Southern Air 747 accident in ANC

[pilot5]

Anchorage runway closed after jet blows tires during landing Anchorage Daily News (CASEY GROVE) 09/11/2012 11:59 AM

A jumbo cargo jet flying with only backup power landed in Anchorage early Tuesday, blowing out most of its tires in the process, according to airport officials.

The incident still had one of the runways at Alaska's busiest airport closed as of noon Tuesday.

A Southern Air Boeing 747 was headed from the Lower 48 to Asia when the plane's four main power generators quit working, said Trudy Wassel, business manager at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport. Two backup generators kicked on, but they do not power a mechanism on the 300- to 400-ton jet that keeps its tires from skidding, Wassel said.

"They had to use manual brakes that had no anti-skid," Wassel said.

The crew decided to make an emergency landing in Anchorage, and firefighters rushed to the runway prepared for the worst: a fiery crash.

Of the jet's 18 tires, 14 blew out when it landed about 2 a.m. Tuesday, Wassel said. Only the flight crew was onboard, and nobody was injured, she said.

The plane remained sitting on the runway, 7 Left or 7L, Tuesday morning while crews worked to fix it and figure out what happened. 7L is one of two east-west runways at the airport. The adjacent runway, 7 Right, was closed for maintenance unrelated to the emergency landing, Wassel said.

Wassel said she did not know at what point in the flight the generators gave out or what caused the failure. Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration were looking into the incident, she said.

Airport officials say there are no delays with the runway shutdown.

"We have other runways, so we're fully operational with that plane there," Wassel said.

All of the tires on the plane -- which still carried the logo of its previous owner, Saudi Air -- had been replaced by 2 p.m. Airport officials expected it to be towed out of the way, with runway 7 Left to be reopened by 2:30 or 3 p.m.

[Earl]

I assume Trudy is a woman.
Any one that has even min time in the 747 has a good laugh at this.
Piss poor reporting once again
They do not know the systems, gens and electrics , 2 extra ones, damn boieng added more and did not tell us , but sounded like she is expert.
We could tell her anything, check is in the mail, package on the truck. and i wont _____________________!

[L-38]

I had heard that they got the APU running and tried to electrically power the airplane from it inflight. This is probably what she was referring to . . . . I know that there was an option for two APU powered generators on the old SP version of the 747, maybe it was also an option on others.

[Earl]

That makes more sense they tried to start the APU and get the APU gens on line.
Boeing ops manual says apu in flight for pneumatics only,
Many APU on the 747 are locked out and will not even start in flight.
Dont blame them would try anything at that point since the airplane is only being powered by essential standby bus with loss of all gens.
Had that problem a few years ago, maybe not the same as what they experienced.
Left the bus ties open and at least got one gen back on line.
I am sure the crew tried all of this.
Good they landed safely, tires are cheap, lives are not!

[Earl]

There is no split system breaker on the 747 SP electrics,
SP I have operated lately the APU will not work in flight.
Not sure why they are locking the APU out for in flight use.

[hetfield]

All 4 genies failed....

Incident: Southern Air B742 near Anchorage on Sep 11th 2012, failure of all generators on board (http://avherald.com/h?article=455c3629&opt=0)

[grounded27]

I had an experience after launching a 742or1-f with one GEN on MEL in the rain. Had an ATB after being about an hour out (not sure, does not matter). Anyways rain water had fried 2 more GCU's (3 GEN's out) and the 741/2 made it home with out event. The scary thing was how easy it was for rain water to make it to this rack in the lower 41. It is not far from the main entry door.

[JW411]

Purely as a matter of historical interest, I was on a command course and having a 2-engine landing being demonstrated to me by my leader sitting in the right seat.

We burst 16 mainwheel tyres (out of 20 wheels on the aeroplane) which turned out to be a major maintenance error.

The vibration on landing was quite interesting but not particularly violent.

From that day on, I never worried about losing tyres on take-off or landing.

We blocked the runway for over 5 hours.

[bvcu]

Not a normal fit to have inflight capability on 747 apu. Seem to recall there is a different intake door position for flight use on the actuators which wasnt enabled according to my Boeing course notes for 100/200 and 400.

[tflier]

Just my pennies worth. Not an accident but an incident.

Well done to the crew. They say it can never happen. However.......

[Intruder]

"Certified" to be used and ABLE to be used are 2 different concepts.

I've been off the Classic for a few years, but I suspect a savvy FE could figure out how to get the APU and APU generators on line if he had to. Of course, if it didn't work, the battery charge just went WAY down...

Reasonable altitude to prevent overheat on start, possibly a ground-sensing switch or CB or 2...

[bcgallacher]

As I recall early classics were physically able to power their respective buses in flight but it was not a permitted procedure.Unlike the Tristar apu generators could not be paralleled with the engine generators. later aircraft were modified to prevent in flight use. Most 747 also were modified to ground only use of the apu - this involved removal of the external scoop on the intake door which reduced drag and in theory reduced fuel burn.

[matkat]

Brian, you are indeed correct however several 747s ( not AAI) could use the apu in flight it was iirc if there was a fuel line shroud heater installed. FYI still in Balmullo but in Vukonovo Moscow right now.
All the best Dave

[Earl]

An old technique before was to open the apu door during decent to allow the cold soaked one to warm up.
After landing and body gear steering was armed F/E just started the APU with no problems.
I don't know of any circuit breakers you could pull to B/S the system into thinking it was on the ground,
Ground safety relay maybe but would lead to many other issues.
Just wonder how much money did they save on fuel by making this apu in flight use impossible now.
Bean counters once again getting into places they don't belong.

[Earl]

Tristar you could parallel eng and apu gens in flight up to the max flight level limits of the apu.
great airplane.
747 would not allow you to do this unless you opened the split system breaker isolating the 2 sources and sides.
With the 747 it was engine gens only or apu, not both.
Could not mix the 2.

[csd]

Two backup generators kicked on, but they do not power a mechanism on the 300- to 400-ton jet that keeps its tires from skidding, Wassel said.

Probably referring to the backup power sources. i.e. the main standby bus and the apu standby bus both driving inverters from their respective battery busses.

[av8tor94]

Saw a Southern Air classic 747 that blew 13 tires after landing in ANC on 07L. It had flown for quite a while with no generators operating before landing. Anyone have any details?

[hetfield]

Try avherald, there is the full story.

[av8tor94]

Thanks,

Never seen that site, good one and Bookmarked it. Will be interesting to follow.

[VFD]

also a topic over in Freight Dogs section.

[GlueBall]

We burst 16 mainwheel tyres (out of 20 wheels on the aeroplane)

What type aeroplane is that...?

[Intruder]

They probly had 2 spares in the aft cargo bay.

[JW411]

Glueball:

Short Belfast; 2 nosewheels, 16 mainwheels and 2 tailwheels.

[bcgallacher]

Hi Dave - the apu could only be used for pneumatics in flight never electrics. I am happily retired in Glenrothes - we have rental properties and have just acquired a powder coating company - if you curb your alloy wheels come and see us!

[matkat]

Brian, will certainly bare that in mind lol.

[noorex]

if memory serves me on the classics the apu can only supply the tie busses inflight if they were suppying it before TO if after TO it will not be able to supply the tie bus due to ground shift. Not sure on 400's

[L-38]

My old company had experienced a loss of all generators on one of their B-727s about 30 years ago.

Turned out that the airplane's Constant Speed Drives coupled to the generators were mistakenly ground serviced with Skydrol by a mechanic fresh out of school . . . . All 3 CSDs had seized about 30 minutes into the flight, but luckily this occurred during day VFR.

Perhaps history repeating itself?

[thedude1]

if memory serves me on the classics the apu can only supply the tie busses inflight if they were suppying it before TO if after TO it will not be able to supply the tie bus due to ground shift. Not sure on 400's


And you would be wrong about that.
If you can get the APU started, it will supply power for the a/c through bus #4