QATAR Airways QTR28N Mel-Doh

[pgrwrx]

Flight took off from MEL at approximately 22:20ADST 8th Feb 2020. Currently flying at approx 8800ft Grd speed 260MPH. Doing laps of the bay area. Nothing on news feeds. Probably dumping fuel.

[diffident]

Flight took off from MEL at approximately 22:20ADST 8th Feb 2020currently flying at approx 8800ft Grd speed 260MPH. Doing laps of the bay area. Nothing on news feeds. Probably dumping fuel.

Conflicting reports on social media suggesting either a landing gear problem or an engine problem. Nothing definitive though.

It's a Qatar A380 - here's the Flight Radar link - https://www.flightradar24.com/QTR28N/23cbfcc2

[Airbubba]

QR905/QTR28N has finished fuel dump, requests 30 minutes more holding to burn fuel. Descending to 6000 feet.

After takeoff QTR28N reported a 'gear retraction problem' to ATC at the beginning of this clip:

https://archive-server.liveatc.net/ymml/YMML3-Feb-08-2020-1130Z.mp3

LiveATC audio: https://www.liveatc.net/hlisten.php?mount=ymml3&icao=ymml

FR24: https://www.flightradar24.com/QTR28N/23cbfcc2

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1662x1168/qr905_c135b2ecb3c72ebab081db3f6c7d67b9c20e7380.jpg

[chuboy]

An awful lot of fuel to waste.

[Airbubba]

On the ground, vacating the runway at K. Taxi A, T, Bay D9. :ok:

[zerograv]

"gear retraction problem"

Yeah, keep the gear down ! You'll burn fuel more quickly that way, if the problem is to much fuel.

Now assuming that they had 4 good working engines, why the hell concentrate the fuel dump in a bay ?

What would be the problem taking it out to the sea, and even to an higher altitude to reduce concentration, and dump there ?

[Commander Taco]

Now assuming that they had 4 good working engines, why the hell concentrate the fuel dump in a bay ?

What would be the problem taking it out to the sea, and even to an higher altitude to reduce concentration, and dump there ?

Zerograv: Large international airports have designated fuel jettison areas with associated minimum altitudes to ensure complete evaporation of the fuel.. For example, CYYZ has a designated area over Lake Ontario, CYVR up the Howe Sound about 35nm northwest of the airport, ZBAA has one about 20nm NNE of the field. The aircrews don’t just dump fuel wherever they feel like it.

[clark y]

Interesting holding pattern, not quite the standard racetrack. Is that just countless vectors over the water or is there a way to plot the hold in the A380?

Interesting to see if the snapper and flatheads caught from the bay have a nice kerosene taste for a while.

[zerograv]

Zerograv: Large international airports have designated fuel jettison areas with associated minimum altitudes to ensure complete evaporation of the fuel.. For example, CYYZ has a designated area over Lake Ontario, CYVR up the Howe Sound about 35nm northwest of the airport, ZBAA has one about 20nm NNE of the field. The aircrews don’t just dump fuel wherever they feel like it.

Thanks for the explanation !

Now I know that the designated dumping area in Melbourne is the bay south of town.

[fatbus]

Assuming @200 T fuel , T/O wt @570 , they could dump @ 120 T fuel. Hopefully they dumped to a brake energy wt rather than feed tank only just because they could.

[fdr]

Now assuming that they had 4 good working engines, why the hell concentrate the fuel dump in a bay ?

What would be the problem taking it out to the sea, and even to an higher altitude to reduce concentration, and dump there ?

From the height they were at, the fuel vaporises and doesn't reach the ground as a precipitate.

[Airbubba]

Interesting holding pattern, not quite the standard racetrack. Is that just countless vectors over the water or is there a way to plot the hold in the A380?

In this case they were vectored by ATC.

Discussion of the dump plan starting about 10 minutes into this LiveATC.net clip:

https://archive-server.liveatc.net/ymml/YMML3-Feb-08-2020-1200Z.mp3

[Dave Gittins]

Just musing .. presumably if 120 T of kerosene evaporates in a relatively small area, it must condense at some point. So will it rain (very) dilute kerosene wherever that moist air from above the bay ends up over the next few days. At what dilution % age will you still be able to smell it ?

[Chu Chu]

When something evaporates, it's because the ambient conditions favor that (if I remember right, the vapor pressure of the liquid has to be more than the ambient partial pressure of its vapor). It doesn't condense again unless the conditions change. And since the partial pressure of kerosene vapor would drop as it mixes into the atmosphere, subsequent condensation seems pretty unlikely.

I'm not sure what eventually happens to it. My guess would be that it oxidizes over time (forming water vapor and CO2). Maybe it stays in the atmosphere for a length of time, diluted to undetectable levels. But there are many other ways that petrochemicals get evaporated into the atmosphere (doubtless totaling much large amounts), and we generally don't walk around smelling them.

[Pearly White]

When something evaporates, it's because the ambient conditions favor that (if I remember right, the vapor pressure of the liquid has to be more than the ambient partial pressure of its vapor). It doesn't condense again unless the conditions change. And since the partial pressure of kerosene vapor would drop as it mixes into the atmosphere, subsequent condensation seems pretty unlikely.

I'm not sure what eventually happens to it. My guess would be that it oxidizes over time (forming water vapor and CO2). Maybe it stays in the atmosphere for a length of time, diluted to undetectable levels. But there are many other ways that petrochemicals get evaporated into the atmosphere (doubtless totaling much large amounts), and we generally don't walk around smelling them.
The kerosene is vectored to the nearest bushfire area, where it is safely burnt off in the pyrocumulus.

[bean]

Zerograv: Large international airports have designated fuel jettison areas with associated minimum altitudes to ensure complete evaporation of the fuel.. For example, CYYZ has a designated area over Lake Ontario, CYVR up the Howe Sound about 35nm northwest of the airport, ZBAA has one about 20nm NNE of the field. The aircrews don’t just dump fuel wherever they feel like it.
Maybe someone should tell Delta Airlines

[Tedderboy]

Looks like QR905 is burning off fuel overhead Sumatra...just doing circles for last 20 minutes - possible diversion to Singapore?

[Airbubba]

Looks like QR905 is burning off fuel overhead Sumatra...just doing circles for last 20 minutes - possible diversion to Singapore?

Looks like SIN wouldn't take them for some reason so now they are doing a jettison in the hold at SALAX to go into KUL, planning landing runway 32R.

From FR24:

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1197x566/qr905_kul_ae7ada1dba79c40e6b5b9f514514af7b5af92710.jpg

[VH DSJ]

Looks like SIN wouldn't take them for some reason so now they are doing a jettison in the hold at SALAX to go into KUL, planning landing runway 32R.

From FR24:

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1197x566/qr905_kul_ae7ada1dba79c40e6b5b9f514514af7b5af92710.jpg

Jettison? You'd think after flying almost 11 hours, it will be well under it's MLW by now!!

[Airbubba]

Jettison? You'd think after flying almost 11 hours, it will be well under it's MLW by now!!

I agree. The circle on the way to SIN was done at FL370. After they turned toward KUL they went into the hold at FL210 and later 11000 feet. The Lumpur Approach audio on LiveATC.net wasn't too good but it sounded like they were offered an approach but said they would continue the jettison. Maybe they said negative jettison. But they held for almost an hour near K.L. from 2145Z to 2238Z.

Hydraulic problem with reduced braking? Number 1 and 4 reversers inop? ;) For some reason they had to divert but were in no hurry to get on the ground.

[megan]

Jettison? You'd think after flying almost 11 hours, it will be well under it's MLW by now!!At the time of the FR24 picture they had flown for 7:32 and the event had occurred 10:49 prior.

[Capn Bloggs]

Number 1 and 4 reversers inop? https://www.pprune.org/images/smilies/wink2.gif
That'd do it! Pretty hard to stop if you don't have those 1 and 4 TRs working on the whale, I believe! :eek: :}

[Commander Taco]

The A380 does not have thrust reversers on the outboard engines and never did. During the design/build process, Airbus realized that the A380 was seriously overweight, well above what was promised to it’s customers. The decision was made to eliminate the outboard reversers to reduce weight.

[Dookie on Drums]

The A380 does not have thrust reversers on the outboard engines and never did. During the design/build process, Airbus realized that the A380 was seriously overweight, well above what was promised to it’s customers. The decision was made to eliminate the outboard reversers to reduce weight.

Oh dear, someone didn't see the wink and pick up on the joke haha

[Capn Bloggs]

What happened to it anyway? Overdump and ran out of fuel? TRs 2 and 3 failed on landing and overrun? :confused:

[lomapaseo]

The A380 does not have thrust reversers on the outboard engines and never did. During the design/build process, Airbus realized that the A380 was seriously overweight, well above what was promised to it’s customers. The decision was made to eliminate the outboard reversers to reduce weight.

I thought that it was because they would have made a mess out of the grass and snow banks alongside the runways

[Rarife]

Same here. I'm getting lost what is joke and what is not.

[Airbubba]

What happened to it anyway? Overdump and ran out of fuel? TRs 2 and 3 failed on landing and overrun? :confused:

Here's a 'social media' report from an article on the Simple Flying blog:

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/931x488/qr_divert_16686e0ae5891d4b27a4c98d153045313931e16e.jpg
The airline further confirmed this to Simple Flying, with a statement which read:

“Qatar Airways can confirm that flight QR905 from Melbourne to Doha on Tuesday 17 March was diverted to Kuala Lumpur due to a disruptive passenger. The individual was offloaded and met by airport security staff. Qatar Airways has a zero-tolerance attitude towards any actions that put at risk the safety of our passengers and staff and will cooperate fully with law enforcement agencies in all such circumstances.

“The aircraft re-fuelled and continued its journey to Doha [via Muscat to enable a crew change]. Qatar Airways is assisting each passenger individually in Doha with regard to their onward travel and apologizes for the inconvenience caused.”


https://simpleflying.com/qatar-airbus-a380-diver/

[synteny]

YMML3-Feb-08-2020-1200Z.mp3

Could anyone still have the ATC recording file in their downloads folder? I've been on the flight and only just discovered this fascinating discussion. Totally intrigued to hear, but it's already gone from the server.

This was my first ever flight on an A380, something I had been looking forward to ever since I was a teen. I remember, as the airplane was speeding down the runway, I kept thinking, would I ever return to Australia? Ironically, that's just what happened. As the plane got airborne, all the vibration and shaking ceased -- it was so heavy that not even turbulence disturbed the flight, and the lights of the city were calmly scrolling across the window. Entertainment screen reported an altitude of 1800 m. Five minutes later we were over the ocean, but still at only 1800 m. We turned, and flew over the city. 10 minutes into the flight the altitude was unchanged. I was suspecting something was going wrong, but there was no indication of any problem. While in other discussions online some passenger reported that at row 72 one could hear a rattling sound of some open bay door, I couldn't hear or feel anything unusual at my seat somewhere around the wing centerline. The passengers were calm, most were watching the movies or falling asleep. At 15 minutes we were still at low altitude and then the captain announced that we "could not retract the landing gear", "the options are dumping fuel and returning to the airport", and that "there's no risk, it's just the gear". "We may not continue the flight since fuel consumption is too high". He sounded calm, comforting, if not annoyed by this unfortunate issue. At this point I was not at all scared, but astonished to realize that it's such a rare event to happen, and now I was a paticipant. We started circling over the sea and dumping fuel. The passengers weren't very concerned, but of course everyone were agitated to certain extent, and stuck to the map on entertainment screens. After the fuel dump completed, the captain announced again, that we were to land in 50 minutes, and that "it will be just a normal landing". He concluded, "and good night to all of you" in a vaguely sarcastic tone. This resolved the tension aboard and everybody broke laughing. There was no emergency landing drill, like customary on some other airlines, we just landed. In the line to immigration back in the terminal a senior lady asked me: "What happened? I fell asleep and now we're back". That sums it up -- nothing spectacular really happened aboard, but left curious memories and I did return to Melbourne for an extra day.

And I have a picture to share, the view of tons of fuel trickling down in moonlight.

Alas, as a new member I can't attach images or post links until I have 10 posts. Hack the link below by replacing '|'s with '/'s to see it:
https :|| yadi.sk | i | E2ifnueV2iPabQ
(or could a moderator attach the image?)

[Airbubba]

Could anyone still have the ATC recording file in their downloads folder? I've been on the flight and only just discovered this fascinating discussion. Totally intrigued to hear, but it's already gone from the server.

I'll attach an edited version of the LiveATC.net recording from the first 30 minutes of the episode. Since several channels including ground control and clearance delivery are on the original clip some transmissions concerning the Qatari A380 are missed. The audio is in a .zip file that will open on most computers but not on many phones and tablets. As you can hear, this emergency does not require urgent action even though the flight has to return to MEL.

There was no emergency landing drill, like customary on some other airlines, we just landed. In the line to immigration back in the terminal a senior lady asked me: "What happened? I fell asleep and now we're back". That sums it up -- nothing spectacular really happened aboard, but left curious memories and I did return to Melbourne for an extra day.

I had a similar experience years ago deadheading back to base from Japan on a Northwest B-744. I had been flying around Asia for a few days and decided to forgo an extra day of layover to catch the first flight home.

At rotation the number the three engine started having compressor stalls and sounded like somebody banging on a trash can. I heard the engine being shut down and saw that we were going into the hold to dump fuel. I dozed off and woke up when the gear came down on the approach. I looked at my watch and it appeared that only 15 minutes had elapsed since takeoff. Wow, these guys are good I thought. It turns out that I had forgot to change my watch from China time and we had been airborne for an hour and 15 minutes.

I made a couple of wisecracks about Pratt motors and the well dressed fellow next to me viewed me with great suspicion. I figured out later that he was a nervous flyer and a Federal Air Marshal.

Northwest had a 747-200 available somewhere in theatre that operated the flight uneventfully a few hours later.