QANTAS forced to ground entire A380 Fleet?

[rusty_fork]

News is there is problems with fuel indication systems... Anybody with further info?

[Airbubba]

The three QF A380's were grounded but have been returned to service from what I see in the news:

Qantas A380s flying after faults fixed

March 3, 2009 - 4:39PM

All three of Qantas' new A380 super jumbo jets are up, up and away once more after being grounded for 24 hours to deal with fuel tank and steering problems, the airline says.

The two-storey jets, which are capable of carrying almost 600 people in full economy mode, were grounded in London and Sydney to deal with issues the airline said were teething problems.

Two were out of service due to a fuel tank indication system problem and one experienced a nose wheel ground steering issue and an unrelated fuel leak issue, Qantas said in a statement.

All the issues have been resolved, it said...

Qantas A380s flying after faults fixed (http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/qantas-a380s-flying-after-faults-fixed-20090303-8n6e.html)

[Mikeb744]

Why have SQ not experienced the same issuses ??

I know EK uses a different engine

[kotakota]

SIA and EK tend to keep their cards close to their chests , but EK have apparently had no end of problems with the 380 , including engines .
This will not be the last 'grounding' for sure.

[Capt Claret]

Semantic hat on

If the regulator or manufacturer ordered the grounding, that would be force.

If the operator decides, prudently, that trouble shooting is required, that is not force. It is a free decision.

Semantic hat off ...

[Rainboe]

So crisis over! It is a complex new aeroplane, it is going to have a lot of shake down problems like this until the systems are proved. Have we forgotten the 747 was just the same- numerous in-service problems. One grew used to passing in and out of airports seeing stranded 747s all over the world. And then suddenly, the world grew to rely on it completely. A short temporary 'grounding' (withdrawal from service) to fix a minor problem or make an improvement across a fleet is occasionally to be expected, and really not R&N 'hot off the press' stuff, is it?

[White Knight]

Well said Rainboe - people forget the dynamics involved with putting over a 1,000,000 different components together.. It always takes a while for the fixes to be learnt with any new type.. This really is no big deal:ugh:

[Sobelena]

Fully agree, er......, as long as none of it's "teething" problems leads to the aeroplane flying 500+ pax into the ground!

[MacBoero]

Wouldn't it be fair to say that this is probably the first major new airliner to come into service during the Internet age, and therefore under very close scrutiny from pretty much everybody with access to the net.

My first involvement with the aircraft industry was working at a 'small' avionics company called GEC Marconi Avionics from 1986 to 1989. I was involved with the Airbus A320 project during the time it came into service, and it was not unusual for A320 to be on the ground for one reason or another. The difference then was, no Internet, and therefore it was unlikely to become widely known when it occurred.

Now with the Internet, and Bloggers in all areas of industry, is it any wonder that we the denizens of the Internet, get to hear about virtually all incidents, even minor ones. Further more is it not understandable that this gives the impression that more problems are occurring in relation to the days of yore, when the fact is its really no different.

To be honest I'm surprised at how few real problems there have been, given the incredible complexity of a modern airliner, its systems and its software.

[angels]

MacBoero - You make a very good point there.

The internet has put the aviation industry under incredible scrutiny (as well as other walks of life).

The amount of go-arounds, plane grounded, plane delayed stories we see here (usually quite rightly moved to other areas) prove that.

[Rainboe]

It does show the naivety of people with a keyboard who suddenly have, for the first time ever, a wide audience, coupled with limited knowledge and no experience whatsoever. Thus we get the 'outraged' correspondents who can't imagine that an airliner has any defects when it is sent out to fly passengers, and we get the frankly ridiculous comments like Sobelana's above. All rather silly. But then why do we even listen to these twerps? Because we are forced to!

[MacBoero]

As an engineer its easy for me to accept that NO system is perfect, its impossible. A perfect system, which in this case is an airliner, would have to be design by perfect designers, and built by perfect engineers. Does anybody have any of those? No! I thought not, and why? Because the designers and engineers are human, despite all the tools, techniques and computers they use.

Therefore systems designs are products of decades years of experience, and the adoption of 'best practice', and the incorporation of redundancy and features to mitigate against foreseen eventualities. The problem is that designers and engineers have only the time, money and resources to 'foresee' so much, to do more would make the product cost too much and no-one would by it. It's not a nice concept to talk about in a system that is safety critical, but a compromise has to be made somewhere in anything we do.

Joe Bloggs on the street however, will often have trouble understanding all that. It is all too easy for them to think that it is possible to make a perfect design, build a perfect product, prove that it works in ALL eventualities, and never suffers damage, break down or any defect of any kind. The deluge of news coming from modern day reporting has come as a bit of a shock to some of them. Welcome to real life!:ok:

[bvcu]

Other point to make is that 3 individual a/c were u/s at the same time , two with similar faults . Bit of a play on words but that is not the same as a 'fleet grounding' , which would be done by authorities/operator for a specific problem . After all how many operators with a fleet of 3 of one type have them all AOG at once for different reasons! Not uncommon , especially when they're all in use on long haul flights , cant just swap them on to another flt in a couple of hours like a shorthaul a/c !

[Rainboe]

MacBoro, interesting points. An example of a simple basic system: let's build a pedestrian bridge across the Thames! Make it a fancy pants design. It's a bridge- simple¬! What could go wrong? Nothing closing it for months to put strengthening in couldn't fix because the harmonics of people walking across (as it was designed for) caused it to shake or sway or do whatever bridges aren't meant to do. That was a bridge, designed by a fancy pants designer, built of good steel, bolted together, and it was a screw up! Well done Airbus! You have produced a horrifically complicated giant aeroplane, with minimal in-service issues, and it is shaking down well. And we get spectacular idiotic comments like the above!

[Sobelena]

:) well, thank you Rainboe. I'm curious though, do you actually fly for a living? Only you seem to spend your entire time on PPRuNe, mainly bollocking other posters. You should really try an anger management course. Have a nice day now :)