Navigation blunder sees AirAsia plane landing in Melbourne instead of KL

[Mushrif A 3]

What Im curious and want to better understand is whether cost considerations (read: dont what to spend) played any role in why the aircraft was not equipped with the upgraded navigation system which, from the report, appeared optional but was an option that could have countered any human input errors.

[flee 5]

What Im curious and want to better understand is whether cost considerations (read: dont what to spend) played any role in why the aircraft was not equipped with the upgraded navigation system which, from the report, appeared optional but was an option that could have countered any human input errors.

Very good question - one should note that this aircraft is leased from AerCap. So any upgrades will need to be performed in consultation with them. Also note that at the time of the incident, about 46% of the affected aircraft have been upgraded. So, the majority of the aircraft were still running the old version. Also do note that this upgrade is not mandatory.

 

As to why the upgrade was not done, only AerCap and D7 know the reasons for sure! Do note that the ATSB report did not state that the upgrade was done even after the incident. All that was done was to highlight the incident in D7's training and their manuals were updated.

[JuliusWong 0]

The aircraft is one of six ex-KA A333, leased from AerCap. All six are now with Thai AirAsia X and Indonesia AirAsia Extra. Wonder if their navigation system differ from AirAsia own A333.

[Mushrif A 3]

I recall that one of the contributory factors in the Airasia A320 crash was a fault with an item relating to its rudder system. The fault wasnt permanently dealt with and somewhat becoming a recurring one over a number of flights. Again, was cost one of the motivations behind the non-replacement of the faulty part?

 

Put simply, as long as something is not mandatory, a nice to have or "masih boleh pakai" (which seems to be the thinking behind the continuous usage of that faulty bit on the A320), the culture of the group may seem to dictate that funds should not be expended. This is, of course, purely a speculation and a conjecture on my part.