Narrative:

While parked at the gate awaiting departure; light snow began to fall. I called deice control and informed them that we would need deicing. The company page clearly says that the deice coordinator will come up to the aircraft to coordinate deicing before departure. Just to be safe; I had the first officer configure the aircraft for deicing anyway. About 20 minutes later; I observed steam blowing by the first officer's window. I asked him 'are we being deiced?' he said yes. Just then; the purser reported that deice fluid was dripping onto the carpet from door 1L. I immediately called deice control to get them to stop while I tried to get the gate agent to close 1L. About 5 minutes later the deice person came over the flight interphone and asked why we told him to stop. He was very hard to understand and had a thick accent that significantly hindered communication. I told him that deice fluid was getting into the aircraft and that we needed to be fully configured before he started the deice procedure. He could not explain why he had not followed procedures. He apologized and I informed him that I would be writing this report. In summary; the established deice procedures were completely ignored; communication with the deice crew member was very difficult because of his lack of ability to speak english clearly; and a major problem could have occurred had passengers been boarding while deice fluid was dripping into the aircraft or if the aircraft's packs had still been on. The managers need to do a better job to ensure that the proper deice procedures are followed.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: An air carrier deice crew failed to follow company gate deice procedures and began application of deice fluid before the notifying the crew. Deice fluid entered the main cabin door which had not been closed by passenger service in preparation for deicing.

Narrative: While parked at the gate awaiting departure; light snow began to fall. I called deice control and informed them that we would need deicing. The company page clearly says that the Deice Coordinator will come up to the aircraft to coordinate deicing before departure. Just to be safe; I had the First Officer configure the aircraft for deicing anyway. About 20 minutes later; I observed steam blowing by the First Officer's window. I asked him 'are we being deiced?' he said yes. Just then; the Purser reported that deice fluid was dripping onto the carpet from Door 1L. I immediately called deice control to get them to stop while I tried to get the gate agent to close 1L. About 5 minutes later the deice person came over the flight interphone and asked why we told him to stop. He was VERY hard to understand and had a thick accent that significantly hindered communication. I told him that deice fluid was getting into the aircraft and that we needed to be fully configured before he started the deice procedure. He could not explain why he had not followed procedures. He apologized and I informed him that I would be writing this report. In summary; the established deice procedures were completely ignored; communication with the deice crew member was very difficult because of his lack of ability to speak English clearly; and a major problem could have occurred had passengers been boarding while deice fluid was dripping into the aircraft or if the aircraft's packs had still been on. The managers need to do a better job to ensure that the proper deice procedures are followed.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.