ChisseyLuke
"Listening to the ATC tape, there does appear to be a time-gap between the Speedbird stopping message, and the Mayday fire services requested message.
Did the flight crew not realise that a fire was (or was likely to have) started?
ATC appear to have despatched fire services anyway, but given this delay, and the damage already occuring to the fueselage/cabin, we're looking at few seconds before catastrophe, it seems.
In now way am I critical, but I'm just interested in this gap between announcing stop, and calling for fire service."
Following an RTO, well-trained flight crew are educated to ensure the park brake is set, the reverser(s) is/are stowed and clear handover of control is given to the captain, if the FO was flying the aircraft (unsure in this instance who's sector it was). We are then advised to take a couple of deep breaths and assess the gravity of the situation before carrying out any drills. The severity is reconsidered and then the captain makes a decision to evacuate or not.
If these vital steps are not covered, you may run the risk of evacuating an aircraft with engines running and it self-taxiing across the airfield. Not very healthy for the evacuees and other airport users.
These actions have to be done with a degree of urgency, but it takes time. I think the timescale here was nothing short of incredibly good.
No you are not critical, just not very clever.