Cathay's Aussie Hero Pilots

[ROH111]

From thewest.com.au

"The Australian pilots of a Cathay Pacific A330 are being hailed as heroes after successfully landing an aircraft at high speed after the engines malfunctioned. The problem was first noticed, on the flight from Surabaya in Indonesia, when the aircraft was on descent.

The plane, twenty minutes away from landing at Hong Kong International Airport, suffered wild variations in thrust in both engines.The pilots were forced at one stage to shut the right hand engine down, before restarting it. When the A330 touched down at high speed, the right hand engine was idle and the left hand engine was delivering 70 per cent power, well above the power usually needed for landing. The unequal and powerful thrust caused the aircraft to veer violently to one side.

Extreme braking was required to stop the plane, resulting in the tyres overheating. Six of the eight tyres on the main undercarriage deflated automatically to prevent fire.

Eight passengers received minor injuries during the evacuation.
Hong Kong's Civil Aviation department said it would investigate the "serious aircraft incident".


By the sounds of it, a great job done by the Aussie pilots!
Pilots land plane with engine failing - The West Australian (http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/7061144/pilots-land-plane-with-engine-failing/)

[Capt Fathom]

Similar threads running here in Runours & News, (http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/411959-emergency-landing-cathay-a330-300-a.html) and Fragrant Harbour! (http://www.pprune.org/fragrant-harbour/411928-cx-a330-evacuation.html)

[hardNfast]

What would have been the headline if it was QF?

:}

[TopTup]

Aussie Press? Hmmm...... "Qantas in yet ANOTHER flight of fear as Aussie battla's are left incinerated by the tarmac!"

Your Aussie press is something to behold!

Interesting as this comes at a time when CX have for the time being ceased recruiting experienced pilots and recruiting [pilots?] with ZERO hours as yet for their cadetship while turning their back on the many pilots on hold with thousands of hours of experience, many with (heavy) jet experience. AND constantly trying to lower salaries, T & C's.... These guys get no housing allowance EVER for their entire tenure at CX, nor other expat norms such as child educational allowances..... Check out the Fragrant Harbour pages.

And the bar gets lower.... (sorry, potential thread divergence).

CX A330 crew: Well done! You did what you were trained to do and did it well. I wonder if QF deemed them not suitable once upon a time?

(Beware though, CX may try to get you to pay for those blown tyres if they can find a way to do it).

[p.j.m]

What would have been the headline if it was QF?Situation normal, another day another Qantas failure. :)

[Jamair]

Australian passengers in asian airline death plunge!
hundreds of passengers including some Australians were lucky to be alive after the engines on their Cessna A320 stalled several kilometres above the ocean today. The aircraft, of the same type as those involved ion several recent incidents, went out of control before being wrestled to the ground where several tyres exploded due to the force of the crash landing. "I thought we were going to die!" sobbed one traumatised passenger; "I sent farewell text messages to 328 of my closest friends just before we almost crashed"

Other passengers told of "swerving wildly before almost skidding off the runway" to what would have certainly been a probable fiery death, similar to another asian airline incident where some Australian were killed.

Several passengers were seriously injured in the wild crush to escape the stricken plane.

The pilot, said to have once had his photo taken, was suspended pending an investigation into his guilt.

:\