The Lion Air pilot who was flying the airline’s ill-fated 737 MAX the day before it crashed near Jakarta, killing 189, issued a “pan pan” alert and made a request to ATC to turn back to Bali because of technical problems.
According to a Reuters report, citing Bali Airport official Herson, the captain then canceled the request after the technical problem stopped. A “pan pan” indicates an urgent situation and is one step below a Mayday.
“The captain himself was confident enough to fly to Jakarta from Denpasar,” Herson told Reuters.
.@GeoffreyT_Air: The black box that's been found, is the flight data recorder which basically measures the 'heartbeat' of the aeroplane. We're waiting to find the cockpit voice recorder which gives us all the conversations pilots had.
MORE: https://t.co/YsWQnYstal #SkyLiveNow pic.twitter.com/vewrHH4ePM
— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) November 2, 2018
.@GeoffreyT_Air: The Indonesians are under no obligation to reveal the data. There will be intense pressure on them though; there are about 7,500 737s flying around the world and the world needs to know if it's an issue with the model.
MORE: https://t.co/YsWQnYstal #SkyLiveNow pic.twitter.com/70YsWAoggL
— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) November 2, 2018
The news agency also quoted a pilot of another plane approaching Bali at the time and able to listen to a radio conversation between the Lion Air pilot and air traffic controllers.
“Because of the Pan-Pan call, we were told to hold off, circling the airport in the air,” the pilot said.
“The Lion plane requested to return back to Bali five minutes after take-off, but then the pilot said the problem had been resolved and he was going to go ahead to Jakarta.”
READ Emirates to buy Rolls Royce powered A380s.
The Lion Air 737 MAX that crashed on Monday, October 29 had serious control problems the day before, similar to those seen just before the ill-fated flight crashed into the sea.
On the previous flight from Denpasar to Jakarta on Sunday, October 28, the 737 had experienced the same erratic values (BELOW WHERE HIGHLIGHTED) in altitude and airspeed after takeoff. But after 8 minutes the values stabilized.
A log entry cited by AirlineRatings.com shows “airspeed unreliable and alt disagree shown after take off. It adds that the Captain’s instrument was unreliable and handover control to FO.”
Passengers on that flight said that the plane pitched violently and many passengers were screaming and sick.
Lion Air has confirmed that the aircraft had a “technical problem” on the previous flight, “which had been resolved according to the procedure.”
The copy of the tech log shows that the Pitot Tube and Static Port were examined and checked.
Put simply a pitot-static system is a system of pressure-sensitive instruments that are used in aviation to determine an aircraft’s airspeed, altitude, and altitude trend.
Lion Air Group chief executive Edward Sirait said the airline could not comment further at this time.
The last major accident in Indonesia was in December 2014 when an AirAsia Indonesia’s Airbus A320 aircraft crashed into the waters after taking off from Surabaya to Singapore with 162 people on board.
