‘Miracle’ Pilot Sullenberger Calls for Simulator Training on Boeing 737 Max
‘Miracle’ Pilot Sullenberger Calls for Simulator Training on Boeing 737 Max
(Bloomberg) -- The pilot who gained fame by safely landing a hobbled US Airways jet on the Hudson River in 2009 called for simulator training for pilots of Boeing Co.’s 737 Max on the malfunctions linked to a pair of crashes that grounded the jet.
“We should all want pilots to experience these challenging situations for the first time in a simulator, not in flight with passengers and crew on board,” retired pilot Chelsey “Sully” Sullenberger told lawmakers Wednesday at a House aviation panel hearing.
The hearing, called to examine the 737 Max crashes, included representatives of pilots, flight attendants and the airlines. A prior hearing included representatives of the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration.
Two 737 Max crashes since October killed 346 people and led to a worldwide grounding of the jet. Boeing and the FAA are working on software fixes to restore the jet to flight.
Simulator training wasn’t required for pilots already certified for prior versions of the 737. An FAA advisory board that examines pilot training requirements for aircraft, which reviewed Boeing’s proposed fix, tentatively concluded in April that simulator training wasn’t needed for pilots transitioning from older models of the 737 to the Max.
The proposed fix to the 737 Max would prevent the kind of severe, repeated nose-down dives that occurred in the two accidents. The Max updates are designed to lessen the need for additional training by preventing such dives.
Nevertheless, Sullenberger said simulator training will also allow pilots to physically experience the cockpit warnings and recovery procedures that crews encountered in the doomed 737 Max flights.
“They need to develop a muscle memory of their experiences,” Sullenberger said. “It needs to be intuitive.”
Sullenberger gained fame by safely ditching a jet disabled by striking a flock of birds on the Hudson River off Manhattan, an event that came to be known as the “Miracle on the Hudson.”
Sullenberger said he recently experienced a recreation of the disasters in a simulator.
“Even knowing what was going to happen, I could see how crews could have run out of time and altitude before they could have solved the problems,” he said.
Daniel Carey, president of the Allied Pilots Association that represents American Airlines flight crews, told reporters after the hearing that simulator training would be the best scenario.
However, he said, the handful of 737 Max full-flight simulators available globally would make the logistics of training the airline’s more than 4,000 737 pilots “almost impossible.”
Instead, he said a computer-based training along with video of the simulator session described by Sullenberger would be sufficient until American pilots hold their regular training sessions, which happen every nine months.
“That would satisfy us to bring this airplane back with great confidence in safety,” Carey said.
--With assistance from Alan Levin.
To contact the reporter on this story: Ryan Beene in Washington at rbeene@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jon Morgan at jmorgan97@bloomberg.net, Elizabeth Wasserman
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