Navy: Human error to blame for March cable break aboard USS Eisenhower flight deck

[ryoder 1,590]

http://pilotonline.com/news/military/local/navy-human-error-to-blame-for-march-cable-break-aboard/article_c4675c54-6cdc-5882-867a-68f961145c9d.html

"There are only three things of value: younger women, faster airplanes, and bigger crocodiles" - Arthur Jones.

[jclalor 12]

ryoder

http://pilotonline.com/news/military/local/navy-human-error-to-blame-for-march-cable-break-aboard/article_c4675c54-6cdc-5882-867a-68f961145c9d.html

That was some of the most incredible footage I've ever seen. Brought back a lot of memories watching the PLAT (Pilot Landing Aid Telivision) footage, I worked in PLAT on board the USS Constellation, I taped some pretty crazy things.

[JohnMitchell 16]

Holy Fooook! I was so relieved to see that plane come climbing out after that. Good use of ground effect by the pilots. Great lesson on "keep flying the plane, keep flying the plane."

[jakee 1,489]

JohnMitchell

Holy Fooook! I was so relieved to see that plane come climbing out after that. Good use of ground effect by the pilots. Great lesson on "keep flying the plane, keep flying the plane."

True. The backlash from the cable on deck was terrifying though.

Pretty serious list of injuries, but I'm amazed no-one lost limbs or got killed.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[Phil1111 1,149]

Thats the training that over five decades of active carrier operations will illustrate. That China will have to learn when it places its carriers into operation.

As for the new Ford class carrier USN mismanagement is at work as well.
"The new Advanced Arresting Gear (AAG) has yet to be tested with a live aircraft, and the Ford is expected to begin sea trials this fall with the system installed but not fully proven. The Navy is concerned enough to have reviewed the implications of returning to its tried-and-true Mark 7 landing system for the Enterprise, the third ship in the class."
http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense-news/2016/07/11/pentagon-inspector-general-navy-aircraft-carrier-general-atomics-advanced-arresting-gear-aag-shipbuilding-ford-kennedy-enterprise/86932922/

“The Advanced Arresting Gear has become a model for how not to do acquisition of needed technology,” a senior Navy official told USNI News on Tuesday.
“Exactly how we move forward is still being worked out.”....
“Doing a detailed engineering assessment we recognized the water twister was under-designed,” Rear Adm. Tom Moore said.
“GA was responsible for the design — remember they’re on a firm fixed price contract — so the vendor was responsible for the fix.”

The fix delayed the testing schedule by two years.
https://news.usni.org/2016/05/24/19801

"The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday blasted the U.S. Navy’s Ford-class aircraft carrier program as an acquisition debacle.

Sen. John McCain, a Republican from Arizona who served as a naval aviator during Vietnam, didn’t waste anytime launching into his criticism of the sea service’s $40 billion effort to develop the first three new supercarriers.

“The Ford-class aircraft carrier program is one of our nation’s most complex and most expensive defense acquisition projects,” he said in his opening statement during a hearing on the matter. “It’s also become, unfortunately, one of the most spectacular acquisition debacles in recent memory — and that’s saying something.”
http://www.dodbuzz.com/2015/10/01/mccain-ford-class-overruns-may-mean-fewer-carriers/

[jumpwally 0]

i see no video,,,what gives ?

smile, be nice, enjoy life
FB # - 1083

[ryoder 1,590]

jumpwally

i see no video,,,what gives ?

The link still works.
But here is a link directly to the Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-EHwYOfY94

"There are only three things of value: younger women, faster airplanes, and bigger crocodiles" - Arthur Jones.

[jumpwally 0]

Thx,,,wowza...

smile, be nice, enjoy life
FB # - 1083

[riggerrob 643]

Flight decks are the busiest and most dangerous airports with dozens of things happening simultaneously.
I have only worked on the flight decks of HMCS Athabaskan and HMCS Iroquois and we only handled Sea King helicopters. Even at 1/10 the operational tempo of an aircraft carrier, it was still a busy and dangerous place what with parks and starts and folding the blades traversing it into the hangar, the haul-down system, hot refuelling, 30 degree rolls, winds, rotor down wash, noise, ship's exhaust, rain, heat, cold, etc.

Bottom line, it amazes me how few accidents occurr on flight decks.

[Phil1111 1,149]

"Navy investigators blamed human error and an improperly programmed valve for a March incident in which eight sailors were injured when a cable used to catch a landing E-2C Hawkeye snapped on the flight deck of the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower.

According to a Navy report obtained by The Virginian-Pilot through a Freedom of Information Act request, maintenance personnel missed at least one and possibly two “critical steps” while working on an engine that helps operate the carrier flight deck’s cables, which are called cross deck pendants, after a previous landing. As a result, the engine failed to slow the aircraft, instead causing the pendant to break “at or near” the Hawkeye’s tailhook.

The Navy did not find evidence of willful dereliction of duty or negligence by the maintenance workers. The report said that while there was a “lack of procedural compliance” while troubleshooting an error code from a previous arrested landing, “the sailors involved reasonably believed they had properly and conscientiously completed the complicated procedure.”

The Eisenhower Strike Group could not be reached for additional comment Friday. The strike group left Norfolk Naval Station on June 1 for a seven-month deployment and on June 28 began flying combat sorties in support of Operation Inherent Resolve from the eastern Mediterranean Sea, the Navy has said.

Cross deck pendants are 1½-inch-thick steel wires that stretch across a carrier flight deck and are used to catch a landing aircraft’s tailhook. The four pendants that cross an aircraft carrier’s flight deck are placed at 20-foot intervals and can be used for up to 125 landings, or “traps.”

The other system of cables is attached to the steam engines underneath the flight deck; they are called purchase cables.

Those cables pull a movable part of the engine that travels along greased skids and pushes a giant piston into a cylinder full of pressurized hydraulic fluid. The piston compresses the fluid, bringing the wire on the flight deck, and the aircraft, to a stop.

In the March 18 incident, personnel that were troubleshooting a fault code from a previous arrested landing with the Eisenhower’s No. 4 arresting gear engine were using an approved Navy procedure when they missed steps that led them to misprogram a valve that controls the gear engine’s pressure and energy absorption, according to the report...

Eight sailors suffered a variety of injuries, including a fractured ankle, wrist, pelvis and legs. One sailor received skull and facial fractures while another suffered a possible traumatic brain injury.

A C-2A Greyhound and an MH-60S Seahawk also received about $82,000 in damage, according to the report. At the time of the incident, the No. 4 cable had been trapped 16 times.

The report credits the “phenomenal airmanship” by the Hawkeye’s crew. The plane landed safely at Norfolk Naval Station, where it is part of the Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron 123, or “Screwtops.”"
http://pilotonline.com/news/military/local/navy-human-error-to-blame-for-march-cable-break-aboard/article_c4675c54-6cdc-5882-867a-68f961145c9d.html