Easyjet A319 at Bristol on Jun 30th 2016, inadvertent flaps retraction instead of gear

Last Update: September 14, 2017 / 13:55:36 GMT/Zulu time

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Photo of Easyjet G-EZEW, Airbus A319 — Easyjet G-EZEW, Airbus A319 (Photo credit: MKY661 / Flickr / License: CC by)

Incident Facts

Date of incident
Jun 30, 2016

Classification
Report

Airline
Easyjet

Flight number
U2-6253

Departure
Bristol, United Kingdom

Destination
Lisbon, Portugal

Aircraft Registration
G-EZEW

Aircraft Type
Airbus A319

ICAO Type Designator
A319

An Easyjet Airbus A319-100, registration G-EZEW performing flight U2-6253 from Bristol,EN (UK) to Lisbon (Portugal) with 144 passengers and 6 crew, was in the initial climb out of Bristol's runway 27 with flaps and slats at position 1+F. The first officer was pilot flying and instructed to select the landing gear up, the captain (38, ATPL, 8,500 hours total, 6,500 hours on type), pilot monitoring, however selected the flaps up when the aircraft climbed through 190 feet AGL. The aircraft began to pitch up, at a height of 370 feet AGL the first officer applied nose down inputs to prevent the aircraft from falling below 153 KIAS. Climbing through 550 feet AGL the flaps were fully retracted, the slats were retracting through 7.5 degrees and the indicated airspeed was increasing through 160 KIAS. The captain, realizing his mistake, advised what he had done and instructed the first officer to apply TOGA thrust, the first officer set the thrust levers to the TOGA detent. When the slats reached their fully retracted position the Vls (Lowest Selectable Speed) "shot up" to 180 KIAS, 30 knots above present speed. The first officer requested flaps at position 1 again, the captain selected the flaps to position 1, the slats began to extend and the Vls dropped below the present airspeed again at about 710 feet AGL. The first officer set the thrust levers into the CLB detent. At About 850 feet AGL the slats were retracted again and the flight continued to destination without further incident.

The AAIB released their bulletin releasing following conclusion:

The operator realised that the flap mis-selection event to G-EZEW was not an isolated event and carried out a study into similar incidents with assistance from the manufacturer.

The operator was concerned about the risk associated with aircraft being in a low energy state near to the ground, including performance risks and the possibility that crew members would become confused leading to a loss of situational awareness.

Information from the manufacturer indicated that properly-computed takeoff performance calculations, combined with the aircraft’s Alpha/Speed Lock and Alpha Floor protection functions, would allow the aircraft to climb safely following a flap mis-selection event, even when combined with other, adverse, factors. Aircraft climb performance following early flap retraction would exceed one engine inoperative climb performance.

The operator began to focus training effort on avoiding the mis-selection of switches and levers, and amended its SOPs with the same intention. However, a similar event occurred to a pilot shortly after he underwent that training and he wondered subsequently whether, by focussing on not making the action slip, he had brought it about. This hypothesis would be supported by the comment of the pilot of G-EZEW in this report who stated that, while waiting for the instruction to raise the landing gear, he had been thinking about an earlier mis-selection event by another crew at his home base.