Kenya Airways 737 crashes

So yet another plane goes down in Africa. It really is about time that the CAA and FAA imposed much more stringent controls on airlines with regard to servicing in particular and operating controls in general.


That's good?
Nonsense!

Maybe a knee jerk reaction but this kind of thing threatens the good name of reputable airlines and confidence in air travel as a whole.

Definitely a knee jerk reaction.- and probably uniformed.
For start, who says poor servicing was the cause? Read the report, and you see bad weather is hampering rescue efforts.
How often is bad weather a big player in such things?
Was the not an Air France jet at Toronto last year that crashed on landing (fortunately with no serious casualties)
And just how clean are European and American airlines? Remember the American commuter jet last year that crashed seconds after takeoff as the pilot took off from the wrong (too short) runway.
Oh, and dont forget the midair collision over Switzerland a few years back - not really anything to do with servicing of aircraft.

Yes the EU does ban certain airlines from its airspace but Kenyan was certainly not one of them. They are one the few African airlines that could be considered good (along with South African and Ethiopian) and thats probably down to KLM part owning them.

Back to the present - if and only if - it turns out to be a servicing issue - then fine - be harsh, but until so, lets wait and see what emerges.

let's not let common sense get in the way of hype and hysteria.

My post is not based upon hype and hysteria as you well know OG

It is based upon evidence of piss poor servicing methods outside of the major aerospace countries.

As for uninformed, we'll see . ...

@Crispybee

KLM doesn't own any shares in South African Airways. SAA is and always has been a government parastatal, owned and operated by the Deparment of Transport. SAA is one of the world's oldest commercial airlines, consistently rates one of the best in terms of service and boasts one of the best safety records.

The only major incident was the Boeing 747 Drakensberg, which crashed near Mauritius in the early 80's. To this day the actual cause of the crash is unknown, but there are rumours and conspiracies that point to the SA Government (it was the height the sanctions era) at the time covertly using the plane to fly dangerous goods. The wreckage is in very deep water, but is strewn over a large area, flaming suggestions that the plane exploded in mid-air.

If safety was the only consideration I would fly SAA over the likes of American Airlines any day.

@South African

I think crispybee meant that Kenyan is part owned by KLM, not SAA.

You mean the Helderberg, not Drakensberg right?

you may have a point about general levels of maintenance and safety in Africa as a whole but I think to infer that this airline has a poor record in such is a bit off the mark. Kenya Airways is certainly one of the better airlines in Africa and has, indeed, suffered from fewer fatal crashes in its history than either Air France or Lufthansa, so your statement is based on hype, in my opinion.

@ OG
Not really - to assess whether one airline is safer or not , even in terms of fatalities you would need to assess the level of exposure - say the number of passengers multiplied by the length of the journey. I bet once you've taken this and the other factors into account Dave's argument holds a lot of water.

Well, that quote refers to one accident only. So, not quite perfect, but...

Do you have other information to show they've got a poor safety record?

Here ya go, Lufthansa is ranked 8th whilst Kenya is ranked 76th.

ranked as what?

Look at the link

Sorry, realised i hadn't put the link in before, mea culpa.

still, it ranks better than other fairly well known airlines, such as Singapore Airlines and PIA. I've never heard anyone question the safety record of Singapore Airlines.

I really do agree with you, though, that, on the whole, Africa has a pretty poor safety record. My issue was just singling this particular one out with no evidence to support it (which you have now given us).

@Maddul

You're right - it was the Helderberg. Don't know where I got Drakensberg from!

Regarding airline safety in Africa, the safety issues have more to do with a shambles in air traffic control than actual airline safety, which means even the best international airlines flying over or landing in Africa are more at risk than flying in the US or Europe.

That link isn't a safety record though - it's an independent look at accidents but also takes the number of fatalities into account - so although Kenyan Airways rates low because there were 169 deaths in their one accident I don't think it accurately represents their overall 'safety' record.
If there had been only 30 people on that plane they would be much higher on the list, even though the number of accidents per flights would be the same.

So I don't think the BBC's quote is nonsense.

to be honest, I don't understand the rankings either. How can an airline with 3 fatal losses be ranked higher than an airline with none?

There's a breakdown under the table of how they measured everything. I think it's interesting in the kind of way where you can play around with statistics to get different views of things but doesn't really reflect anything useful in regards to the actual 'safety' record.
And although the number of individual deaths attributed to an airline is relevant in many ways.. we need to take into account that some airlines could have an amazing safety record but have had one large crash in their history which will skew the stats considerably. The info on that link doesn't take this into account at all - it measures the opposite.

I think somewhere in there they use 'prediction' as well to rate the airlines.

I did say at the beginning it was probably a knee jerk reaction. All i am concerned about is how these crashes affect public confidence and you are right Kenyan is one of the best in Africa.

In general terms i still believe that the CAA/FAA have a job to do in tightening up procedures and licensing of airlines though.

do you mean the kenyan civil aviation authoriy?

no, i think maybe he means what he says, ie the CAA/FAA. They really do need to tighten up the rules allowing airlines from countries in Africa and such with extremely bad safety records to fly into British and American airspace , for example. OK, this wouldn't have any direct impact on preventing crashes on airlines not flying to Europe/USA but for those flying there, the potential loss of revenues could be crippling and incentive enough to sort out their act.

However, the problem in air traffic safety in places like Africa goes well beyond the airlines and their maintenance procedures / safety standards. ATC in most of Africa is a joke, for example.

I stayed out of this while I followed the story, but it is becoming apparent that all may not be as clear as a 'Bad Weather Accident' or 'Engine Failure'. Something isn't right with the loss of KQ 507.

At times like these it is worth checking out the local press: Kenya to pursue terrorism as probable theory of plane crash. Not that I believe terrorism was involved just yet.
Cameroonian paper hints sabotage against KQ-507 flight
Photos of the crash site
Whatever, I'm starting to believe that the event went something like this: KQ 507 took off and within minutes dissappeared from radar. 30 minutes (or more) elapsed while the tower decided what to do. The tower then enacted the distress and Toulouse picked it up. The time difference gave the rough position 100-150km SW (where the search started), but the wreckage was found 5.24km from the end of the runway (20km according the AFP). There have been unconfirmed reports of witnesses seeing flames coming from the aircraft on take-off (could this be a Paris Concorde type accident? Debris on the runway piercing a fuel tank?). Multiple witnesses also report a loud explosion heard over a wide area (one would have thought that at 5.24km, airport staff may also have heard it). Whatever, I don't think the loss of KQ 507 can be merely fobbed off because Africa has a poor air safety record. This one is worth following a bit longer.