MK Airlines B747 crash at Halifax
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Accident Reports
broadreach posted: "You won't see any of those published until after the official accident report is produced. But the industry is not that large and within a month or so, way before it's published, the real reasons or as close as the collective minds are able to reach them, will be known throughout the industry. And the lessons added to SOPs in many cargo airlines. Including MK's."
So what did the collective minds have to say about MK's last totalled 747 ? This accident occured more than three years ago and there still isn't an accident report. If broadreach is to be believed everyone here knows the "real reasons" already.
So what did the collective minds have to say about MK's last totalled 747 ? This accident occured more than three years ago and there still isn't an accident report. If broadreach is to be believed everyone here knows the "real reasons" already.
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What McGinty writes in his last post doesn't square with what Bill Fowler of the TSB stated, as quoted by Capt. KAOS on Oct 15 (p. 5 of this thread):
“There is an indication the aircraft was barely airborne,” Mr. Fowler said at a news conference. “The scrape trail disappears just before the berm.”
Mr. Fowler said the trail struck for the first time about 250 metres from the end of the 2,700-metre runway, then again with about 170 metres to go.
“The indication is there was prolonged contact of the aft fuselage with the runway and off the end of the runway,” he said.
About 300 metres beyond the end of the runway, the tail then struck the earthen mound topped by an antenna and snapped.
“That is what caused the tail to break away from the rest of the airplane … ,” he said. It came to rest near the berm.
Is McGinty now claiming that the main wheels, as well as the tail section, hit the berm?
Rockhound
“There is an indication the aircraft was barely airborne,” Mr. Fowler said at a news conference. “The scrape trail disappears just before the berm.”
Mr. Fowler said the trail struck for the first time about 250 metres from the end of the 2,700-metre runway, then again with about 170 metres to go.
“The indication is there was prolonged contact of the aft fuselage with the runway and off the end of the runway,” he said.
About 300 metres beyond the end of the runway, the tail then struck the earthen mound topped by an antenna and snapped.
“That is what caused the tail to break away from the rest of the airplane … ,” he said. It came to rest near the berm.
Is McGinty now claiming that the main wheels, as well as the tail section, hit the berm?
Rockhound
Gerbils,
Sorry, I didn't follow the last MK accident and can't answer that specific question. I'd suggest, though, that the 30+ pages on here re the Halifax crash are a good example of the "collective minds" at work.
Whether the thoughts coming out of those minds are worth professional consideration is up to individual readers to judge, but I think the professionals can, each in their field, separate wheat from chaff.
If you go back over this thread you'll find that, early on, much was made of possible overloading. Possible? I'm being diplomatic. As it happened, that was the first thing to be conked on the head by the investigation team.
Then it was MK's working hours. That debate continues and, if the volume of informed comment on here is anything to go by, exhaustion could well be a contributing cause.
What collective intelligence seems to boil it down to, at least so far, is takeoff thrust settings which were not sufficient to get the aircraft off the ground within the field length.
Crew exhaustion is not going to go away because of this accident. You can work against it but, until you win the battle, for now it's a fact of life.
That is the crux of the real message and it will not take the months to come before the official report comes out for tired cargo flight deck people to remind themselves and each other to check again, remember the Halifax MK.
This accident, and this thread, may eventually turn out to be pprune classics in the sense that they have made people throughout the industry think.
A note to Rockhound.
Don't know if the photo's still there in one of the early pages, but it clearly showed gear tracks leading from the end of the runway and becoming deeper on their way up the berm.
(just checked the first fifteen pages and didn't find the photo. It must have been a link from a news site. But the tracks were quite clear)
Sorry, I didn't follow the last MK accident and can't answer that specific question. I'd suggest, though, that the 30+ pages on here re the Halifax crash are a good example of the "collective minds" at work.
Whether the thoughts coming out of those minds are worth professional consideration is up to individual readers to judge, but I think the professionals can, each in their field, separate wheat from chaff.
If you go back over this thread you'll find that, early on, much was made of possible overloading. Possible? I'm being diplomatic. As it happened, that was the first thing to be conked on the head by the investigation team.
Then it was MK's working hours. That debate continues and, if the volume of informed comment on here is anything to go by, exhaustion could well be a contributing cause.
What collective intelligence seems to boil it down to, at least so far, is takeoff thrust settings which were not sufficient to get the aircraft off the ground within the field length.
Crew exhaustion is not going to go away because of this accident. You can work against it but, until you win the battle, for now it's a fact of life.
That is the crux of the real message and it will not take the months to come before the official report comes out for tired cargo flight deck people to remind themselves and each other to check again, remember the Halifax MK.
This accident, and this thread, may eventually turn out to be pprune classics in the sense that they have made people throughout the industry think.
A note to Rockhound.
Don't know if the photo's still there in one of the early pages, but it clearly showed gear tracks leading from the end of the runway and becoming deeper on their way up the berm.
(just checked the first fifteen pages and didn't find the photo. It must have been a link from a news site. But the tracks were quite clear)
Last edited by broadreach; 27th Nov 2004 at 20:01.
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Early on, we picked up on much being made of the aircraft actually starting its takeoff way down the runway ..... in fact many hundreds of feet shorter than max available ..... we quickly identified that a taxiway could lead the craft to begin its roll some 700 feet shorter than max
this suggestion now seems to have "died a death"
this suggestion now seems to have "died a death"
Thanks, Shadow, a thousand words. And a slight correction to my earlier recollection, Rockhound; the photo doesn't show the tracks leading from the end of the runway to the berm so the centre gear may have been a few inches off the ground prior to hitting it.
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Hmmm, the photo provides a grim reminder that when things go wrong, they can sometimes go very wrong...if you don't pay attention to details.
Just opening up the taps and hoping for the best just ain't good enough...as some operators have found out.
Just opening up the taps and hoping for the best just ain't good enough...as some operators have found out.
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Thanks go to The Shadow for putting up that photo again. The left end of the berm fitted between the fuselage bogies and the bogie under the left wing. What are the tracks to the left beyond the berm? Do they belong to the aircraft or another vehicle? Did the under-wing bogies leave any tracks?
Rockhound
Rockhound
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Its a good question Rockhound ..... here's a photo of 9G-MKJ
on the nose ...... I can't relate the Halifax photo to it .... what am I missing? ..... have also added a side view link
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/116010/M/
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/658730/M/
on the nose ...... I can't relate the Halifax photo to it .... what am I missing? ..... have also added a side view link
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/116010/M/
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/658730/M/
Last edited by hobie; 28th Nov 2004 at 19:18.
Hobie and Rockhound,
The tyre tracks beyond the berm seem to be from cars or trucks.
The port and starboard wing gear may have hit the top or the berm, or not. The photo doesn't show so, and they would certainly have been within the width of the berm.
If we wanted to finesse, we could debate as to whether the lights on the berm were removed by the undercarriage, the engines or the rear fuselage, but it doesn't really make much difference, does it?
What happened seems pretty clear. A few red herrings have been sent on their way. What led to that happening has now been narrowed down here to a few flight deck scenarios and will eventually be published for all to see, if they're still interested.
And, If I recall correctly, they did use the entire runway. The suspicion that they might have thrown away 700m was laid to rest in one of the earlier threads.
The tyre tracks beyond the berm seem to be from cars or trucks.
The port and starboard wing gear may have hit the top or the berm, or not. The photo doesn't show so, and they would certainly have been within the width of the berm.
If we wanted to finesse, we could debate as to whether the lights on the berm were removed by the undercarriage, the engines or the rear fuselage, but it doesn't really make much difference, does it?
What happened seems pretty clear. A few red herrings have been sent on their way. What led to that happening has now been narrowed down here to a few flight deck scenarios and will eventually be published for all to see, if they're still interested.
And, If I recall correctly, they did use the entire runway. The suspicion that they might have thrown away 700m was laid to rest in one of the earlier threads.
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Rockhound suggests that "What McGinty writes in his last post doesn't square with what Bill Fowler of the TSB stated, as quoted by Capt. KAOS on Oct 15 (p. 5 of this thread).....:"
He goes on to ask "Is McGinty now claiming that the main wheels, as well as the tail section, hit the berm?"
My original post about the wheel marks was on page 18 of this thread, well after the early speculation by Bill Fowler and others.
All that I passed on to readers of the thread was a news report in the Halifax Herald that said the following: "From the helicopter there were no gouges visible in the pavement, but two tire marks in the brown grass led to a line of orange posts [the berm], part of the airport's navigational system."
The origin of my information was therefore not an aerial photo. My apologies for that.
If aerial photos of the grass strip between the runway and the berm do not in fact confirm the existence of the tire marks that the Halifax Herald reporter described, then my apologies for bringing an erroneous report to everyone's attention.
But if the reporter was correct in his or her observations, then the conclusion must be that at least one pair of wheels did hit the berm.
In the photo just posted above by Hobie there do seem to be some wheel marks both below and some distance before the obvious collision point, which is about the 40% of the way from the left of the berm along the white section on the top. There is a line of white debris immediately beyond that berm collision point. Or maybe it is a trick of the shadows that makes me see tire marks there?
Is there no other aerial photo of the ground between the runaway threshold and the berm that would provide better evidence one way or another?
He goes on to ask "Is McGinty now claiming that the main wheels, as well as the tail section, hit the berm?"
My original post about the wheel marks was on page 18 of this thread, well after the early speculation by Bill Fowler and others.
All that I passed on to readers of the thread was a news report in the Halifax Herald that said the following: "From the helicopter there were no gouges visible in the pavement, but two tire marks in the brown grass led to a line of orange posts [the berm], part of the airport's navigational system."
The origin of my information was therefore not an aerial photo. My apologies for that.
If aerial photos of the grass strip between the runway and the berm do not in fact confirm the existence of the tire marks that the Halifax Herald reporter described, then my apologies for bringing an erroneous report to everyone's attention.
But if the reporter was correct in his or her observations, then the conclusion must be that at least one pair of wheels did hit the berm.
In the photo just posted above by Hobie there do seem to be some wheel marks both below and some distance before the obvious collision point, which is about the 40% of the way from the left of the berm along the white section on the top. There is a line of white debris immediately beyond that berm collision point. Or maybe it is a trick of the shadows that makes me see tire marks there?
Is there no other aerial photo of the ground between the runaway threshold and the berm that would provide better evidence one way or another?
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I have interpreted the parallel tracks that appear to begin immediately in front of the berm and continue up it to have been made by the two fuselage bogies. Is this correct? If so, the wheels must have contacted the ground before the berm and rolled up (and over?) it. Correct? Those bogies are at the mid-section of the fuselage. However, Bill Fowler stated (I don't think he was speculating) that the tail section hit the berm, so presumably it was dragging. I would have thought the top of the berm would be heavily damaged but it doesn't look like it to me. Were repairs made to the berm immediately following the crash and the photo was taken subsequently?
It does look like they weren't even barely airborne at the berm.
Rockhound
It does look like they weren't even barely airborne at the berm.
Rockhound
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There is so much info on this topic so far, that the following may have already been covered - if so, apologies!
I fly the 747 Classic Freighter although not the -7Q. The method my company uses for calculating EPRs and RTOMs involves the use of runway analysis charts for each airfield - flap 10 or 20 - then entering the ambient conditions for the day. Reduced power is obtained using the assumed temperature method and the actual take off mass. Since we don't have a TAT/EPRL computer, the other EPR limits are also extracted from tables. We then enter the speed tables using actual take off mass against pressure altitude and assumed temperature to give the Vee speeds.
There has been quite a bit of speculation about the power that was actually set and the idea of V1 being reached but a lot further down the runway than it should have been. I suspect that what might have happened is that the crew entered a much lower mass than actual ( eg zero fuel mass ) so that not only were the EPRs too low, but the Vee speeds as well. This would explain why the a/c didn't leave the ground when the pilot rotated, which it should have IF Vr had been reached. Is it possible that the pilot/ flight engineer simply applied go around power when it became obvious that 1.3 EPR wasn't enough?
Another point is that we are usually right at the limit of performance flying freighters - max take off and landing is the norm, so there's little room for error.
Cheers,Y
I fly the 747 Classic Freighter although not the -7Q. The method my company uses for calculating EPRs and RTOMs involves the use of runway analysis charts for each airfield - flap 10 or 20 - then entering the ambient conditions for the day. Reduced power is obtained using the assumed temperature method and the actual take off mass. Since we don't have a TAT/EPRL computer, the other EPR limits are also extracted from tables. We then enter the speed tables using actual take off mass against pressure altitude and assumed temperature to give the Vee speeds.
There has been quite a bit of speculation about the power that was actually set and the idea of V1 being reached but a lot further down the runway than it should have been. I suspect that what might have happened is that the crew entered a much lower mass than actual ( eg zero fuel mass ) so that not only were the EPRs too low, but the Vee speeds as well. This would explain why the a/c didn't leave the ground when the pilot rotated, which it should have IF Vr had been reached. Is it possible that the pilot/ flight engineer simply applied go around power when it became obvious that 1.3 EPR wasn't enough?
Another point is that we are usually right at the limit of performance flying freighters - max take off and landing is the norm, so there's little room for error.
Cheers,Y
Berm Tracks
There seems to be a faint bogie track past the berm to the left of a white stripe at a distance which makes the stripe appear to be the continuation of the right prominent bogie track before the berm.
Perhaps a less abrupt slope would improve the odds in the deceleration case, but my preference would be for frangible stopway paving, especially in front of something like a berm.
Perhaps a less abrupt slope would improve the odds in the deceleration case, but my preference would be for frangible stopway paving, especially in front of something like a berm.
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I have not read much comment about the nature of this berm, and its contribution to this tragedy. It seems from what has gone before that the aircraft went over the berm in a nose high attitude, quite possibly with the pilots seeking to get off in ground effect, but then the tail hit this solid mass. So what is such an obstacle doing in what seems to be an otherwise clear clearway? While it is not possible to be anyway certain, had these lights been mounted on frangible posts, there would have been that much more of a chance of a better outcome.
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Clarity,
Hold on a minute. That berm is located 300 m beyond the end of a 2700 m runway. It can hardly be considered an obstruction. That the berm was hit shows just how woefully, how tragically, short of takeoff capability the MK jumbo was.
Rockhound
Hold on a minute. That berm is located 300 m beyond the end of a 2700 m runway. It can hardly be considered an obstruction. That the berm was hit shows just how woefully, how tragically, short of takeoff capability the MK jumbo was.
Rockhound
Hmm, yes, Rockhound.
The berm looks to be some four or five metres high and the light posts perhaps another 1.5m. In many other airports from which cargo aircraft operate there are houses 300m from the threshold.
Been thinking about recent posts re whether the aircraft was airborne or not. One, that from the tyre tracks up the berm it was quite obviously not airborne enough and that the efforts to lift off by raising the nose, scraping the tail, may have, through the resulting loss of speed, contributed to her finally not being able to clear the berm.
As to the possible gear tracks beyond the berm, I just can't see any trace from the photo Hobie posted. Either before or after the berm. And I'd expect that the impact of that centre gear, then the rear fuselage, hitting the berm, would be sufficient to punch the gear up into the fuselage and send the aircraft on a huge bounce that only ended where the woods begin or shortly before; that darker area 4/5ths of the way from the berm to the woods may be scorched grass where the first impact after the bounce from the berm occurred. Or it may be just an area where the grass wasn't growing before, cindered perhaps. I really don't think it's worth much speculation.
I think we have to draw back from all this discussion of the berm (remembering it is quite a distance from the end of the runway) and, considering that the aircraft wasn't overloaded, that it used the full runway length, that Halifax is not an unfamiliar stop for cargo crews, let the investigation team come up with its detailed findings. Those findings will include the crew's duty hours prior to Halifax and then, if there's justification, people can start using this accident as a means to draw attention to and, if necessary, correct the system.
The berm looks to be some four or five metres high and the light posts perhaps another 1.5m. In many other airports from which cargo aircraft operate there are houses 300m from the threshold.
Been thinking about recent posts re whether the aircraft was airborne or not. One, that from the tyre tracks up the berm it was quite obviously not airborne enough and that the efforts to lift off by raising the nose, scraping the tail, may have, through the resulting loss of speed, contributed to her finally not being able to clear the berm.
As to the possible gear tracks beyond the berm, I just can't see any trace from the photo Hobie posted. Either before or after the berm. And I'd expect that the impact of that centre gear, then the rear fuselage, hitting the berm, would be sufficient to punch the gear up into the fuselage and send the aircraft on a huge bounce that only ended where the woods begin or shortly before; that darker area 4/5ths of the way from the berm to the woods may be scorched grass where the first impact after the bounce from the berm occurred. Or it may be just an area where the grass wasn't growing before, cindered perhaps. I really don't think it's worth much speculation.
I think we have to draw back from all this discussion of the berm (remembering it is quite a distance from the end of the runway) and, considering that the aircraft wasn't overloaded, that it used the full runway length, that Halifax is not an unfamiliar stop for cargo crews, let the investigation team come up with its detailed findings. Those findings will include the crew's duty hours prior to Halifax and then, if there's justification, people can start using this accident as a means to draw attention to and, if necessary, correct the system.
Last edited by broadreach; 1st Dec 2004 at 09:39.
There are four distinct tracks from just before the berm and then going up the berm.
Possibly each track is made by one bogie -- or each track is made by the wheels on one side of a bogie -- can't say for sure without measurements, but I'm beginning to suspect we're looking at the tracks from all four bogies.
Perhaps somebody can supply the width and/or height of the berm.
So the wheels went up to the top of the berm.
Past the berm the wheels either:[list=1][*]rolled down the opposite side until the fuselage met the top of the berm and were held off the ground for a distance until the remaining fuselage failed[*]arced in a flattened ballistic trajectory until the rear fuselage collided with the top of the berm[/list=1] The grey debris pattern in front of the berm is consistent with reports of the tail breaking off at the berm, but absorbent material is possible.
Possibly each track is made by one bogie -- or each track is made by the wheels on one side of a bogie -- can't say for sure without measurements, but I'm beginning to suspect we're looking at the tracks from all four bogies.
Perhaps somebody can supply the width and/or height of the berm.
So the wheels went up to the top of the berm.
Past the berm the wheels either:[list=1][*]rolled down the opposite side until the fuselage met the top of the berm and were held off the ground for a distance until the remaining fuselage failed[*]arced in a flattened ballistic trajectory until the rear fuselage collided with the top of the berm[/list=1] The grey debris pattern in front of the berm is consistent with reports of the tail breaking off at the berm, but absorbent material is possible.
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Rockhound Date : 29th November 2004 17:36
I have interpreted the parallel tracks that appear to begin immediately in front of the berm and continue up it to have been made by the two fuselage bogies. Is this correct? If so, the wheels must have contacted the ground before the berm and rolled up (and over?) it. Correct? Those bogies are at the mid-section of the fuselage.
I have interpreted the parallel tracks that appear to begin immediately in front of the berm and continue up it to have been made by the two fuselage bogies. Is this correct? If so, the wheels must have contacted the ground before the berm and rolled up (and over?) it. Correct? Those bogies are at the mid-section of the fuselage.
After looking at a lot of photos on Airliner.net I found the wheel and bogie spacings to be approximately as shown below
So normally there would be eight wheel tracks spaced as shown above, the pairs of tracks being spaced about 3.4 times as far apart as the spacing between the wheels on a single bogy.
Doing a similar exercise with the photo of the berm re-posted by TheShadow shows the spacings of the wheel ruts to be as shown below:
So it appears that the two pairs of wheel ruts running up the berm were made by adjacent bogies, probably, as Rockhound says, the center two with the wings of the plane level.
In which case the other two bogies would have passed over the berm as shown below:
The smaller images are copies of the rut images in the lower photo, and indicate the relative positions of all four bogies.
This seems to me to show why some of the orange thingees were knocked down and not others, the wings also missing all but one of those not knocked down by the undercarriage.
Photos on Airliner.net of 747s taking off show that the last wheels of all the four bogies seem to leave the ground almost together e.g. http://www.airliners.net/open.file?id=716477
Therefore, for only the center bogies to have made contact with the ground and leave ruts while the outer bogies cleared the berm without leaving marks, the plane must have been in an unusually nose-high attitude.
And for the center bogies to make ruts at the base of the berm while the outer bogies were above and clear of the berm means that the plane mist have been in an exceptionally high nose-high attitude.
I assume that the black blob between the tracks at the top of the berm may have been the position of the final tail strike.
Rockhound posted 28th November 2004 17:54
Thanks go to The Shadow for putting up that photo again. The left end of the berm fitted between the fuselage bogies and the bogie under the left wing.
Thanks go to The Shadow for putting up that photo again. The left end of the berm fitted between the fuselage bogies and the bogie under the left wing.
Two questions: How high is the berm, and how far behind the outer bogies are the inner bogies on a 747? And hence what must that minimum nose-up angle have been? That’s three questions.
Cheers,
Last edited by PickyPerkins; 1st Dec 2004 at 14:18.
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MK Airlines accident in Halifax - First report
Weight assessment methods, runway information at Halifax and crew fatigue all concern Canadian safety board
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSBC) has written two safety advisory letters to the country's transport department following the 14 October crash of an MK Airlines Boeing 747-200F at Halifax, Nova Scotia. One concerns the data available on the runway slope at Halifax, the other draws attention to assessment methods used to determine the weight of freight pallets loaded with packages at airports where there is no ability to weigh the full pallet.
In addition, the elapsed time from take-off at Luxembourg to the attempted take-off in Canada has been confirmed by the TSBC as 12h 6min. The destination of Zaragoza, Spain would have meant a further 8h crew duty. The same augmented crew, consisting of two captains, a first officer, two flight engineers, a loadmaster and a ground engineer were rostered to perform the entire trip from Luxembourg via Bradley, Connecticut, on to Halifax; and finally to Zaragoza. All seven died in the accident.
Asked whether this was an excessive duty period even for an augmented crew, Ghana-registered MK says that it has since changed its rostering to bring it in line with European practices, but claims this was the result of a study begun early this year, not as a reaction to the accident.
The TSBC says its safety advisory letters do not imply a cause for the accident, but it says that concerns about the quality of data from which take-off performance calculations were made have arisen as a result of investigations into the MK incident.
The TSBC confirms, for example, that pallets of seafood loaded on to the 747 at Halifax could not be weighed when filled, so their weight was calculated as a multiple of the assessed average weight of the packages stacked on it. The aircraft attempted a take-off, but did not get airborne despite two tailscrapes near the runway end, after which its tail hit an earth and concrete bank 200m (650ft) beyond the runway and detached.
The TSBC will not comment on whether crew fatigue might have been a factor in the accident. The board also says that it is not allowed by law to reveal flight data recorder (FDR) information in advance of the accident report, so local press claims that FDR data shows the aircraft began its take-off at a low power setting and only increased it to the planned setting close to rotation have not come from official sources.
S: FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSBC) has written two safety advisory letters to the country's transport department following the 14 October crash of an MK Airlines Boeing 747-200F at Halifax, Nova Scotia. One concerns the data available on the runway slope at Halifax, the other draws attention to assessment methods used to determine the weight of freight pallets loaded with packages at airports where there is no ability to weigh the full pallet.
In addition, the elapsed time from take-off at Luxembourg to the attempted take-off in Canada has been confirmed by the TSBC as 12h 6min. The destination of Zaragoza, Spain would have meant a further 8h crew duty. The same augmented crew, consisting of two captains, a first officer, two flight engineers, a loadmaster and a ground engineer were rostered to perform the entire trip from Luxembourg via Bradley, Connecticut, on to Halifax; and finally to Zaragoza. All seven died in the accident.
Asked whether this was an excessive duty period even for an augmented crew, Ghana-registered MK says that it has since changed its rostering to bring it in line with European practices, but claims this was the result of a study begun early this year, not as a reaction to the accident.
The TSBC says its safety advisory letters do not imply a cause for the accident, but it says that concerns about the quality of data from which take-off performance calculations were made have arisen as a result of investigations into the MK incident.
The TSBC confirms, for example, that pallets of seafood loaded on to the 747 at Halifax could not be weighed when filled, so their weight was calculated as a multiple of the assessed average weight of the packages stacked on it. The aircraft attempted a take-off, but did not get airborne despite two tailscrapes near the runway end, after which its tail hit an earth and concrete bank 200m (650ft) beyond the runway and detached.
The TSBC will not comment on whether crew fatigue might have been a factor in the accident. The board also says that it is not allowed by law to reveal flight data recorder (FDR) information in advance of the accident report, so local press claims that FDR data shows the aircraft began its take-off at a low power setting and only increased it to the planned setting close to rotation have not come from official sources.
S: FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL