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Posted: 06-07-2013 21:51 Post subject:

I had one, but the tail fell off:

Boeing 777 jet crash lands at San Francisco airport
A passenger jet crash was engulfed in flames after crash landing at San Francisco International airport, with black smoke seen billowing from the wreckage.
By Nick Allen
8:20PM BST 06 Jul 2013

The Boeing 777 from Seoul appeared to break apart on the runway before bursting into flames.
One witness said the back of Asiana Airlines Flight 214 detached while it was touching down, and another described how the aircraft “cartwheeled” down the runway.

Fire officials said some passengers were taken to hospitals but it was not immediately known if anyone died in the crash which happened at around 11.20am local time (7.20pm).

The aircraft can carry up to 300 passengers, but it was not clear how many were on board.
Federal Aviation Authority said it was not immediately clear how many people were injured or [whether] any were dead.

A spokesman said the sequence of events was still unclear, but it appeared the plane landed and then crashed.
Witnesses described how it appeared to be a normal landing, with the landing gear down, but the nose of the plane then went up and they heard a “popping” sound. One passenger said the plane seemed to “wobble” and then begin turning over.
Aviation expert Jim Tillman said it was a”miracle” that so may passengers appeared to have walked off the plane.

David Eun, a passenger on board, sent a message on Twitter reading: “I just crash landed at SFO. Tail ripped off. Most everyone seems fine. I’m OK. Surreal...”

One eyewitness described how the plane began “shaking violently” when it hit the runway and then appeared to “roll over.”

Weather conditions were said to have been good when it landed and winds were only about 8 mph.

Asiana is South Korea’s second-largest airline. A previous fatal cash with Asiana Airlines took place in 1993, when a Boeing 737–500 crashed in poor weather about short of the runway in Mokpo, South Korea, killing two of the six crew members and 66 of the 110 passengers.

The 777-200 is a long-range plane from Boeing. The twin-engine aircraft is one of the world's most popular long-distance planes, often used for flights of 12 hours or more, from one continent to another. The airline's website says its 777s can carry between 246 to 300 passengers.

The last time a large US airline lost a plane in a fatal crash was an American Airlines Airbus A300 taking off from JFK in 2001.

Smaller airlines have had crashes since then. The last fatal U.S. crash was a Continental Express flight operated by Colgan Air, which crashed into a house near Buffalo, N.Y. on Feb. 12, 2009. The crash killed all 49 people on board and one man in a house.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/10164727/Boeing-777-jet-crash-lands-at-San-Francisco-airport.html

Posted: 06-07-2013 23:27 Post subject:

Surely the 777 can carry well over 300 people..

'314 to 451' according to wikipdia, depending on configuration, it is a wide body, like the 747.

Posted: 08-07-2013 08:18 Post subject:

San Francisco crash Boeing 'tried to abort landing'

The Boeing 777 that crash-landed at San Francisco airport was "significantly below" its target speed near the runway and the pilot tried to abort the landing, US investigators say.
The pilot was flying into San Francisco for the first time at the controls of a 777, Asiana Airlines says.
The flight from Seoul with 307 people fell short of the runway on Saturday, killing two and injuring dozens.
The aircraft apparently hit a sea wall, ripping off its tail.

Passengers and crew escaped down emergency slides as it burst into flames.
Asiana confirmed that two female Chinese teenagers died in the crash. They had been seated at the back of the aircraft.
They are believed to be the first-ever fatalities in a Boeing 777 crash.

San Francisco's coroner is currently trying to establish whether one of the two fatalities occurred after a passenger was run over by an emergency vehicle rushing to the scene of the crash. Sad

At a news conference on Sunday, National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) chief Deborah Hersman said aircraft speed was below the planned 137 knots (158mph; 254km/h) as it approached the runway.
Citing information both from the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder, she said there was a call to increase the speed about two seconds before the impact.
The pilot then requested to abort the landing and "go around", Ms Hersman added.

"We have to take another look at the raw data and corroborate it with radar and air traffic information to make sure we have a very precise speed.
"But again, we are not talking about a few knots here or there. We're talking about a significant amount of speed below 137," she said.

Asked about possible reasons for this, Ms Hersman stressed that "everything is on the table" and "it is too early to rule anything out".

It has now emerged that although the pilot who was at the controls had nearly 10,000 flying hours - only 43 hours of those were on a Boeing 777.
Asiana Airlines said that Lee Kang-kook was assisted by another pilot who had more experience flying that type of aircraft.
Although he had flown into San Francisco 29 times at the controls of other types of aircraft, this was the first time he was doing so at the controls of a Boeing 777.

In a separate development, US officials confirmed that a navigation system helping pilots make safe descents was turned off for maintenance at San Francisco airport.
The Glide Path is used for landings in bad weather conditions; however, it was clear and sunny when the Asiana Airlines aircraft crashed on Saturday.

The twin-engine Boeing 777 has a good safety record for long-haul and is used by many major carriers.
The only previous notable crash occurred when a British Airways plane landed short of the runway at London's Heathrow Airport in 2008.

Five people are in critical condition at San Francisco General Hospital, hospital spokesperson Rachael Kagan said. Three others are being treated at Stanford Hospital.
About another 15 have yet to regain consciousness, said Margaret Knudson, interim surgery chief at the hospital,

Altogether 181 people were taken to hospital, mostly with minor injuries.
There were 291 passengers and 16 crew on board, Asiana said.
Nationalities on board included 141 Chinese, 77 South Koreans and 61 US citizens, the airline said.

Footage of the scene showed debris strewn on the runway and smoke pouring from the jet, as fire crews sprayed a white fire retardant into gaping holes in the craft's roof.
One engine and the tail fin were broken away from the main wreckage.

Passenger Ben Levy said there had been no warning of problems, although the plane appeared to be coming in too fast and too low.
"It happened in a flash, nobody was worried about anything," he said.
But once the aircraft crashed, "there was chaos, disbelief, screaming".
"My seat had been pushed to the floor, it was a mess everywhere," Mr Levy recalled.

Nevertheless, people "calmed down pretty quickly" and evacuated the plane without pushing or stepping on each other.

Meanwhile another passenger, David Eun, tweeted a picture of people evacuating down the plane's emergency inflatable slides and wrote: "I just crash landed at SFO. Tail ripped off. Most everyone seems fine. I'm ok. Surreal..."

A witness to the crash, Ki Siadatan, said the plane "looked out of control" as it descended over San Francisco Bay to land just before 11:30 (18:30 GMT).
"We heard a 'boom' and saw the plane disappear into a cloud of dust and smoke," he told the BBC. "There was then a second explosion."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23222048

Photos and more info on page.

Posted: 12-07-2013 20:32 Post subject:

Heathrow reopens after Boeing Dreamliner 787 fire

Flights have resumed at London's Heathrow Airport after a fire on a parked Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 787 Dreamliner jet.
All runways were closed for nearly 90 minutes after the fire at 16:30 BST. No passengers were aboard the plane at the time, a Heathrow spokesman said.

Fifty Dreamliners worldwide were grounded in January after malfunctions with the plane's lithium-ion batteries.
Boeing modified the jets with new batteries and flights resumed in April.

The Air Accidents Investigation Branch of the Department for Transport has despatched a team to the scene.

The Ethiopian Airlines Dreamliner in the Heathrow incident - named the Queen of Sheba - flew from Addis Ababa to Nairobi on the first commercial flight since the grounding.

Pictures of the Heathrow fire showed the Queen of Sheba close to a building and surrounded by fire vehicles. London Fire Brigade said its crews assisted Heathrow staff.
Fire-retardant foam appeared to have been sprayed at the airliner, and an area in front of the tail area on the fuselage appeared to be scorched.
Ethiopian Airlines said smoke was detected from the aircraft after it had been parked at Heathrow for more than eight hours.

A Heathrow spokesman said: "Heathrow's runways are now fully open following an earlier fire on board an Ethiopian Airlines aircraft which the airport's emergency services attended.
"The aircraft was parked on a remote parking stand and there were no passengers on board. Arrivals and departures were temporarily suspended while airport fire crews attended to this incident.
"This is a standard procedure if fire crews are occupied with an incident."
Heathrow reopened shortly before 18:00 BST but was advising passengers to check the status of their flights with the airlines.

Gatwick Airport said it experienced minor delays on departing flights as it assisted Heathrow with flights that were diverted.

Meanwhile, Thomson Airways said one of its Dreamliners travelling to Florida returned to Manchester Airport as a precautionary measure, not connected to the Heathrow fire.
Thomson, which became the first British carrier to operate the aircraft earlier this week, and is taking delivery of eight of the planes, said the plane had "experienced a technical issue".

British Airways is due to take delivery of the first two of its 24 Dreamliners.
Virgin Atlantic said it "remains committed" to taking on the first of its 16 Dreamliners in September 2014.

The battery problems followed production difficulties for the Dreamliner, marketed as a quiet, fuel-efficient aircraft carrying between 201 and 290 passengers on medium-range routes.
It was due to enter passenger service in 2008 but it was not until October 2011 that the first commercial flight was operated by Japan's All Nippon Airways.

The groundings of all Dreamliners in service in January followed two major incidents concerning the plane's two lithium-ion batteries.
On 7 January, a battery overheated and started a fire on a Japan Airlines 787 at Boston's Logan International Airport. Nine days later, an All Nippon Airways 787 had to make an emergency landing in Japan after a battery started to give off smoke.
The two batteries are not used when the 787 is in flight.
They are operational when the plane is on the ground and its engines are not turned on, and are used to power the aircraft's brakes and lights.

The new versions of the batteries, which run at a much cooler temperature, are now enclosed in stainless steel boxes.

Boeing shares fell on the New York Stock Exchange on news of the fire.

A Boeing spokesman said: "We're aware of the event. We have Boeing personnel on the ground at Heathrow and are working to fully understand and address this."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23294760

I first read about this in Breaking News earlier. It mentioned Ethiopian Airlines, and I assumed it was probably an old aircraft, but no, it seems it's the newest around. The Dreamliner is turning into a nightmare for Boeing.

Posted: 13-07-2013 01:43 Post subject:

Heck I survived several trips on DC10s and they had a lousy safety record.

But I will absolutely not step on board a B787 - that plane will kill Boeing like the DC10 killed McDonald Douglas.

Posted: 13-07-2013 07:29 Post subject:

Posted: 08-10-2013 09:33 Post subject:

Would you be told if your plane was going down?
Will the pilot keep quiet about emergencies to avoid panic? Will you see it in the flight attendant's eyes? Patrick Smith, pilot and author of Cockpit Confidential, reveals all.
By Patrick Smith
8:15AM BST 08 Oct 2013

That glazed look in the flight attendant’s eyes is probably one of exhaustion, not fear. Nervous flyers are prone to envision some silently impending disaster, with distressed crew members pacing the aisles and whispering to each other in secret. In reality, passengers will be told about any emergency or serious malfunction.

And most nonserious ones too. If you’re informed about a landing gear issue, pressurization problem, engine trouble, or the need for a precautionary landing, do not construe this to be a lifeor-death situation. It’s virtually always something minor - though you’ll be kept in the loop anyway. With even an outside chance of an evacuation in mind, you have to be kept in the loop.

On the other hand, a crew will not inform passengers of small malfunctions with no legitimate bearing on safety.
Being blunt about every little problem invites unnecessary worry, not to mention embellishment. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is the captain. Just to let you know, we’ve received a failure indication for the backup loop of the smoke detection system in the aft cargo compartment.” In this example, passengers come home with, “Oh my god, the plane was on fire.” Not that people aren’t bright enough to figure out what is or isn’t dangerous, but we’re dealing with jargon and terminology that begs to be misunderstood.

This topic brings to mind the unfortunate saga of jetBlue flight 292, an Airbus A320 that made an emergency landing in Los Angeles in 2005 because of a landing gear problem.

Although only a minor incident from a technical point of view, the entire affair was caught on live television, engrossing millions of Americans and needlessly scaring the daylights out of everybody on the plane. Moments after lift-off from Burbank, California, the pilots realised their forward landing gear had not properly retracted and was cocked at 90 degrees.

Unable to realign it, they would have to make an emergency landing with the tyres twisted sideways. The pilots and jetBlue’s dispatch team agreed to a diversion to Los Angeles, primarily to take advantage of LAX’s long runways. But first came the matter of the plane’s gross weight, which was several thousand pounds above its maximum allowable heft for touchdown.

The A320, like other smaller jetliners, does not have fuel dump capability. This meant three hours of leisure flying over the Pacific until the poundage was down to the appropriate amount.
Those three hours are what allowed this relative non-event to be catapulted into a full-on network spectacle.

The California news outlets, out and about in search of the usual car chases and traffic accidents, had only to tip their cameras upward to catch the Airbus as it circled. On board, 146 souls readied for what, according to the commentators, could very well be a devastating crash. Grown men were seen weeping. Others scribbled goodbye notes to loved ones. Words like “terrifying” and “harrowing” would later show up in interviews with those who “survived.”

Those of us who knew better weren’t nearly as alarmed. We saw a jetliner with a mildly threatening problem preparing for what would be a telegenic but perfectly manageable landing. And that’s what we got. The plane touched down smoothly on its main tyres, the nose gently falling as speed bled away until the wayward gear scraped sideways into the pavement, kicking up a rooster tail of sparks. There were no injuries.

As if the liveaction saga hadn’t been enough, the media spent the next three days choking on its own hype and melodrama, showing slowmotion replays, interviewing passengers, and generally giving jetBlue all the free advertising it could possibly hope for.

For those who’d been aboard, jetBlue’s seat-back TV screens helped induce panic, beaming in reckless live coverage from the networks. What the passengers needed was a calm and accurate explanation of exactly what was going on, and what was likely to happen at touchdown. What they got was sensational commentary from people who had no idea what they were talking about. The whole thing set up a weird and distasteful voyeuristic triangle: the terrified and transfixed passengers assumed they were watching themselves, where in truth they were watching us watch them. And all along there were better things on TV.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/travel-truths/10361755/Would-you-be-told-if-your-plane-was-going-down.html

Posted: 09-10-2013 11:21 Post subject:

Passenger lands plane at Humberside Airport after pilot falls ill

A passenger has landed an aeroplane at Humberside Airport after the pilot fell ill at the controls.
Police, fire and ambulance crews were called to the airport after the pilot collapsed and a distress call was made from the light aircraft.
Two flying instructors were called in to advise the passenger how to bring the plane down.
One of them, Roy Murray, said the passenger had no flying experience and did a "remarkable job".

The passenger and pilot were the only people on board the aircraft, which took off from Sandtoft Airfield 25 miles (40km) away.
Mr Murray, who works at a flying school based at the airport, said: "He made quite a good landing, actually.
"He didn't know the layout of the aeroplane, he didn't have lights on so he was absolutely flying blind as well.
"I think he'd flown once before as a passenger but never flown an aeroplane before."

Mr Murray said he tried to keep the man calm as he talked him through the landing procedure.
"The last thing you want to do is panic, then all sorts of things can happen."

He said there were cheers in the airport control room as the plane landed safely on its fourth attempt. Cool

"It's a fantastic feeling knowing I have achieved something and probably saved somebody's life.
"I think without any sort of talk down he would have just gone into the ground and that would have been the end of it."

Stuart Sykes said he saw the aircraft land at about 19:50 BST.
"It came down with a bump, a bump, a bump, hit the front end down, I heard some crashing and it's come to a halt," he told BBC Look North.
"There were a few sparks and three or four crashes, that must have been the propeller hitting the floor.
"Then it uprighted again and it came to a stop."

Details of the pilot's condition have not been released.

The North Lincolnshire airport said a full emergency plan was put in place. Roads surrounding the airport were closed but have since reopened.
Two incoming flights from Aberdeen and Amsterdam were delayed while the aircraft was removed from the runway.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-24450534

Sadly, however:

Humberside Airport emergency landing pilot dies

A pilot who fell ill at the controls of his plane forcing his passenger to land the light aircraft has died, police have said.
The man collapsed in the cockpit of the plane after taking off, leaving the "inexperienced" passenger to make an emergency landing.
The plane landed at Humberside Airport under the guidance of instructors called in by air traffic controllers.

Police said they were unable to confirm the cause of death.

A spokesman for Humberside Police said: "The pilot of the plane sadly died last night.
"We are not treating it as suspicious and we are in a position whereby formal identification will take place later today."
He added that a file would be prepared for the coroner.

...

The passenger and pilot were the only people on board the aircraft, which had taken off from Sandtoft Airfield 25 miles (40km) away.
It is believed the two men had flown to Skegness and were returning to Sandtoft when the pilot collapsed.

...

Richard Tomlinson, a friend of the pilot and his passenger, told BBC Radio Sheffield the passenger was "nothing short of a hero".
He said "For somebody who is not a pilot but has been around airfields and been a passenger on several occasions to take control is nothing short of phenomenal.
"The man is nothing short of a hero."

Mr Tomlinson, himself an amateur pilot, said of the man who died: "He was a very experienced pilot.
"He had been flying for many years.
"Only this week I was sat having a cup of tea and airfield banter [with both men].
"They were both very funny gentlemen to have a conversation with.
"It is very, very sad news."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-24457031

Posted: 10-10-2013 08:32 Post subject:

More Dreamliner woe:

Dreamliner: Two JAL flights diverted due to glitches

Japan Airlines (JAL) has said it has turned around two of its Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft during flights due to technical problems.
On one plane one of the two anti-ice systems, which prevent ice building-up around the engine, failed.
Meanwhile, an electric glitch rendered six toilets unusable on another flight.

These are the latest technical issues to hit the Dreamliner, which saw the entire fleet being grounded earlier this year following battery problems.

The anti-icing system failed on a Tokyo-bound flight that took off from San Diego.
A spokesperson for JAL told the BBC that a similar issue had forced a Tokyo-to-Singapore flight to be turned back in June this year.

Meanwhile, an electrical system failure connected to the lavatories affected a flight from Moscow to Tokyo.
The failure resulted in six of the seven toilets on the plane not being able to flush.
The airline said that it was looking into the problems.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24471093

Posted: 10-10-2013 08:48 Post subject:

Humberside Airport emergency landing man 'just wanted to get down'
[Video: Passenger John Wildey: "I hadn't a clue what to do to get down"]

A passenger who was forced to land a light aircraft after his pilot fell ill at the controls said he panicked and then just thought of survival.

John Wildey landed the plane at Humberside Airport on Tuesday night, under the guidance of instructors called in by air traffic controllers.
The pilot, who has since died, had collapsed in the cockpit.

Mr Wildey, 77, told BBC News he "just wanted to keep going, to get down".

Mr Wildey is a flying enthusiast but has never had a lesson.
He said he "had plenty of doubts [about whether I'd survive], because I just didn't know what was going to happen".
"Luckily [the instructors] were talking to me on the radio all the time, so that was helping me. They gave me confidence."

He described how he landed the plane with a "right bump", saying it was like a "controlled crash, really".

Mr Wildey said the pilot, who has not been identified at the request of his family, was a "brilliant" man.
"We had a good laugh and a chat going out there and coming back and then it all happened," he said.
"I really feel sorry for his wife and his relatives, they're the ones that have actually suffered."

Mr Wildey and his pilot were the only people on board the Cessna 172 aircraft, which had travelled from Sandtoft Airfield, near Scunthorpe, to Skegness.
The men were close to arriving back at Sandtoft when the pilot fell ill and Mr Wildey had to be diverted to Humberside Airport to make his landing.

He said he was finding it hard to deal with the death of his friend.
"I didn't get much sleep last night worrying about, thinking about what I should have done, could have done," Mr Wildey added.

Richard Tomlinson, a friend of both men, said Mr Wildey was a "hero".
He said that "for somebody who is not a pilot but has been around airfields and been a passenger on several occasions to take control is phenomenal".
"The man is nothing short of a hero."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-24465646

Posted: 16-10-2013 21:33 Post subject:

Impact! A Horizon Guide to Plane Crashes

It's a macabre paradox, but almost every advance in aviation safety has been driven by a crash. After every crash, investigators determine its cause and scientists make every effort to ensure the same mistakes never happen again. Dallas Campbell delves into the Horizon archives to chart the deadly disasters that have helped make air travel today the safest it has ever been.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b03d690n/Impact!_A_Horizon_Guide_to_Plane_Crashes/

Available until
10:59PM Thu, 24 Oct 2013

So the next time you're involved in a plane crash, and you know you're gonna die, you can console yourself with the thought that it will probably be safer in your next incarnation! Twisted Evil