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An A330 flight crew received inaccurate weight and balance information for takeoff calculations.
| Attributes | |
| ACN | 879060 |
| Time | |
| Date | 201003 |
| Local Time Of Day | 0601-1200 |
| Place | |
| Locale Reference | ZZZ.Airport |
| State Reference | US |
| Aircraft 1 | |
| Make Model Name | A330 |
| Operating Under FAR Part | Part 121 |
| Flight Phase | Parked |
| Flight Plan | IFR |
| Person 1 | |
| Function | Captain Relief Pilot |
| Events | |
| Anomaly | Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Deviation - Procedural Weight And Balance |
Narrative:
In receiving our weight and balance; it was for the arrival runway 9R. When we requested the departure runway; we received weight and balance numbers we intuitively knew were wrong; but could not immediately find the mistake. We asked to have the numbers run again and got the same result. Since we could not find the error; and we knew something was wrong; we chose to depart on runway 9R for which the weight and balance matched our experiences with weight and balance. Later without time pressure; the error was found to be in the mtow [maximum take-off weight]. The wrong number was used.I am not sure why the mtow was imputed incorrectly by load control. Since it is a number that does not change we in the cockpit were not looking for that kind of error.it is unknown how the mtow was a variable in load planning. There was a captain acting as an relief pilot. I am sure a regularly assigned relief pilot; whose duties are to regularly evaluate the weight and balance; would have found this error much more quickly.
Original NASA ASRS Text
Title: An A330 Flight Crew received inaccurate weight and balance information for takeoff calculations.
Narrative: In receiving our weight and balance; it was for the arrival Runway 9R. When we requested the departure runway; we received weight and balance numbers we intuitively knew were wrong; but could not immediately find the mistake. We asked to have the numbers run again and got the same result. Since we could not find the error; and we knew something was wrong; we chose to depart on Runway 9R for which the weight and balance matched our experiences with weight and balance. Later without time pressure; the error was found to be in the MTOW [Maximum Take-off Weight]. The wrong number was used.I am not sure why the MTOW was imputed incorrectly by load control. Since it is a number that does not change we in the cockpit were not looking for that kind of error.It is unknown how the MTOW was a variable in load planning. There was a Captain acting as an relief pilot. I am sure a regularly assigned relief pilot; whose duties are to regularly evaluate the weight and balance; would have found this error much more quickly.
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.