Travel & Holidays Recent Plane Crash

I was saddened to hear about the recent Colombia plane crash where over 70 people have been killed, most from the soccer club Chapeconese. It immediately reminded me of the plane crash in the Andes many years ago. That was a truly amazing story of survival.

Colombia plane crash: 71 dead and six survivors on flight carrying Chapecoense football team

Here are some statistics on sports teams suffering similar incidents.

A look at other sports teams devastated by deadly plane crashes

MTR

 

I have an interest in planes staying in the air as I used to fly 2 weeks out of 3. It always staggers me why you'd let an entire Australian Olympics team get on one plane (even if it is Qantas) or a football team get onto one like yesterday. The Royals don't do it.

 

my understadning is that it wasnt the top of the top team......

 

I seem to recall being told that blue chips aren't that keen on putting their entire leadership team on the one plane either.

 

Spot on. I worked for a few large financial instituitions and I can confirm that there is a rule that no more then 50% of a particular team and 20% of Senior Management (Heads of & above) can be on the same flight.

 

I didnt know policiticans were so valued........

 

Confirmed that the plane ran out of fuel.... I initially did not believe this, how could this happen???

 

The fuel gauge was frozen at half full. Happened to me once when I was driving to Jindabyne. Had to get out and hitch hike (and show a bit of leg).

 

Almost all multinationals will have a limit on who can fly together.
Chevron for example doesn't let two board members onto the same flight.

Interestingly I've never seen or heard of any companies limiting the number allowed to drive together.

The risk perception is wrong.

Blacky

 

Here is the update, how tragic

'What he did was mass murder': little sympathy for Colombia plane crash pilot

 

One hopes this wasn't in a Chrissy Teigen kind of way...

 

If it wasn't so tragic it would be funny...

How the $&@) do you short fill a plane? How the ()$&@ don't you notice while you are flying?

 

Pilot was an owner of the airline, trying to save a few dollars by not doing a refueling stop, got caught out by an unexpected delay (another plane had an emergency landing ahead).

A friend of mine did run out of fuel in northern NSW in a light aircraft, didn´t check properly before take off. He successfully belly landed it in a cow paddock (but wrote off the plane). His daughter was able to scribble out her last words on paper on the way down.

 

A pilot once told me there is no point to pick aircraft type, the safety standards are the same. (I.e an A380 is not safer than an old Russian propeller). In aviation history almost all plane crashes are caused by human, such as pilot's mishandling, a suicidal Co-pilot (the Germanwings crush), terrorist attack etc.
Very little were caused by extreme weather. (Pilots are well trained in this regard, some will deliberately fly through storm rather than fly around it to save fuel, depends on the airline.)
So i think for my peace of mind I will still choose large airlines as they probably have better training for pilots even though they are more expensive.

 

Your probably right.
I have watched many air crash investigations, human error is not the only factor, mechanical failure also a major issue if airlines don't have proper and regular maintenance checks etc.

I do like Qantas