B-737 Cargo Plane down in Hawaii

[Stuka Child]

DaveReidUK:

I went on FR24 like you said, and the last data point seems to show 114 KTS and 1088 FPM for the rate of descent - not sure where you saw the 150 FPM. Rescuers say that winds at the time of rescue were at 17MPH, so roughly 15 KTS. Even in the scenario where it was all headwind, 129 KTS is pretty slow if they were heavily loaded - hence the high rate of descent at touchdown. If you listen to the audio, at some point you will hear the crew mention they are worried about their airspeed. We will have more information when the report comes out, but I believe they attempted to slow down their descent and stretch the sort-of-powered glide and in the process ended up on the wrong side of the drag curve and plopped her in like vilas said.

As for the sea, rescuers said they were working in 5 foot swells. There is zero way you will break an aircraft in 5 foot swells in a normal ditching.

You can see in the pictures that the nose was shorn off, indicating the aircraft touched down tail-first and then the front section slammed in in a hard secondary impact, similar to Turkish 1951. Even the way the aircraft broke apart is similar. The forces, however, were of a lesser magnitude, and this crew survived the secondary impact.

Magplug:

That is incorrect. Ditchings usually have a good outcome in the sense that the aircraft remains intact, but unfortunately there is often the risk of drowning.

Air Niugini 73 (B737-800) - aircraft intact but eventually sank to the sea bed 100 ft below - one person drowned
ALM 989 (DC-9) - although landed on significant swells, aircraft intact but eventually sank in 5000 feet of water - 24 drowned or were thrown about at impact due to not wearing seatbelts, as the ditching wasn't properly announced
Japan Airlines 2 (DC-8) - aircraft intact, came to rest on the sea bed in the shallows - 0 fatalities
Lion Air 904 - aircraft only suffered damage upon hitting rocks in the shallows - 0 fatalities

So no, the norm isn't aircraft breaking in pieces when touching the water, regardless of water depth or the presence of waves. People think that because the most famous ditching in history before Sully was the hijacked 767 from Ethiopian, which went down off the Comoros Islands. It broke apart due to impacting the water at high speed with a left bank, which caused the left engine to dig in, while also hitting a reef. Of the fatalities, many drowned as they became trapped in the half-submerged pieces of wreckage. More CFIT into water than ditching.