Originally Posted by
Rainboe
You have to be joking! What you said cannot be serious. A wake vortex encounter is not an unusual event They happen. This type operated in Australia for years quite happily, having wake encounters. The fin came off because of the unusual pilot reaction to it. I would call it bizarre flying practices because I cannot believe the rudder reaction, the scale of the movements, and the rapidity. I'm quite sure even a 747 fin would come off if you did this to it. The fact that regulatory authorities are satisfied that the aeroplane as it stands is fit to continue operating with pilot 're-education' suggests that the cause is known.
There you go twisting things again.
I didn't say anything about wake turbulence.
This type did operate in Australia, for a little over 12 months (not years), and yes we did not have this trouble (obviously as this was thankfully a one off), in fact we had very little trouble at all with them, and I had the pleasure of certifying for them for all that time, but they were NOT operating in the same environment as the AA one.
Later when with an identical Aircraft based in NY, and operating identical routes to the AA Aircraft, was when we had all the maintenance problems with the composite tail, not in Australia.
I do not know about the possibility of a tail coming off a B747, B737 or any other Airbus, and would never comment on such, however no matter how much you all ridicule me, I do KNOW that with an identical Aircraft (A300-600), operating out of the same Airport (JFK) and operating the same routes (down through the Caribbean), we had lots of maintenance problems with the tail, and I honestly feel this is a hell of a coincidence IF as you all say, this could not have possibly played a part in it.
However, I bow to your superior knowledge, even though you weren't there as I was, and will comment no more.
Save it for the picnic.