AF356 tailstrike in yyz
 

Air France 356 https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....549012c332.jpg
That’ll buff right out

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....3c765978fd.png
(Picture from Reddit, which came from @saiters_photography on Instagram)

Why was the PF pulling back on the stick so much? The deflection is quite large here. Also, it sounds like the engines didn't go in TOGA straightaway, but rather into reverse initially?

Weekly Air France incident - tailstrike in Toronto
 

https://aviationsourcenews.com/incid...ng-in-toronto/

Was the copilot landing while the pilot was taking off? What a stuff up.

Does that Reddit photo show deformation above and infront of the THS?

Ah! In YYZ was it! Now some know but probably 95% of the readership haven't a clue. And why should they?
How about using real names instead of esoteric codes to show how clever (not) and 'insider' you are.

Has it not occurred that people who don't operate in that area will have no idea where that is, and that many here are not pilots or exposed in any way to IATA codes either?
Not all of us have a global list of IATA codes in our heads, and suggestions to use google are just smug smartarsery.

They are very easy to find. Anyway, any Rush fan knows where YYZ is. 😁

AF 356 schedules CDG Paris France to YYZ Toronto, that is in Canada.
Tail strike on L1011 back in late 70's (aircraft has tail a strut), PANAM adviser says "not much damage", I open aft access door~frames buckled~ work party from HKG (Hong Kong) took a good week to repair.

You've made my day TURIN...hope we can hear the ATC tapes here about this AF incident in "The Spirit of Radio" ;)

Will be interesting to repair a carbon fiber hull with that amount of damage. Why on earth are such gross errors are made in a computer ladden A350? WB wrong from the loadmaster?

It occured during a Go Around (baulked landing methinks).

Yeah, some of us in Canada get a little puzzled, and have to refer to Google, with the use of four letter codes on the other side of the Atlantic.

All large Canadian airports have "Y" as the first of three characters, or "CY" as the first of four. Usually the last two characters seem random, though for some of the newer Canadian airports, there is some apparent logic. Apparently the seemingly random last two characters on the "original" airports originated with weather station designation at those locations - before my time!

YYZ was home base for me for years - back in the "Terminal 2" days!

First observations :
The landing occurred just past the 600m mark. That may be a reason for go around.. And it was confirmed by people talking about hearing it on liveATC. I'm looking out for the recording.
The thrust reversers appears to have been selected, before the thrust was increased again. This is against operating rules.
I don't know if the 350 behaves weirdly in a balked landing ? At least, the 320 does, with huge pitch down input on the stick which incurs a lot of force.

Which reminds me of a Canadian pilot we once hired:

"How the hell do you get Luton out of EGGW?"

"Same way that you get Gander out of CYQX!"

Obviously bounced first then tail strike on GA. Will be a flight home at 10,000ft

I don't see any bounce. To me it was a completely normal landing.
My bet is the reverse were deployed, so the thrust was much longer than usual to come.
The pilot pulled too hard. Maybe used to the 320 where you need to pull very hard.
The absence of thrust didn't help the aircraft climb and gain some tail clearance.

At least from the passenger window, looks like a perfectly normal landing past touchdown. What would have caused them to go around? Yes, engines are slow to develop thrust, but once she is fully in the air, notice how fast she climbs?

Runway incursion?
 

I was on the flight. Once the flight was stabilised after the go around, the pilot announced that the reason for the go around was that the runway was occupied…. How can we know what was on the runway?

There was a Canadair Global Express business jet in front. Impossible to say accurately with FR24 but it could well have been a tad late vacating the runway.

I'd hope the decision to go around due to an occupied runway would come a bit before touchdown on a seemingly severe CAVOK day with great visibility to see this other traffic occupying the runway... No need to put it down first and then second guess if the guy in front has vacated yet or not.

Sounds a bit strange to me, but let's see if any reports come out later. I'm inclined to believe the FR24 data which has the preceding traffic already moving in the opposite direction on the taxiway after vacating.

I was on a flight as well and was watching nose wheel cam. The flare was quite long and the go around was initiated just before the nose wheel touch down. I did not notice tail strike but I thought reversers were actuated for brief moment. Could explain lack of thrust during rotation as there is definitely some delay if it went to reverse. From a Live ATC archive file - Departure freq 21:30z (approx 06:00) the pilot said they wanted to avoid long landing. I can confirm that on PA he said it was due to occupied runway. Funny thing was that the captian was standing by door saying bye to passengers as if nothing happened. Maybe he did not notice tail strike as well 🙈

flyrealtraffic.com not showing any ground targets that might have been in the way. ADS-B ground coverage at YYZ is gapless, so if whatever was on the runway had an ADS-B transponder it would show up here.

Perhaps a goose walking across.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....0993872e56.png

'Never go around after selecting reverse', is what manuals say. Possibly PM pulled sidestick too? Both inputs added together.... Lets see!

Similar event here :
https://assets.publishing.service.go...XWBC_09-22.pdf

The root cause to me appears clearly on the plots page.
The elevators show a clear triangle shape. This means the elevator are chasing a target they can't reach, at maximum speed. This basically means PIO.
Why is there PIO ?
Because the pilot pulled, and noticed a reaction that was too large. He was convinced that the reaction was too large especially when the tail hit... So he pushed forward at maximum, and induced the PIO.

Why did the pilot pull too much ? Because if you look closely, there is a huuuge delay (in the order of one second) between the pilot pulling and the elevators going up.
So the pilot maintains his order longer than he would have, if the plane had reacted. It can also happen that when noticing the absence of reaction, he increases his order (maybe not the case here? look at the curves and see for yourself!). If he maintains his order, the time average of the order that is used in the flight control computer will increase and the elevator will go nose up... Too far nose up. Hence an airplane overreaction, and the subsequent induction of PIO.

Here, with only two full triangles visible, it's a short PIO. But the PIO is just a symptom of the PIO conditions being present. And only the onset of PIO, which is an airplane overraction, is enough for the plane to strike its tail.

FR24 replay is an absolute shamble.

If there was anything on or near the runway when AFR356 was touching down, it wasn't the preceding GLEX.
21:34:04 was the GLEX's first timestamp (well) beyond the holdingpoint line
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....debc951812.jpg

They said it was "to avoid long landing" (much like the BA incident shown).. Heard on liveATC.

The replay facility on FR24 has always been pretty iffy - the only way to judge separation accurately is to download the respective ADS-B tracks and compare them.

But that's not an option in this case as the GLEX, like most of its ilk, doesn't have downloadable data on FR24.

The touchdown was not long, and the crew went immediately after touchdown to GA thrust. They had ample room to do the GA and they were not outside of the landing zone, something spooked them into tossing away the landing, and why they wanted that attitude on the departure will be an interesting discussion.

Sorry pumpkin what part of the name of the website you are on passed your ever so observant eye.

I think one should take this announcement with a grain of salt ...

Small digression: a friend was on a Company flight to JFK around 11 October 2010. He wrote this: "the pilot approached the runway [...] at the last minute (I mean we were already above the runway), he pushes all power in and aborts the landing sequence [...] At the end of the pilot said that he apologizes but the runaway was occupied and he had to abort [...] the A380 has tail camera and from what I could see there was nothing on the runway [...]"

That particular event got some attention, on this forum and elsewhere ...

Why are the scrape marks off center?

runway camber... :}

C. Coriolis

In the UK you will not be cleared to land if the runway area is still occupied (and that includes aeroplanes that are vacating on the taxiway but not yet past the Cat 1 Hold).

In CDG you can be cleared to land when not only the aeroplane on the runway has not yet vacated, but the one ahead of you has not even landed yet.

Could someone let us know when you get your clearance to land in Canada?

We teach students in light aeroplanes to go around from a safe height if the runway is still occupied. Why would you land an airliner if the runway is still occupied? Something doesn't add up! Any formal reports will be interesting.

You can get a land-after clearance in the UK. Not sure I'd continue to the point of touch down if there was still traffic on the runway, but the decision can certainly be made up to and including that point. I don't think Canada does that awful thing like in the USA by clearing you to land while still in oceanic airspace (I'm being facetious, but you know what I mean). I've certainly never noticed it.

What concerns me about this video is that reverse thrust is clearly audible for several seconds in the clip.

Surely that would be a CYQX problem

I explained everything but you don't believe me.
They're telling in on the radio that the cause was a long landing. They touched down slightly after the 600m mark. Some airlines won't allow pilots to touch "in the TDZ" which can sometimes extend for more than one kilometer.

Why they pulled so hard is probably explained here :
https://www.pprune.org/11581420-post25.html

Although the AAIB report doesn't explicitly identify the elevator delay and PIO, as a contributing factor, they are clearly visible on the curves. If we get curves for this incident, I expect to see a similar thing. I don't think they've updated the flight control laws between the two incidents.

Easy fix
 

They could repair the damage by wrapping the rear fuselage in silver tape . Afterwards it would look a lot like F-WWCF.

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....b056831eef.jpg

Does Airbus actually say "Never"?
Boeing has a similar statement, but it's somewhat weasel worded - IIRC it's along the line of "Go around after selecting reverse is not recommended" - it doesn't say "never".
If you touchdown, select reverse, then discover another aircraft/vehicle blocking the runway, you have pretty limited options...

Airbus: “Thrust reverser selection is a decision to stop.”

Furthermore:

I thought it became "never" after the Cranbrook 737 crash, where the crew tried to go around, after selecting reverse thrust, when they discovered a snowplow on the runway. The FO was a friend of mine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacifi...nes_Flight_314