Cardiff record signing Sala on missing plane

[nailsy]

Cause of death has been revealed as "head and trunk" injuries.
I would imagines immediate death on impact, which is, I think, better than fighting against drowning.

I do find it interesting that Cardiff have cancelled their warm weather trip to Tenerife in order to let the player get over the situation with their families. I doubt any of them had even met Sala yet, so didn't actually know him.

Maybe it's Warnock or the coaches who want the time with family? He's definitely been effected by it.

 

[worcestersauce]

The Air Accident Investigation Branch has completed it's interim report in this incident and have found that it was, as many of us thought, down to the pilot.
He was responsible for "A string of basic errors" however basic errors occur with inexperienced pilots and this guy had years of experience so it seems pretty clear to me that they weren't really errors they were a complete disregard for the rules.

 

[Sandros Shiny Head]

Maybe I'm soft but I think they ought to have a good go at finding his body before dragging his name through the dirt

 

[worcestersauce]

Maybe I'm soft but I think they ought to have a good go at finding his body before dragging his name through the dirt

They are not dragging his name anywhere they are making public the findings of the investigation, if that damns him that's his responsibility and nobody else's.

 

[rightwayup]

The AAIB only state facts, and are doing an important job. If this accident cuts down all the fly by night cowboys operating as if they are commercial pilots, then it will be good thing. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

 

[CoopsieDeadpool]

The fact that (according to radio 2) the base of their investigation is apparently questioning whether he was actually qualified to fly that particular plane, one can't help but question his integrity.

I can't remember the names of the 2 guys on here who are clued up on the flying/piloting stuff, sorry , but if they're reading this, could they answer this question, please?

On the radio, they said that the plane dropped 1000ft in 20 seconds. Is that nuts? And does it indicate anything in particular, ie most likely mechanical, or pilot totally lost control?






Or pilot bumped off Sala, parachuted out & is living somewhere lovely waiting for his share of the insurance pay out

 

[rightwayup]

It would suggest he lost control. 2 most probable reasons are either
1) icing leading to loss of speed and possible stall/spin.
2) loss of Situational awareness in cloud due to his lack of instrument rating.

Scary thing is that this sort of accident happens way too often and normally from a pilots overestimation of their and their aircraft abilities.

 

[worcestersauce]

It would suggest he lost control. 2 most probable reasons are either
1) icing leading to loss of speed and possible stall/spin.
2) loss of Situational awareness in cloud due to his lack of instrument rating.

Scary thing is that this sort of accident happens way too often and normally from a pilots overestimation of their and their aircraft abilities.

It would suggest the pilot acted below the standard he ought to have done and was unqualified for the job.
That being the case you have to question the quality of football agents, it was apparently the agent, one of the Mckays I think, who arranged the flight. A professional footballer with a market value of something like £20 million about to start his big opportunity and the agent doesn't think it is worth doing things properly, much better to do it on the cheap. If they aren't facing a lawsuit by Cardiff City and Sala's family so huge it ends them there's no justice in the world.

 

[CoopsieDeadpool]

Another thing that was said on the radio yesterday was something along the lines of, he got his flying qualifications in America & may not be qualified to fly over here.

Are there different rules for different pilots from different countries?

 

[worcestersauce]

Another thing that was said on the radio yesterday was something along the lines of, he got his flying qualifications in America & may not be qualified to fly over here.

Are there different rules for different pilots from different countries?

There are but even with his American qualifications he can't do what he did.
As I understand it the plane was registered in the States which means the actual owner of the plane doesn't have to be on the registration, in the UK and I believe Europe, they do

 

['O Zio]

It would suggest the pilot acted below the standard he ought to have done and was unqualified for the job.
That being the case you have to question the quality of football agents, it was apparently the agent, one of the Mckays I think, who arranged the flight. A professional footballer with a market value of something like £20 million about to start his big opportunity and the agent doesn't think it is worth doing things properly, much better to do it on the cheap. If they aren't facing a lawsuit by Cardiff City and Sala's family so huge it ends them there's no justice in the world.

It really depends what the situation was. If the agents hired what they thought was a fully licensed/qualified professional service then I'm not really sure how you can sue them if it then turns out to be a bit of a cowboy/backstreet outfit. If they knew it wasn't all above board and insisted on going through with it to save money then that's one thing, but presumably that isn't the case.

 

[worcestersauce]

It really depends what the situation was. If the agents hired what they thought was a fully licensed/qualified professional service then I'm not really sure how you can sue them if it then turns out to be a bit of a cowboy/backstreet outfit. If they knew it wasn't all above board and insisted on going through with it to save money then that's one thing, but presumably that isn't the case.

They paid some boiler engineer with a part time pilots license so you have to think they at least have questions to answer, I would be surprised if he charged them the going rate for a Harrods private jet hire which with someone this valuable, you'd expect to be the quality level. That being the case there does appear on the face of it to be a lack of care and attention for his safety wouldn't you think?

 

['O Zio]

They paid some boiler engineer with a part time pilots license so you have to think they at least have questions to answer, I would be surprised if he charged them the going rate for a Harrods private jet hire which with someone this valuable, you'd expect to be the quality level. That being the case there does appear on the face of it to be a lack of care and attention for his safety wouldn't you think?

Like I say, we just don't know. If it's all been done in a mad panic and the agency's secretary has just been told "Quick, we need to get two people from Nantes to Cardiff leaving in 2 hours, sort it out!!!" and she's gone on google and found what looked like a proper private plane hire company and booked it, then to what extent are the player's agency really liable if this company turned out to be not as advertised? In that case would they really have known that it was some tin-pot operation using a dangerously poorly-maintained plane and an unqualified / illegal pilot?

Maybe you could argue the price was too good to be true, but I'm not sure that's grounds in itself to hold the agency responsible for what happened. And again, we just don't know the details of how it all went down. Maybe the price wasn't too good to be true and they just got ripped off by two chancers with a plane.

 

[worcestersauce]

Like I say, we just don't know. If it's all been done in a mad panic and the agency's secretary has just been told "Quick, we need to get two people from Nantes to Cardiff leaving in 2 hours, sort it out!!!" and she's gone on google and found what looked like a proper private plane hire company and booked it, then to what extent are the player's agency really liable if this company turned out to be not as advertised? In that case would they really have known that it was some tin-pot operation using a dangerously poorly-maintained plane and an unqualified / illegal pilot?

Maybe you could argue the price was too good to be true, but I'm not sure that's grounds in itself to hold the agency responsible for what happened. And again, we just don't know the details of how it all went down. Maybe the price wasn't too good to be true and they just got ripped off by two chancers with a plane.

What you are doing is giving explanations for how it could have come about but I am not sure they are good arguments for absolving them of responsibility. Sorry guv he looked the part to me, he had a peaked hat with a badge you know, isn't really a defence.

 

[CoopsieDeadpool]

When I popped into work earlier, I got chatting to one of the other drivers & he said he listened to a whole debate about it last night, with them talking about what the investigation has found out so far.

I can't remember the exact figures he told me, but he said something along the lines of.....

"The pilot was flying at a weird pattern. It would be flying at 11000 ft, then dropped to 8000 ft, then climbed to 20000 ft, then dropped to 11000 ft"

By all accounts, he was trying to fly over or under any rain they were approaching.

Is that standard flying procedure/technique?

 

['O Zio]

When I popped into work earlier, I got chatting to one of the other drivers & he said he listened to a whole debate about it last night, with them talking about what the investigation has found out so far.

I can't remember the exact figures he told me, but he said something along the lines of.....

"The pilot was flying at a weird pattern. It would be flying at 11000 ft, then dropped to 8000 ft, then climbed to 20000 ft, then dropped to 11000 ft"

By all accounts, he was trying to fly over or under any rain they were approaching.

Is that standard flying procedure/technique?

I'm not an expert by a long stretch but I would assume that if you're in a plane like that and the weather is that bad that you're needing to fly all over the place ducking and diving erratically, then I imagine the standard procedure would be to deem the conditions unsafe for flying and not take off at all until the situation improved.

 

['O Zio]

What you are doing is giving explanations for how it could have come about but I am not sure they are good arguments for absolving them of responsibility. Sorry guv he looked the part to me, he had a peaked hat with a badge you know, isn't really a defence.

I'm giving explanations for how it could come about to show that the fact that we don't know what happens doesn't mean you can automatically start pointing the finger at his agent. If they knew it was dodgy and forced him to use it anyway, then that's one thing, but as far as I'm aware there's no indication of that so you're just jumping to conclusions.

Put it this way, if youre sat in your office in, say, London, and your boss is on a business trip to Edinburgh and asks you to sort out a taxi for him to get to the station after his meetings. You not being from Edinburgh, google cab companies and find one that looks alright, book it, send him the details. The next morning, you come in to work to find that your boss never made it to the station but was killed in a car accident. It later emerges that the cab driver didn't have a driving license and was drunk at the time of the accident. Is it fair that you, who in good faith booked what you thought was a legitimate cab company, should be held personally responsible for your boss's death because the cab company were poorly run hadn't done their paperwork/background checks on the driver properly? I don't think so. That's their fault not yours.

Like I say, maybe that's not what happened. Maybe the agent said "I've found this dirt cheap plane, it looks dodgy as fuck and I don't think the so-called pilot even knows how to fly it, but fuck it, Sala's not my biggest client so he'll have to make do". In that case, then yes they have to accept some responsibility, but there's no evidence of that being the case so far so I don't see how you can just jump to that conclusion when it's far more likely that the agency was not fully aware of the situation and how bad it was.

 

[CoopsieDeadpool]

I'm not an expert by a long stretch but I would assume that if you're in a plane like that and the weather is that bad that you're needing to fly all over the place ducking and diving erratically, then I imagine the standard procedure would be to deem the conditions unsafe for flying and not take off at all until the situation improved.

OR the weather was perfectly manageable, for a pilot who's actually competent & able to fly the craft he's piloting?

 

[CoopsieDeadpool]

I'm giving explanations for how it could come about to show that the fact that we don't know what happens doesn't mean you can automatically start pointing the finger at his agent. If they knew it was dodgy and forced him to use it anyway, then that's one thing, but as far as I'm aware there's no indication of that so you're just jumping to conclusions.

Put it this way, if youre sat in your office in, say, London, and your boss is on a business trip to Edinburgh and asks you to sort out a taxi for him to get to the station after his meetings. You not being from Edinburgh, google cab companies and find one that looks alright, book it, send him the details. The next morning, you come in to work to find that your boss never made it to the station but was killed in a car accident. It later emerges that the cab driver didn't have a driving license and was drunk at the time of the accident. Is it fair that you, who in good faith booked what you thought was a legitimate cab company, should be held personally responsible for your boss's death because the cab company were poorly run hadn't done their paperwork/background checks on the driver properly? I don't think so. That's their fault not yours.

Like I say, maybe that's not what happened. Maybe the agent said "I've found this dirt cheap plane, it looks dodgy as fuck and I don't think the so-called pilot even knows how to fly it, but fuck him, he's not my biggest client he'll have to make do". In that case, then yes they have to accept some responsibility, but there's no evidence of that being the case so far so I don't see how you can just jump to that conclusion when it's far more likely that the agency was not fully aware of the situation and how bad it was.

Good points, but all ignores Sala's own words.

“I’m so afraid” and warned that the aircraft “seems like it’s falling to pieces,”

“If, in an hour and a half, you have no news from me, I don’t know if they are going to send someone to look for me, because they are not going to find me,” he said.


Really doesn't sound normal to me.

 

[worcestersauce]

I'm giving explanations for how it could come about to show that the fact that we don't know what happens doesn't mean you can automatically start pointing the finger at his agent. If they knew it was dodgy and forced him to use it anyway, then that's one thing, but as far as I'm aware there's no indication of that so you're just jumping to conclusions.

Put it this way, if youre sat in your office in, say, London, and your boss is on a business trip to Edinburgh and asks you to sort out a taxi for him to get to the station after his meetings. You not being from Edinburgh, google cab companies and find one that looks alright, book it, send him the details. The next morning, you come in to work to find that your boss never made it to the station but was killed in a car accident. It later emerges that the cab driver didn't have a driving license and was drunk at the time of the accident. Is it fair that you, who in good faith booked what you thought was a legitimate cab company, should be held personally responsible for your boss's death because the cab company were poorly run hadn't done their paperwork/background checks on the driver properly? I don't think so. That's their fault not yours.

Like I say, maybe that's not what happened. Maybe the agent said "I've found this dirt cheap plane, it looks dodgy as fuck and I don't think the so-called pilot even knows how to fly it, but fuck it, Sala's not my biggest client so he'll have to make do". In that case, then yes they have to accept some responsibility, but there's no evidence of that being the case so far so I don't see how you can just jump to that conclusion when it's far more likely that the agency was not fully aware of the situation and how bad it was.

Of course I am jumping to conclusions but I am willing to bet that the Cardiff legal team will be all over this and if your explanations are correct I bet they'll have them in court quicker than you can say ten percent.
You may be correct though as it happens the agents have been distancing themselves from the whole thing so they are obviously taking the possibility seriously.

When I popped into work earlier, I got chatting to one of the other drivers & he said he listened to a whole debate about it last night, with them talking about what the investigation has found out so far.

I can't remember the exact figures he told me, but he said something along the lines of.....

"The pilot was flying at a weird pattern. It would be flying at 11000 ft, then dropped to 8000 ft, then climbed to 20000 ft, then dropped to 11000 ft"

By all accounts, he was trying to fly over or under any rain they were approaching.

Is that standard flying procedure/technique?

My understanding is that he was qualified to fly visually but in the weather conditions on the night he should have flown using instrument navigation, I suspect the changes in altitude were to avoid the weather which may not have been necessary had he been qualified for the instruments.