Incident at Heathrow
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RMT boy
As TURIN says excuse NO reason YES !
I think you should try to think how you would cope at the B1 guy who has six or seven aircraft to ramp check, your help ranges from the guy just out of his appreniceship who is smart but inexperienced to the semi-skilled mechanic. It is the early hours of the morning when you circadian rythem is at its low, add to this its pi**ing with rain. The management are on your back needing all your aircraft serviceable, you are chasing spare parts and you are unable to get around the airport because you and three other B1 guys have one van between you.
Now do you get the line maintenance picture ?
I think you should try to think how you would cope at the B1 guy who has six or seven aircraft to ramp check, your help ranges from the guy just out of his appreniceship who is smart but inexperienced to the semi-skilled mechanic. It is the early hours of the morning when you circadian rythem is at its low, add to this its pi**ing with rain. The management are on your back needing all your aircraft serviceable, you are chasing spare parts and you are unable to get around the airport because you and three other B1 guys have one van between you.
Now do you get the line maintenance picture ?
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I fully appreciate that, but the two gentlemen up the front were potentially the proud owners of a 75t glider. I would have thought that the nearest strip of concrete would have been the best. However, I am SLF - and a midnight man at that - so I bow to the professionals knowledge.
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Well, at last some good contributions amongst all the bull!
Post #295 from AandC is well worth a read, as are some subsequent contributions from folks such as NigelonDraft who clearly knows his onions!
This incident will have been a case of all the holes in the Swiss cheese lining up. Or put another way, many of the contributing factors will be present on many days, but only rarely will they ALL be. I believe it has also been termed the 'accident chain'? No big single event caused this incident, but that is overwhelmingly also true in most. Any errors are relatively small, and all well understood, which is why we attempt to 'trap' them by having procedures to combat those pesky fallible humans that we ALL ARE!!!!
Somebody earlier said they wouldn't like to be the people most closely involved in this, as 'BA will come down hard'! In my personal experience you could not be more wrong! BA are an extremely mature and enlightened airline. The only time they would play hard ball is where they find wreckless negligence. I have seen absolutely no suggestion of that here, nor do I expect to.
Again in my personal experience, there will be a tendency for those most closely involved to beat themselves up. To them I say, don't. Even those pompous gobby idiots on here are only human.
An absolutely top job was done in the air. Of that all professionals can agree! Made me very proud to be fortunate enough to be doing this job.
Thank you.
Post #295 from AandC is well worth a read, as are some subsequent contributions from folks such as NigelonDraft who clearly knows his onions!
This incident will have been a case of all the holes in the Swiss cheese lining up. Or put another way, many of the contributing factors will be present on many days, but only rarely will they ALL be. I believe it has also been termed the 'accident chain'? No big single event caused this incident, but that is overwhelmingly also true in most. Any errors are relatively small, and all well understood, which is why we attempt to 'trap' them by having procedures to combat those pesky fallible humans that we ALL ARE!!!!
Somebody earlier said they wouldn't like to be the people most closely involved in this, as 'BA will come down hard'! In my personal experience you could not be more wrong! BA are an extremely mature and enlightened airline. The only time they would play hard ball is where they find wreckless negligence. I have seen absolutely no suggestion of that here, nor do I expect to.
Again in my personal experience, there will be a tendency for those most closely involved to beat themselves up. To them I say, don't. Even those pompous gobby idiots on here are only human.
An absolutely top job was done in the air. Of that all professionals can agree! Made me very proud to be fortunate enough to be doing this job.
Thank you.
Last edited by 4468; 25th May 2013 at 16:56.
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<<I understood that LHR ATC have a standard pro forma that they read out to aircraft in distress notifying/asking them of the risks of overflying built-up areas?>>
Would someone from ATC confirm this please? The only arrangement I am aware of is that in the case of a major problem involving an aircraft, e.g. something which may prevent it from landing and leaving the runway, ATC maybe asked to relay a message from the airport authority asking the captain to consider diverting to a less busy airfield. Of course, the captain has the final decision.
Would someone from ATC confirm this please? The only arrangement I am aware of is that in the case of a major problem involving an aircraft, e.g. something which may prevent it from landing and leaving the runway, ATC maybe asked to relay a message from the airport authority asking the captain to consider diverting to a less busy airfield. Of course, the captain has the final decision.
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RTM Boy
NoD and you have made valid points.
ATC handling an aircraft in emergency - even local ATC who know where urban areas are - will NOT reroute an aircraft recovering with an emergency as if they do so and the aircraft for whatever reason lands short it will be "their fault" for extending the aircraft track. There will have been a lot of work going on in the background making sure nobody got in the way of the emergency aircraft and that everyone involved or who 'needed to know' was aware of the problem(s). It would appear that from the declaration of the emergency to the safe landing and evacuation of the aircraft everyone successfully did as they should.
Inventing new low-risk procedures for those on the ground is NOT something for the flight-deck or the control room in an emergency; if they are necessary such procedures have to be developed, tested, simulated and briefed before flight and are only appropriate if the captain considers they are safe in a particular situation.
However, as NoD points out - doing as you should in aviation terms may not be politically acceptable. I have no doubt that there are going to be many hypothetical questions posed in the next few weeks thanks to video of an aircraft 'trailing smoke' over the centre of London. It is obvious that further development of Heathrow in many respects is hanging by a thread. Had this aircraft crashed at 6 miles finals all the logic of the arguments on this thread would be eclipsed by the political fall out and all the justifications for the return back to Heathrow - however valid - would be disregarded. Indeed there would also be impact worldwide on acceptance of airports like LGA where normal patterns are directly over major cities.
I do think the likelihood of the Heathrow 3rd runway must now be in increasing doubt.
Of course it is entirely true that built-up areas cannot be avoided around LHR given that it is hemmed in on all sides, but the industry cannot ignore the potential consequences of relegating this aspect of safety to the point of a quick decision in the event of an emergency.
I think you are right NoD - a worst case scenario would strongly increase political pressure for Boris island to the point that LHR would be history. Indeed this may yet result from this incident if the AAIB blames BA procedures and questions the return to LHR from a public safety perspective - BA's case for a third runway will be seriously undermined. Such a situation would call into question the whole way maintenance is managed and carried out, which would mean very difficult questions for the CAA, BA and individuals managing and doing the work.
I think you are right NoD - a worst case scenario would strongly increase political pressure for Boris island to the point that LHR would be history. Indeed this may yet result from this incident if the AAIB blames BA procedures and questions the return to LHR from a public safety perspective - BA's case for a third runway will be seriously undermined. Such a situation would call into question the whole way maintenance is managed and carried out, which would mean very difficult questions for the CAA, BA and individuals managing and doing the work.
ATC handling an aircraft in emergency - even local ATC who know where urban areas are - will NOT reroute an aircraft recovering with an emergency as if they do so and the aircraft for whatever reason lands short it will be "their fault" for extending the aircraft track. There will have been a lot of work going on in the background making sure nobody got in the way of the emergency aircraft and that everyone involved or who 'needed to know' was aware of the problem(s). It would appear that from the declaration of the emergency to the safe landing and evacuation of the aircraft everyone successfully did as they should.
Inventing new low-risk procedures for those on the ground is NOT something for the flight-deck or the control room in an emergency; if they are necessary such procedures have to be developed, tested, simulated and briefed before flight and are only appropriate if the captain considers they are safe in a particular situation.
However, as NoD points out - doing as you should in aviation terms may not be politically acceptable. I have no doubt that there are going to be many hypothetical questions posed in the next few weeks thanks to video of an aircraft 'trailing smoke' over the centre of London. It is obvious that further development of Heathrow in many respects is hanging by a thread. Had this aircraft crashed at 6 miles finals all the logic of the arguments on this thread would be eclipsed by the political fall out and all the justifications for the return back to Heathrow - however valid - would be disregarded. Indeed there would also be impact worldwide on acceptance of airports like LGA where normal patterns are directly over major cities.
I do think the likelihood of the Heathrow 3rd runway must now be in increasing doubt.
Last edited by Ian W; 25th May 2013 at 09:46.
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oldlowandslow
When the decision was made to divert, which was the nearest strip (in suitable track miles) of concrete (please confine yourselves to runways "suitable" for a commercial A319).
Since you are SLF, I will leave out the factors that mean the "nearest" might not be best e.g. briefing / familiarity. I will also leave out, for the same reason, the 'R' in DODAR which will make it a complex answer, especially in a changing scenario (as apparently here).
I am 95% certain it was LHR 27R
why? Or rather, why ere they to any greater extent than when they reported yesterday morning?
I fully appreciate that, but the two gentlemen up the front were potentially the proud owners of a 75t glider. I would have thought that the nearest strip of concrete would have been the best
Since you are SLF, I will leave out the factors that mean the "nearest" might not be best e.g. briefing / familiarity. I will also leave out, for the same reason, the 'R' in DODAR which will make it a complex answer, especially in a changing scenario (as apparently here).
I am 95% certain it was LHR 27R
were potentially the proud owners of a 75t glider
More than just an ATCO
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ATC maybe asked to relay a message from the airport authority asking the captain to consider diverting to a less busy airfield. Of course, the captain has the final decision.
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<<I understood that LHR ATC have a standard pro forma that they read out to aircraft in distress notifying/asking them of the risks of overflying built-up areas?>>
Nope. Certainly nothing to that effect in the tower. The captain is always best placed to decide where he should put his aeroplane and we are just there to provide any assistance we can and generally keep everyone else out of the way. If the incident occurred a long way out and they were overflying other suitable airfields then the aerodrome authority would rightly want to question if Heathrow was the best place but at the end of the day it's the decision of the guy at the pointy end with the big hat and in this case, a job very well done.
Nope. Certainly nothing to that effect in the tower. The captain is always best placed to decide where he should put his aeroplane and we are just there to provide any assistance we can and generally keep everyone else out of the way. If the incident occurred a long way out and they were overflying other suitable airfields then the aerodrome authority would rightly want to question if Heathrow was the best place but at the end of the day it's the decision of the guy at the pointy end with the big hat and in this case, a job very well done.
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Would someone from ATC confirm this please?
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4468 wrote:
All very correct except: thankfully the very last hole in the Swiss Cheese didn't quite line up this time. I can think of two ways it could easily have happened and brought the aircraft down.
1) When the cowls were ripped off the l/h engine no fuel and oil pipes were ruptured (unlike the r/h engine), so there was no fire and (presumably) the engine continued working well, giving high levels of thrust.
2) Had any of the departing cowls damaged the tailplane, possibly disabling the control surfaces.
I believe this was a very close call......
This incident will have been a case of all the holes in the Swiss cheese lining up. Or put another way, many of the contributing factors will be present on many days, but only rarely will they ALL be. I believe it has also been termed the 'accident chain'? No big single event caused this incident, but that is overwhelmingly the case in most. Any errors are relatively small, and all well understood, which is why we attempt to 'trap' them by having procedures to combat those pesky fallible humans that we ALL ARE!!!!
1) When the cowls were ripped off the l/h engine no fuel and oil pipes were ruptured (unlike the r/h engine), so there was no fire and (presumably) the engine continued working well, giving high levels of thrust.
2) Had any of the departing cowls damaged the tailplane, possibly disabling the control surfaces.
I believe this was a very close call......
Most engines, I have had the pleasure to work on, had axial (forward and aft) safety pin latches which engaged into the nose cowl and only after the eye bolt latches had been tensioned, (eg: classic B747 JT9D installation) they are omitted in this installation and I wonder why?
As I recall, engine fan cowls are not the remit of the engine manufacturer; you certainly will not find them in their engine manuals or parts list; in IAE's interest, they should be jumping on the airframe pylon bods for a positive modification.
As I recall, engine fan cowls are not the remit of the engine manufacturer; you certainly will not find them in their engine manuals or parts list; in IAE's interest, they should be jumping on the airframe pylon bods for a positive modification.
Last edited by aeromech3; 25th May 2013 at 10:00.
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Regarding the decision to return to LHR, I don't think you can discount that pilots weren't aware both engines were damaged. The incident happened on take-off, passenger reports wouldn't have made it to the cockpit and only the damage to 1 engine would have shown up in the cockpit. Single engine failure, return to origin.
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I think that most crew when faced with a serious incident would consider using another airfield but in this case with both engines in trouble, and one on fire by all accounts I can picture the ECAM workload must have been utterly bewildering. In such a circumstance it would hardly be surprising if they were to dismiss the thought of diversion almost instantly as too much extra work and revert to the traditional assumption that we brief on every departure, to turn back and re-land where we started from.
Go back to the audio of Sully setting up for the Hudson landing. He's so maxed out he can barely spare the brain cells to speak coherently, and then so briefly it is not readily apparent what he means and on one or two occasions doesn't have the capacity to reply to RT calls - if he even registered haring them. That's the reality.
Beating the guys up for not thinking about STN which was very possibly just as close and might have been self-evidently more suitable in a simulator exercise is to ignore the overwhelming pressure they were under just to contain the situation and LAND IMMEDIATELY. They're only human after all.
Perhaps this incident will strengthen the argument for pilotless aircraft as a computer would clearly have handled all this better...
Wouldn't it?
Go back to the audio of Sully setting up for the Hudson landing. He's so maxed out he can barely spare the brain cells to speak coherently, and then so briefly it is not readily apparent what he means and on one or two occasions doesn't have the capacity to reply to RT calls - if he even registered haring them. That's the reality.
Beating the guys up for not thinking about STN which was very possibly just as close and might have been self-evidently more suitable in a simulator exercise is to ignore the overwhelming pressure they were under just to contain the situation and LAND IMMEDIATELY. They're only human after all.
Perhaps this incident will strengthen the argument for pilotless aircraft as a computer would clearly have handled all this better...
Wouldn't it?
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Widebody69 wrote:
Quite possibly this is the case. And even if the cabin crew at some point managed to inform the flightdeck that both engines had visible damage, the decision to turn back to Heathrow may have already been made. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, I guess we'll learn all the facts when the AAIB report is published.
Regarding the decision to return to LHR, I don't think you can discount that pilots weren't aware both engines were damaged. The incident happened on take-off, passenger reports wouldn't have made it to the cockpit and only the damage to 1 engine would have shown up in the cockpit. Single engine failure, return to origin.
What would the procedure be if an alert pax noticed the problem while taxying, or during the T/O roll, and rushed forward to warn the cabin crew? Would the CC contact the flight deck immediately during a critical stage of departure, or do a visual check first?
Is the simple solution to this to add a few bungee cords around the engine to ensure that everything stays done up? Belt and braces at its finest.
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What would the procedure be if an alert pax noticed the problem while taxying, or during the T/O roll, and rushed forward to warn the cabin crew? Would the CC contact the flight deck immediately during a critical stage of departure, or do a visual check first?
What would the procedure be if an alert pax noticed the problem while taxying, or during the T/O roll, and rushed forward to warn the cabin crew? Would the CC contact the flight deck immediately during a critical stage of departure, or do a visual check first?
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PS for those still harping on about EGSS, a "downwind, base, 10NM final" from LAM is 40NM (and does not allow for turn radii). A LHR 27R interecept @ 10NM final is 28NM. OK they went a bit further SE, but I would venture that a realistic min dist never placed EGSS closer than EGLL on their entire routing.
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Originally Posted by hunterboy
I wonder if this may change BA ETOPS engineering procedures? I believe that I am correct in saying that the same engineer checks both engines.
Two Engineers, one on each side to latch. Then swap over to verify.
The 319 doesn't come under ETOPS.
Ideally the crew would review the log entries before flight and see the cowls have been opened and shut. In practice it may be hard to see that the are unlatched, this needs to be addressed.
Last edited by Fargoo; 25th May 2013 at 10:40.