Pilot Guide to Takeoff Safety

Pilot Guide to Takeoff Safety (Section 2)

Introduction

The Pilot Guide to Takeoff Safety is one part of the Takeoff Safety Training Aid. The other parts include the Takeoff Safety Overview for Management (Section 1), Example Takeoff Safety Training Program (Section 3), Takeoff Safety Background Data (Section 4), and an optional video. The subsection numbering used in Sections 2 and 4 are identical to facilitate cross referencing. Those sub sections not used in Section 2 are noted “not used”.

Objectives

The objective of the Pilot Guide to Takeoff Safety is to summarize and communicate key RTO related information relevant to flight crews. It is intended to be provided to pilots during academic training and to be retained for future use.

Contents

“Successful Versus Unsuccessful” Go/No Go Decisions
Decisions and Procedures—What Every Pilot Should Know
RTO Overrun Accidents and Incidents
Runway Surface Condition
Flaps
Missing or Inoperative Equipment
Speedbrake Effect on Wheel Braking
Runway Parameters
The Takeoff Data the Pilot Sees
Takeoffs Using Reduced Thrust
Increasing the RTO Safety Margins
RTO Autobrakes
The V1 Call
Crew Preparedness
Crew Resource Management
CRM and the RTO
The Takeoff Briefing
The Use of All Crew Members

RTO Overrun Accidents and Incidents:

The one-in-one-thousand RTOs that became accidents or serious incidents are the ones that we must strive to prevent. As shown in Figure 3, at the end of 2003, records show 57 inservice RTO overrun accidents for the western built jet transport fleet. These 57 accidents caused more than 400 fatalities.

V1 Speed Defined:

What is the proper operational meaning of the key parameter “V1 speed” with regard to the Go/No Go criteria? This is not such an easy question since the term “V1 speed” has been redefined several times since commercial jet operations began more than 30 years ago and there is possible ambiguity in the interpretation of the words used to define V1.