short landings at HRW

[SatInTheBack]

Last Friday was on LX338 Zurich to Hrw, very nice flight intil the landing when a nice touch to 09L became a MAJOR brake with luggage and SLF fighting to stay in seats etc.

The reason to this was to make the exit slot at 21(o), rather than roll on the 200 yards to exit at 23(o), which we taxied past. Now I will not accept a following plane as the next aircraft landing was a significant distance behind.

The question is why, and this fast departure off the runway is becoming a habit at HRW.

Comments

[PAXboy]

Dear SatInTheBack,

Welcome aboard the SLF forum and that is a very smart name!

When you refer to 'Hrw', I think that you are referring to London Heathrow, known to pax as LHR? This from your flight number LX338 which operates from Zurich (ZRH) to LHR daily at 18:30?

It certainly sounds like an unpleasant end to a trip. We have had some discussion on this subject in recent months, so you should get a response from other pax or from the people who sit up the front and read the newspaper ;)

[BOAC]

I cannot help with the question as I am not LX and therefore did not operate the flight but to pick up on what may be a significant point:

"became a MAJOR brake with luggage and SLF fighting to stay in seats"

Exactly what luggage, and what difficulty did SLF have staying "in seats"?

There should be no lose luggage in the cabin for landing and passengers should be strapped into their seats so that in the event of a landing 'event' they are safely restrained. Had some of them undone their belts because 'the flight was over now we have touched down'?

[SatInTheBack]

some detail
the force was sufficent to move bags in the racks, my laptop moved forward the equ. of one row.
A hand bag which was on the floor was recovered three rows ahead. As to passengers, I felt a major push in the back as the person behind was using the back of my seat to remain upright.
even the restrained cabin crew were suprised by the effort used.

The lucky ones sat in the exit rows had only the set bealts and I could see them being thrown forward in the seats

I would not classify this as a landing incident but rather abuse of the braking system. as a freq. flyer on many airlines I note that it is only LHR ( why all the different codes for that nightmare some call home) that I suffer this.
Is it ATC (Air Traffic Control) or Professional pride that says we must exit be the first run-off?

As to those who undo seatbelts before the engines have stopped... Err where are you going, and the doors are still closed anyway ...:-)

[Pegasus77]

Might have something to do with minimum runway occupancy,

or because your aircraft was slow (what was the type?), there might have been a jet close behind,

or it was most practical due to taxi- and turnaround times,

who can tell, several reasons for increased braking.

P77

Edited to add this:
Oh I see I misread your post, there was no-one behind you and for taxi-time it didn't matter, you say. Did you ask the flight crew? Really there can be a lot of reasons to leave the runway quickly.

[PAXboy]

The Swiss timetable shows the flight on a friday (can only check August, obviously) as being served by A320.

As for the different names, I can only agree. They all seem to suffer from "Our organisation invented this sequence so we shall always use them." There may well be good reasons.

I stick to the three letter codes that are (I think) IATA but the four letter codes tend to be used by flight crew. I am not sure where they come from.

If memory serves, LHR is EGGD?? I remember it as "EGAD there is a silly name!"

[PPRuNe Radar]

The good reason is that the ICAO ones are used as part of an international communications network which is worldwide and covers many more airfields than just those used by IATA. If it used the IATA codes only we'd run out just allocating them to airfields in the USA never mind anywhere else !!

The code includes the ICAO region, country, and a 2 letter designator for the airfield (except for places like the US and Canada which have a slightly different system).

Heathrow is EGLL. The E being Europe North, G being the UK and LL being the code for Heathrow specifically. EGAD is Newtonards ;)

The US has K as both country and region code and then 3 letters ... e.g KJFK is New York JFK.

[Elvis21]

"my laptop moved forward the equ. of one row.
A hand bag which was on the floor was recovered three rows ahead"

Stow it proper and it aint gonna move me old son!!!

As for the harsh brakes it could be for a number of reasons

[Carry0nLuggage]

One late night flight back from TLS to LGW I was woken by a very firm landing then very firm braking (think engine cutoff during the Apollo 13 launch) followed by a sharp turn off onto the taxiway. A bit unusual we thought.

Over the PA came the anouncement:
<Fr accent on> "Ladies and Gentlemen, we have arrived at Gatwick airport" <Fr accent off>.

The rest of the speech was drowned by laughter and cries of "No, really?" etc.

[Hartington]

I can think of three landings like the one you described I've had where I got an explanation.

1) Belfast. 3 runway exits - 1 each end, 1 in the middle. By braking hard we made the middle exit, saved 5 minutes taxi time and made up most of a delay.
2) Chicago. Plane in front was a Japanese 747 and our pilot wanted to get us to the terminal (and hence customs/immigration) before the passengers on that other 747.
3) Heathrow. Close to the plane in front (nobodys fault, just the way it was). We'd been a minimum approach speed since somewhere around Westminster and we knew the plane behind couldn't fly that slow so we had to vacate quick (so quick we got a brake overheat).

[DistantRumble]

Aircraft behind can go round if they need to though. If they can't then it's not the guy on the runway's fault.

However the maxim is ' you've paid for ALL the runway in your landing fees - you can use all of it if you want' .

Next time demand a pro-rata rebate by length of runway used. It'll get a laugh at least.

[Hooligan Bill]

SatInTheBack,

It is quite possible that there was another aircraft holding at 23(O) when you touched down, making it unusable for your aircraft without blocking the runway. Hence vacate at 21(O) rather than continuing down to 24(O).

[Gonzo]

SatInTheBack,

If the headwind was anything more than about 5 knots on a good weather day and dry runway, I would be disappointed if an A320 did not vacate into 21o.

There is an entry in the UK Aeronautical Information Publication (contains all the procedures for crews and airlines who fly into UK airports or airspace) under the Heathrow section which asks crews to use mimimum time on the runway, due to very high intensity operations.

Unless I tell an a/c it can roll down to such and such an exit, I will expect it to vacate my runway as soon as possible.

Please don't take this the wrong way, but just how could you tell that the "the next aircraft landing was a significant distance behind"?

Distant Rumble: If every a/c at LHR followed your maxim, then I'd have to send every other one around! :D

Gonzo.

[EGLD]

"Last Friday was on LX338 Zurich to Hrw"

"why all the different codes"

Hmmm, if you make the codes up yourself, then they dont contribute to the list of official codes. Anywho, I believe there are only 2 - EGLL and LHR and are used in different situations, and passengers should never come across EGLL, so I make that only 1 code

Is that too confusing???? I'm surprised you found your gate....

"....that nightmare some call home"

Welcome to London ! dont rush back... :p

[DistantRumble]

Gonzo : Yes of course I know that...

[canberra]

im not a pilot and i know heathrow is egll, im that sad that i know the majority of the uk icao designators! what i want to know is in the iata system is how did leuchars get adx? my theory is st andrews international, and it used to confuse the pilots of yank bizjets when they found out we were a military airfield!

[EGLD]

Canberra,

neither am I and so do i ! :)

I'd wager 95% of those checking bags in dont know that code :confused:

[Gaza]

This thread reminds me of a story I heard a few years ago...


An unnamed airline had a policy of flighdeck crew saying good bye to pax on disembarkation. After a particularily heavy landing a young FO was standing rather sheepishly at the front. One wag then asked "Did we land or were we shot down??"

:D

[PAXboy]

If we are going to get into that line .... After a 'firm' landing the CC announcement, "Welcome to Detroit. Welcome to Detroit." :D