Tristar Cabin Door - Escape

[SRENNAPS]

Not quite the plan - Riggers responsibility????

ESCAPE - YouTube

The comment from You Tube:

Unfortunately one of the cabin doors on this TriStar aircraft had been incorrectly operated on the ground. As the escape slide was partly set off, the only way to replace it safely was to open the door as if there was an emergency and let the slide deploy.....It didn't quite go as planned.

[BEagle]

Presumably the TriStar fleet has now been grounded until all other doors/chutes have been fully checked....???

[Wander00]

That's a cracker - but a good job not a "real" deployment.

[Avionker]

Presumably the TriStar fleet has now been grounded until all other doors/chutes have been fully checked....???

Without knowing exactly what had been done to the door and slide prior to the attempted deploy that comment is perhaps a bit alarmist. Had there been attempts to remove the slide prior to deciding it was unsafe to do so? What, if anything, had been disconnected? It looks to me like the slide backboard was not connected to the floor, as if the girt bar was not engaged.

Also bear in mind that when evacuation tests are carried out prior to certification that the aircraft must be evacuated in 90 seconds with half the exits inoperative.

Slides do fail to deploy at times, but this one looks to me like it was not deployed correctly, as opposed to any particular failure in the mechanism.

[NutLoose]

I remember them doing a VC10 deployment for the CAA, we all went to watch and one of the young WRAF girls was wearing nylon knickers that welded themselves to her butt... She was lying on the apron in agony with her skirt up as some medic tried to get them off... Needless to say, the growing circle of Gentlemen averted our erm eyes and never made any derogatory comments.. Her comments however have turned the air blue...


.

[airborne_artist]

Did she have her legs on the right way up? :=

[NutLoose]

Indeed she did, she was a rare attractive version.

[Wander00]

But with her knickers welded on..........

I'll get my coat

[Moi/]

Presumably the TriStar fleet has now been grounded until all other
doors/chutes have been fully checked....???


Tristar video is nearly 6 weeks old.

[rolandpull]

Surely a Mover was involved somewhere?

[NutLoose]

I'm Surprised nothing was said as that just makes the RAF look a bunch of amateur cnuts.

It reminds me of the terrible witch hunt carried out by members of the RAF against one of their colleagues online thru you tube. They should have been found and ejected.

[SRENNAPS]

just makes the RAF look a bunch of amateur cnuts

Ah, Nutloose, I think that is a bit harsh. Cockups occur all over the place and You Tube has millions of them from all walks of life.

To be honest I think the hysterical laughter in the video shows the human side of the RAF and nobody would think any bad of it. Mistakes happen, even in the aviation world:ok::ok:

[NutLoose]

True, but it doesn't exactly show the RAF as professionals does it.

[Stuff]

I really don't see the issue.

This looks like it went EXACTLY to plan. Whatever the issue was it was deemed safer to let the pressure out of the bottle by discharging it. Why do it inside the aircraft? Just pull the bolts and throw the whole damn thing out and be done with it then refit in slow time.

I can't imagine how many safety-critical systems must have failed for that to be unintentional. For a start the slide leaves the aircraft symmetrically, are you really telling me that all the fixing points failed at exactly the same time?

Inflammatory posting and representing this to be something that it's not is a bit beneath you isn't it SRENNAPS?

[SRENNAPS]

Sorry, have I just read this correctly,

Inflammatory posting and representing this to be something that it's not is a bit beneath you isn't it SRENNAPS?

WTF, I just posted a link mate, It was sent to me from somebody in the middle east who worked on Tristars. He worked with me on Tonkas many years ago!

I thought it would be of interest (and a bit of a laugh) here.


PS.....and I suppose the laughter was all part of the plan!!

[Dengue_Dude]

Err . . . Girt Bar?

[Krystal n chips]

"Presumably the TriStar fleet has now been grounded until all other doors/chutes have been fully checked"

I hate to say this BEagle, but in the real world ( the one without the RAF chain of command and, at times, self justification structure ) I have deployed several life ex.slides that duly dangled in the metaphorical breeze...never grounded a fleet however. No need.

Good video though....liked the engineers reactions ! :ok:

Dengue..girt bar...it's a bar that is attached to the slide by a steel cable. The bar is then attached to the cabin floor by the CC prior to push back ( the RAF will probably have totally different procedure of course ) hence the term "Doors Armed" or "Doors to Automatic" and, in theory, when the door is opened" in the unlikely event" etc, the tension on the cable, will result in the N2 bottle inside the slide being activated and the chute duly deploys.

This can be "rather interesting" when Ms Vapid forgets to disarm the door on arrival at an airbridge and the slide deploys as intended...she found it sooo funny....then she had an "educational" meeting with the engineers.

[BEagle]

....in the real world ( the one without the RAF chain of command and, at times, self justification structure ) I have deployed several life ex.slides that duly dangled in the metaphorical breeze...never grounded a fleet however. No need.

Leaving your stupid anti-RAF sniping aside, this wasn't an inflation failure, the whole escape slide fell off.

How many others were similarly affected? It wouldn't have taken long to have conducted a quick physical check of the fleet.

Years and years ago, the static line between the seat and the parachute of a Gnat was found to be disconnected. A fleet check revealed several others and it was soon established that this was due to sabotage by a disaffected airman who didn't like being in Anglesey. I hope he enjoyed Colchester rather less...:mad:

Safety equipment does matter; I don't know of any operator who would think otherwise, nor would I wish to fly with them.

[Al Murdoch]

This can be "rather interesting" when Ms Vapid forgets to disarm the door on arrival at an airbridge and the slide deploys as intended...she found it sooo funny....then she had an "educational" meeting with the engineers.

This also happens in the "real world" now and again. It occasionally results in very nasty accidents for the people standing the other side of the door.

[NutLoose]

Thing is although it dropped out of the aircraft as it had partially deployed, you do not know what was disconnected prior to the incident in an attempt to fix or remove it...


Thought the pop at srennaps was a bit uncalled for, I thought they had mixed up my post with his.

[Krystal n chips]

" Safety equipment does matter; I don't know of any operator who would think otherwise, nor would I wish to fly with them."

I know. That's why I ( and many others ) spent a lot of time checking the safety equipment every working day / night.And in this, rather entertaining event, as Nut Loose states, we don't actually know what preceeded the slide going "plop" in the way it did.

As for the "anti RAF"comment, well lets be honest. Plenty on here, past and present, make comments far more detrimental than the little and innocuous dig I made. The RAF is not immune from criticisms now is it...... and you have made a few yourself have you not ?

The point being that the RAF does have a well established propensity to over react at times and over engineer. In comparison to which, and I have worked in both worlds, the civilian world does not have the chain of command or manpower and places the responsibility for inspection / certification firmly on the Lic / approved engineer.

We tend to take this individual responsibility rather seriously, very seriously in fact.

This works quite well actually. ;)

For Al Murdoch, when the slide in question was operated, thankfully there were no injuries in this instance. Interestingly enough, one UK operator used to insist an engineer inspected the doors of the 747-100/200 at the airbridge and confirm with the CC that the latch on the middle of the door was disengaged. Always thought this was nice way of saying engineers were "expendable"..... should it all go for a can of worms.

[Dengue_Dude]

Thanks Krystal n Chips.

I think my irony was missed.

I've flown 3 holers of one flavour or another for about 20 years and thought that if "they" had check the Girt bar engagement, a part of said mechanism would actually have stayed with the aircraft thus deploy the slide. . .

[glum]

I think this shows just how far the RAF has sunk.

Not the fact that the slide didn't deploy correctly, since as posted it may have been a cockup or it may have been decided it was safer to lob it outside than risk it going off and injuring someone.

What saddens me is that there was someone videoing it (no doubt on their mobile phone) and then posting it on youtube.

I know for a fact there's a sign at the entrance (both of them) saying photography is prohibited.

Has the CRO or PRO (or whoever it is gives permission for pictures or video taken on station) approved this to be released? Of course not, because they'd never allow it.

We all make mistakes, but washing our dirty linen in public always was, and always will be bad form. I do hope the JEngO in charge when this was recorded has been made aware and somebody got a one-way conversation...

[NutLoose]

You think that's bad, look at the witch hunt that was pursued against the SAC on you tube.

[gijoe]

'True, but it doesn't exactly show the RAF as professionals does it.'

...Never though any different.

Many trips on the 'bridge and stays in the Gateway saw to that.

...Let along sucking of teeth when the Met says FEW.

:ok:

[woptb]

Glum,
No cameras ? There would be a LOT of flt crew in the nick !
Beags would like a cushion for your saddle ?
Careful, you could have some ones eye out !

[622]

Surely if they meant the door to drop clear of the A/C (as somebody mentioned earlier..let it go in a safe place away from the A/C)..would they not have put something beneath to catch/protect it a bit?

[glum]

I suspect if they had expected it to fall out, they would have strapped it to the inside, since the pressure bottle doesn't fire until the slide is below the door sill.

Failing that, positioning aircraft steps or a loader outside would have caught the slide before it could fire, or at least prevented the drop which undoubtedly buggered the housing.

Not to worry eh, the taxpayer will foot the bill!

[Dengue_Dude]

As I alluded to . . . the girt bar was obviously not properly engaged, otherwise that end would have stayed with the aircraft and allowed the slide to deploy normally.

[Avionker]

OK everybody. Please watch the video again. Note the following points. The area under the door is completely clear. The filming is carried out from an area fwd and outboard of the expected slide deployment area. The slide was expected to deploy, not fall off. The laughter starts a few seconds after the slide pack hits the ground. A few seconds in which the spectators process what they have just seen, which is obviously not what they expected.

@ Glum:- I would suggest that the reason it was filmed is because a slide deployment is not something you see every day. It just happened to go spectacularly wrong.

@ Stuff:- Your suggestion that this is exactly what the engineers planned to do seems to me to be so far off the mark as to be laughable. I cannot imagine anyone who is entrusted with aircraft maintenance doing anything as foolish, dangerous and outright destructive as this.

I suspect the most likely course of events was a follows.

The girt bar was disengaged intentionally, as it was initially intended to remove the slide pack normally, and replace it. The decision was then taken that it would be safer to deploy the slide, remove it and then fit a replacement pack.

Slide deployment? Hey lets film that, we've never seen one before. Hence the audience outside.

Obviously the deployment was done incorrectly. Either through inexperience, distraction, or possibly interference from someone higher in the food chain, the slide was not returned to an operative condition prior to operating the door. Result, door opens, slide pack fall outboard as intended, slide backboard is not connected to the aircraft, lanyard does not operate to discharge the bottle. Entire slide pack falls to the ground in front of an initially stunned audience. It was a cock-up, plain and simple. Not a badly packed slide, not a design flaw, it was quite simply a case of not using the maintenance manual correctly, for whatever reason.

@ Beagle:- There are many engineers, technicians, mechanics or whatever you want to call us, reading this thread. We would never dream of telling you how to operate an aircraft. Neither would we accuse you of been a cavalier and dangerous individual who intentionally flew aircraft in a reckless manner with no thought or concern for others safety. Why? Because that was your job and we expected you to do it and do it well. It was not our place to tell you how to fly.

Please return the courtesy, and don't presume to tell us how to maintain and repair aircraft. That is our job, and our responsibility. And we take it very seriously.

Cock ups happen on the ground and in the air. At least this time no one was hurt, severely embarrassed I would imagine, but not hurt.

[stealth117]

The escape slide "girt bar" normally engages in the floor hooks when the door is closed, normally electrically and can then be selected to deploy or not when the door emergency T-handle is pulled from the inside.

However if you look closely from the start of the video you can see that the door is not fully closed (blue paint line out of alignment). This could cause the "girt bar" to partially engage and pull the slide pack from the door when opened but then allow it to fall free.

[SRENNAPS]

Avionker :D:D:D:D:D:D:D

Bloody well said, especially the comments on the video.

As for mistakes occurring, as much as I have always 100% respected aircrew, enjoyed working with them very closely and gained their respect because of my ability to help generate aircraft quickly under pressure situations, the culture of “groundcrew made reckless cockups" and "aircrew made honest mistakes” always used to annoy me.

I also have to add that this culture did not normally come from the immediate aircrew off the Sqn, it generally came from the faceless people in ivory towers who had the better ability to put pen to paper rather than hand to throttle or tools to aircraft.

[BEagle]

If the cause of the detached escape slide was immediately identificable as a one-off error, that's one thing.

But if there was the slightest likelihood of this having been caused by anything else, such as a more general servicing error, that's rather another. Which would surely require that all other TriStar escape slide assemblies should have been checked and the aircraft withdrawn from service until such inspection work had been completed and the aircraft cleared for use.

That's all.

[NutLoose]

Would appear someone must not have been happy with it being posted as it has gone.

[Motleycallsign]

Suspect others are correct, door selected to 'Detach' and 'T' handle pulled therefore 'Girt Bar' not engaged in the floor hooks to hold slideraft in a/c.

[sycamore]

Putting on a very battered ex-GFSO hat,was there a Unit Inquiry convened into the circumstances,as one of HM`s aircraft sustained damage..?I suspect not as the video was not impounded.....

[Redcarpet]

Is there another link to the video?

[D-Aviator]

In 20 years with a very large fleet Tristar airline we NEVER had a slide to this. NEVER. :)
The slide is mounted in a bustle in the door.
The door has a huge coil spring retract mechanism for emergency retraction..

To arm the door and slide first close the door electrically and then a lever at the door frame is moved to the arm position by the attendant.
This moves a floor latch to link with the girt bar in the slide, and links the spring retractor to the door via the gearbox in the door mechanism.
The door is then opened by the tee handle in red which releases the retract spring and the door runs up the track, leaving the slide to be pulled out of its door shroud as it is attached AT THE FLOOR by the girt bar to the floor mount. The slide pivots and inflates normally.