Robert Piché
Robert Piché (born 1953 in Mont-Joli, Québec) is a Canadian pilot. On 24 August 2001, he was captain of the Airbus A330 flying Air Transat Flight 236 and managed to land the aircraft safetly in the Azores after it lost all power due to fuel exhaustion. Piché and his co-pilot were later assigned partial responsibility for the incident.
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[edit] Personal history
Piché grew up in Quebec’s remote Gaspé Peninsula and learned to fly as a teenager.
In 1983, Piché served 16 months of a 10-year sentence in prison after a plane he landed solo at a small airfield in Georgia, USA was found to be full of marijuana smuggled from Jamaica. He was pardoned in 2000 and is considered fully rehabilitated.[1] In 1996, at the age of 43, Air Transat hired Piché. He rose rapidly from co-pilot to captain on Lockheed L-1011s, and transitioned to the Airbus A330 in the spring of 2000.[2]
In a response to a reporters question regarding heroism, Mr. Piché stated I don't consider myself a hero, sir. I could have done without this.[2]
[edit] Emergency landing
Immediately after performing a successful dead-stick landing of an Airbus 330 in the Azores in 2001, Piché was praised by media and was celebrated as a hero, especially in Quebec, where he remains a popular speaker.[3] However, while the primary cause of the incident was improper maintenance, the final investigation also assigned the flight crew partial responsibility for failing to detect the fuel situation earlier. Detractors claim that the pilot failed to use the main procedural checklist when attempting to rectify the imbalance of fuel between the tanks, which might have prevented the extent of the fuel leak on one side. Experienced pilots praise the captain for not panicking or trying to make a sea landing. The pilot glided the Airbus 330 longer than any commercial aircraft in history as of 2011, and landed at an airport on a remote island with no navigation instruments. This feat has never been successfully reproduced in a flight simulator. He successfully was able to save the plane (with only 8 blown tires), crew and 304 passengers.[4][1]
[edit] References
- ^ a b Crossette, Barbara (September 10, 2001). "Jet Pilot Who Saved 304 Finds Heroism Tainted - NYTimes.com". The New York Times (New York: NYTC). ISSN 0362-4331. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9504EFDA1738F933A2575AC0A9679C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1. Retrieved 3 February 2011.
- ^ a b Langewiesche, William (June 2009). "US Airways Flight 1549: Anatomy of a Miracle | Style | Vanity Fair". vanityfair.com. http://www.vanityfair.com/style/features/2009/06/us_airways200906?currentPage=4. Retrieved 3 February 2011.
- ^ "Robert Piché". robertpiche.com. http://www.robertpiche.com/. Retrieved 3 February 2011.
- ^ http://www.moptc.pt/tempfiles/20060608181643moptc.pdf
[edit] External links
- Final investigative report for Air Transat Flight 236
- "Jet Pilot Who Saved 304 Finds Heroism Tainted", New York Times, September 10, 2001
- Robert Piché's personal website
