Am I reading the AVH article correctly that Medellin had two separate flights declare emergency at the same time, an A-320 that landed safely and the RJ that crashed 5 min later?

@TomMcW it seems so -- the A320 had an unknown issue which caused it to divert, and the RJ was very timid about declaring their low fuel state (shades of Avianca 52)

I'm baffled by the use of SLVR as the fuel stop though

SLTR would have better balanced the two legs, and also is a less busy airport overall

correction (!): apparently the team commercialed to SLVR from their origin airport then boarded the ill-fated charter at SLVR

as to the other diversion -- the descent to FL160 makes me suspect pressurization problems

@Shalvenay I wonder if the other emergency is why they flew a holding pattern. It would be tragically ironic if one emergency caused the other - of ATC put them in a hold to prioritize the Airbus and they ran out of gas. I immediately thought of that Avianca flight too.

@TomMcW yeah, I think that if they had spoken up assertively about their fuel status, the Airbus would have held .. a pressurization emergency that's already gotten down to breathable air isn't nearly as time critical as a fuel emergency

They declared an electrical though. That seems odd

@TomMcW I think the electrical emergency was the generators kicking off because 1 and 4 had quit burning

or at least running at reduced capacity

Well, with survivors and both recorders found there should be more info soon

@TomMcW yeah. I'm not sure what to say about the flight planning at this point though

@Shalvenay So they were pushing it on the range of the aircraft?

@Shalvenay Apparently they asked for the hold to troubleshoot the electrical problem.

@TomMcW quite

@TomMcW hrm

"That dude who contacted ATC via a facebook post"

(Shameless star bait)

@voretaq7 I'll bite. ;)

You guys

There's an E6B app

like… it simulates the actual slide-rule

I'm dying.

172 MB, they weren't kidding about high resolution

I don't get that. My flight computer has km and litres marked at the 10 on the outer dial, and it makes the conversions very simple. Why would you put them at a different number? (I appreciate that it makes no difference to the ratio, but it's harder to read.)

@DanHulme What do you mean "marked at 10"?

(I have no idea where liters or km or anything else are on mine, I just spin the inside dial until the number lines up with the correct arrow and then find the one I want to convert to :P)

@voretaq7 on his, the km mark is at 48.5 and nm is at 66; on mine, km is at 10 and nm is at 54

the ratio is the same, but it's much easier to find the metric label because they're all at the top of the fixed ring

it also makes the specific gravity scales easier, because the kg/l scale is directly over the same numbers on the outer ring

@DanHulme eh, idunno - I find putting anything at the very top of the ring to be weird, and no matter what you do you can only have one thing up there…

I do think it makes sense to try to line them up with whole-numbers on the outer scale though.

@DanHulme What's the equivalent designation for a European E6B anway?

@voretaq7 nah, you can have km, kg, and litres all there because they're not unit conversions

I think people recognise the name E6B on the whole. Mine is a Pooley's CRP-1, but I don't think they have those on the continent. (There's a couple other CRP-n things, which add extra scales for stuff like mach number calculations.)

@DanHulme Hmmm, yah OK I see how that layout makes sense

The E6B conversions are organized into 3 functional blocks (Distance, Quantity, Weight), and the imperial measurements are mostly clustered. The metric stuff is then scattered all over the place because we're heathens and don't use those units :)

I like putting the units on both scales. That way it's easier to do the same conversion on lots of inputs.

@Shalvenay Looks like you and I were both right on that crash in Colombia. You were saying that it was poor flight planning, stretching the limits of aircraft range. I was saying the A-320 emergency played a part. It appears both are true. ATC put then in a hold to prioritize the A-320 and two rings around the racetrack used up their teaspoon of reserve fuel. They should at least plan for a tablespoon for these situations

@TomMcW yeah, pretty much so. and the A-320 was well within rights to divert that urgently as they themselves were having fuel troubles, albeit of a "where's our fuel going?!" sort

@voretaq7 Do I get from your conversation with Dan that you actually use your e6b? I thought after training was over those ended up in a junk drawer somewhere in your garage

@Shalvenay Yeah. I wonder how often that airline makes that exact flight in the same aircraft type. "It made it last time. You'll be ok."

@TomMcW ...until something goes bump, and you're not OK any longer

@TomMcW I do, in fact, use it. Mainly for calculating winds in flight.

@voretaq7 Kinda figured everybody had an app on their iPad for all those calculations. I guess you do now!

@TomMcW I do, but my iPad is busy being charts

it's easy enough to read track, heading, groundspeed and airspeed & use the wind computer to get the actual winds aloft though.

also my airspeed indicator doesn't have a true scale, so if I want that I need to actually do math.

@voretaq7 Do you have done kind of stand or something to put your iPad on? If so where does it mount?

Your asi is a steam gauge?

@TomMcW right now it goes in the chart pocket. When we redo the radio stack in March I'll revisit the idea of mounting it somewhere in the center stack if there's room

(it basically has to not interfere with the throttle or the bottom radio)

I've got a pic of your cockpit somewhere on my phone.

@TomMcW there's one of it on the main site

I think it's in the checklists vs flows answer

@voretaq7 Where's the CD player?

There's an aux audio input above the 6s

:)

Also a few of the placards have been replaced - I need to spend an hour or two when we're doing the radios and mark out the new placards I need cut :P

I'm sure you've got a mix tape. "Fly like an eagle," "Time for me to fly," "Come fly with me," "Fly by night."

Usually I'm listening to ATC :P

I've used the aux audio like 3 times, one of those was on the ground testing it.

Oddly enough, while I was driving to my one and only flight lesson the radio played Pink Floyd, " Learning to Fly."