Engine fire forces landing at Sydney Airport

[Buster Hyman]

Engine fire forces landing at Sydney Airport
February 5, 2004


A Qantas plane carrying 11 people made a forced landing at Sydney Airport today after a suspected fire in an engine.

The Qantas Link flight QF 2042 from Sydney to Dubbo returned to Sydney soon after take-off at 11.30am (AEDT).

No-one was injured and the plane landed safely, police said.

A Qantas spokesman said the pilot of the Dash 8 Turbo aircraft was advised by air traffic control to return to Sydney after smoke was seen coming from one engine.

A replacement aircraft, with all passengers on board left Sydney at 12.30pm, the spokesman said.

For the life of me, I can't fault this article. A reasonable report.

[chris70082]

Anyone know which dash it was?

[Desert Dingo]

C'mon Buster, read it again.

Sure, it lacks the usual "I thought we were all going to die" quote, but it still seems like a beat-up to me.

If there really was a fire in the engine do you think it would take an ATC intruction to get the pilot to come back and land?
It seems to me that ATC reported seeing some smoke and the pilot decided the best thing to do would be to return and find out what was wrong.

No engine FIRE and no FORCED landing. And just a bit different to the headline. :yuk:

[compressor stall]

Even if it factually accurate - is it newsworthy? Still feeds the sensationalism.

Radio National (WA) at 1200 AEST reported a QantasLink flight bound for Mount Kieth turned back to Perth at 12 nm after a fire warning light.

Two in the one day or more wires being crossed? Did not think QFlink flew to MNE? :confused:

[Buster Hyman]

Yes, I'll take your point DD. I had a quick read of it & thought it lacked the obvious terror connotations, but yes, I see where it has fallen down. Perhaps they are slowly improving?

[DirectAnywhere]

Dash 8 Turbo aircraft

A what?? Piston Dash 8?? C'mon...

[Capt Claret]

Thank god ATC TOLD the pilot to return, othertwise they'd have continued, blissfully unaware that the engine & wing were about to ..... depart! :rolleyes:

[HotDog]

Hey Direct, people in the Aviation industry know the Dash 8 is a turbo but the majority of Joe public do not. This was a news report, not an article in Crews News.:rolleyes:

[turbantime]

Apparently a hydraulic leak onto the engine which caused the smoke....so not even an engine problem

Quote from channel 10 news, "Plane on fire over Sydney CBD", "Mid-air Mayday"

Funny thing is that they're the worst when it comes to aviation related matters. Remember the United Airlines 747 that had to make a landing in NZ due to a cabin fire.

As they showed the thing land the reporter said "smoke could be seen coming from the wheels as it landed, noone was injured"

The media guys really do know how to scare the public don't they?

[ozbiggles]

hats off to ATC if the rumours as reported here are true for watching,seeing and informing the pilots. It's the teamwork we so often forget about when we get on to these forums

[Agent86]

Stally... Qlink do go to MNE
This morning NJL had a fire indication (and ONLY an indication thankfully) during departure from Perth.
Aircraft returned to Perth and all pax reboarded a replacement aircraft 1 hour later.
No drama...No Evac...No FIRE :cool:

[devolved]

Turbantime,

at about 1400 I heard 10 news say "A cargo plane with 14 people on board".

I dare say if there were not critics out there correcting the reports then the content would be more diluted would it not?

We want quality news right?

[DirectAnywhere]

Sorry HotDog, I'm confused. It's a turboprop...nothing to do with a Turbo Supercharger surely??

[The PM]

Well, the Dubbo "newspaper" The Daily Liberal is often known as the Daily Libel or Daily Liar, so I'll post the drivel that they will no doubt print tomorrow!

[amos2]

Aw! C'mon guys...what are we going on about here?

A typical trashy, botched up, incompetent newspaper article no different to the past and probably no different to what we will read in the future!

Why get your knickers in a knot!

The media is trash...read the paper in the morning, have a smile and move on!

Have a good day! :p

[Capn Bloggs]

FOR GOD'S SAKE IT WAS A TURBO NOT A NORMAL!
Tee Hee back to my red...

[compressor stall]

Do Qlink go to MNE or is it a closed charter? Can I as joe public get a seat from PH to MNE on a Qlink flight, or is it a NJS flight which just happens to use an aircraft painted in Qlink colors cos that's what it does most of the time?

In any case probably not newsworthy!

CS

[HotDog]

Direct, I don't think even the reporter thought the dash 8 has turbocharged engines. I think it might have something to do with the Australian propensity to shorten everyhting, like the car ads "with air", instead of Airconditioning.:confused:

[Jamair]

....and the newsies didn't even report the Q-Link Dash 8 which was grounded after multiple birdstrikes in Roma the day before. Unsure of the bird type, but the LH windscreen was well and truly stuffed, with blood and guts all over the areas above the windscreens. Q-Link brought another -8 in from BN and collected the pax within a coupla hours; LAMEs came out and fixed or at least ferry-rigged the sick -8.

[plainmaker]

Reading this thread has pointed out to me that a few need to get out into the wider world and get a life.

As Buster said in his initial post, the report was factual.

If smoke is seen, you ASSUME a fire (or at the very least an ignition source) is active.

To my mind there is a difference in a FORCED LANDING and being FORCED to land. The first I would contend (and am prepared to be corrected) realtes to control - ie the aircraft is incapable of normal sustained flight. In this instance, following the advisory by ATC, would not SOP's require an immediate divert to the first available airport (but still capable of normal control)? That instruction removes the pilot's discretion, thereby "forcing" them to land.

And correct me if I am wrong, but THE POLICE reported a safe landing and no injuries.

Arguing about the technical deficiency of Turbo in what is essentially a newssheet is pure semantics. Come on guys!!

Now the channel Ten item about a cargo plane........well a Dash 8 to the "foamers" (US term for trainspotters - love it!!) is a freight locomotive produced by GE!!!. Perhaps Corrigan's influence extends further than we believe. :) :) :)

Plainmaker

[splatman]

Well this is all very interesting.

No doubt the media has got it wrong in this case. Reports of "emergency landings", discharging of engine fire extinguishers to put out the fire" and "engine fire" etc.

The aircraft returned to land with both engines operating. No doubt about that, and it has been reported by the media. They have to be right! Right???

But hang on, they also reported that "the fire was extinguished with the aircrafts on board fire extinguishing system that allowed the aircraft to return to land with the engine operational. Well for any one with a bit of DHC8 knowledge, they will tell you that to discharge either of the fire bottles, they must first be armed by pulling the Fuel Off handles. Yes folks, that shuts off the fuel and isolates the hydraulics for that side prior to the bottles being discharged. So based on that misinformation alone we can all conclude it was no engine fire as both engines were operating on landing!

Oh, but the smoke must have been from some form of fire, right? Well, NO. If I had to take a guess, I would say it was one of the oil seals that had failed and leaked into the exhaust or final turbine stages.

The result, - one would expect a white trail of smoke and no abnormal indications to the crew at that stage of flight.

Full marks to ATC for the timely notification of the smoke to the crew :ok:

Full marks to the Flight Crew for a professional decision in returning for what one would assume to be a normal landing :ok:

Any thing else is just pure speculation and sensationalism.

:E

[DirectAnywhere]

Plainmaker, agreed. However, if the media is going to report things like this they should make a reasonable attempt to get at least the basic factual information correct.

It is at times like this, when I see how flawed they are in relation to aviation topics, I wonder what else they get wrong??

[Slipri]

I agree with you splatman!

Media will hype up anything that looks exciting.

It was a small hydraulic leak. maybe a couple of tablespoons!

See you

[Pimp Daddy]

It was a small hydraulic leak. maybe a couple of tablespoons!


It was actually an engine oil leak thru the oil breather system. A blanking plug came loose in the oil/air separator. Because the breather in the -200 goes into the exhaust instead of out the back of the nacelle like the -100 dump oil into hot exhaust = smoke on go, just like the display planes.

Engine lost about 7 quarts of oil.