Lou I think you make a good point about perhaps not enough actual experienced pilots adding an input to this and wierdos like Yamaha unsatisfied by our answers.

I have spoken to the crew on board and the incident happened approx 15 mins into the cruise whilst the Purser was actually in the flight deck speaking to the crew about a sick passenger. Therefore they were definitely past Cairo and headed towards Iraklion (or Heraklion [I]sic[I]) and Larnaca. The aircraft was hard to control laterally but it certainly was not falling from the sky plummeting towards the ground (therefore get me to THE nearest airport Cairo). Instead, the crew made the first in-flight engine shut-down in the history of Sabre/Excel/XL Airways. They went to Larnaca where we have an engineering base and is an airport familiar to the flight deck, excellent fire cover and ATC. They spent over 30 mins over the airfield burning fuel to get under MLW and to allow the cabin crew to prepare the cabin for a precautionary landing. Contrary to press reports there was no emergency evacuation after landing, instead lots of applause from the passengers. A good job done and carried out to training requirements.

Have I opened a can of worms getting some more facts out? There can always be arguments about the necessity to get under MLW, the choice of diversion airport etc but all that was evaluated by the crew and the end result was good. I just wanted to answer once and for all Yamaha's silly persistence about why the crew did not divert to Cairo.

thanks for the insight fly-half its much appriciated mate.....

once again kudos to the crew:ok:



G-STAW

i would suggest using a different forum to post then such as the quwstions forum or the SLF part of PPrune.

i would say post 26 would have answered all your questions.

with all due respect yamaha, its ok to ask a question but please do not comment when you have no knowledge as you have made some pretty strong statements that seriously undermine the pilots role and responsability.

many pilots have spent 50-90K in just getting trained how to fly then go onto getting trained on a type of aircraft so they know what they are doing. no airline will let a pilot onto a flight deck if they dont know what to do. procedures are put into place for problems just like this (and an engine failure is one thing pilots practice for day in day out) so pilots take the best option. no airline will want to have a hull loss that will cost the price of the aircraft, the price for every pax, the price for the cargo and the price for the sectors the aircraft has booked after the flight in question. the pilot is in the aircraft for exactly this sort of thing. on a normal flight the pilots watch over the computers which fly, but when a problem comes up they decide what to do.

the pilot will want to do the best thing as at the end of the day whatever happens to the people in the back will happen to him as well. the understanding and logic you have put into your thought process quite frankly makes no sence.

saying that, i think the crew did the job as expected. nobody hurt, aircraft still flying i presume and everyone happy. so well done!

Don't feed the trolls! Doubt he's even read it! How sad a relatively minor incident handled perfectly correctly and apparently magnificently well by the crew involved gets put under the spotlight. How do we think it made the pilots (in this case) feel seeing doubt thrown on their actions by ignoramuses who don't know what they are talking about! I'm really getting to resent uninformed opinion being thrown around here ('after all it's Rumours, innit mate? You can say anything!'). I have lately seen some awful postings here- the worst being a totally scurrilous rumour about the BA038 Captain that was admittedly removed fairly rapidly. I really do wish lawyers would become involved more often to stop this barrage of accusations and innuendo!

So step forward for this week's prize, Mr. Yamaha! You truly are an idiot.

nashers, I thanked you for your post 26 but didn't consider it as specific enough to these circumstances because you also wrote However your other point is interesting

You know this just doesn't hold up to scrutiny and so the logic you use makes no sense.

All the following taken from this website.

Pilots of course have full command and authority and do not bow to commercial pressure I hear. Yet we have discussions on fuel load. Of course pilots always take enough fuel. So why do aircraft land with remaining fuel below the legal minimum then?

Of course pilots wouldn't fly an unsafe aircraft. Yet engineers claim they do.

Of course pilots highlight faults as they occur, yet engineers and some pilots?posting here are also suggesting they do not.

There are of course a million more examples on pprune.
So who is really the idiot here rainboe?

Those who read digest and question in order to get to the real truth or those muppets who always maintain everything is fine no matter what.

Time to take off your funny coloured specs rainboe or is your real name in fact bungle?

So you can question the motivation and methods of the pilots in this minor incident, but you cannot take criticism of your motivation and methods in this thread?
You are a waste of space and join the ignore list immediately! I will not even read any more of your garbage. You are in an area you should not even think of trespassing!

I'll stick with you, Yamaha - no reason at all for anyone not to 'question' the way things are done, as long as the 'questioning' remans reasonable and in the correct forum, and I believe that is the 'intention' of pprune. If indeed you were on that ?Hapag Lloyd' a/c I can understand your concerns, and whether you are a greengrocer or ace pilot matters not.

The problem is you 'queered your pitch' at post #4, although you did retract your 'speculative scaremongering' at post #8. Let's compound the mistake by having so-called 'professional pilots' coming in with all sorts of questionable info about where it happened etc. Then some of them aggravate the situation by talking tosh about how far you are allowed to be from an airport - that in fact has nothing to do with an in-flight emergency but relates to route planning. My post #28 gives Boeing/FAR guidance on landing at the 'nearest suitable' and you will note leaves the Captain discretion in the choice. 'Todders' post (#50) is slightly misleading as it comes from another section concerning any 'non-normal procedure' such as flap failure, etc, whereas the 'nearest suitable' section definition is different and as you can see generally points to 'time' as a significant factor.

As I said at post#28 and #41, the various 'parties' will look at this, rest assured.

Taking your latest comments:-

- of course they don't. Your own claimed experience tells you that. In that case although they probably departed with enough fuel, the decision to continue was made for 'other' (company pressure?) reasons. Departing with 'enough' fuel is a difficult definition. We are allowed to leave with less than required for the normal route with the option of 'reviewing progress as we go', so that may be why crews are arriving with less than 'legal'. We often have to leave with less than desired. En-route diversion is always an option. Often performance factors limit the amount you can lift and you may not have what you want. - sadly aviation history is littered with examples where they have. HOWEVER, professionally run UK airlines do not put pressure on crews to fly 'unsafe' aircraft. This is not so everywhere in the world. There are innumerable 'failures' which can occur with no effect on safety.

So, in summary - as I see it, the decision in this case was sound and will, I suspect, be supported by company and authority. Had the wing been 'falling apart' due damage it would probably have been found to be the wrong decision. I endorse your right to ask questions, but ask that they are based on facts - although those are often difficult to establish.

Well I think you misplace your support! Pprune has made a subtle change over the last few years where any incident has not been discussed as an incident, but become a Courts Martial for examining fault by the pilots involved. Any incident is closely questioned for any chance of pilot culpability. This is not what Professional Pilots want out of this forum. By all means examining where neglect or incompetence may be involved, but in an incident such as this where an extraneous event occurred, I feel uncomfortable that every action of the pilots is questioned closely by uninformed outsiders. That is not what this place is for....or is it? Myself, I think it is becoming weird. But then you Moderators are allowing all areas of this board to become a place for dissaffected passengers to demand explanations for their grievances like go-arounds, sharp jolts, heavy landings etc. Perhaps you should work harder to keep it more a place for pilots to discuss aviation than every Tom, Dick or Harry to start pointing fingers first! The recent 'discussions' on BA038, the LAX-LHR flight, and now this perfectly reasonable diversion becoming 5 pages of drivel has not done Pprune any professional benefit at all. No wonder so many professional pilots avoid the place- they laughingly refer to it as a 'jungle'. You, as a Moderator, should be cleaning it up of this extraneous and unnecessary 'foliage'!

- bit out of date. old chap? BTW, I don't see any 'Court Martial' here, merely possibly misguided 'questions'. Has anyone actually charged the Captain here?

Nonsense like this amounts to an accusation (or charge).
(A classic case of the loaded question: 'for how long have you been beating your wife?')

IMO, ruthless editing of such idiocy needs to take place if the vast majority of professionals here are not to be offended and disgusted by this sort of writing. It's all very well having outsiders here, but more positive control needs to take place of their postings rather than ruthlessly eliminating pleas to illiterates to try and improve their English!

Rainboe,
Just argue the case.If you believe that the pilots acted within the law say so,just as you did over BA's 3 -engine transatlantic "ferry"(sorry,passenger) flight.If we put people on an ignore list simply because we dont like what they say,what would be the point of these fora?Yamaha had a valid question,he said what was on his mind,and people have answered him.I agree with you when discussing incidents that we should avoid,wherever possible, direct criticism of the crew as if we're entitled to stand in judgement.We're clearly not,none of us.However,discussion of these incidents can be very educational on safety and technical issues so I believe they're important.

Discussion of the incidents by all means yes. but so often these threads kick off with accusations first, and the thread becomes a defence of current procedures rather than any discussion of issues. The BA038 thread, although examining technicalities in fine detail had a minority of posters maintaining an undercurrent of finger pointing and innuendo that has proved totally unjustified. Some of them, through their ignorance of procedures and practice, take over 'discussions' with the loudest voice and turn them into virtual accusatory tribunals. That is when my back gets up, and that is what keeps a vast number of real pilots away from here.

RB - why not use the link at the bottom of the page and tell Danny what he is doing wrong rather than froth on here? I'm sure he'd be pleased to hear.....

I'm sure he takes enough interest to follow discussions for himself! BTW, are you not a Mod any longer? It still says so in your profile.

if you got off your hobby horse for just a few seconds you would realise that you are talking nonsense rainboe.

I may have been educated as to why they didn't land elsewhere but I think it has been pretty much confirmed here that Larnaca wasn't the nearest airfield.
Therefore I have made no accusations but just asked why. You will find had you read all the posts correctly that nobody questioned the timings.

Therefore it was a fair question which has been answered. The rest was totally unnecessary.

Unfortunately you seem to be old fashioned and out of touch. The days of the secret brotherhood are long gone.

Blow me down, someone has encouraged him now! No doubt he will become a regular self-appointed aviation prosecutor!

- then I'm sure we can also assume that he is content, at this time anyway, with the way the site runs and this forum in particular?

Profile edited. Never was good with 'paperwork'..:)

And you went to Collyers---SHAME ON YOU!!:)

Collyers? Is that a bar?

My other half recently got herself a Yamaha.

It was pretty cheap and at first glance seemed to produce a moderately believable sound.

However, when you actually listen to it in any detail or depth it reveals a complete lack of substance and she's realised now that it just isn't the genuine article :-(