Dragging Your Arse In HKG
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What's a 3 engine engine ferry on a 747? They can and do fly on 3 as far as the fuel allows. It was only a fuel balancing cock up that put them into MAN instead of LHR so your point was?
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747-8
My point, if you had read-on a little, is that BA and CX seem to have the same practice of high-tailing an a/c away from the scene of something embarassing. In the case of the BA 744 out of LA, they lit up the sky with their spectacular engine failure, granted the residents of LA might have thought it was Bruce Willis' latest Die Hard movie and ignored it(!).
CX have in the bad old days of 2004/2005 operated under the same M.O., where they might have normally done an IFR after an engine failure on TO ex-HKG (their home base) or indeed after an ass-dragging, instead they trucked the a/c on to an OUTPORT destination, to rectify the 'embarrasing' issue.
Is this getting any clearer?? BA returned to their home-base, slightly understandable, CX flew their a/c AWAY from the home-base out of fear-of-embarassment - WTF!
Regads,
N1 Vibes
My point, if you had read-on a little, is that BA and CX seem to have the same practice of high-tailing an a/c away from the scene of something embarassing. In the case of the BA 744 out of LA, they lit up the sky with their spectacular engine failure, granted the residents of LA might have thought it was Bruce Willis' latest Die Hard movie and ignored it(!).
CX have in the bad old days of 2004/2005 operated under the same M.O., where they might have normally done an IFR after an engine failure on TO ex-HKG (their home base) or indeed after an ass-dragging, instead they trucked the a/c on to an OUTPORT destination, to rectify the 'embarrasing' issue.
Is this getting any clearer?? BA returned to their home-base, slightly understandable, CX flew their a/c AWAY from the home-base out of fear-of-embarassment - WTF!
Regads,
N1 Vibes
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Let me make it even simpler:
- You just took off ex-HKG
- You suspect you just a) had a tail scrape or b) you had an engine failure
- You contact the IOC and they suggest that a) pressurization is OK etc or b) that you are in a 4 engine a/c and you can 3 engine ferry - and it's OK to truck on to your destination...
Do you think to yourself - I feel that the right decision was made using sound reasoning? Or do you think why am I flying-on just to 'save-face'?
Regards,
N1 Vibes
- You just took off ex-HKG
- You suspect you just a) had a tail scrape or b) you had an engine failure
- You contact the IOC and they suggest that a) pressurization is OK etc or b) that you are in a 4 engine a/c and you can 3 engine ferry - and it's OK to truck on to your destination...
Do you think to yourself - I feel that the right decision was made using sound reasoning? Or do you think why am I flying-on just to 'save-face'?
Regards,
N1 Vibes
N1 Vibes
I seem to recall a few years ago now when RW scraped an A340 tail out of Auckland and he decided to continue on to HK. I don’t think that was face saving do you?
I seem to recall a few years ago now when RW scraped an A340 tail out of Auckland and he decided to continue on to HK. I don’t think that was face saving do you?
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Sorry but I still don't understand your term "3 engine ferry" If a 4 engine A/C has a single engine failure then the decsion to continue or return is entirely commercial and has nothing to do with airmanship (assuming it is only the engine failure and not any other factor) So again I ask what do you mean by 3 eng FERRY?
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404 Titan,
that A340 ass-dragging was indeed a 'few years ago', which makes it 2007 when CX did not have a policy of hiding things from the press.....but in 2004/2005 they did.
747-8,
of course to be accurate the BA flight was full of pax, an IFSD was performed and the a/c continued towards Blighty - not a ferry flight. The suggestion has never been one of poor, or ill-considered, airmanship.
The suggestion is that an airline which formulates a policy - for the particular reason of keeping things hidden from the local press - is not the best policy in this business.
When an a/c has experienced a tail-strike or an engine failure, on TO, at your home base, why fly it on to an outstation where you have considerably less support.
There are so many other threads here whinging about CX wasting money and not getting things like a 13th month. How much more do you think it costs to do an engine change in Jakarta instead of doing it in HKG?
- Additional a/c downtime to fly-in the engine change equipment and an engineering team
- Additional a/c downtime while spare engine is prepared/transported/clearing customs
- 744F diversion, or a specific flight, with spare eng onboard
- HOTAC costs to put an engineering team on-site
- Knock on effect of having an engineering team at outstation - overtime costs at their own base, roster instability etc
- Arranging alternate flights for the returning pax
The average time taken to get an outstation engine change performed is about 3 days (believe me I've done them)
OR
You could have returned to HKG, moved affected pax to another a/c, changed the engine in 12 hrs......
The A340 tailscrape in LHR put the plane out for 6 days.
Do you catch my drift?
Regards,
N1 Vibes
that A340 ass-dragging was indeed a 'few years ago', which makes it 2007 when CX did not have a policy of hiding things from the press.....but in 2004/2005 they did.
747-8,
of course to be accurate the BA flight was full of pax, an IFSD was performed and the a/c continued towards Blighty - not a ferry flight. The suggestion has never been one of poor, or ill-considered, airmanship.
The suggestion is that an airline which formulates a policy - for the particular reason of keeping things hidden from the local press - is not the best policy in this business.
When an a/c has experienced a tail-strike or an engine failure, on TO, at your home base, why fly it on to an outstation where you have considerably less support.
There are so many other threads here whinging about CX wasting money and not getting things like a 13th month. How much more do you think it costs to do an engine change in Jakarta instead of doing it in HKG?
- Additional a/c downtime to fly-in the engine change equipment and an engineering team
- Additional a/c downtime while spare engine is prepared/transported/clearing customs
- 744F diversion, or a specific flight, with spare eng onboard
- HOTAC costs to put an engineering team on-site
- Knock on effect of having an engineering team at outstation - overtime costs at their own base, roster instability etc
- Arranging alternate flights for the returning pax
The average time taken to get an outstation engine change performed is about 3 days (believe me I've done them)
OR
You could have returned to HKG, moved affected pax to another a/c, changed the engine in 12 hrs......
The A340 tailscrape in LHR put the plane out for 6 days.
Do you catch my drift?
Regards,
N1 Vibes
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geh065
the cabin crew sat down the back noted a grinding noise on take-off, but only reported it at the end of the flight. Amazing what you can remember after 13hrs of serving/sleeping/serving/serving/sleeping. Yet apparently it wasn't significant enough for them to mention at the time that they heard it.....
Hope this explains the quality of the staff you have behind you on some flights. And before I get leapt upon here - I'm sure you would want the CC to at least mention something, when they hear the back end of the a/c getting a 10 grit runway buffing!
Safe Flying,
N1 Vibes
the cabin crew sat down the back noted a grinding noise on take-off, but only reported it at the end of the flight. Amazing what you can remember after 13hrs of serving/sleeping/serving/serving/sleeping. Yet apparently it wasn't significant enough for them to mention at the time that they heard it.....
Hope this explains the quality of the staff you have behind you on some flights. And before I get leapt upon here - I'm sure you would want the CC to at least mention something, when they hear the back end of the a/c getting a 10 grit runway buffing!
Safe Flying,
N1 Vibes
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N1,
I agree it is quite scary how they did not say anything! Still, can't blame the cockpit crew for continuing the flight when they did not even know there was a problem.
I agree it is quite scary how they did not say anything! Still, can't blame the cockpit crew for continuing the flight when they did not even know there was a problem.
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3 engine ferry
747-8:
After the station engineering department confirms that a single engine has failed.
Would then require changing but resources are not available at the subject station or logistics warrant the aircraft to fly as a '3 engined ferry'.
The station engineers then have a procedure in conjuction with data analysis from maintenance control to carry out detailed inspections to the remaining three engines, wheel and braking systems and to closely review all remaining ADD's.
To lock the inop engine and do any other blanking and specific checks as required.
The flight crew maybe required to do simulator training prior to the three engine take-off.
The aircraft would then depart with no passengers onboard to destination as a 3 engined ferry flight.
TW
What's a 3 engine ferry on a 747?
Would then require changing but resources are not available at the subject station or logistics warrant the aircraft to fly as a '3 engined ferry'.
The station engineers then have a procedure in conjuction with data analysis from maintenance control to carry out detailed inspections to the remaining three engines, wheel and braking systems and to closely review all remaining ADD's.
To lock the inop engine and do any other blanking and specific checks as required.
The flight crew maybe required to do simulator training prior to the three engine take-off.
The aircraft would then depart with no passengers onboard to destination as a 3 engined ferry flight.
TW
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This thread is useless without the names of the flightcrew
If you work for cx, should you so wish to satisfy some desire to ascertain who the crew are, there is a way for you to find out as posted on page 1 of this thread by another poster.
It still doesn't answer the glaring lack of information from the crew at the back of the aircraft if they did notice something out of the ordinary. N1 Vibes - couldn't agree more.
Nor does it condone the questionable advice, in the old AKL case, of continuing to HKG.
We should remember that as useful as the resources in IOC and ENG can be, they only provide information and can suggest courses of action, but the Captain carries the can which is why he makes the decision.
In this case, there is little for the Captain to answer as far as the aircraft continuing to London goes. In the AKL case, Capt No Newspapers got off very lightly for making a bad decision swayed by poor advice from HKG.
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The cabin crew at the back end are the most junior. It is possible that one of them reported the graunching noise to someone higher up the food chain, only to be squashed for her lack of experience. The 'Cantonese Mafia' in CX can be very snotty. Years ago, when CX boasted ' cabin crew from ten Asian lands,' some of the best Chief Pursers were from India, Japan, Malaysia and Singapore. Their English was impeccable and they actually socialised with pilots and flight engineers. A far cry from the 'Gay Bar' of today.
