UAAG Air Crash Investigation Team

Chapter 8

Views:

The pilot controls the aircraft, not like riding a bicycle, by correcting the handlebars and stepping on the pedals.

Airplanes are undisputed behemoths.

Even a small flap weighs tens of kilograms, and it is difficult for ordinary people to shake it.

Then the pilot controls the plane, of course, not by brute force, but by a complete control system.

A hundred years ago, this system was realized by the simplest pulleys and steel cables, using the principle of leverage, and it was called a mechanical system.

After that, it became a hydraulic system. Through the hydraulic pump, the power of human beings is amplified to realize the control of the aircraft. For example, the pilot only exerts a force of 1 Newton, but the hydraulic pump can amplify it hundreds or thousands of times, so that this giant can be manipulated.

Today, with the development of computers, the telex system has gradually become the mainstream.

The fly-by-wire system allows computers to control the aircraft.

This view is still somewhat controversial in the industry.

Whether it should be based on pilots or computers, several major aircraft manufacturers have their own priorities, and there are endless debates.

But what is not in dispute is that they all use the fly-by-wire system on the new aircraft.

Maifei F435 uses the telex system.

The fly-by-wire system includes all aspects of the aircraft. The computer can control the take-off and landing of the aircraft, the change of the rudder angle, and the size of the engine.

Since EASA confirmed the cause of the "four engine flameout" accident, they first ruled out the two reasons of fuel exhaustion and weather factors. What they next suspected was not the human factor, but the telex system.

Computers make mistakes.

A computer error shut down all four engines simultaneously, the most likely cause of the accident.

But now Zhuohuan told him to check the engine.

Check the engine related to the fly-by-wire system, not the fly-by-wire system related to the engine.

The engine is the main body, and the fly-by-wire system is secondary.

The decision is puzzling.

Just like what Fucheng said, this is four engines shutting down together.

If there is really a problem with the engine itself, how could all four of them go wrong together. But now Zhuo Huan asked them to check from the engine, everyone felt incredible, but they had no choice but to start from the metal fatigue.

metal fatigue.

After repeating the same work tasks for a long time, metal materials will suffer from structural damage.

Quantitative change produces qualitative change. When tiny cracks and damage accumulate to a certain extent, fracture will occur.

Previous investigators did not examine the engine in detail, so it is likely that the damage to engine parts caused by metal fatigue was mistaken for the explosion after the crash.

What everyone has to do now is to find out every key part and examine it in detail to determine whether they were damaged before the crash or after the crash.

It's a physical job.

Everyone checked together for a whole day, and only one of the twentieth was checked.

At this time, the black box was sent over by McFly Company.

The moment Su Fei saw the black box, with tears in his eyes, he ran up excitedly: "Is this for me?"

Old Joseph didn't know whether to laugh or cry: "Look, it's for your pleasure."

Su Fei was overjoyed. After sending the black box upstairs with the staff, he ran down and said to Fucheng, "Brother, I'm sorry, I'm leaving you alone. I'm going to do another great cause. Don't worry." Well, when I fix the black box, I can prove what RIP said is wrong and save you from suffering."

Fucheng smiled and said, "Okay, I'll wait for you."

Su Fei suddenly felt that he had carried the hope of the whole village to defeat the Great Demon King, and returned to the second floor with a lofty heart. When leaving, he also kicked in Zhuo Huan's direction, Fu Cheng's eyes widened in surprise. After Su Fei left, he turned his head and looked in the direction where Su Fei kicked his foot just now.

That man was nothing like a big devil.

He was wearing a white T-shirt with a black jacket tied around his waist. The long hair was pushed back by the master a few times, and tied a little. Holding a flashlight in his right hand and a metal fatigue detector in his left, he sat on the inside of the number one engine on a high stool, with the beam of the flashlight pointing upwards, and carefully inspected every part above the inside of the engine.

He was extremely focused, as if there was a water curtain separating him from the noisy voices of the outside world.

There seemed to be light in those eyes.

Fu Cheng looked away calmly.

The repair of the black box was more difficult than Su Fei imagined.

In fact, if the black box is so easy to repair, McFly would not have spent several months on repairing it.

Twenty-three days later, the metal fatigue identification of the engine was completed, and no metal fatigue was found.

On the other hand, the black box has not been repaired yet.

It took a full twenty-three days to check all four engines from the inside to the outside, but nothing was found. Several people in UAAG did not have any opinions, but investigators from other agencies and organizations had some objections in private.

When Fucheng poured water from the tea room, he heard an EASA investigator whisper to his companion: "Although Mr. Patrick is recognized in the industry as a genius aircraft designer, this is an accident investigation, not an aircraft design. This is his first Participate in the investigation of the plane accident for the second time, you have no experience at all, and you have wasted more than 20 days in vain."

"To be precise, this can be regarded as his first time. In the air crash of Loge Airlines four years ago, the black box has not been recovered from the sea. After more than three years of investigation, no clues have been found at all."

"I'm not disrespecting Mr. Patrick, it's just that maybe he's better suited to building airplanes than investigating air crashes...uh..."

Holding a water glass, Fu Cheng walked past the two of them.

One of them hurriedly said: "Fu, don't get me wrong, we don't mean that."

Stopping, Fu Cheng turned around, looked at them, and said word by word in a calm but firm voice: "He is Reid Irvin Patrick."

After the words fell, he walked away.

Behind them, the two investigators of EASA froze in place without making a sound.

The black-haired young man took a few steps with a water glass in his hand, and when he reached the corner, he suddenly stopped.

After a long time, Fucheng's voice was calm: "Teacher Zhuo."

Holding a cup of coffee in his right hand, Zhuo Huan leaned his back slightly against the wall. He lowered his head and took a sip of coffee, then turned his head to look at Fucheng. "You seem to always have this expression."

"Teacher Zhuo?"

"Calm, peaceful, neither sad nor happy." Standing up straight, Zhuo Huan thought for a while, "When he smiles, he is polite and distant, but when he is not smiling, he looks like a statue standing there. Oh yes, it's a bit like that."

Fu Cheng looked in the direction of his finger.

Lina is a standard French person with a strong sense of romance and ceremony. Even if she temporarily works in a foreign country, there is a SEEROSE immortal flower bear on her desk. The pink rose bear is treasured in a glass case and tied with a black bow.

Withdrawing his gaze, Fu Cheng said, "I don't understand what you're talking about, Mr. Zhuo."

Zhuohuan took a deep look at him.

for a long time.

Mr. Long Legs stretched his legs and gave orders: "Let's go, let's go downstairs and have a look."

At night, the staff went back to the second floor to sort out the metal fatigue data that had been checked before. The first floor was empty, except for four huge engines.

Confidential parts are everywhere, and the two threw the disposable water cups in their hands into the trash can when they went downstairs to prevent accidents.

Zhuo Huan said as he walked, "Excluding the weather and human factors, if the flight system is wrong, what do you think is the most likely place to go wrong?"

"Telex system."

"So firm?"

"Yes." Fucheng added: "You just said it's the most likely, not 100%."

"What if it must be the engine?"

Fu Cheng raised his head, looked at him, and finally showed a puzzled expression: "Why must it be an engine?"

Zhuo Huan pointed to his own brain: "Intuition."

Fucheng: "The current monitoring result is that there is no part of the engine damaged. Except for the damage caused by the explosion after the crash, it is intact."

Zhuo Huan said to himself: "On January 17, 2008, when British Airways Flight 38 landed at Heathrow Airport, all four engines shut down and finally made an emergency landing on the lawn in front of the runway. Fortunately, no one was there. Death. Subsequent investigations showed that the reason was that the engine’s heat exchanger was poorly designed. When the plane flew over Russia, the temperature was too low, and the moisture in the fuel condensed into ice. ?"

Fucheng nodded.

He used to be a pilot, but since he was transferred to UAAG a month ago, he has made up a lot of accident investigation information. The accident of British Airways Flight 38 was also on his reading list.

Fucheng: "Because the accident was caused by icing, after the plane crashed, all the ice melted into water and disappeared. This caused great obstacles to the investigation process, and it took 8 months for the AAIB to find out the truth .”

Zhuohuan: "Does it sound familiar?"

Fucheng was taken aback.

Zhuo Huan laughed, and said in a loose voice, "It's very similar to this time. Also when flying over the Arctic Circle, the water will disappear, so the murderer can't be found. This time, the murderer also disappeared strangely."

With a buzzing sound, it hit Fu Cheng's brain.

The face described as the statue of the eternal flower finally showed a variety of emotions, and he said hurriedly: "You mean, this time it's also a water problem?!"

"Did I say so?"

Fu Cheng was stunned: "Teacher Zhuo?"

Zhuo Huan didn't answer, but suddenly asked: "A month ago when you were at the crash site, what were you looking at when you stroked the scorched ground at the initial impact point?"

Fu Cheng slightly opened his lips.

"Or, what did you see?"

Falcon-like gazes shot straight over, pressing into the dark-haired young man's eyes.

Zhuo Huan had an imperceptible smile on his lips, but the smile didn't reach his eyes, and he looked sharply at the black-haired young man in front of him. It's hard to tell what kind of eyes it was, but Fucheng felt a trace of expectation and desire from it.

This man seemed to be expecting something, what kind of answer he was expecting, and then use his answer to prove something.

what is it

After pondering for a long time, Fucheng: "Speak out, can you not laugh?"

Zhuo Huan never expected such an answer: "What?"

Fucheng looked at him seriously, and said it again word by word: "Can you stop laughing?"

"… Um."

Fucheng: "I feel, it's its fault."

"he?"

"It, McFly F435... that plane."

Zhuohuan: "..."

Fu Cheng: "You said you never laughed!"

Zhuohuan covered his cheeks: "Am I smiling?"

Fucheng: "..."

His face gradually turned hot, Fu Cheng regretted it so much, why did he answer this answer, make up anything, or ignore this man's question like a month ago, wouldn't it be fine. The only thing he was lucky about was that it was night now, the lights on the first floor were not turned on, and no matter how bright the moonlight was, it could not illuminate his reddish cheeks.

The shame in his heart was gradually turning into anger, but just before that shame and anger was about to erupt, a hand that was so cold that it almost made people feel lonely gently pressed his head.

Fu Cheng raised his head slowly.

Zhuo Huan rubbed his hair, then curled up his fingers and flicked lightly on his forehead.

"Thanks, I like this answer."

The man walked around him, turned and walked upstairs.

Halfway through, Zhuo Huan stood in the middle of the stairs, turned to look at Fu Cheng: "Su Fei said that the black box can be repaired tomorrow. Do you want to know the answer?"

The moonlight was not bright enough, but it illuminated the man and the young pilot standing under the stairs.

Fucheng couldn't help but stepped up the stairs and walked to this person's side.

***

The next day, the repair of the black box was completed. Su Fei imported all the flight data into the computer, and he was about to sort out the data in detail, when Zhuo Huan interrupted him: "Listen to the CVR first."

CVR, the cockpit voice recorder, records all sounds on the plane.

On the second floor of the investigation headquarters, dozens of people tensed their backs, waiting for the final answer.

Su Fei nodded, and he began to import the data in the CVR.

In an instant, hundreds of sound fluctuation curves appeared on the computer screen.

Zhuo Huan: "Use the Fourier transform to strip out the sound in the cockpit. I want to hear what the pilot said, as well as the instrument prompts in the cockpit. For the time being, I will only listen to the last thirty seconds."

Half an hour later, the sound of JAL JL917 30 seconds before the crash slowly sounded from the stereo.

"Make sure the throttle is tightened."

"Confirmed throttle tightening."

"Flaps open 30 degrees."

"Flaps open 30 degrees."

"Getting ready to deploy the landing gear... wait, I suddenly lost thrust."

"Check engine switch condition."

"Engine switch is on."

"Where's the gas pedal?"

"Four engines stalled, ah, soon, the plane is going to crash!"

"Ah, get up, pull up!"

A harsh siren sounded, and the crash warning system of McFly F435 announced over and over again in a cold voice—

"GLIDE SLOPE! GLIDE SLOPE! GLIDE SLOPE!"

"Ah, it's about to hit!"

"boom-"

The investigation headquarters was dead silent.

No one knew how long it had passed before a cold and thin voice sounded.

Zhuo Huan: "JAL JL917 crash accident, confirmed to rule out human factors."