On April 4, a serious incident involving an Air France Boeing 777300ER caught the attention of people around the world. It was said at the time that the plane had “spun” and gone off course while attempting to land in Paris.
However, a preliminary report by the Bureau d’Enquetes et d’Analyses (BEA), which is responsible for investigating air accidents and accidents in France, says the event may have been caused by the two Air France pilots doing controls in pulled in opposite directions. Control columns were “out of sync” for 14 seconds, the report said.
The incident flight was AF11, a regular service between New York and Paris. On the first approach for landing, the plane turned left and started flying so frighteningly that one of the pilots could be heard shouting, “Stop! To stop! Stop it!” on an audio recording with air traffic control.
⚠️ Serious incident on @Boeing #777 @AirFranceFR FGSQJ on 4/5/22 at #CDG /Research update: https://t.co/i9gnLL7vJH pic.twitter.com/VDUWgz5dRO
— BEA ✈️ ⚙️🔬🇫🇷 (@BEA_Aero) April 27, 2022
“The plane is practically going insane,” one of the pilots told an air traffic controller as he struggled to regain control and aborted the approach. Luckily everything went well on the second try and the pros ordered a safe landing.
Shortly after the fall, attention immediately turned to the Boeing 777’s flight control systems, but the BEA says initial analyzes showed no “inconsistencies” between “the movements of the controls and the movements of the plane.”
The BEA says it will attempt to replicate the actions of the two pilots at the flight controls to see if this will reproduce the aircraft’s behavior. After aborting the landing attempt, the captain held the control column with his nose down slightly while the copilot made “stronger” inputs with his nose up.
Like all previous ones, this incident will also help increase the safety of flights around the world. BEA will publish the results of the simulator tests shortly.