Terrible, reminds me of the 1998 Surat Thani plane crash with a THAI Airbus, also bad weather and multiple approaches.

Arrived many times on HKT, usually the 27 (saves the long return to the terminal).

Direction of landing
 

I don't think it landed on 09.

Look at the shots of the tail fin below - you can clearly see other aircraft parked on the apron, on the other side of the taxiway/runway, in the far background:

http://static.sky.com/images/pictures/1586455.jpg

That surely means the crash site is on the northern side of the airport, not underneath the tower (which, like the apron, is on the south side).

It also suggests, from the debris trail in some of the panning video shots, that the aircraft would have landed on runway 27 - which makes far more sense.

Or am I just talking rubbish? :confused:

I don't think so. The deep drainage ditch is also on the north side. The accident site seems in-line with the edge of the forest and the terminal ramp area in the background, as you say. From the photo inserted, (of the whole airfield), that line would be approximately half way, perhaps a bit further, down the north side of the runway.

Very sad day for world aviation.

while the METAR doesn't reflect it, does anyone know if:

lightning had been seen in the area?

or

if the low level windshear alert system had issued a warning?

Eyewitness account from Canadian survivor.

"We started to go for the landing and he just about hit the runway, but couldn't make it, so he lifted back up. We started to circle. I thought he was going to circle back around and try again, and then we took a sharp right and we started going for the ground."

Passenger says she adopted brace position at this point.

"We bounced once and then went straight into an embankment with trees and bushes.

"It was raining really hard. We saw a couple of people who were on fire."

It's most certainly on 09. The accident site is nearly at the end of the runway, which would have been the beginning of 27, so hardly possible.

The tail lays this way because the aircraft bounced into the wall and started to turn.

Dani

It looks like 27 to me, you can see planes in the background in one of the pictures which suggests that the picture was taken facing south, which puts the wreckage half about half to two thirds down 27.

I think it is 27
 

I think it is 27 because the slope of the runway seen in the background appears to be downhill...elevation of 27 is 82 feet sloping down to 19 feet on the other end.

does this make sense?

Dani, how do you account for the wreckage trail, clearly visible on one of the photos, if the a/c had turned around. The FACTS will emerge soon enough, but to me it looks pretty sure that it was 27. [note the survivor report re the right turns too).

It was raining very hard today in south Phuket and with a lot of sudden, but short-lived, gusts of wind. It's raining again now.
One poster on Thaivisa.com stated that he lives near the runway and the wind was very strong just at the time the plane was landing.

Just watched BBC News ar 10 (Sunday night). According to the fragrant Emily Maitlis, the a/c came in "fast and hard" Fast? what was Vref? What was the additive for prevailing wind/gusr? What was the actual approach speed? And therefore was it "fast"? Why don't journos (of which my daughter is one) consult one of us before publishing?

What is meant by hard?

Oh dear.

microburst/windshear?
 

this reminds me so much of a crash in the US about 13 years ago...go around and then hit by microburst.

right now that is what I have to think in this scenario.

long ago, I decided that if a go around and windshear were mixed...might be better to put it on the runway and take your chances there.

Deepest sympathy to all affected by this tragedy.

I have been through Phuket once, and on the morning of departure it received extremely heavy rainfall. I suspected that the standing water was deep enough to constitute a contaminant. Initially I could get no information from the airport authority and a request to inspect the runway surface was met with resistance - so I refused to depart. By the time that I persuaded them to take me out to the runway, the rain had been stopped for a while and the surface was drying. During this time other aircraft continued to use the runway. My aircraft docs class a 3mm depth of water as contaminated and the landing distance and crosswind limit are then heavily factored.

Let's hope some old lessons have not just been re-learned.

Dani;

Re 27 vice 09, the following image may assist:

(removed)

The "geometry" of your suggested position doesn't work. The X's mark areas where I believe you are suggesting the site is, but there isn't any other place on the airfield where the view that is being widely broadcast, can look like the inset. The arrow marks an approximate line of sight, give or take...

The tail didn't "swing around" as there are no tell-tale gouges in the ground.

As mentioned, comments from passengers indicate a right turn.

You'd be amazed at the nonsensical "facts" I've been fed by the "one of us" brigade - usually when they're basing their "expertise" entirely on shaky crash footage from (ironically) Sky News. :hmm:

The wind direction implies that it should have been 27, I agree that the red dot seems the most resting spot from the view of planes in the background

Either way as it looks like it came to rest halfway up the runway there must have been a lot of energy left to disipate

PJ2- good bit of research. However I believe you can recognise the gap in the tree line by the coast, and lining that up with the trees at the corner where the taxiway meets the apron, it would appear that the site is halfway between your X and the red circle?

Runway 27 ILS doesn't quite line up with the runway and while it wil help you find it, it's not an approach I would like to fly right to the minima with those hills either side.

Usual journalistic rubbish coming out "Pilot was given permission to abort his landing." I didn't think I had to ask if I needed to go around.:rolleyes:

Rainboe;

TwoOneFour's notion got me looking more closely. I'm still looking at the various photos/video-stills. I see what you mean in re the trees/gap etc. I think it could perhaps be a bit closer to the X (north side) but not much. In GoogleEarth for example there is a road from the north which comes up to the perimeter of the field and then T's east and west. I'm thinking that it came to rest near that road, slightly before or after. Any location well before that point begins to place the 737 on the ramp "out of position", (not enough out in the open). Here's another view:

http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/5...irportxsr9.jpg

The whole exercise will be academic shortly - we'll all know quite quickly where the actual scene was with continued photo coverage.

I often wish the news media would do this kind of elementary homework. A lot of basic questions can be answered with a general layout of the accident scene but the media just never get it or even think to ask these kinds of questions.

The BBC video purporting to be "right after" the accident doesn't verify "strong" winds but there appears a 10 to 15kt wind blowing - nothing dramatic, and while there is rain, it's not the kind described by many including the media - one expected the kind of weather that Singapore 006 encountered for example, which was far more "severe" (that is the term used by eyewitnesses), than the weather both video'd and reported in the METARs at the time of the accident. An interview with another gentlemen from Flight International mentions windshear but such phenomena almost always come from thunderstorms and there were none reported in the METARS - the METAR is entirely unremarkable, so we'll have to wait to see what went unreported, unobserved, if anything.

Are we getting the impression from passenger accounts that this occurred on the first go-around? It will be interesting too, to learn what the words "then we took a sharp right and we started going for the ground" and the report that the a/c "bounced" before colliding with the embankment/drainage ditch. Several scenarios present themselves.

PJ

Indonesian pilot killed in the crash
 

Read the headlines in today's The Jakarta Post that an Indonesain pilot was killed in the crash.

Does anyone know if he was flying the aeroplane or was he just a passenger?

Thanks.