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German Federal Police helicopter crew twice refueled the wrong fuel
The German Federal Police demanded more than one million euros in damages from a helicopter crew because they had twice refueled the wrong fuel. The police practiced a surveillance mission in March, using a helicopter with thermal imaging camera. As the "Spiegel" reports, there was a mix-up that could ruin three policemen financially. The crew consisting of pilot, co-pilot and flight operator, landed twice during the exercise at Stendal airfield in Saxony-Anhalt. There, they refueled their Eurocopter 135, but unfortunately with the wrong fuel. At the end of the exercise, the damage was noted during the routine inspection: The turbines were virtually burned out, the technicians reported. The Federal Police had several ways to repair the damage, learned the "Spiegel": This included a major overhaul of the engines or an exchange for used turbines. It was decided to install new turbines, which was the fastest but also the most expensive solution. The bill should now pay the three policemen: Together exactly 1,072,293.49 euros. Now the union of the police representing the occupation is arguing with the Federal Ministry of the Interior about the legality of the claim. Sorry, I can not insert a link... |
I searched for the link and didn’t find it. Suggest you reply to this and a couple of other threads and you can then post links. |
Removing English language elements and searching for "Stendal Saxony-Anhalt Eurocopter 135 Spiegel" I turned up the following German language articles:
https://www.spiegel.de/plus/bundespo...0-000165579685 https://www.heute.at/s/falsch-getank...ahlen-43310805 Although I neither speak nor read German, <bundespolizei beamte tankten falschen sprit> and <Falsch getankt> seem to me to be saying something about wrong fuel! I note with interest the German word <Hubschrauber>, from the second link, which apparently means "helicopter", I suspect sometimes that German is best appreciated by non speakers... Edit: also this link: https://polizistmensch.de/2019/08/fi...ersatz-zahlen/ |
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im interested to know what fuel they put in
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In 1981 we ran some helicopters ,Astars, B206 and 500's (LTS 101 and C20Bs) on avgas for 5 days not knowing about it, our fuel drums were filled with avgas instead of jetB (still using jetB at the time) a couple of days later an AME noticed a white powder inside the exhaust of the Astar and phoned around trying to figure out what it was, he found out it was lead from the burned avgas doing it.
We stopped the operation for 2 days until new drums of JetB showed up and simply started working again. Nobody ever had any problems from it, at least on the job we were on. JD |
The explanation of burned turbine sounds odd....if it was hot enough to do damage to the turbines you'd think the ITT indicator would give them a clue.
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This old thread touches on the likely issue, lead contamination of the turbine blade surfaces (not overheating). See: https://www.pprune.org/engineers-tec...ne-engine.html
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I would have thought leaded fuels in the eco-conscious EU would be a no-no. Interesting to know what fuel they inadvertently used. Obviously, the operator shouldn't have any claim against the flight crew for using the wrong fuel, no?
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Originally Posted by GrayHorizonsHeli
(Post 10557544)
im interested to know what fuel they put in
Avgas skadi |
A gas turbine will run on Avgas though not so efficiently. The problem is that there is no lubricant in the fuel so pumps and metering devices suffer.
The old Turmo III on the 330 Puma would run on anything. Avgas required a couple of litres of oil tossed in the tanks before refuelling. |
Turbines are frequently permitted to use Avgas, but limitations are spelled out in the manual. The PT-6 in the King Air is permitted 150Hrs on Avgas hours between engine overhauls.
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Originally Posted by gulliBell
(Post 10557587)
I would have thought leaded fuels in the eco-conscious EU would be a no-no. Interesting to know what fuel they inadvertently used. Obviously, the operator shouldn't have any claim against the flight crew for using the wrong fuel, no?
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if its only avgas, where else did it all go wrong to burn out the turbines?
sounds like much more to the story we may never know. |
Originally Posted by Fareastdriver
(Post 10557688)
A gas turbine will run on Avgas though not so efficiently. The problem is that there is no lubricant in the fuel so pumps and metering devices suffer.
The old Turmo III on the 330 Puma would run on anything. Avgas required a couple of litres of oil tossed in the tanks before refuelling. |
Interesting that helicopters seem quite resilient to the wrong fuel. Diesel cars don’t fair so well if you fill them with petrol/gas!! |
Not really as they are totally different. A turbine is basically a blowtorch which would run on any fuel .... including alcohol! |
Originally Posted by nigelh
(Post 10558285)
Not really as they are totally different. A turbine is basically a blowtorch which would run on any fuel .... including alcohol! |
My Instructor at Army Apprentice college told me you could run a Gas Turbine on coal dust.....if you could pump it around fast enough.
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The Turmo used in the Puma descended from the gas turbines used in French railway trials. Not only were they bulletproof simple but they would run them on diesel.
My experience with them was that they would run on anything you threw at it. Pigeons, sparrows, bats, it didn't matter. |
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