757 with 307pax gear collapse?
 

Just found this....



A Boeing 757-200 chartered by Air Niamey (Niger), Hajj flight from Garoua (Cameroon) to Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) with 307 passengers, was taxiing towards the runway, when the left main gear collapsed reportedly causing the airplane to drop onto its left engine. The pilgrims on board panicked and were evacuated. No injuries have been reported.


Full Story

The Aviation Herald

interesting number of pax to have on a 757-200, was it standing room only?

Probably a misprint... must have been a 767.

Grossly overweight then, it's no wonder the landing gear collapsed!!

307 pax? Blimey, I used to think BY packed them in with 235 on their B757-200's! :eek:

must be a B763 if it's 307, not a B762.....as even in BY world they had a max of 290 in the B762 mind you there was 344 in the B763 at one point.....

Capacity vs Weight Limits
 

The Aviation Herald article noted:
"Local Cameroon Media reported, that Cameroon's Civil Aviation Authority had granted special permission to transport 307 passengers on that plane far beyond its normal seat/passenger capacity, but well within its structural weight limits."
:eek:

B757-200 Basic Weight ~60,000kg
307 Passengers @75kg = 23,050kg
Hand luggage (and there will be a LOT of it if it's a Hajj trip @5kg = 1,535kg
Total 84,585kg

235 pax (charter confgi) is a tight squeeze. No way could 307 passengers be on that aircraft, if a 757-300 then possibly (280 in charter config).

B757-200 MZFM = 83,500kg.

And the weights will almost certainly be significantly higher than that, let alone hold luggage.....

Interesting to say the least!

767-300 - no problem.

The quoted article goes on to say that Air Niamey...
 

"leased two Boeing 757-200s for that purpose: LY-SKJ owned by Aurela (Lithuana) was transferred Nov 14th and OH-AFJ owned by Air Finland (Finland) was tranferred Nov 21st"

Having seen some of these Haaj operators at work first hand I wouldn't be surprised if the aircraft in question was significantly over it's max weights and there were more bums than seats on board.

That being said the gear shouldn't have collapsed on the ground, it's designed to absorb touchdown G forces that would be equivilent to it being over twice the max landing weight which I'm sure it wasn't.

At least the evacuation meant none of the pax got round to lighting their gas stoves for cooking lunch. You think I'm kidding?

LD

Or perhaps it's just and typo and should read 207

Problem is not the inbound HAJ as going on now.
Things begin to go bad for the outbound legs.
All of these haj pax have gifts from Saudi Arabia to bring to friends and family back home.
Not to mention the 2 or 3 liters of Zam Zam water they all carry.
Planes are absolutely overweight.
You discover this near the end of the runway as you barely clear the lights.
Then your next clue is the aircraft barely climbs at max climb power.
We all called this the Rose Village departure, as we were very low passing over the compound where crews were based.
Not being able to reach the flight planned altitude is the final answer.
Even at a lower cruise altitude you are near MCT.
You run the performance charts backwards and see that you are 10-20 tons over max weight.
After you drop the pax at there destination it is amazing how the airplane flys exactly on the charts.
Dangerous operation, done many of them.
Not good for the new pilots, but you will learn a lot about aircraft performance, quickly.
Normal Haj operations, been going on for years like this.

Come on Boys and Girls, its Africa. These have to be brand new off the shelf Haaj Specials.
Sounds like one of these companies that forms just for this purpose. If they make it they walk away with big duckets. If not as in this case, everyone disappears.
And its not overloaded.......unless theres an accident.

Interesting, why are airlines so interested to get their planes worn out on those trips, can't imagine this is good for the plane it self? They do get more earning per flight then a ordinairy charter?

75kg (165 lb)may be considerd slim by UK standards. But that would be considered high by cartered Haji standards. 60kg (132lb) may be closer to the mark

B757-200 Basic Weight ~60,000kg
307 Passengers @60kg = 18,420kg
Hand luggage @5kg = 1,535kg
Total 79,955kg

Also, the Hajj flights are all adult!

Strange thing about this case is that at the time this incident was reported SKJ was standing in Maiduguri (MIU) after having engine problems. Saw it standing there for several days. I've been flying these Hajj flights with AFJ since 22nd and we haven't operated from Garoua. Only from MIU. I guess there has to be third plane leased because that report mentions only 2 aircraft which have been elsewhere. Would be really nice to hear who is dumb enough to load 307 pax in 752. :bored: We have 219 seats in ours.

Pete

Strange...Somethings not right.Anyone have an official report link?
regds
MEL.

There is a slightly different version of events here, second one down.
JACDEC - Current News

I wonder how many passengers ended up on the flight deck. :):):)

Still saying it was in Garoua. I even have a photo of SKJ taken on 21st at Maiduguri airport in Nigeria. It was already grounded. Even spoke with the pilots. Engine was going for inspections after exceeding EGT limit and blowing smoke. Didn't see any external damage on aircraft. Nobody mentioned anything about 307 pax back then.

Pete

So maybe if it was a dry lease they were flying it 307 up as single engine ops? :}

RIX

seen this before...
 

I use to be based at Prestwick many years ago.
They often had the odd old B747 parked there for long periods for internal cleaning.
These B747 in question had BEEN used for the Hajj or the other "mass movement to the middle east" religious festival(s). In my recollection non had any commercial markings other than the minimum legal. Just all white ['ish].
They were often there for months. We were all very curious as to why these expensive "NOT flying in revenue service" hulls were stuck there.

We were told:
chartered by "middle eastern" customer for these events;
all pax seats had been removed, i.e. they have no seats inside passenger cabin;
all pax sat on the floor;
they are filled to the max of the floor space;
grossly overloaded in NUMBERS of pax, but not the mass [weight];
pax had to bring own food and drink for flight;
some pax brought portable "stoves" !;
toilets were insufficient for pax numbers - therefore pax did their "thing" in and around the cabin;
A/C were stuck for long periods every year until cleaners could be found who were prepapred to accept this "cleaning" task!
Imagine the internal atmosphere. the door were rarely opened due to OUR H&S laws.

Hence i am not suprized at the pax numbers at the top of this thread.

@YouNeverStopLearning
That must be some kind of joke
Please say Yes
Which pilot would accept to fly such a ........ (Really can't find a suitable name) :ugh::ugh::ugh:

... thanks for triggering my memory SU-GCM ...
 

All the B747's I ever saw were middle-eastern registered... I seem to remember that they were all -200's...

and to answer your question: No, this is not a joke.

Ryanair were flying into Prestwick when i was there so maybe some of their pilot's might remember these long-term parked a/c?

oh! i just remembered something else: they had been used exclusively in the middle-east, africa and far east to mass-move pilgrims to the middle east. They were ferried empty to Prestwick just for cleaning!

Having flown the Hajj for several years with TriStar aircraft, yes this year also, our small outfit has picked up quite a lot of extra business recently due to cancelled flights from other operators...we can pack in 329, and this is with a small business class section.
I have noticed for the last two years that the phase two baggage has been less, and was told by one charter broker that there are now limits on just what can be loaded....or not.

I believe it was an L1011!

Capt 411A will maybe have some knowledge perhaps?

B-757 with 307 pax...
 

As usual - I would caution newpaper readers about "numbers" published in the media...
It is likely to be a 757 with 207 passengers...
Or a 767 with 307 passengers.
xxx
Makes me recall news in a "highly knowledgeable publication" such as the Daily Mirror, which stated -
Sir Freddy Laker's airline will take delivery of 10 DC-3s...
Or, in reality, was it 3 DC-10s...?
xxx
I love Pprune, but at times, seems that the aviation IQ of a few is getting eroded...
:rolleyes:
Happy contrails

question: B757 with 307 pax...
 

i ask to all B757 jockeys:

could any model of 757 have 307 pax sitting down on cabin floor if all pax seats removed?

Well EL AL fitted 1087 pax on a Jumbo in 1990 during their Ethiopian rescue flights, how they did it I've no idea, most seats I've ever seen on a 747 must have been 550 + in Europe anyway!

The aircraft concerned was an L1011 or Tristar

It blew some tires which damaged the gear.

It was not overloaded, it was not a B757

Everyone must surely know how often the press get it wrong, then we are off on all the theories about how many people can you get in a 757?

Sheesh!

Icehouses
 

El Al took all the pax seats out... and a load of other stuff to lighten it and make room...

anyone care to correct me on that?

Ethiopian Immigration

Thanks for that guys, have always wondered about that one, what an operation though..Elf N safety people must have had nightmares thinking about it..

I suspect the World Airways 727 out of Da Nang must count as one of the most overloaded, 260 people on an aircraft intended for 105.

Someone's reporting leaves a lot to be desired though, I could understand a bit of confusion with a typo between 757 and 767, but not with a Tristar if that's what it turns out to be.

The average idiot media out there wouldn't know the difference between a Tristar and a School bus. :sad:


NEXT.....

Seem to remember that QF held the record at one time, for the Darwin air lift after the slight WX snag they had some many moons ago:D

From memory in DRW evacuation after Cyclone Tracy, QF threw seat belt rule away and allowed four pax per treble, plus used one belly hold with ladder access to main deck, and that way got to about 660.

Incidentally, Indonesian Hajj flights require international standards compliance and QF have been in that market for years using standard QF procedures (and therefore relatively high charter price ) - not all Hajji flights are clapped out freighters with kero stoves.

Fortunately, that is becoming only an urban tale now:rolleyes:

Does anybody know who's aircraft it was as both operators mentioned seem to be denying any involvement?