On Thursday, Air France flight AF1162 from Paris to Tenerife South (Airbus A320 reg. F-HEPI) faced severe weather conditions, with strong wind shear over the Canary Islands. The pilot attempted to land at Tenerife South Airport five times but was unsuccessful.
Great decision-making by this team of pilots. It’s easy, particularly after a go around, to get tunnel vision, to be hyper focused on landing the plane regardless of the stability of the approach. These pilots chose against human nature, as they were trained, five times back-to-back. It’ll become a case study, part of pilot training.
After three failed attempts, the Airbus A320 diverted to Gran Canaria’s Las Palmas Airport. The pilot then made two more attempts to land in Tenerife but ultimately returned to Gran Canaria
So they went for the alternate, didn’t (attempt to) land there and went back? Were they diverted by ATC against their will?
The two airports are roughly fifty miles apart. Heavy wind conditions can change in moments. What’s most likely is that the weather conditions changed after the initial decision to divert to the first alternate. I’d assume there was also a second alternate within continental Africa.
It sounds odd with the amount of information that’s in the article. Diverting and then going for two more attempts after three unsuccessful ones, maybe they did land and then took off again from the alt so they wouldn’t have to pay for everybody’s overnight stay (as they did in the end).
Obviously if that’s the case I’m not trying to take anything away from the pilots’ airmanship. They were most probably just following predetermined procedures of their employer. Wouldn’t want to be a passenger on that fourth and fifth attempt though. My SO and I were plenty startled flying into Miami with an upcoming tropical storm and we landed on the first attempt.
