TAM Fokker 100 Deadsticks into Field, Cow Killed!

[lamer]

http://www.uol.com.br/folha/cotidiano/ult95u58062.shtml

Use the fish at http://world.altavista.com/tr

Regards.

[Capt PPRuNe]

This is about as good as i managed to get it translated:30/08/2002 - 14h58
Pilot of the TAM was skillful, says inhabitant of Birigui on forced landing
of the Online Leaf
The pilot of Fokker 100 of the TAM that today made a landing forced in a grass of Birigui (518 km the northwest of São Paulo) was "sufficiently skillful", in the opinion of the entrepreneur Maur'cio Longuini Barber, inhabitant of the city.
Barber, that sent photos of the aircraft to the Online Leaf , said that he did not have access to the place where the airplane stopped, but affirms that the pilot was sufficiently experienced to prevent an accident.
Maur'cio Longuini Barber
http://www.uol.com.br/folha/cotidiano/images/30aviao.jpg
Fokker 100 that it made landing forced in Birigui
"the region is full of mountains, of mounts, and it it chose an opened, ample area", said.
The commander of the aircraft was identified as Soter.
Fokker 100 that Great SP)-Field made the flight 3804 Guarulhos ((MS) settled in a grass of the Taquari quarter, in Birigui, for return of 11h. The aircraft had taken off of São Paulo to 9h48, with 24 passengers on board.
According to Vivaldo Donizete Coast, attendant of the soon-aid of Birigui, four passengers - two men and two women had been taken care of with light excoriations and pains in the body. All pass well.
Pieces of the tires of the landing gear had been spread in the grass. A cow was run over and died.
As Antonio Carlos Simaro, commission agent-assitente of the Seccional de Araçatuba, the pilot said informally that a fuel emptying provoked the incident. The TAM informed that the aircraft took off supplied and that the causes of this loss are being investigated.

[PaperTiger]

And ANOTHER one, same day. Gear-up landing, managed to find an airport this time though :eek:

http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=worldnews&StoryID=1393577

Double WOW.

[AeroBoero]

Ok..bad day here in Brazil. Just a few hours ago a EMB-120 (Bras'lia) landed short of the field at Rio Branco Intl. Airport (North region). Only 8 people of the 31 (28 pax + 3 crew) on board been reported to have survived.

[lamer]

pics of both incidents : http://oglobo.globo.com/oglobo/pais/

click on fotogalerias on the right.

caution: contains pic of fatality.

regards.

[320DRIVER]

Any news on probable cause?

[justplanes]

These pictures clearly show the airplane is a w/o
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/airlineaccidentsandincidents/

[andrewc]

Yeah, the cow didn't enjoy it either,

-- Andrew

[gofer]

a/c may be a write off but hats off where its deserved guys - lots of spare parts and PAX OK. Sorry for the cow, but beefsteak was it's medium term fate anyway.

If all such outcomes would be so positive.... ;)

[320DRIVER]

Hats off indeed... if you see the pic, the terrain ain't really some flat plain but has a noticeable slope. Imagine judging the flare height in the eerie silence if it was indeed a deadstick landing. Some sites seem to be pointing to hydraulic troubles. Any pointers?

[OzPax1]

Sounds like Captain M Rocha (Director of Safety) will be a busy for a while. Was just reading an article in Airliners (issue 77 - Sept/Oct 2002) with him saying how comitted TAM is to safety! I think they just showed how that commitment has paid off.

[Flap40]

320 Driver,

I think you are confusing the two accidents. The one in the field is said to be due to fuel (of the lack of). The other one (wheels up) at Viracopos airport was said to by due to hydraulics.

[broadreach]

I'm sitting in Rio but no closer to the subject than any of you are. The odds against two incidents of this nature happening in the same airline, with the same type of aircraft, on the same day, are just too great to even consider.

We always try to reason out possible "whys" and I jumped to a possible reason early on - wrong oil in the hydraulic system, administered at the same base. That doesn't seem to fit because the Birigui cow-pasture landing appears to have been wheels-down, the undercarriage having collapsed and departed shortly before the aircraft came to a stop, whereas the Campinas landing appears to have been totally wheels-up.

On the other hand, both assumptions might be mistaken. Wheels half-down but not locked can be ripped off on rough terrain as in Birigui and wheels half-down but not locked may fold back up on a runway as in Campinas.

Globo TV last night broadcast a mobile call from a TAM technician at the site of the Birigui pasture landing which appeared to confirm there had been an unintentional fuel dump and consequent flameut. Again, "appeared to confirm".

In any case I would imagine that whoever is supplying the lubes to TAM is paying very close attention to the case and champing at the bit to see what the recorders - and the lube samples - show.

The Rio Branco crash, of a Brasilia where 23 people died, was entirely unconnected other than by the fact that it happened in the same country. Awful weather seems to have been a contributing factor, not the case in the TAM landings.

broadreach

[Flap40]

A couple of points:

1. There is no fuel dump facility on the F100

2. In the event of a system 1 hydraulic failure the wheels will rest on the doors. The alternate gear handle mechanically unlocks the doors and the gear free-falls by gravity to the down and locked position leaving the maingear doors hanging open.

Therefore in the case of the aircraft in the field it either had insufficient on board at takeoff of suffered some sort of fuel leak.

For the aircraft that landed wheels up you can the possibilities are either: a) a fault in the u/c alternate system or b) operator error. Personally I'd go for a).

[Mork]

All right folks,

It´s hard to point fingers at this point, but let me tell you that TAM has had a few minor incidents that are not posted on the news. Just from the top of my head there was an airbus landing very hard in congonhas, there was a F-100 that scraped the wing at Ilheus after a very unstable app, there was a F-100 gear collapse during towing, there was an F-100 too close to building after a go-around in Bauru. I´ve worked there, and safety is definitely not the priority. Getting the airplane on the air as fast as they can is the priority and a detriment to safety for sure. I can elaborate better on these incidents if anyone cares.

[FlyingRabbit]

Mork

yes, please elaborate on this, I'd be quite interested. I agree, there has been a lot of minor incidents with TAM, and almost always with the Fokker 100. I for one never fly TAM, I prefer either Varig or Gol.

Regards
FR

[Mork]

As far as the Airbus incident, ATC had requested a high speed approach which was promptly accepted by the crew. I have never flown a bus but I imagine it´s not as easy to slow her down as it is to slow a F-100. To make a long story short, the crew elected to put the gear down to help the aircraft slow down. The F/A know they have about 1min30s before touchdown but since they were fast they only had about 40 seconds. Bear in mind that normally the F/A should be seated a long time before that but....... Well anyways, they finally configured the landing flaps at about 60 ft agl and the aircraft landed hard, bounced touched the nose gear and settled down. Result, one of the F/A who was standing up, fell and broke his ankle. They are still investigating.

The F-100 wing scraping occured after the aircraft tried a few instrument approaches at Ilheus. Their original destination was Ilha de Comandatuba, but the wx there was crappy. After the second app and G/A the low fuel light came on. He had to make it or ditch. He made a last attempt approaching thru the ocean and saw the rwy too close. After about a 40 degree turn to line up with the rwy, the wing contacted the ground. They managed to break a few rwy lights and settle back on the rwy. Very fortunate because nobody was injured.

The other F-100 G/A at Bauru, I would rather not comment because I´m not sure about the facts. The gear collapse during push back was probably some kind of mechanical failure. We used to call our intermediate stops "pitstops". We once managed to do a 7 minute turn-around. This includes deplaning, boarding with the captain at the foot of the steps greeting all of the passengers, leaving me in the cockpit doing everything. One detail, I was going thru my IOE because I had just upgraded to the F-100. Not very comfortable.

Gotta go!!!!

[Smudger]

I'm sorry?, what is this all about? Why did this aeroplane crash? Can somebody talk some sense? Please enlighten me, what the hell happened here?

[downfourgreen]

- Gear up landing at Viracopos.
- Dual engine failure. (cause not know yet).
- Landing below minimus and wing scraped.
- Bomb explosion inflight and one passenger dead.
- Decompression and one passenger dead.
- Main landing gear collapse after a hard landing at Santos Dumont airport.
It seems Tam has had a good safety record lately...

[AeroBoero]

Visual;

FR is behind TAM in this matter for a long time. The norm is/was between 10 and 15 minutes with the F100. With complete crew changes was 30 minutes (I timed many times). But in one thing they are equals: they are the bash target for their colleagues in other outfits.

I don´t know how the A320´s are doing in TAM now in turnaround matters.

[fokkerjet]

We received this memo from Fokker in part;

"The first Fokker 100 aircraft landed in a grassy field. Reportedly, the aircraft suffered a decrease in fuel quanity, and subsequently diverted to the nearest airfield, but reportedly ran out of fuel approximately 60 nm from intended alternate airport.

There were no casualities amongst the 24 passengers and 6 crew, and 4 passengers sustained minor injuries. The aircraft has significant damage.

The other Fokker 100 was reportly forced to make a belly landing at an airport, after the flight crew did not succeed to get the landing gear down and locked following a hydraulic system 1 failure. The landing gear doors remained closed. None of the 42 passengers were hurt. This aircraft suffered less damage than the previous aircraft."

[AeroBoero]

Here a rough translation of a official note from the DAC (Brazilian CAA), not all of it but the part about the deadstick landing. It was taken from this (http://www.aerospace.com.br/display_news.asp?news_index=00004618) page...that is in Portuguese for who have a desire to see more. This is not the final report- just a note that so far confirms what the company is saying. The oficial one will take time.


"....The aircraft PT-MQH, that made a forced landing in a unprepared field at approximately 10:45 (13:45 Z), near the town of Araçatuba-State of São Paulo, classified as an Accident was with its papers in order and so was the crew.

The reason for the landing was the excessive fuel consumption that was caused by a leak located in the pipe that gives access to the high pressure fuel pump in the right engine.

There was a movement that made the connection between the pipe and the pump to have a failure. The fuel got out of the a/c within a short period. The right engine was the first to flame out and very close to the landing the left engine flamed out.

The investigation will be centred on the material side to discover why this happened in the pipe and pump and on the operational aspect as to which, why and how the crew were trained and worked the situation......"

Seem a bit similar to the Air Transat in Azores...at least for now.