Abysmal Journalism concerning Aviation
 

Some more outstanding journalism about aviation, as witnessed on the news.com.au website. The story concerns a United Airlines flight that diverted to Brisbane (enroute to Sydney) because it was "running out of fuel" and had an "engineering problem".

United Airlines flight forced to land due to low fuel | News.com.au

This was probably no more than a 744 using a little more fuel than forecast and requiring a top-up. Hardly a major story, you would think, but what makes this truly appalling journalism is that the headline read "United Airlines flight forced to land due to low fuel". What's more, a picture was posted beside the story that showed an A319 that had landed with one main gear not locked down in Newark, USA, five days ago.

Maybe we should post every terrible/misleading/alarmist story about aviation on this thread, and then send it to Media Watch at the end of the year for comment. The Mods will probably have to limit the thread to make it a managable length though.

I would have thought that a regular scheduled airline flight not being able to make its stated destination because it was running low on fuel, is cause for some concern.

So would I, especially if I was on it. :eek:

Arnold,

A diversion for fuel reasons is not always a call for concern. Headwinds are a general cause. In any case, they diverted to Brisbane with appropriate reserves in their tanks for that destination. Storm in a teacup.

In any case, that article is ridiculous. Have just sent it to Mediawatch.

Yes, but that was NOT their scheduled destination. ;)

Maybe it is a slow news day. :ok:

No, Arnold.

LAX-SYD for most 744 will be payload limited, maybe to less than full pax capacity. Without getting into the arcane world of saleable capacity calculation, most carriers will take the offering, limited, load, on the day in the knowledge that the forecast enroute wind component might be lean or fat. The tech call risk is a legitimate piece of commercial judgement.

(Mind you, it was easier HNL-SYD, when you could expect the same crew to continue to destination)

Been part of aviation forever. LAX-SYD you can drop into NAN, NOU or BNE; there is no risk to life or limb.

And, who knows, SYD threw in a risk of fog or something nasty late in the flight.

As others have said. Non-event.

Ho-hum.

In the good ole days of the semi-transcontinental 146, it was not uncommon to have to drop into Kalgoorlie for a (fuel) tech stop. Particularly if a 100 series was scheduled and the winter westerlies were strong.

Generally the decision wasn't made until the load ex ASP was finalised, and some times, not until established in the cruise and actual conditions determined.

Pax would be advised when appropriate with an explanation that not enough fuel could be carried, yadda, yadda, yadda. I'd be very surprised if the explanations weren't passed on by non-technical people as "we had to go to Kalgorlie because the plane ran out of fuel".

Just because a layman's explanation gets reworded, doesn't mean there is any cause for concern.

Emergency landing? One must have mistook the fuel truck for a fire truck

Absolutely it was a slow news day, what a crock of ****e!

Firstly it didn't land at 11.30am in Brisvegas, it was about 6.30am (7.30am Sydney). Secondly there was no engineering problem!

As someone else pointed out about the unforecast headwinds, they decided to divert abeam Brisbane as they were going to be short for holding at YSSY and then diversion to YBBN. They landed at YBBN, got some fuel, and left. Nothing more, nothing less...

@airsupport,

No perhaps it wasn't their destination. But neither are flights that are re-routed from Melbourne to Sydney, or Sydney to Canberra, or Adelaide to Melbourne or Perth to, well, anywhere but Perth, and so on. There are unique conditions for any of these flights. But to headline a "news" article with "ZOMG!!!! NO FUEL ON PLANE!!!! POSSIBLE DITCHING IN PACIFIC! UA ENGINEERING EMERGENCY!" is just ridiculous.

Media these days are "social media" sites like twatter, er, *******, where things that are trending (UA emergency landing in Newark, anything QF related, Airbus sucks bollocks, etc) have sensationalist headlines attached to them with unrelated "content" (bodgy images) slapped into a HTML stylesheet and regurgitated to us as "news".

Remember, Rupert wants to charge you for this trash.

The standard response from the bureau desks when you inform them of their faux-paux is "oh, this is just a reuters wire, we don't check for accuracy or content". That's not journalism - that's just plain :mad: lazy in my very humble opinion.

"unforecast headwinds" .....my a$$. You guys do know that grib data is quite accuirate and updated every 6 hrs. Did anyone else divert ?

Doesn't UA carry Altn fuel everywhere.

Piss poor effort if you ask me...............

Gawd I'm getting sick of these stupid B011ocks stories from our supposedly professional news service.

Is there anything we can actually do about this? Sure we can all post it to mediawatch, but is there anything else we can do? Can the ombudsman do anything?

Masif Eego - how many over water longhaul flights into a jetstream have you flown? Maybe listen to those around us who actually have experience before you make comments like that.

However, in fairness, I will eat my hat if it comes out that there was an issue that they're hiding, but I am going to wager that that is going to be a very slim chance.

Still reckon this is pi$$ poor journalism though.

@massive ego
Sure. a lot can happen in 6 hours. 6 hours is a bit under the half the 14 hours it takes to do LAX-SYD.

So, I get six hours into the flight, and oh, there's the headwinds. CLACKACLACKA on the ACARS "HEAD WINDS PROBABLE".

Oh cheers, thanks for that.

Masif Eego,

Yes I know all about grib winds, and I have also seen them be way off the mark, and also not updated as they are meant to be.

Regarding the comment above and your a$$, I was just trying to provide some factual information rather than speculation...

I was the controller that diverted him to Brisbane and asked him why he was doing so. The answer is in my previous post.

DeeJayyEss

Unfortunately, as I mentioned above, most of these stories come in from other wire services (AAP, Reuters, etc). They don't have real journalists, and probably no journalists with aviation experience, so it's basically "a lie can circle the globe before the truth has even got its boots on" scenario.

There was a big mediawatch expose last year about it, but the on line content providers don't really care. It's a shame.

I don't have any idea about the UA fuel policy. However, I can say that at the airline I work for, it is perfectly legal and quite common to depart for you destination WITHOUT having the required legal inflight fuel requirements to make your destination. However, you DO have the legal requirements to go to a SUITABLE airport enroute. As the flight progresses, more and more options become available until hey presto, you have the inflight requirements to make destination (Flight Fuel, VR, FR etc etc). If however, the headwinds are stronger than forecast and if you departed with absolute minimum fuel and max payload, then yes, it is possible to not make destination. Result, make a TECH STOP. This is obviously what United did.

i.e. WHO CARES!!!!!!!

airsupport

How do you know. Were you one of the crew.It appears they had a scheduled destination of Melbourne but what was their flight planned destination?

Maybe they planned to Brisbane knowing that the winds were against them with the idea of recalculating abeam Brisbane.

Or don't they teach recalculating abeam these days.

By the way, which way WAS it going?

There was, but it was discovered after landing. It wasn't the reason for the initial diversion. The aircraft is still at YBBN (down at the old terminal) awaiting some tender loving care.

Agree 100% about the standard of aviation journalism.

I really couldn't care less. :rolleyes:

However there is more to this than some of you are making out, why did the original aircraft not just go on to Sydney after refuelling? ;)