plane. This is a horrible tragedy, but why on earth would anyone allow all those people on the same plane? That just makes no sense to me whatsoever. The Polish government has been essentially decapitated.
Kevin
I believe the president is the symbolic head of government, the Prime Minister is the leader, so they still have him.
But yes, a horrible tragedy. They were going to mourn Polish victims of Russia from WWII.
Bailey
I can’t imagine waking up to that kind of news in the US. It must be so shocking to the people of Poland.
c u n d gulag
And please, Dear God, save us from any idiots about to make Polish jokes!
This is truly horrible. My thoughts and prayers go out to the relatives and friends of those killed, and to the Polish people.
Carol
I wonder how many people in high places in Poland woke up to a combination of grief and that pit in their stomach at having to take charge now, and that sense of being unready to fill large shoes, and wondering if they can really do what they now must do.
I hope the world is patient with the replacements as they stuggle with both grief and the weight of unexpected new responsibilities, as they finish suddenly unfinished work, and then have to turn around and make a new course.
scav
@Kevin: Yes, the BBC has a list of some of them and the PM seems to be in charge of day to day management. Lot of high end people / politicos but not all from the govt. ËDIT: meaning, I don’t think the chain of command was necessarily violated or something. Not that I have a clue about the exact chain.
RedKitten
I agree. Anybody who does so shows a complete and utter lack of class.
What a terrible shock for the Polish people. And my deepest sympathies to the families and loved ones of those who were in that plane.
Martin
I think only the US is as obsessive about redundancy and not putting all your eggs in one basket. One of our better policies, I might add. But it’s quite expensive to do, which is why most countries don’t do it.
scav
@Martin: Well, Charles and William can’t travel on the same plane so it’s not just the U.S. doing it and that lot are utterly symbolic. And the cost of the plane / replacement is explicitly mentioned as a factor in both The BBC and Guardian reports.
Scott
Of course given the nature of what they were going to, it wasn’t just politicos and government officials who were killed, it was cultural icons, historians, and a lot of leaders of civil society. This is an enormous loss for their society.
lotus
Not only was having that much of your national leadership on one (untrustworthy) plane horrendous — check out this stunner in The Guardian:
Hard to imagine the pilot who’d take such a risk with such a passenger list — but Fallows thinks it may have caused a case of “get-there-itis.”
gogol's wife
If they couldn’t afford to replace a 26-year-old Tupolev, I think they probably couldn’t afford multiple flights.
LT
@Scott: God, I hadn’t even thought of that. Just horrible.
StonyPillow
Another bright victory for free market capitalism and the Chicago School of economics. When you starve the beast, your government flies in ancient planes.
As Former Poland Prime Minister Leszek Millers said,
“I once said that we will one day meet in a funeral procession, and that is when we will take the decision to replace the aircraft fleet”.
licensed to kill time
@lotus:
I can’t imagine how terrifying the multiple attempted landings must have been for the passengers. Well, actually I can imagine – must have been a very tense atmosphere in the cabin. So devastating and sad.
GregB
Fallows has some of the details on the possible runway and landing issues.
It sounds from the initial reports that it is some sort of pilot error.
Here.
NobodySpecial
Sadly, the irrepressible smartass in me had an instant one-word joke for this.
Seriously, what does this do to that whole ‘missile defense’ thing? Does (God Forbid) that insane Christian brother duo take over again?
Tony J
Never been a fan of the Kaczynski Bros and their brand of ultra-Catholic homophobia, but this is an all-levels shitty event for Poland as a nation. That they were on their way to Katyn, of all places, just makes it that little bit worse.
GregB
Nobody Special.
The Christian brother duo is now solo. The Lech Kaczynski was one of the twins.
NobodySpecial
@GregB:
Yeah, I just caught that. For some reason, I thought the brother duo was named something else. Dumb me.
EDIT – Figured out why. The opposition leader (and now acting President) is Komorowski.
Blue Raven
@Tony J: You beat me to what I was going to say. Will not forget Kaczynski was a raging ‘phobe, but I can also recognize how horrible this is for Poland as a nation and the survivors of everyone on that plane on a personal level.
burnspbesq
Most US corporations have policies that prohibit more than two officers from being on the same plane, and/or prohibit the CEO and CFO being on the same plane.
My dad worked in the Bell System for his entire career. Regulators used to bitch at him about having to pay for the “AT&T Air Force.” This is why they ultimately shut up and allowed those costs into the rate base.
LT
@licensed to kill time: Flying into Buffalo once in unbelievable fog the pilot tried three times to land. We’d come down into the fog, be completely enveloped, then after what seemed like forever come out the bottom – and there would be buildings and land right fucking there. I mean really low. And then he’d abort again. Three times he did this before we finally went to Rochester. Flying does not scare me at all, but that, let me tell you, was not fun. A lot of wind too. Jesus, what a horrible day.
Bill E Pilgrim
The entire leadership wasn’t on the plane. The foreign minister (oddly also Washington Post writer Anne Applebaum’s husband) wasn’t, and neither was the Prime Minister, who’s as much the leader of the country as the President.
From what I understand a lot of people in the government weren’t on it, but the wide range from throughout government, the military, etc who were is tragic to be sure.
Tony J
@NobodySpecial:
Ahem.
His brother Jaroslaw is still Chairman of the Law and Justice Party, having stepped down as Prime Minister following their 2007 electoral defeat.
Edit – I see my decision to go to Teh Google took so much time it left this pointless. Very well, as you were.
Cat Lady
Poland’s system doesn’t translate to our political system very well, but it would be like losing POTUS and FLOTUS, Geithner, Bernanke, Steny Hoyer, the Joint Chiefs, Dep. Secretary of State Steinberg, Leon Panetta, and a bunch of Congresspeople. That’s just a huge loss.
GregB
I cut and pasted this from Wikipedia. Talk about devastation. Their legislative body members, the entire top tier of the military. A horror indeed.
Presidential and governmental figures
* Lech Kaczyński, President of Poland
* Maria Kaczyńska, First Lady of Poland
* Mariusz Handzlik, Undersecretary of State in the Office of the President of the Republic of Poland
* Ryszard Kaczorowski, the last President of the Polish government-in-exile
* Andrzej Kremer, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs
* Sławomir Skrzypek, President of the National Bank of Poland
* Borat Sagdiyev, Deputy Minister of Tourism
* Władysław Stasiak, Chief of the Office of the President of the Republic of Poland
* Aleksander Szczygło, head of the National Security Bureau
* Paweł Wypych, Secretary of State in the Office of the President of the Republic of Poland
Military figures
* Lieutenant General Andrzej Błasik, Chief of the Polish Air Force
* Major General Tadeusz Buk, Commander of the Polish Land Forces
* General Franciszek Gągor, Chief of the Polish Army General Staff
* Vice Admiral Andrzej Karweta, Commander-in-chief of the Polish Navy
Senat members
* Krystyna Bochenek, Deputy Speaker of the Senat
* Stanisław Zając, member of the Senat
Sejm members
* Leszek Deptuła, member of the Sejm
* Grzegorz Dolniak, member of the Sejm
* Janina Fetlińska, member of the Senat
* Grażyna Gęsicka, member of the Sejm
* Przemysław Gosiewski, member of the Sejm
* Izabela Jaruga-Nowacka, member of the Sejm
* Sebastian Karpiniuk, member of the Sejm
* Aleksandra Natalli-Świat, member of the Sejm
* Krzysztof Putra, Deputy Speaker of the Sejm
* Arkadiusz Rybicki, member of the Sejm
* Jerzy Szmajdziński, Deputy Speaker of the Sejm
* Jolanta Szymanek-Deresz, member of the Sejm
* Zbigniew Wassermann, member of the Sejm
* Wiesław Woda, member of the Sejm
* Edward Wojtas, member of the Sejm
Religious figures
* Archbishop Miron Chodakowski, Orthodox Ordinary of the Polish Army
* Tadeusz Płoski, bishop of the Military Ordinariate of the Polish Army
* Ryszard Rumianek, Rector of the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University
Others
* Janusz Kochanowski, Polish Ombudsman for Citizen Rights
* Janusz Kurtyka, Historian and president of the Institute of National Remembrance
* Piotr Nurowski, President of the Polish Olympic Committee
* Maciej Płażyński, President of the Polish Community Association
* Andrzej Przewoźnik, Secretary-General of the Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites
* Anna Walentynowicz, free trade union activist, member of Solidarity
licensed to kill time
@LT:
That sounds freakishly horrible. I am glad you made it!
When I first heard about this accident today I thought ‘well, at least it was probably quick, and they didn’t know what was happening’. But the multiple landing attempts story quashed that small hope for their last minutes.
Violet
So tragic. The poor Polish people. What a horrible thing to happen.
LT
Calouste
Not really. The only cabinet member that was on the plane was the deputy Foreign Minister. And although the Polish president has some power, it is nowhere near the power the President has in the US, or even France. The main executive power lies with the prime minister.
Not saying that the crash won’t have a big impact in Polish politics (15 mostly senior parliamentarians also died, as did the heads of all four branches of the military), but it is not like the country is rudderless.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
This is such tragic irony. They were going to an event related to which much of Poland’s leaders and intelligenstia wiped out by the Soviets at the time. The Massacre at Katyn of Polish military officers was a who’s who Polish society. Not unlike those on this plane.
GregB
By the way, Polish Solidarity was the only union the GOP ever supported.
lotus
More appalling by the minute, innit?
Tony J
@Blue Raven:
Yeah, exactly. The tragic thing about tragedies is that all the hurt happens to the people left behind.
My friend just lost his sister-in-law to a sudden brain haemorrhage, out of the blue, no hope whatsoever. His brother had to tell the doctors to keep her on the machines for an extra day because he didn’t want his eldest daughter to spend her 12th birthday watching her mum die. Poor thing still can’t sleep through the night without waking up screaming because she’s having a nightmare about it.
So yeah, what you said.
Walker
Wife and in-laws are Polish. We woke up to this information.
There are many debates going right now about the cause. There seems to be some evidence that this was “pilot error” in the sense that this occurred on the fourth attempt to land in deep fog. The pilot should really have tried an alternate landing site. However, the last time a pilot did something like that on an official trip, Lech Kaczynski summarily fired him.
Peter J
Russia held a joint remembrance with Poland a couple of days ago, but they didn’t invite the President, just the Premier, because of bad blood between Putin and Kaczyński.
So, Kaczyński decided to hold another one.
The Russians wanted the plane to land in Minsk due to the fog, the Poles in the plane might have seen that as them trying to sabotage/meddle with their remembrance.
The big question is who it was that decided that they should try to land at the airfield; the pilot, the president, or someone else, and if that can be determined from communications or from the black boxes.
Hurling Dervish
Or, as Atrios put it, “I guess this is a big deal.”. Phlegmatic dolt.
PaulW
New rule: NO F-CKING LANDING IN THE FOG.
There’s been a slew of fog-related plane accidents, haven’t there, I’m thinking that big one in 1977 where two planes slammed into each other on the runway? It’s just not a good idea.
To the families of Poland who lost so much this weekend, my sympathies and prayers. :(
Mark S.
Walker @ 35
Really? That’s just incredibly crazy.
Alex
Borat Sagdiyev, Deputy Minister of Tourism
Let’s hear it for Wikipedia, everybody.
Not mad at you, Greg, just whoever wrote that.
Rex
I hope that Poland is at full alert along their Eastern border right now.
Gary
@Walker, re: summary firing of pilot
For real? God damn that is ironic.
GregB
Alex,
Jeebus. I should have read every name.
That’s such an asshole move at a time of tragedy.
ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty
Not sure that once every 33 years makes a slew, but weather related accidents have always been de rigueur in aviation.
Actually technology exists to let airplanes land almost automatically in near zero visibility, but I am sure that Eastern Europe is not up to that standard or anywhere near it either in the infrastructure on the ground or the equipment in the air.
Early reports are often wrong, but this sounds like what is known in aviation circles as a “duck under” accident. The crew is tempted to go below the minimum allowed altitude just a little to see if they can get under that fog or cloud deck and get visibility to land. The reason why that isn’t allowed is that it can and often enough does lead to what happened here … a collision with trees or ground or wires or something, and …. disaster. The legal and proper thing to do is to abandon the approach and head for the alternate airport which was chosen for its better weather conditions, and land there. But if there is pressure to get in there, a lot of pilots will try the duckunder. The maneuver has killed a lot of people over the years.
tenkindsofgrumpy
@Peter J: Any pilot will tell you it is always the pilot’s decision. Having said that, the pilot can always allow himself to be influenced by some one else.
db
@Rex: … because Putin is going to rear his head? I guess it’s time to ask Bible Spice what Poland ought to do.
tenkindsofgrumpy
Although this is an appalling tragedy, the idea, in the abstract of a government, any government, being decapitated doesn’t bother me all that much. All governments can be replaced.
Tony J
@tenkindsofgrumpy:
Yeah, but the point is that, until such a time as our machine overlords pull back the curtain and let us in on the secret, all governments are going to be made up of human beings, and they have families, friends and colleagues who are going to be ripped up inside for a very long time.
There ain’t no ‘abstract’ about it, there never is.
Peter J
@tenkindsofgrumpy:
On commercial flights there usually isn’t any direct influence, and the pilot doesn’t confer with the passengers about where and how to land.
I would be very surprised if the pilot on this flight made this decision all by himself.
Little Dreamer
I’ve been reading up on this most of the morning. I saw a report that stated someone (one of the polish diplomats) was supposed to be on the plane and wasn’t. Whoever that person may be, I’m sure they are counting his/her blessings now.
My condolences to the families and the people of Poland.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Rex:
Putin was there to personally take over the investigation. So, you know, that might at least delay him from the imminent invasion and occupation of a suddenly vulnerable Poland. (rolling eyes).
Good lord, folks.
And whoever said that they don’t have modern airport technology in “Eastern Europe”, this was a small military airfield so not sure what they have for passenger service, but they certainly have all of that in Moscow. They even have computers.
ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty
@Peter J:
Sooner or later in a career where one flies for a living, a decision is going to have to be made that may require putting one’s job on the line.
In my case, the passenger was bold enough to tell me that he’d get me fired if I did not go into the airport he wanted me to reach. I refused, and landed at an alternate.
Later, back at the home airport, with the chief pilot interrogating me, the conversation went basically like this:
CP: Why didn’t you go in there? I would have gone in there.
Me: Well, Don, then you should have taken the flight. It was my flight, you gave it to me, and I wasn’t going in there. Sorry.
The end. I didn’t get fired. No decent chief pilot is going to fire a new guy over something like that. But I had to go through the experience to find that out. Had I gotten fired, it still would not have made me go in there the next time.
ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty
@Bill E Pilgrim:
Well, you need three things for near zero visibility landings.
You need the infrastructure on the ground, the electronics and runway lighting and configuration, and the air traffic control protocols that make it work.
You need the equipment on the airplane, which is sophisticated and very expensive.
And you need the crew training, and currency (recency of experience) to use the procedure.
I would wager that this Polish flight lacked at least two of the three requirements.
Bill E Pilgrim
@ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty: Could well be, but your comment earlier said “I am sure that Eastern Europe is not up to that standard” which was a much broader statement.
nodakfarmboy
@Rex: Why? Because Belarus and Ukraine will take this opportunity to strike Poland?
The “mainland” of Russia doesn’t have a border with Poland anymore. Just a small separated bit, made up of the isolated Kaliningrad Oblast.
Maps- learn to use them.
DBrown
@Rex: Your comment is uncalled for.
someguy
Guess you never flew Aeroflot or any of the big Tupelovs pre-1990. I did. I had no idea that shitty old badly piloted airliners and frequent disasters in Warsaw Pact civil aviation were the result of capitalism and Chicago School economics. Man, the things I learn around here.
Personally I think you’d have been smarter to blame it on Bush looking in Putin’s soul, which grew three sizes that day; causing him to decide to kiss and make up with the Poles and attend the Katyn ceremony, thereby causing these deaths. It’s less of a stretch, particularly when pilot error is already the frontrunning cause.
ExtremismInThe DefenseOfLiberty
@Bill E Pilgrim:
I seriously doubt that the combination of Poland and Russia are going to produce many zero-zero landings in nonmilitary aircraft. My original blurb stands as written.
All one has to do is look at their aircraft. They fly a bunch of old junk that is not going to be equipped with the latest electronics. And they are not going to have the simulators or the money to spend on simulator time to get the training either.
This story provides some background.
Maybe a little overstated, but this is an eighties-era Soviet airplane, not likely that it has the latest equipment. It might, but ….
also ….
.. and at the military airfield in question:
I would wager that Smolensk is not Cat III equipped and that this airplane was not Cat III equipped and that its crew was not Cat III trained.
Given this, or something like it, and a pushy VIP passenger, the stage was set. Add fog, a planeload of VIPs, and stir.
ExtremismInThe DefenseOfLiberty
Please take my post at 58 out of moderation
ExtremismInThe DefenseOfLiberty
WTF?
AngusTheGodOfMeat
Fine, I will repost then:
@Bill E Pilgrim:
I seriously doubt that the combination of Poland and Russia are going to produce many zero-zero landings in nonmilitary aircraft. My original blurb stands as written.
All one has to do is look at their aircraft. They fly a bunch of old junk that is not going to be equipped with the latest electronics. And they are not going to have the simulators or the money to spend on simulator time to get the training either.
This story provides some background.
Maybe a little overstated, but this is an eighties-era Soviet airplane, not likely that it has the latest equipment. It might, but ….
also ….
.. and at the military airfield in question:
I would wager that Smolensk is not Cat III equipped and that this airplane was not Cat III equipped and that its crew was not Cat III trained.
Given this, or something like it, and a pushy VIP passenger, the stage was set. Add fog, a planeload of VIPs, and stir.
D-Chance.
@DBrown: So was db’s.
Konrad2
As many of the previous commenters have said, the PM of Poland is the Head of Government, while the President is more of a Head of State, so the country will still function. One of the more tragic parts of this accident is that the plane also had many of the relatives of the victims of the Katyn Massacre.
On a political level, I wonder how this will affect Polish elections. There now have to be Presidential elections scheduled within 14 days to be held within 60 days of the announcement. The Kaczynskis’ party, Law and Justice, was pretty far behind in the polls, and it was likely that the Civic Platform would replace them in the next Presidential elections (held at a different date than (basically) Congressional elections).
This would be necessary, because the minority Law and Justice party was obstructing and distracting the ruling coalition’s attempts to govern, with Kaczynski vetoing many different pieces of legislation, in a gridlock situation kind of similar to what we have here with the filibuster. I wonder if the outpouring of sympathy for Kaczynski will result in his party being reelected in the Presidency.
Jaroslaw was the dominant of the twins, he is the one who is still alive, and he has a very firm grip over his party. It’s hard to make a parallel in American government, but it’s kind of like how Putin has total control over the United Russia Party. Every talking head and minister has to agree with Kaczynski or they get replaced, which, considering that Poland has representation by party and not by district, is common and possible. Just saying this so that those curious will realize what changed and what didn’t.
teraz kurwa my
In a nice bit of irony, the interim president will be the Speaker of the parliament who was also going to be Kaczynski’s opponent in the presidential elections in the fall. The Polish PM is the more powerful figure, but the president is not a figurehead. He has legislative veto powers and has considerable perogatives in military and foreign affairs. He also has a large presidential administration. I was no fan of either of the twins, but I do honour them for their important role in the illegal opposition under communism and negotiating a smooth and peaceful transition of power (which they have since campaigned against, feeling that once the threat of a Soviet intervention became moot, there was no reason not to break the agreements). For those who don’t know Polish politics, I’d also point out that a key factor in their victory over Tusk and his party in 2005 was a focus on economic issues – Tusk promised tax cuts for the rich and decreased government spending, the twins promised the reverse. There was also the corruption issue, with the twins having a rep as corruption fighters In reality, while they themselves are personally quite ascetic with no interest in profiting from their power, they happily make use of patronage and corruption as a means of control.
Alex
It is not a plane. When politicians start running complex machinery, instead of trained professionals – that’s when trouble comes. After firing the gutsy military pilot who refused to land in Tbilisi with five (5) presidents on his plane without flight plan and clear understanding who controls Georgia’s airspace despite Kaczynski’s heroics – the new pilot had less testicles and crashed plane in foggy conditions on the 5th attempt to land on a crappy airstrip in Smalensk. This time Kaczynski heroics costed lives of 87 people.
phoebes-in-santa fe
@ExtremismInThe DefenseOfLiberty: I flew a few years ago from Nantucket to Providence on a tiny commercial plane with one pilot. ACK was completely shrouded in fog, as was PVD. There was complete fog in between. The pilot took off blind at ACK, flew blind, and landed blind at PVD.
Beautiful flight and landing. I asked the pilot if she was nervous flying blind – I was terrified – and she said, “Nah, no brainer”. Is that common?
ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty
@phoebes-in-santa fe:
Not enough information really to know what the landing conditions were in the critical time between visual contact with the runway, and touchdown, and how much time that was. Or what the visual conditions were.
I imagine she was answering a question like “Is it nervewracking to fly on instruments?” This is a pilot question, because “flying blind” is not really an aeronautical term. And with the right equipment and the right experience and the right conditions, it can be relatively routine, and is, much of the time.
Take a look at this (somewhat technical) description of the layer cake of categories here:
You can probably tell that the more advanced categories of operation here (the worst conditions) are never going to be “no brainer” ops even under the best circumstances. Any pilot who could sit through a Cat IIIb landing without getting at least a tingle is a little too calm for me. I would question his or her judgment. You are talking about a very precise and delicate operation that has really ugly consequences when it goes wrong.
I have never had the fun privilege of sitting in a Cat III cockpit in real weather and folding hands in my lap while the gear does the work. I am pretty sure my very limited hair would be standing on end the whole time.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
You haven’t known flying fun till you land in Missoula, Montana. It’s not so much landing as a corkscrew dive bomb ending in a controlled crash. Specially fun when it’s snowing and you can almost reach out and touch the snow covered mountains.
phoebes-in-santa fe
@ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty: Well, yes, she did call it an instrument flight. I was sitting in the seat next to her and there were maybe five other passengers, all of whom immediately either went to sleep or pretended to be asleep.
I mean it was really foggy. When the runway lights broke through at PVD and she set that puppy down perfectly, I was just astounded. I was figuring on death by crash any minute. If I was Catholic, I would have been crossing myself and saying the “Hail Mary” the entire flight.
I guess what I am asking is that if some literal “puddle jumper” had the capability to take off, fly, and land in dense fog, why didn’t the Tupelov? Are the “Cat” levels the same in travel outside the US?
I’m Lifetime Platinum status on American, which means I fly more than 50,000 Butt-in-the-Seat miles a year. Most of what I fly on seem to be MD80’s, which I like because I like the 2/3 seat configuration in the back if I have to fly back there. I think that most of the planes are over 25 years old, but obviously McDonnell/Douglas makes better planes than Tupelov or Illushion(?)
I remember reading years back on the commonness of crashes by Aeroflot, particularly on their domestic routes.
In any case, this crash today is a very sad story
Do you read Patrick Smith’s columns in Salon?
ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty
@phoebes-in-santa fe:
I’m sure the Tupelov is equipped for instrument flight, but we don’t know what category it’s equipped for. Or the capability of the crew, and we are still trying to find out exactly what they had at that airport. But ….
The real story of any instrument landing is the exact nature of the visual conditions along the approach path in real time. And these conditions can and do change from minute to minute. Patches of thinner or denser fog are moving around. Light conditions are changing. The ceiling (the exact height at which the base of the fogbank or clouds) is moving up and down. So you can fly the same approach 3 times and get 3 different results.
This latter fact is one of the things that lures pilots to try the duckunder …. let’s shoot one more, and just go a little bit below the legal decision height and take a look, we might get lucky and have a good look and then be able to land ….. and so they duck under, make a minor mistake, miss the path slightly to one side maybe … and there they are in the trees or wires or power poles or other obstruction … or misjudging and hitting the ground. It’s the nasty old duckunder accident, an evil that every pilot knows about, has been warned about, and thinks he will never have … One of the most common mistakes in flying.
There is a point in every flying career where a pilot thinks he is sort of invincible for a while. He is skilled and comfortable with a wide range of conditions and thinks he can just slightly go outside the rule ….. Every type A personality has this experience. You think, I can do it. We’ll just take a little peek under the minimums. No harm, no foul. More often than not, you get away with it. Once in a while, something goes wrong. Once in a great while, it goes really badly wrong like today.
phoebes-in-santa fe
@ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty: Thanks for the info. Are you a professional pilot?
EIGRP
@LT: re: fog diverting BUF to ROC
Similar thing happened to me last week – we were supposed to land in Rochester but diverted to Buffalo. The pilot came on and said the plane in front of us tried the landing but didn’t because visibility was awful.
Now, I don’t understand why they couldn’t land with instruments, but if the pilot doesn’t feel safe and wants to land elsewhere I’m ok with that.
Unfortunately, it took 4 more hours to get home after landing in Buffalo. Thanks, USAir.
Eric
ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty
@phoebes-in-santa fe:
Used to be in a former life. Flight instructor for ten years.
phoebes-in-santa fe
@ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty: Well, you do seem to know a lot and be able to explain it well.
Do you read Patrick Smith’s column in salon.com?
ExtremismInTheDefenseOfLiberty
@phoebes-in-santa fe:
No but I will take a look, thanks.
Glen Tomkins
Apparently monarchism isn’t dead
Yes, it’s a tragedy that so many individuals died. But, if Poland is a republic and not a monarchy, it’s government has not been decapitated. Some people who held public office have died, but the offices remain and will be filled by other people. No matter how wonderful and irreplaceable each of the individuals who died were as fathers or mothers, husbands or wives, sons or daughters; they are all eminently quite replaceable as President, or Minister of Defense, and will not be missed, at all, in those roles.
Yes, I remember the day Kennedy was killed. I was young and impressionable, and all of the older and supposedly wiser people acted as if it were some great national tragedy, quite aside from the undeniable personal tragedy to his family, that the President had been killed. But the older I get, the less sense it makes to me that we indulge this sort of monarchism. Kennedy, no more than any president before or since, was not some demigod, guided by any sort of personal or idiosyncratic abilities and wisdom beyond the ken of mere mortals. The nation was no more, or less, lost the day after he was killed than the day before. He made some awfully foolish decisions, especially about Vietnam, but no more or less than his successor, also especially about Vietnam. He would have been free to make less foolish decisions, and probably would have made less foolish decisions, did we not treat the president as if he were some sort of god-emperor, and force him to make decisions in private, on his own, that should be made by the people’s representatives, in public.
It would be a tragedy if our president were to die. But if the Presidency were to die, that would be as good a thing as the death of monarchy.
asiangrrlMN
What a horrible, sobering tragedy.
NonWonderDog
No links, but it’s my understanding that the Smolensk military airport isn’t equipped with ILS at all. It was apparently equipped with an old Soviet system called СП-50 that’s similar to ILS (my Russian’s terrible, so I’m not sure about this), but it was shut down because no modern planes can use it. The plane was apparently retrofitted with a brand new avionics package and a glass cockpit a couple of years ago, so that probably wasn’t an issue.
What this means is that the pilot was either flying an NDB approach (flying with reference to a non-directional beacon somewhere in the general vicinity of the airport) or he was getting talked down over the radio on the equivalent of a PAR approach (the controller gets a radar fix on you and tells you where to fly). Either way, he really shouldn’t have landed there.