Commercial flight crews engaged in overnight operations should be required to discuss fatigue in briefings before every departure, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) says, citing the Aug. 14, 2013, crash of a UPS Airbus A300-600 during an early morning approach to Birmingham, Alabama, U.S.1
The crash just short of the runway at 0447 local time — 43 minutes after departure from Louisville, Kentucky, U.S. — killed both pilots, the only people aboard. The airplane was destroyed by the impact and subsequent fire.
In its final report on the accident, adopted in September, the NTSB cited flight crew fatigue among four contributing factors to the accident. The report said the probable cause was the crew’s “continuation of an unstabilized approach and their failure to monitor the aircraft’s altitude during the approach, which led to an inadvertent descent below the minimum approach altitude and subsequently into terr…
