Crash Imminent!
 

Hi,

Well I’m a wannabe by night but by day I’m an operations manager with the London Ambulance service, and based in west London am one of the managers responsible for responding to LHR.

Today my current job and my dream one collided at the moment that I received a pager message to tell me that there was a full emergency at LHR. Now this in itself isn’t unusual as we respond to a number of aircraft incidents each day at Heathrow, however they are almost always stood down very quickly.

The adrenaline started to flow with the second message I received telling me that the cause of the emergency was hydraulic failure / no flaps / very heavy landing expected, however I still expected the next message to be the one telling me that the incident had been stood down Wrong….

The third one was this one ‘Crash Imminent’!

Ok so you can imagine that this one got my attention!

So 18 minutes later after a blue light run from Fulham I and my colleagues found ourselves across from the runway at RVP North awaiting the arrival of an Air Mauritius Airbus scheduled for 19:25.

Ultimately the flight arrived safely and seemed to land flawlessly, to a collective sigh of relief.

Anyway just incase the flight crew happen to read this forum I thought I’d pass on the thanks of the emergency services for a job well done. You gave us all a bit of a fright there for a moment 

Regards,

Damo

Good job,

But can't help feeling if you ever had to deal with the aftermath of an aviation disaster, you would want to quit your current job and your dream job.

Nice to see you take your job seriously. No matter if it is a crash of a 152 or the 380 it is still gonna suck for those that have tasked themselves with cleanup. My admiration goes to them. :)

Quite funny this one......we were informed by West Drayton about the 340 returning with the flaps stuck at position 2. We put out the full emergency call, and then ten minutes later the BAA Heathrow switchboard phoned us back to say they'd just been told (by whom, I don't know) that it was now going to land with no landing gear, and that the central bus station was being evacuated.

Very bizarre!

Evacuated
 

Anyone shed any light on why they evacuated the central bus station but there is nothing here saying they evacuated the terminals the plane would have ploughed through en route to the central bus station....bizarre! as you say! I know the BAA is keen on promoting the use of public transport but to prioritise the safety of the bus travelling public over the airline flying public...seems a strange way of looking after the people who provide them with their revenue. Seriously glad that all escaped the incident unharmed.

I presume the central bus station would be evacuated to allow for fleets of ambulances or similar which would be required in a full emergency, and not because it was thought that the aircraft might hop over the terminals before flattening said bus station!
:O

Any news of why it happened? Sounds like a hydraulic problem.

No idea why. The BAA phoned us to see if it was a no gear landing, but we told them it wasn't, so no evacuation of the bus station. 320DRIVER, no idea.

Is 18 minutes with lights going the standard response time to get an ambulance to LHR? Just wondering because it seems like a lifetime.

I do think you have a nerve dragging the name of a good company through the dirt with your title. I hope the company lawyers will be after your hide!

As usual sounds like the information flowing around the various agencies was confused etc. Facts were; A/C took off, on flap retraction, flaps did not move and associated fault messages on ECAM. Drills c/out, unable to move flaps. A/C vectored by ATC for fuel dumping. Emergency services were put onstandby as the A/C would have to land slightly faster than normal and a bit heavier. Never any mention of a hydraulic failure or gear problems. Fault actually caused by flap assymetry switch failure.

Fulham to LHR approach tunnel = 15miles or so, in 18 minutes by maths tells me it's an average speed of 49.5mph - not bad considering the usual traffic around SW6.

Did NotSo say anything interesting? - only he's on my ignore list :E

"Not so" didnt post anything worth mentioning. He appears to underestimate the work done by a very under staffed Ambulance service,by the way Fulham to Runway tunnel in 18 minutes is excellent time by my watch.

Staller- yes- damn good high speed dash through the streets of London, blue lights flashing, Police and ambulence men looking incredibly serious, screaming children jumping out of the way, dogs getting squished........for a partial flap landing? Purrlease!

This person is implying in the title of his thread that Air Mauritius is likely to experience a crash. Using the name of a Company in that manner is actually rather offensive to that Company and the good professional people who work there. All I can say is I hope they follow this matter up! Whatever did poor Air Mauritius do to have associated with it "Crash Imminent!". A little bit over-dramatic perhaps?

So there we have it. A fairly minor technical problem leading to an enormously hysterical emergency response out of keeping with the original minor problem. Bit of a shame running a full blue light run (which is a risky event) and hurting someone en route for a non-event minor technical problem! Headless chickens springs to mind! WHy didn't they evacuate the boroughs of Feltham and Staines, and while we're at it, bundle the Queen out of Windsor Castle too? The crew hardly need congratulations from London Ambulance Service for doing their job and handling a relatively minor problemo!

Tell me, amanoffewwords, why does an IT man want to pop up in a Pilot Forum with nearly 500 postings? Why so much to say? Bit like me going into an Accountants Forum with 500 posts.......I'll pass!

Sorry, not really qualified to post in here, but.. what a load of bol**x Notso.

Yes, the thread title could be interpreted that way, but reading it again I'm sure the thread starter had no intention to infer that particular airline was generally more likely to suffer an accident than another. On reflection perhaps, not the best choice of words, but I'm sure nothing else intended.

Leave the guy alone, an interesting post once again hijacked by someone who obviously knows better.

these were the messages the emergency services were getting ....

quote ......

" received a pager message to tell me that there was a full emergency at LHR.

the second message I received telling me that the cause of the emergency was hydraulic failure / no flaps / very heavy landing expected ….

The third one was this one ‘Crash Imminent’!"


whats the guy meant to do? ..... I can't see how such an incident could be treated as anything less than very seriously

I thought NotSos posts here read as a load of common sense. What's the problem?

"Crash imminent " man adamant!
 

Notso + groundfine if you bother to read the original post you will see clearly that the 'crash imminent' statement derived from another source. They were the very words sent to Damo's pager. Perhaps you should channel your grieviance into finding out who sent that message!

Dont worry, Im sure now you have set the wheels in motion for every LHR serving paramedic to carefully scrutinize the pager messages regarding an aircraft pan or mayday, perhaps put the kettle on back at base and have a good old chin wag as to whether its worth 'nipping' down to the airport just to 'have a look' at whats happening!:ok:

quote "What's the problem?"

I suspect a better question would be ...... who the xxxx is passing the messages below, to the Emergency Services" if they are so comprehensively, complete "Crap"


" received a pager message to tell me that there was a full emergency at LHR.

the second message I received telling me that the cause of the emergency was hydraulic failure / no flaps / very heavy landing expected ….

The third one was this one ‘Crash Imminent’!"

given that the messages were sent, what are the Emergency Services meant to do? ..... toss a coin ..... have a vote ? or maybe ignore them

edit for spelling

notso..

The ambulance service, and fire and police, receive the 'type' of call from the airport authorities - relayed as reported by ATC.

Full emergencies are not an uncommon episode but there is a set minimum response level from all the emergency services and at times, especially for the ambulance service, it is VERY difficult to meet that required response level. We often respond to LGW from over 15 miles away..

As I am sure you are aware the level of emergency is decided by ATC based on the information they receive from the PIC!

I was involved directly in a full emergency yesterday and whilst being a normal day to day response the Chinese whispers effect took place, due to a lack of understanding by the ambulance controller that I was speaking to they upgraded to major incident status and doubled the ambulance response.

I m lucky in the fact I am a pilot too - 99% of emergency service staff are not... I have a good understanding of things from a pilots point of view as well as from a paramedic view - unfortunately the majority of the ambulance service doesn't have a clue and this often causes problems. Similarly we find that a lot of aircrew don't follow the SOP for the airport they operate into when they've requested medical assistance, nor do they (understandably) have a clue about a pax medical condition - a £10 for every mis-diagnosis by aircrew or Medlink and I d be happily retired at 35... ;)
'
I have to admit though that an' Aircraft Accident Imminent is unusal - I ve know one in the last 3 + years... and that was a total no event too.

So.... if this had been posted by a spotter would it have generated as many reponses or just the usual 'just a routine priority landing' response?

PW