Plane that crashed near Buffalo was on autopilot

Associated Press
February 16, 2009

BUFFALO, N.Y. — The commuter plane that crashed near Buffalo was on autopilot until just before it went down in icy weather, indicating that the pilot may have ignored federal safety recommendations and violated the airline’s own policy for flying in such conditions, an investigator said Sunday.

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Federal guidelines and the airline’s own instructions suggest a pilot should not engage the autopilot when flying through ice. If the ice is severe, the company that operated Continental Flight 3407 requires pilots to shut off the autopilot.

“You may be able in a manual mode to sense something sooner than the autopilot can sense it,” said Steve Chealander of the National Transportation Safety Board, which also recommends that pilots disengage the autopilot in icy conditions.

Automatic safety devices returned the aircraft to manual control just before it fell from the sky, Chealander said.

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This article was posted: Monday, February 16, 2009 at 11:01 am

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