A flurry of reasons has been given as possible causes for the crash of a US-Bangla plane at Kathmandu airport on Monday – ranging from pilot fatigue to confused communication with air-traffic controllers about which end of the runway the flight would land.
Speculation over reasons for the crash, which killed 51 of the 67 passengers and four crew on board, has run rife after a tape of the radio conversation between the captain of the flight, Abid Sultan, and officials at Tribhuvan International Airport in Nepal was uploaded to YouTube.
The ill-fated plane was a Bombardier Dash-8 Q400 – a twin-engine turboprop used for short to medium-range flights of 500 miles or less. US-Bangla was the fourth owner of the 17-year-old aircraft, after Royal Jordanian, Augsburg/Lufthansa Regional and Scandinavian airlines.
Flight BS-211 crash-landed at Kathmandu at 2.18pm local time after a 75-minute trip from the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka. A total of 51 people — 28 Bangladeshis, 22 Nepalese and a Chinese national — have died so far, including the four Bangladeshi crew members.
The flight data recorder was recovered on Tuesday and a six-member team from the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal has launched a formal inquiry.
Aviation experts say a definitive cause of the accident cannot be pinpointed without a thorough investigation. However, the leaked conversation between the pilot and air-traffic controller (ATC) has spurred great debate and buck-passing over who was most to blame.
What was in the leaked conversation?
The leaked conversation between the pilot Sultan and an air-traffic controller reveals moments of confusion over which end of the runway the plane should land from after it circled the airport twice.
Tribhuvan has a single 10,007-feet (3,050-metre) concrete runway orientated 02/20. There is no instrument landing system, which enables pilots to conduct a predetermined maneuver landing if they are unable to see the actual runway.
The conversation shows that the ATC told the pilot not to proceed towards runway 20 at the northern end and hold onto its current position. The captain agreed and said he would orbit in the air. But a moment later, the tower cleared the plane for landing and asked if the pilot wanted to land from 02 – the southern end instead.
The captain said he would land from 20, the northern end. The ATC then asked if he had the runway in sight. Captain Sultan, who tried doing a visual landing, replied “Negative.”
The tower then instructed him to maneuver to the right. Sultan did that and a few moments later said, “Affirmative”, which meant he then had the runway in view. The tower then gave him a clearance.
But, even though pilot Sultan had sought permission to land from the northern end (20), the next thing he said was, “Cleared to land on runway 02.” And the ATC seemed to clear him to land from the southern end of the runway. The pilot’s last recorded words were “Sir, are we cleared to land?”
After some silence, the seemingly alarmed air-traffic controller shouts, “I say again, turn!” There is further silence, then the tower calls out ‘Fire One’, indicating that a crash has occurred.
Blame game
After the crash, Kathmandu airport general manager Rajkumar Chetri told the media in Nepal that the aircraft skidded off the runway after trying to land in the “wrong direction against the order of the control room”.
Chetri said the control room had given permission for a landing from the southern end – but it landed from the northern end after making two rounds in the sky.
And the plane was not properly aligned for landing, he said. “When the air-traffic controller was informed about the alignment, there was no response. And then the plane descended from close to the airport tower towards the right side (near army hangar).”
But US-Bangla CEO Imran Asif later told the media in Bangladesh that after, listening to the leaked conversation, he suspected “negligence” on the part of the air-traffic controller for not giving clear information. He claimed there was a tendency for pilots to be given wrong information at Tribhuvan Airport.
“Our pilots were given different information at different times. And we think that this accident took place due to this miscommunication. The negligence was not from our part, it was from the Air Traffic Control tower,” Asif claimed.
Pilot’s fifth flight of the day
Asia Times spoke with a number of pilots in Dhaka who have years of experience flying the Dhaka-Kathmandu route. They did not want to be quoted on the record as aviation officials have prohibited them from speaking about the incident while it is “still under investigation.”
One senior pilot who has flown the Dhaka-Kathmandu route for decades said he had detected a “severe cockpit error” after listening to the radio conversation.
Under standard aviation norms for Kathmandu — which is a special airport because it is surrounded by mountains — the co-pilot should communicate with the control tower while the main pilot maneuvers the plane for landing or take-off because the routes for arrival and departure are classed as “difficult terrain”.
But the audio posted on YouTube revealed that Sultan, the senior pilot had done both the flying and communication, which should have been done by the co-pilot, Prithula Rashid.
“It seemed he [Sultan] was manoeuvring the plane and talking to the tower at the same time, which made him lose concentration and [he] eventually lost sight of the runway while switching from runway 20 to runway 02,” the senior pilot said, adding that it was vital to keep the runway at Tribhuvan in sight all the time.
Meanwhile, Asia Times learnt that it was Captain Sultan’s fifth flight on that day. Before the Dhaka-Kathmandu flight, Sultan had flown two flights from Dhaka to Chittagong and back on the day within a gap of five hours.
Kamrul Islam, US-Bangla general manager and spokesperson, admitted this but told Asia Times that US-Bangla pilots had no problem taking such workload.
“Dhaka-Chittagong-Dhaka is a 45-50 minute flight in both ways and Dhaka-Kathmandu-Dhaka is 1-1.15 hours both ways. So making three such [return] flights on a day is not abnormal,” he said.
Experienced pilot but was he tired?
Islam said that Sultan, a former Bangladeshi Air Force pilot, had landed at Kathmandu more than 100 times and was specially trained to land at that airport. “He had more than 5,000 hours of flying experience,” he added.
Meanwhile, a pilot with a foreign airline in Dhaka told Asia Times it seemed from the conversation that the pilot Sultan was fatigued. He said it was one thing to fly a plane for 15-16 hours and another thing to do multiple landings and take-offs on a single day.
Air Vice Marshal M Naim Hassan, chairman of the Civil Aviation Authorities of Bangladesh (CAAB), told Asia Times that the authority would go through the pilot Sultan’s personal logbook, to see if he was engaged in flying extra hours in violation of International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) rules.
According to ICAO rules, he said, a pilot can fly 90 to 100 hours per month. “We will check whether he had crossed the limit.”
Meanwhile, another senior pilot with state-owned Biman Bangladesh Airlines told Asia Times the ATC initially cleared a landing on the Kathmandu runway from the southern end, but when the plane started descending the ATC, suddenly gave an order for the pilot to hold.
As far as he understood, the flight had already descended to a level at which proper maneuvering in the thin air pressure of Kathmandu — which is at an elevation of 4,500 feet — is quite difficult. “The ATC can’t evade the blame,” the pilot said.
There are too many plane crashes to warrant bringing back the Zeppelin. In its heyday the Zeppelin was the luxury way to fly. It had a restaurant and sleeping booths in addition to passenger seating. The only problem was that Germany was forced to use Hydrogen gas due to an international embargo. Helium gas would have made the Zeppelin the safest way to fly. Even in a possible "crash" the Zeppelin would glide down to safety.
Today with stronger and lighter metals the frame and the engine would be much lighter but stronger. New Designs with greater horsepower would mean a noiseless smooth flight that uses minimum amount of gasoline and could carry more passengers. I doubt Zeppelins could be used for transatlantic flights but a good deal of flights are short enough to make the Zeppelin a viable, cheap, safe, comfortable alternative. Time to put bad memories of the Hindenburg in the past and bring back the Zeppelin
It is the job of the ATC to calm the pilot and talk in a clear way. Be calm .. And 02 .. 20.. time to name them differently..
You can’t name them differently. It’s an indicator of the direction. All runways are numbered based on the magnetic azimuth in which the runway is oriented. Here 02 meens 20 degree on the comopass and the opposite direction is always at the 180 degree of course, so here it is 200 degree. In Runway numbering system they simply drop the last digit. So in Nepal, because of the airport’s position, it always have to be 02/20 unless they change the whole runway
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=225392854690368&id=183154118914242&fs=5
Dear writer you haven’t heard the leak complete audio where the copilot was doing the radio and they where given clear to land on 02 and then the Tower asking why you going towards 20 you were supposed to land on 02 that’s where all the confusion started
yes he gives clearance to land on 02 but then again he asks the pilot if he is landing on 02 or 20? why ? even gives clearance to land on 20. and then later switched back to 02. atc needs to have people with better communication skills .
sorry but…… after knowing that the plane was disoriented ATC guided all other fights to HOLD and allowed BANGLA211 to land from any way i. e. either 02 or 20
I witnessed the crash first hand while boarding another aircraft (Thai Airways) from the tarmac. Regardless of the alleged confusion and from which side to land, the runway was cleared to land (100%) and the aircraft clearly overshot the runway by more than half and should have aborted the landing. The aircraft came to the ground tilted (right) and was not in control. It veered off to the left side once the left side came down. Where we were boarding is almost 3/4 past the runway from where it came from; even if it landed properly, I am doubtful the remaining length of the runway was adequate. Kathmandu is an airport that requires pilots to be specially certified and for the deck crew on that aircraft, a call to abort landing should have been made considering it’s alignment to approach and land (regardless of prior conversations) after being cleared to land.
May the departed souls Rest In Peace and bless their families.
There are a lot of wrong information in this article including the number of Nepali victims, Bangladeshi victims. The audio conversation had other components as well but the article has selectively taken few sentences only. I am not trying to single out whose fault it was but this article is not entirely true. Dear writer, please research more. Listen to the audio conversation ten more times.
Well, I believe, the version that I had heard didn’t have that part. Also probably the pilot I quoted did not hear that as well. After your input, I searched and found that part in youtube. You are right. But then again, why pilot had taken over the communication when he was not supposed to?
Thank you for your comment, but I think I gave all the information right including the number of victims. I had no scope of putting all the things of that conversation in the article, only put the gist to make valid points.
Are you saying the aircraft was rolling to the right as it approached from rwy 20? But I’ve read accounts that say aircraft approached from the north west of the tower (i.e. almost 1/3 past the threshold/piano keyboards on rwy 02) rather than being aligned to it. While doing so, it was flying very low and some observers claim it nearly clipped a Thai b772 on the ramp. Keshav Pandey described this in his TV interview; another Bangladeshi PAX narrated that the plane was not descending with both wings parallel to the horizon – i.e. it was banking and trying to land in one fell swoop. Your first hand description is very helpful in trying to piece together this mystery. (See https://www.facebook.com/S2Spotters/posts/2062197663998769
)
This is one of the most objective reports coming out of Bangaldesh. Sadly, the rest is full of either misinformation, emotion laden non-sense or just click baits. Kudos to the author for trying to make an effort to call a spade a spade – something that does not come naturally to Bangladeshis.
Shabbir A Bashar – not sure which is rwy 2 or 20. We were boarding the Thai B777-200ER and I was on the stairs [mid-way] boarding the aircraft when I saw the US Bangla descend. Note: from the direction in which it came and where we were physically, its past approx 3/4 of the total runway. The aircraft was tilted, not rolling [the right wing of the aircraft was lower than the left] and when it veered left is when the entire aircraft went off the runway to the left-side and went down the gorge. On all accounts; from the distance it had past and what was left of the remaining runway, that landing should have been aborted. The crash did not take place in air or elsewhere. Runway was clear [literally] for landing from both sides and the pilot had the decision to either land or abort. If you are familiar with Kathmandu airport, we were boarding in gate#3 [international terminal]. The US Bangla aircraft was landing in from the army & domestic terminal area which means the wheels should have touched ground by the time it came to the international terminal area. The flight was still in the air past the Thai B777 crossing more than 3/4 of the runway length.
The runway was cleared and plane was already given permission by the ATC to land from 02 or 20 after another pilot on ground suggested the plane was disoriented. Eye witnesses and even passenger say the plane flew low and nearly touched buildings when the plane was circling the airport before landing. Why ? only pilot knows and black box reports will tell.
The pilot had landed at Kathmandu more than 100 times and was specially trained to land at that airport. So he already knew he had to have clear sight of the runway and align his plane properly but why did he tilt his plane abnormally while landing.
That so low. Was it trying to crash land down there. Every one taking and saying it nearly crashed. Its lower then the airport area.
Faisal Mahmud You can. Runway numbers are a rough indication of the direction, not an exactly 100% correct number. In Sweden e.g. runway numbers 02/20 and 13/31 are not being used at any airport due to this reason.
James Lama because the airplane went past 02 then again did not approach prop towards 20 again encircled the airport flying very low
Faisal Mahmud
First, welcome. It’s all of our responsibility to talk more about it and bring the information out.
Second, I was referring to the statistics from the ministry. Here is a link. I now think I am torn between information.
https://www.google.com.np/amp/kathmandupost.ekantipur.com/ampnews/2018-03-15/home-ministry-corrects-number-of-us-bangla-crash-death.html
Third, I still think selective information mentioned doesn’t give the gist here.
P.S. I am editing the comment above in the spirit of your initiation to seek truth. Good job!
Read this:
https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/20-by-02/
Its just KMD views. ( he must be angry that his name came up after Kunda Dixit for postingATC recordings to youtube from nepal )Yes there are problems in TIA but that does not mean the pilot had no fault, he was landing with visual conformation and visibility at the time was good.
Faisal Mahmud Faisal Mahmud i drive and i ride as well…. to be straight i can handle my car or bike in any condition or drivable terrain!! in case of Bangla211 PILOT wasn’t happy at all…. he was too tired as he flew 14hrs from Canada to Bangladesh and hence wasn’t conscious(if you listen to the record you can find it out). In addition, the Pilot felt it as a Torture to fly continouos Flights so He even emailed a resignation letter to US BANGLA AIR saying he cannot work like this.
I don’t think the height of Kathmandu airport is 4,500 above msl.
Dimitrios Vlastaras I didn’t know that about Sweden. Is that an exception?
Tshering Wangel Ghale From my knowledge of TIA, (See http://www.planexplorer.net/Xploregallery/displayimage.php?pid=884 and http://www.planexplorer.net/Xploregallery/displayimage.php?pid=267 ), you would have been facing north as you were climbing into your aircraft. Thus the US-Bangla Dash8-Q400 was coming towards you from the north (direction of runway 20 which is parallel to 200 degrees on the compass). When you say "right wing of the aircraft was lower than the left", I presume you mean the wing closest to you was lower? By the way, the length of the runway (20) remaining from the point where you were located is about 2/3 … which given the pilot plenty of distance to land. Also, it is not clear how an aircraft tilted to the right would suddenly veer/pivot to the left without first touching anything on the ground … aerodynamics dictate it should turn to the right. Perhaps this is an indication that the pilot may have been fighting with steering the aircraft onto the runway. Your first hand description is very helpful. Do you recall if your flight to Bangkok was scheduled to depart on time? Typically boarding is completed 10/15 minutes prior to push-back and departure. (Of course you would not have departed on time given that the airport was closed for 3 hours after the crash).
Krishna Dhakal please give us some more details & proof on your conspiracy theory.????
Krishna Dhakal inaccurate
Faisal Mahmud no this is serious case faisal mahmud..cause it has very high range of impact. information should be given fully and clearly ..its not fair to skip the some part of the audio…it may lead to missunderstand to the news reader …and who is she or he who demands to change the name of the runway..shame to heard that…even if you move the the whole earth that name would be same…its techinical thing 02 means 20 degree and 20 means 200 degree as based on the geographica map..when you add {just opposite of that runway} 180 degree on the 20 degree dont you get 200 degree? common yaar …it cant be change …the report of authorized committee designed to investigate is about to came over …until then we cant say anything ..its very painful to heard that ceo of us bangla air blaming to ATC of TIA..to get rid from the critizise of public and international agency
and to skip own blunder mistake of air bangla the irrational view from bangladesh has came ..this is so sad…rip to those all who passed away from us…they are not dead…they all are in our memoery … in our minds…we will never forget them …
Shabbir A Bashar https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBgcC3OlqfQ
please have a watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBgcC3OlqfQ
sir what is this type of flame on the wing of the plane?
Shabbir A Bashar https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBgcC3OlqfQ
I think, There is no mistake from ATC. But, Pilot was confused on 02 and 20 and suddenly he took the wrong decision. He was tired and could not pay full attention. As a result, …….. It is really bad and management of US_Baangala is not Satisfactory.
Krishna Dhakal Yes some thing like this I heard in FB.He wasn’t to be given clearance if he didn’t fly the Kathmandu trip.Source is a junior to the the Captain.
The instant it headed to "20" without informing the ATC, even as cleared to land on "02", was the tipping moment or the start of the Domino fall as said in an article in the latest issue of Annpurna Express.
Faisal Mahmud thank you for detail about 20 and 02.
Faisal Mahmud ..pls replay and watch it again..copilot (girl) is reminding pilot to land on where the atc sured them to… pilot was not in concerntration..my be he was tired
Faisal Mahmud exactly why pilot flying is taking over the radio pilot not flying why??? How come they flew over 02 !!! First they were cleared to land but because they missed it and Tower reminded that they were supposed to land on 02 but went towards 20 they were given the holding … holding did played a big role but remained you that they actually missed the runway without any holding on the first part … can’t wait to hear the actual story though won’t take much time 90 days investigation
I really beleave there was misunderstand about the comminication both ATC and pilot, I know ATC team always doing good job and hard work and Olso pilots know their responssibility, accident can happen every moment and every place but I advise both of you, pls, make sure your responssibility and change this twin direction numbers (02and20) avoid this confuse numbers ( 13,31, 21,12,)
Thank you
ATC initially cleared a landing on the Kathmandu runway from the southern end. when the plane started descending the ATC suddenly ordered pilot to hold.why,ATC did not give any reason!ATC appears to be negligent in performing duty of care that resulted death and damage to the plane!
Faisal Mahmud you can always name them differently. 2A and 20B for instance.
Just ONE POINT: normally, the co-pilot is supposed to coordinate with the ATC, and the Pilot manoeuvres the aircraft for landing. My wild guess is could the co-pilot was manoeuvering the aircraft? (The pilot sounded very tired and fatigued).
It was reported in the local newspapers that Pilot Sultan had submitted his resignation (2-3 days ahead of the crash)…. and was to join Ethiopian Airlines (and it was his last flight with US Bangla).
ATC says “wind 270, 6 knots and the pilot says 260 “copied”. I’m not familiar with aviation communication but does this this miscommunication play any part in the crash?