Crash in Indonesia

[steve1969]

BBC is reporting that an Indonesian airliner has crashed and ended up in a river. That's all I know

[Biggles Flies Undone]

It's a Garuda B737-300 (PK-GWA). Overran landing at Solo and into river. No news yet about any casualties.

[steve1969]

This from Ananova:

"An airliner has made an emergency landing on a river on the Indonesian island of Java during a heavy rainstorm.

Police said only three out of the 54 passengers and crew on board the Boeing 737-300 were seriously injured.

It came down on the Benjawang Solo River.

The plane, operated by Garuda Indonesia, had been on a flight from the tourist island of Lombok to the city of Yogyakarta, 14 miles west of the crash site.

An airline official said it was not known what went wrong on flight GA-421.

A statement from Garuda said all on board had been taken to hospitals.

It said the crash occurred when the plane was 20 minutes away from landing. It is not clear if any foreigners were aboard."

[Biggles Flies Undone]

Apparently several hurt and reports of one Indonesian national killed - not clear if crew or passenger.

[stagger]

<a href="http://www.indonesia-news.com/" target="_blank">http://www.indonesia-news.com/</a>

Indonesian plane crash-lands in river

AFP [ WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16, 2002 5:42:53 PM ]

AKARTA: A Garuda Indonesia airline Boeing 737 carrying 51 passengers crash-landed Wednesday into a river in Central Java, injuring several people, airport officials said.

The plane had been bound for the central Java city of Yogyakarta from the island of Lombok, near the resort island of Bali, when it crash-landed in the Bengawan Solo river some 30 kilometres northeast of its destination.

"No one was killed, the aircraft was not too damaged because it landed in the water, only the right wing was broken," said Hariyadi Subagyo, the head of the Yogyakarta airport administration.

[fox_trot_oscar]

Allegedly now one fatality - possibly a member of cabin crew.

RIP

[320DRIVER]

Any further info re: this crash (causes etc.) and any news from the Lion Air accident? Didn't find any links with images from these two sad incidents yet; to view extent of damage. Both reports seem to minimize the damage involved.

[Alchemy]

The one fatality was a flight attendant who reportedly "jumped out of the aircraft" in the final seconds of the off-airport landing.

[reportfurther]

JAKARTA: A Boeing 737-300 jetliner swaying violently through a monsoonal downpour with apparent engine failure has crash-landed in Indonesia killing one flight attendant.

The Garuda Indonesia plane - with 54 passengers and six crew aboard - came down on the Bengawan Solo River, that cuts through densely populated farmland on Indonesia's main island of Java about 500km east of Jakarta.

Local villagers immediately rushed to the crash site and helped the survivors wade through one-metre deep water from the plane to the banks of the river.

"To survive this is a miracle, especially for my pregnant wife," one of the passengers, Farhan Sunkar, was quoted as saying by El-Shinta radio.

"We landed hard but I only realised it was a crash landing when I saw the water."

Sunkar said he and his wife escaped from the fuselage, which was still in one piece, through an emergency exit.

Hospital officials said seven other people on board were seriously injured and were being treated in the nearby city of Solo. Several others were lightly injured.

The state Antara news agency quoted another passenger, Mawardi, as saying the plane's engines stopped working before it crash-landed. Like many Indonesians Mawardi uses only one name.

He said the aircraft was rocking from side to side as it reduced altitude.

The plane had been on a flight from the tourist island of Lombok to the city of Yogyakarta, about 25km west of the crash site.

Police Sergeant Petrus Sartono said the plane was sitting on its bottom on the river bed. However, most of the fuselage was above the waterline.

A Garuda official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it appeared at least four foreigners were on the plane.

He said officials were checking the passenger list for foreign-sounding names as they did not have a list of their nationalities because it was a domestic flight.

An airline official said it was not known what went wrong on flight GA-421. The crash happened 20 minutes before it was scheduled to land.

The location of the emergency landing is in one of the most heavily populated rural areas in the world, home to hundreds of thousands of people.

It is likely the pilot chose the 25-metre-wide river for the landing as it was the only area not covered by houses or rice fields.

It was the second emergency landing by an Indonesian-owned Boeing 737 in three days.

On Monday, seven people were injured when a Lion Air passenger jet crash-landed immediately after taking off from an airport near the town of Pekanbaru, on Sumatra island.

Today's accident was the latest in a string suffered by Garuda in recent years.

In 1997, a Garuda Airbus A-300 approaching Medan Airport in north Sumatra crashed into a jungle and exploded while trying to land in thick smoke caused by forest fires. All 234 aboard are killed.

[extra]

Brakes 3 then for you Boeing guys - Enjoy the Haj chaps.

[go with the flow]

Does anybody have more information on the event? Are we talking about a glide-ditching into a river: for so many to get out this would be a very fortunate outcome, excluding the unfortunate member of the CC.

<img src="confused.gif" border="0">

[go with the flow]

Answering my own Q, sorry.

Picture on:

<a href="http://www.kompas.com/kompas-cetak/0201/17/UTAMA/mend01.htm" target="_blank">http://www.kompas.com/kompas-cetak/0201/17/UTAMA/mend01.htm</a>

Looks like a very scary walk away. If anyone reads Bahasa they could do a quick summary

[Al Weaver]

Looking at the picture (in the link) they sure are weird looking engines for -300 model

[millhampost]

go with the flow
There is an English translation on the KOMPAS website - simply follow through the English link and click on the headline.

[firehorse]

"sent to a local indo hospital" wouldn't exactly give one a rosy feeling would it.....

[stuartbaker]

ATI reports (from a Garuda statement) that both engines flamed out when the a/c entered a cloudburst whilst descending from FL320 to FL230. Despite several efforts the crew could not relight (CFM56's).

My congrats to the pilot for making such a small splash.

[ 17 January 2002: Message edited by: Technobabble ]</p>

[Al Weaver]

&gt;ATI reports (from a Garuda statement) that both engines flamed out when the a/c entered a cloudburst whilst descending from FL320 to FL230.
Despite several efforts the crew could not relight (CFM56's).&lt;

Very strange indeed considering that if operated above min idle, as placarded, that these engines can take massive amounts of water without flaming out

In fact it actually takes ice mixed with rain to even flame them out if operated at min idle.

No surprise about the inability to relight. It's tough to relight outside the normal restart envelope and especially so if the compressors were damaged internally.

[Willie Everlearn]

try...

<a href="http://www.airdisaster.com" target="_blank">www.airdisaster.com</a>

cheers!
<img src="wink.gif" border="0">

[PK-KAR]

Something about the 732 Lion Air incident on Monday:

The unlisted accident was:
PK-LID, B737-200, Lion Air (Leased from National Aviation & International Air & Sea Lease Inc.), 14Jan02, 1010Z+7, ran off runway at Pekanbaru (PKU) operating a flight to Batam (BTH) just across the ditch from Singapore. Aborted take off, 90 pax, 5 crew, no fatalities. Capt. Zayarli Zain, FO Ahmad Luthfi.

Engine warning came online during take off, aborted, overran R18 by 125m, heavily damaged, rightwing snapped, right engine and landing gear detached.

Fleet: Yak42 (progressively withdrawn), 732 (-LIA & LID), 2 A313, 1 MD82.

Picture link through <a href="http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/mnt/media/image/launched/2002-01-16/A4_0116.jpg" target="_blank">http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/mnt/media/image/launched/2002-01-16/A4_0116.jpg</a>

According to a pax report, the plane was 10m off the ground when it fell.

[PK-KAR]

Here;s something I wrote on another board about the GA crash...

Just been reading the newspapers. It seems that details of the crash have come out pretty quick because the aircraft landed in populated area, albeit in the middle of the river, and near a bridge, hence it attracted a lot of attention and enabled a quick rescue to be carried out. Below here is some that I’ve read from Kompas Newspaper and Jakarta Post.

Most passengers did not suspect an emergency when the impact occurred, and most were wearing their seatbelts. Some passengers have said that they thought it was a very rough landing. Only after the cabin crew scrambled to the exits and screamed “emergency! Emergency, please evacuate the aircraft” did they realize. Some realized when seeing a vast pool of water out of their windows when the aircraft stopped.

Another account however have indicated that at the last few moments, cabin crew were racing up and down the cabin screaming emergency and making sure that everyone was buckled in before sitting in their stations.

Some eyewitnesses have said the aircraft have been circling above around the crash site, and then suddenly dropped into the river. A wing hit a dyke/embankment before hitting the water, hence the damage. No damage to houses or rice fields were apparent.

One witness said “it came from the east, then turned back to the east suddenly, then turned away westwards before landing in the river. There was smoke coming out of the left engine.” Mulyono, the witness, was fishing in the river not far from the crash site.

The aircraft now floating slightly, with both wings declared structurally “snapped.”

It is suspected that the plane have suffered a dual flame-out, due to heavy water and icing. It appears the pilots were trying to relit the engines until the last moment. Re-lighting was not possible due to the wet air and low altitude.

Another theory is that is suffered from total hydraulic failure, but the pilot never issued a mayday, and this has been dismissed from the priority cause of the crash. Jogjakarta tower lost contact with the aircraft and APU was on. The pilot’s lack of communication could be attributed to an electronic malfunction possibly due to lightning strike.

A Pelita F28 behind the 737 as requested to hold at 12,000 feet over Solo, about 45 mins drive away from Jogjakarta. The F28 pilot have said that the weather was raining very heavily.

The local army commander in charge of the rescue operation regretted that people were just watching the crash and slowed down the rescue including evacuation of personal property. However, the logbook, FDR and CVR have been secured.

The locals however did manage to persuade passengers to jump off the aircraft into the river because it was only “knee deep”.

Capt. Abdul Rozak and FO Gunawan is reported to be in hospital but his location is kept secret in case some relatives would like to avenge the tragedy (the Approach ATCO on duty in Medan during the A300 crash a few years back also had the same treatment, and vigilantes did go after him). FA Santi Anggraini died after drowning in the river.

All injured have been taken to R. Koen Hospital in Solo, and or have been placed in Hotel Cakra in Solo, where Garuda have set up a crisis center.

So far I’m quite happy at the local press for identifying the aircraft correctly as 737-300, PK-GWA.

I was at CGK shortly about 30 mins after the crash. GA421 had already been declared “cancelled” It was pouring down with some lightning, so I decided to go spotting. However, I was there to pick up my friend flying on GA211, scheduled to go arrive about 1 hr before GA421. He told me that the wx in Solo (where he drove from earlier) was bloody awful with lightning and heavy downpour, Jogjakarta was also raining heavily. He boarded GA211 on time, and then the pax were told to go off the aircraft and returned to the terminal. They left around the same time as GA421’s scheduled flight. GA told them that they had to wait and pick up passengers from GA421 due to an operational problem. It was not until they landed in CGK that the real reason was disclosed to the pax.

The arrivals board in CGK T2 was blacked out. We had to monitor arrivals from small TV screens.

May Santi rest in Peace.


Gerry

[eka koto]

Hi all...here is the UNOFFICIAL REPORT...but pretty reliable..While on descent to Jogjakarta GA 421 was flying in severe thunderstorms.On passing FL230 both engines flamed out.There were 4 attempts to restart the engines all unsucessfull and one attempt at starting the APU also to no avail.Then they lost their standby power (so much for 30mins)...while still IMC.They eventually broke cloud at 8000" and started looking for a field..decided to land on that river and was able to make one visual inspection..
before putting her down.

If this is so my congrats to the crew on ajob well done..

[stickyb]

Just an observation from seeing the first pictures on the BBC: It appears that soemone had been very busy with a can of spray paint blacking out the airline logos on the side of the plane, saw it sittting there in the river, looking quite clean apart from the spray paint!
Someone seems to want to limit exposure!

[Greg Baddeley]

Well done to the Flight Crew for a successful landing; bit ironic that if the F/A who lost her life had stayed at her post to look after the pax evacuation, she'd still be alive now........

[reportfurther]

An Indonesian navy search team has found the cockpit voice recorder of a Garuda Indonesia Boeing 737-300 that crash-landed in a Central Java river last week, the 'black box' was found 500- metres from the aircraft.

Rescue workers are still trying to salvage the plane and have managed to remove the right engine.

On Wednesday, 59 people aboard the Boeing 737 had a miraculous escape when it came down in the Bengawan Solo river.

One female flight attendant drowned and her body was found a few hours later.

Garuda says the plane had suffered engine failure.

[Kaptin M]

So is there any truth in this statement?. . [quote]"It's a Garuda B737-300 (PK-GWA). Overran landing at Solo and into river.<hr></blockquote>

[Few Cloudy]

Well, don't forget that there is volcanic activity in the region. In fact the first recorded all engine flame out due to volcanic ash occured near Jakarta. So let's see what the turbines look like...

[knackered]

There is an active volcano very near to Solo but the airways go nowhere near it and the the eruption would need to be substantial to the extent that we would know about it.

It is common practice around the world to black out the identifying marks on crashed a/c so why are some people making such a fuss of it here?

[knackered]

Fuel starvation would explain 4 unsuccessful relights and inability to start the APU.

[millhampost]

knackered. .Acknowledged that it is standard practice to black out the airline name. The question is why?

[Alchemy]

The airline does want to be associated with the accident.

If joe nobody, who doesn't pay attention to the news, happens to be passing on that bridge near where the garuda 737 went down, he will not exactly have a positive association to make with the airline.

In short, the airlines pressure local governemental agencies to allow the logos to painted off as soon as possible, and it is sometimes even joked that these painters arrive on the scene of a crash before the accident investigators do.

[Albatross]

Asked the Ground Eng. on a turnaround yesterday down in that neck of the woods so take it all with a pinch of salt. He was told they got the fuel a bit wrong, stooged around in the bad wx wondering whether to make an approach or hold till wx cleared or proceed to alt and simply ran out of gas. It was initially about an hours flight to destination. Deadsticked it into the river bed so not a bad outcome but three cheers for daylight. Including all the ones the media doesn't get to hear about best estimate is 26 hull losses in 9 years including this one for Garuda Indonesia. Anyone heard anything totally different?

[Albatross]

But double flameout due wx sounds better. <img src="rolleyes.gif" border="0">

[knackered]

Certainly makes more sense. Still lucky to get away with it. Pity someone else pays the price ie the FA.

[Mark Six]

I speak Indonesian and have read the report in Kompas from the link which was posted earlier. There is an English translation on the same link which is reasonably close to the original Indonesian version, except for the passengers "without being ordered" calling out in unison to Allah. The translator seems to have added that bit. It is the newspaper which has proposed the idea of icing causing the flame outs after asking for the opinions of other local pilots. They dismiss the hydraulic failure theory because if that was the case the pilot would have declared a Mayday, and he didn't, so it wasn't-interesting logic. Electrical power was lost and the APU was being used for relight attempts. A villager found the flight attendant floating face down, with little blood apparent . He diagnosed her as suffering from a "broken bone", and suggested she died when jumping out the door to save herself. The water was only knee deep. As reported elsewhere there was heavy rain in the area at the time. One wing clipped the bank on landing. The crew added to the panic by running around yelling "emergency"! The crew are safe but their whereabouts are unknown.

[reportfurther]

Weather would not likely prevent the APU from starting also, but lack of fuel on board sure would. <img src="eek.gif" border="0">

[Algy]

Just to be clear - we at ATI reported that Garuda said in an official statement that the captain said the engines flamed out in heavy rain. Yes it does sound a bit odd given the history, and no we don't have a view as to whether it's a correct explanation or not. Any offers of sensible information gratefully accepted.

[Biggles Flies Undone]

Kaptin M – the post you refer to on the previous page was made by me very soon after the incident was reported. That’s how it was stated on the news bulletin I received, so that’s how I posted it. I suppose I could have checked that there was an airport at ‘Solo’ – but at least I got the location and registration mark right!

[MrNosy]

It is understood that initial indications are that there was fuel.

I can immediately think of two double flame outs due water or water/ice ingestion where the engines were not relit as follows:-

May 24, 1988 Boeing 737-300 N75356 TACA near New Orleans.

'While in bound to New Orleans, during the descent from FL350, the crew noted generally green and yellow returns on their weather radar but with some 'isolated' red cells on both sides of their planned track. Before entering the cloud at about 30,000ft., the captain selected continuous engine ignition and turned on the engine anti-ice system. The descent continued with the crew selecting a path between two storm cells showing as red on the radar. Shortly after this heavy rain, hail and turbulence were encountered and as the aircraft reached about 16,500ft., both of its engines flamed out. The crew started up the APU and electrical power was restored as the aircraft descended through 10,600ft. Several attempts were made to restart the engines (four attempts, two on each engine) but without success. With no power and little prospect of reaching an airfield, it is believed that the captain became resigned to having to ditch the aircraft in the Intracoastal Waterway, however, in the end, he was able to land on a narrow grass strip between a canal and a levee. The forced landing was successful and the aircraft suffered only minimal damage.

The NTSB determined that the probable cause of the accident was a double engine flame out due to water ingestion which occurred as a result of an encounter with a region of very heavy rain and hail. A contributing cause of the accident was the inadequate design of the engines and the FAA's water ingestion certification standards which did not reflect the 'waterfall' rates that can be expected in moderate or higher intensity thunderstorms.'

and

April 4, 1977 DC-9 Srs.31 N1335U Southern Airways, New Hope, Georgia

'Whilst descending through 15,000ft., enroute from Huntsville, Alabama to Atlanta the aircraft encountered a severe thunderstorm near Rome, Georgia. After entering the storm both of its engines sustained damage through the ingestion of 'massive amounts' of water and hail. Both engines suffered severe compressor stalls an eventually failed. The crew were unable to restart the engines and were forced to carry out an emergency landing. The aircraft attempted to land on Highway 92 at New Hope, but struck a tree and a gas station and was destroyed by impact and fire. Apart from the occupants of the aircraft, nine people on the ground also died as the result of the accident.

The NTSB determined that the probable cause of the accident was the total and unique loss of thrust from both engines due to the ingestion of water and hail, which, in combination with thrust lever movement, induced severe stalling and major damage to the engine compressors. Contributing to the accident was the failure of the company's despatching system to provide the crew with up-to-date severe weather information, the captain's reliance of weather radar for thunderstorm penetration and limitations in the ATC system, which precluded the timely dissemination of realtime hazardous weather information to the crew.'

Any others?

Lastly, including 'those accidents the media does not report', Garuda (excluding Merpati) has suffered four 'hull losses' (Boeing/FSF definition) including one event where the aircraft was not badly damaged but was apparently not repaired for commercial reasons in the last ten years. . .If you include Merpati then the number goes up considerably (but not to 26) but look at where that airline is operating.

[nilnotedtks]

Mr Nosy, that is a very interesting foot note you add, look at where they are operating. Those Asian pilots operate daily in what is likely the most demanding weather encountered anywhere in the world ! C/B/s are a daily event and if you can fly above FL 300 you are lucky. Remember the old Viscounts/Vanguards/Electras/748's that used to operate regularly inter-island in Indonesia. I take my hat off to all those flyers who every day fly into some of the worst wx on earth, and all for a few thousand Rupiah's a month. Before you start slanging those guys off for lack of fuel, let's all sit and wait, read the official report, and once more be glad they more or less got it all down in one piece !

[Biggles Flies Undone]

NNT - before you hit MrNosy too hard just re-read the first line of his post.

[MrNosy]

NNT

I have made no speculation about the possible causes of the Garuda accident only posted the comment that, according to unofficial sources, the aircraft appears to have had fuel when it ditched.

As to the accident record of some of the Indonesian operators - that's just the point I indended - if you have to operate mainly in difficult terrain, in poor weather with limited aids then you can expect to have more accidents eg the stats show that, all else being equal, a non-precission approach is some 4 or 5 times more risky than a precission approach. You'll note that most of the accidents in Indonesia happen 'up country' at airports with very limited aids and in virtually every case no ILS.

[arba]

Preliminary story is both engine flame-out during descend inside Wx. at 23.000 ft. They never light up.Nor the APU (battery went flat during APU start attempt) Breaking clouds less than 8.000 ft.The crew decide ditching. :(

[Big Tudor]

Just out of interest, how much water are the engines able to ingest before flame-out? I've been through some of the rain storms in Indonesia and it's like walking through Niagara Falls.

[Al Weaver]

It used to be about 12%, but after the Tacca incident they figured that the processing energy necessary inside the engine was more related to temperature and state e.g. is the water partially contained as a frozen state like hail.

Rain is pretty insignificant in the bypass section and the amount that gets into the compressor is affected by the fan spinner shape so 12% water entering the inlet does not translate to as much as 12% going into the compressor. However like I stated earlier if you put the water into the compressor as hail it's a lot more potent.

For rough ballpark numbers it would take in excess of 30% water alone in the compressor to cause the engine to spool down at flight idle. Of course if you manage to operate the engine at something lower than placarded flight idle these numbers are meaningless.

To put it in real world standards the CFM56 engine can sustained better than one in 100 million storms

[Big Tudor]

Lomapaseo

Informative, succinct and polite. Not three words that describe a lot of postings on Pprune but they definately describe that one of yours. Thank you very much.

It will be interesting to see the outcome of the inquiry into this accident.

BT

[Al Weaver]

&lt;It will be interesting to see the outcome of the inquiry into this accident.&gt;

I shouldn't be difficult to quickly assay the engines, for fuel, ash or compressor damage. If it's a fuel problem things will get very quite over there. If it's an ash problem, the phones will start ringing in all the international airline ops sections within hours.

If it's a weather problem, Boeing will be on this big time putting out reminders/restrictions with Airbus following suit.

[Algy]

Anyone aware of a firm diagnosis of the cause yet?

[lomapaseo]

I heard that it was a weather problem affecting the engines.