Heroes or madmen? Experts differently assessed the actions of the pilots who landed in the field

Elena Petrova, Natalia Seibil

Captain Sergey Belov and second pilot Eduard Semenov were able to land the A-320 with the hydraulics failed in a wheat field while the pressure remained in it. It has already become known that they want to present both pilots to state awards.

Meanwhile, the Novosibirsk Investigative Department on Transport opened a criminal case under the article on violation of traffic safety rules and operation of air transport. This is standard procedure. The case is always opened when there is an incident in the air, especially with the participation of passengers. And there were 167 of them, including 23 children.

Not much is known about the incident itself.

According to Flightradar, before landing in Omsk, the board first dropped by 600 meters, and then abruptly gained altitude to 5.5 thousand and headed back to Novosibirsk. According to BAZA, the hydraulics failed, and the flaps did not come out of the plane. On the second lap, the pilots decided to return to Novosibirsk, because there is a longer strip.

«The crew was afraid that the plane would not have enough runway length at Omsk airport, and they would roll out of it at full speed. All due to the fact that when the hydraulics of the aircraft fail, the braking flaps on the wings do not work, » unnamed sources told Shot.

The landing gear also did not come in, so the board flew at a reduced speed of about 500 km per hour. At such a reduced speed, fuel consumption was increased, and the pilots would not have reached the runway at all. I had to sit down in an open field.

Some experts now say: lucky.

What did the pilots do, from the point of view of the pilot

What helped the pilots save people's lives: chance or school? Honored Pilot of Russia, Hero of Russia, test pilot Alexander Garnaev answered the question «NI»:

— There is no such school and there cannot be. No one ever teaches anyone this. And the manufacturer does not provide for such a situation from the word «at all». These planes are designed in such a way that there can be no refusal on them, which does not allow landing at the nearest airfield. In principle, this cannot be. Generally. From the word «absolutely». Airbus aircraft cannot have failures that do not allow landing at the nearest alternate airfield or departure airfield.

Alexander Garnaev recalls the words of another pilot, Hero of Russia Damir Yusupov, commander of the same Ural Airlines, who also landed an Airbus 321 aircraft of the same company in a field near Zhukovsky on August 15, 2019. The pilot then said that the more absurd the actions of the pilot, the greater the chances of a safe landing outside the airfield. «NEITHER» was asked by Alexander Garnaev:

— Do you disagree with this logic?

«I'm not. But this was said by the hero of Russia Damir Yusupov, who did not do a single correct action, who acted in an exceptionally absurd way with the rudders, and the crew talked to each other only with obscenities. Which has not fulfilled any of the recommendations of the manufacturer Airbus. But it pleased God to leave them alive. So, following this logic, it is necessary to put as many crazy pilots as possible for the management of such aircraft. Maybe then flight safety will increase from this.

The sarcasm of the Hero of Russia can be understood. He has been testing airplanes all his life to make them as safe as possible. This is not only a feature of the Russian mentality, Garnaev believes. He believes that the «miracle on the Hudson», when the pilot landed a plane full of passengers in front of Manhattan, fits into the same paradigm:

— Landing on the Hudson is from the same series, when a completely frostbitten pilot makes a completely insane decision, and God wants to help him. Following the point of view of the American pilot Chelsea Sullenberger and the Russian Damir Yusupov, the more crazy the pilot sits in the cockpit and the more absurd decisions he makes, the higher the flight safety. This is their logic. I have no control over it at all. We will look further.

Actions of the crew from the point of view of an aviation expert

Candidate of Technical Sciences, aircraft designer, aviation expert Vadim Lukashevich assessed the incident from the point of view of technology. He also has many questions about the actions of the crew. Obviously, the problem was discovered in Omsk. The plane cannot land with a full tank, so the emergency boards are circling over the airfield, generating fuel. Vadim Lukashevich says:

— I found a problem, circling over Omsk. Well, circle on, generate fuel. How much do you need — half an hour, an hour, an hour and a half, two. As much as you need, work out as much until your mass becomes acceptable for landing. And then go to the landing. You've got an airport down there with all the emergency services. You have a fire station there, you have medics there. While you're hanging out in the air, you can foam the strip if you sit belly down on concrete without a landing gear. Even if you don't have enough lanes, you'll roll out of the lane. There are safety end lanes there, it's still hundreds of meters of soil. It's not concrete, it's soil.
Instead, someone smart, I wonder, on the ground or a pilot, decides to fly to Novosibirsk. With a problem. Above the taiga.

Novosibirsk Tolmachevo Airport is attractive because it has a very good runway. It is so good, the expert says, that it was made as a spare lane when dispersing strategic aviation in the event of a nuclear war. It was this lane that was the backup lane for the Buran, if the space shuttle returned from space due to some emergency situation.

— She's certainly better. But you are flying there with a problem over the Taika. On the way, you generate zero fuel. And you sit down on some edge 200 kilometers from the nearest city. Among the Siberian taiga. Why didn't you stay over Omsk? They flew over the taiga. Wouldn't they have found that clearing? Where to sit? There would not have been one destruction of the plane there. There would have been serious human casualties. They were just lucky.

They were lucky that the field was flat, that there were no wires, that there was no equipment on the field… The aviation god was really with Sergey Belov and Eduard Semenov today. For this, 167 passengers and crew members are sincerely grateful to them.

And in How is Russia? Winners are never judged.