150 points | 22 days ago | 292 comments

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49650418

The FO held an airline transport pilot certificate with a type rating for the Boeing 767 that he received on April 2, 2025. The FO was hired by 21 Air in February 2025. He had accrued about 2,800 total hours of flight experience, as reported in his interview with NTSB investigators, of which 800 hours were in the accident airplane make and model.

This stood out to me --- both pilots are extremely new.

> According to Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) Out and FDR data, flight 7598 was about 105 ft above ground level (agl) at a groundspeed of 177 kts as it crossed the threshold of runway 30. The accident airplane touched down about 3,750 ft past the threshold at a groundspeed of 160 kts.

Runway is 9360 ft long, so touchdown 40% down the runway.

> winds were from 190° at 19 kts with gusts to 22 kts

So, that's strong crosswind from slightly behind - not great.

> 1:42 [1 min 42 sec before end of recording]: The captain called for flaps to be set to 20 degrees, and the FO cautioned they were too fast. The FO made additional comments regarding the airplane’s excessive speed throughout the remainder of the recording. There was not a consistent verbal response to the comments about speed.

> 00:31 Sounds similar to the airplane touching down.

> 00:15 The captain called for a go-around.

> 00:10 Sounds similar to the airplane departing the paved surface.

Looks like they landed way too long and fast, without deploying speed brakes and thrust reverser. Should have gone around. Then there was a go-around attempt that came way too late and was aborted.

> The landing gear weight-on-wheels (WOW) parameter intermittently switched between “air” to “ground” for about 7 seconds. The WOW parameter switched to ground for the remainder of the recorded data when the airplane had about 2,730 ft of runway remaining. The FDR data showed the speed brakes remained stowed and the thrust reversers did not deploy during the landing and subsequent landing rollout.

> Wheel brakes were manually applied at a groundspeed of 146 kts. The brake pedals for wheel braking were subsequently released about 8 seconds later at a groundspeed of 120 kts and the throttle resolver angle for both engines increased to go-around thrust values; the airplane had about 930 ft of runway remaining.

> About 4 seconds later, the throttle resolver angles for both engines reduced to idle values at a groundspeed of 117 kts, when wheel brakes were reapplied; the airplane had about 415 ft of runway remaining.