I haven't trolled through all the comments, so I'm probably repeating what's already been said. Firstly, as an ex-EK 777 driver, may I offer an enormous 'well done' to the cabin crew. Convincing pax, (is it politically incorrect to say 'particularly from that part of the world'?) to leave their hand baggage behind is impossible. Ethiopian Airlines had an evacuation in Dubai some years ago and most of the pax were Nigerians on their way to Dubai to do major shopping/business. There was NO way they were going to leave their hand baggage behind, and the crew wisely recognised this and got everyone off, with their bags, far faster than they would have if they'd tried to enforce the no bags rule.

I'd be very surprised if the final report on this incident doesn't come to a similar conclusion. If there were only four injured in the evacuation, I'd have to say I'm amazed. Given the wide age and state of health range usually found on any EK flight, (on average, every EK flight in my day was met by 10 to 20 wheelchairs, but maybe we should not go there right now as to why that was so), I would have half expected one or more deaths due to heart attacks and the like in the most benign of evacuations, which this was was definitely not.

"ABC World News Tonight," here in the States, said a few minutes ago the crew forgot to lower the landing gear, tower noticed the improper configuration, told the crew to go around, but evidently too late.

With an air temperature (49C) well above the minimum flashpoint of JET-A1 (38C) and the ground surface (concrete or asphalt) likely to be even hotter, any fuel spill might well generate plenty of immediately ignitable vapour. Then any ignition source would cause a rapidly growing fire and even fuel/air explosions, causing the fire seen in the video sources mentioned so far.

Can any specialists comment on whether very hot airports have an increased fire risk of a fuel leak (compared to, for example, the BA38 crash where there was no fire, or the Asiana crash at SFO where fire seemed to take hold more slowly)?

Never say never, but rather unlikely - if you get below 250 ft. with the gear up you get a rather loud EICAS CONFIG warning.

It would be good if at some time, some of you could go over to the cabin crew forum and post a little thank you for the professionalism of the girls and boys shown today during the evac. The pax were something to be desired, and I have had plenty of experience with them over the years.

Although those involved probably will not be monitoring the string, too traumatised going through the what if/if only/perhaps/mumkin/yumkin and Company policy. There are those close to them who will. Just to see/understand what their peers think of them during this traumatic time.

Thank-you

Re the clip taken inside during evacuation. At one point didn't I see a male cabin crew member racing down the aisle shouting "Leave everything, jump on slide' repeatedly? By that time what could be seen of the inside was fairly empty. It was a short message and very much to the point, and I can easily imagine it was being shouted well before we heard it on te clip.

If we had fuel tanks exploding in ground fires there would be signs of over-pressure and ruptures. Ullage ignition is more likely associated with higher energy sparks or time enough for the heat to boil the fuel.

Still to be seen is whether the over-wing departing engine ruptured a fuel tank before the later explosion.

In one of the videos looking head-on at the aircraft there is plenty of dust/smoke but little visible fire and yet the motion of that slide much later is quite violent.

As far as the cabin is concerned, there is little smoke and fire visible inside when the video was taken. However once the RH doors were left open and the external fire took hold it seems to have entered the cabin and flowed along the ceiling.

Good that the passengers got out quickly, but what doors you open can make a difference in how much time you have vs the location of external fires.

Again any comparisons with the SIA event and this one will still need to wait on many details only available in a final report.

As always your mileage may vary so as a passenger you need to listen for trained crew instructions and not believe everything you read on the internet.

Fire service response
 

In respect to fire service, could someone explain the significance of the different liveried fire trucks?
A video appears to show passengers 400 meters from the plane and passing beside a plane parked near hangers, but yet they are passed by a convoy of yellow liveried fire appliances racing toward the plane.
This would be over 6 minutes after the 777 came to a full stop.
Also in this video there is a red fire truck stopped on the apron facing away from from the plane and near the walking passengers, perhaps returning for more water?

How far away is the most distant fire station from the incident?
https://twitter.com/mailonline/statu...41108410605568

The onboard video taken by a passenger shows a brief glimpse of two red liveried fire trucks positioned beside the plane.

Presumably one station has red trucks and another has yellow?

Sad to hear that a firefighter lost his life in the callout.
Mickjoebill

Microburst possibly having put the gear up for a go around ?

Windshear is lethal. Diverted recently without making an approach having heard the preceding 6 aircraft had all gone round due to windshear. Didn't stop one smart arse passenger getting off in his final destination, only an hour an and a half late telling me I should have flown through it through the open flight deck door 🙄

I would like to see a locking system for the overhead bins. They auto lock at, say, application of TO power and can only be unlocked manually, after, say seat belt sign goes off. Re-lock when seat belt sign is activated to On, (turbulence or landing) and once again, have to be manually unlocked after both engines shut down. The manual over ride, CC or flight deck, should always be available in the event of a technical failure.

The fire trucks in the city's stations are all yellow. The aerodrome firetrucks are all red. I'm guessing that due to the gravity of the situation the city's yellow firetrucks for called for additional support.

Yes, probably because it was low on its belly!

Design intent is that in an overload situation, the strut will fail in such a way that the engine goes over the wing instead of under, without rupturing the fuel tank. However that's all done by analysis - how it works in the real world will be interesting to find out.


Regarding windshear - many airports in the US have ground based windshear detection systems (Doppler radar based, IIRC) so ATC can warn approaching aircraft or even temporarily close down a runway. Why wouldn't a major airport like Dubai have a similar system?:confused:


As for passengers evacuating with carry-on luggage, how about creating a separate thread so you can re-hash all the arguments that get repeated after every ground evacuation without cluttering up the thread for those of us that want to discuss what actually happened? Maybe the mods can make it a sticky :rolleyes:

local Captain will be hailed a hero in due course.

Aussie FO will be hung.

EK SOP

"Passenger say minutes before the flight crashed, one of the pilots made an announcement that there was a problem with the landing gear and that the plane would be making an emergency landing."

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/busi...354fc9c9b62484

Since Boeing monitors 787 and 777 real time, it is assured that the details will be available.

Also this:
The crashed Emirates 777 wirelessly transmitted critical flight data within minutes of the accident to airline officials, the supplier of the data storage and transmission device says.

Raul Segredo, president and chief executive of Avionica, says the device spared safety investigators a search through the wreckage for the flight data recorder to recover immediate data about the last seconds of the landing sequence.

Miami-based Avionica supplies the miniQAR Mk III quick access recorder for the Emirates 777 fleet. The device receives flight information from the same databus that feeds the flight data recorder, Segredo says. The device is linked to a 3G wireless transmitter.

A key feature of Avionica’s design may have made the speedy data transmission possible despite the crash landing. Similar devices are programmed to begin transmitting data after the landing gear have touched the runway, Segredo says. The miniQAR MK III uses a proprietary algorithm that uses a mixture of parameters to determine when to activate the data transmission on the ground, he says. Emirates officials have confirmed to Avionica that the device worked on the crashed 777."

Check gear down and locked
 

Keep hearing these reports that ATC "reminded the crew to lower the gear", but I'm yet to hear that on the LiveATC recordings. The transmissions from ATC are very poor, but surely one would think there would be some kind of reply from the crew if ATC indeed reminded them of lowering the gear...

Where is this info coming from?

If true, would it not be indeed strange for ATC to remind pilots to
"lower their landing gear"? Or is this now normal procedure?

Flaps 30 to 20
 

on very low level go arounds ( ground effect?)with adverse ambient and performance conditions ( low speed, low thrust, tailwind, low pressure, high temp) would the SOP of flaps 30 to flaps 20 remove both drag AND lift at a crucial juncture?

Julio747 wrote

Yes but invariably they don't have the luxury of 1000s of acres of sand to use,or relatively flat land

ESP wrote
My point entirely look at how much of Dubai is sand, could easily have had a building embargo of mile if the had wanted to.

http://i63.tinypic.com/ffcpb5.jpg

I would not be at all surprised if this turns out to be the normal "Cabin crew, prepare for landing" PA.

It is a clear instruction FROM ATC 'Emirates 521 go around climb 4000' ....or did i miss hear it ? did the tower see something wrong with the gear ?

These media reports seem to originate with a Keralite journalist based in Dubai:

The Latest: Dubai's ruler names, mourns killed firefighter - Hawaii News Now - KGMB and KHNL

Of course, with the news cycle, the item morphed into:

Emirates plane crash-lands with 300 aboard; 1 firefighter killed

Also, a UK media source says the plane 'caught fire in mid-air' and the captain 'sent out and [sic] emergency signal':

Emirates airline plane 'crash lands at Dubai International Airport after mid-air fire drama' with 24 Brits on board - Mirror Online

And, this early report here:

Was the PA the one made after the aircraft came to a stop and the reporter got it wrong? And were the flames perhaps after an initial hard landing and bounce?

I'm wondering if the initial touchdown did so much damage that the plane, perhaps fortuitously in this case, was unable to do a two engine go around? The Air Canada 621 crash in 1970 in YYZ comes to mind.

Hot brakes heat the plugs and wheel assemblies from the inside out. External fires propagate heat from the outside in, which could (obviously) lead to tire failure before plugs have reached their designed melting temp.

I am unaware of any TWA losses at Logan. There was a TriStar that was consumed by fire at JFK a couple of decades ago.

" Design intent is that in an overload situation, the strut will fail in such a way that the engine goes over the wing instead of under, without rupturing the fuel tank. However that's all done by analysis - how it works in the real world will be interesting to find out."

Thank you tdracer. And as I recall- there is about a 1 foot on either side of the strut assembly which is a DRY BAY ( without fuel ) for the same reason. And as you say and I mentioned in post 181 - the' normal' design assumes the plane is in flight re the linkage and fuse pins. But hitting the ground at an angle to travel can screw up the best of 'what if' design criteria.

That works well in flight where air lift loads on the inlet are significant, but I would think that ground friction loads against the nacelle would stop the engine so the wing would try to overrun it. At any rate no complaints about the design when the aircraft intersects something other than air

just trying to understand the dings and bangs of this incident :)

Most of the ground-based windshear detection systems used around the world employ doppler radar that relies on the reflectivity of water droplets in the air. They're not much good in dry conditions. Hong Kong has a LIDAR system to complement its Terminal Doppler Weather Radar (TDWR). The LIDAR uses an infrared laser to detect the movement of dust particles or aerosols in dry conditions. I don't know what type of equipment they have in Dubai.

So the passenger checked all doors?
Two slides were not used on left hand side, both apparently due to the effect of wind blowing them upwards.

Mickjoebill

oldeberon,

Dubai airport is very constrained due to airspace. The regional ATC is bounded by Iran and Oman, and flights inbound from that direction only have a 6 minute timeframe to show up on the screens, so all of that traffic has a very short notification time to be integrated by ATC. The airspace issues with DWC, which shares a hold pattern further complicates the issues.

Depending, if something is in the way, they will remove it

In addition, there are very narrow corridors due to military airspace, tall structures, other Countries, and other restricted zones.

Lomapaseo, this is somewhat out of my area of expertise (I've never worked structures), but my understanding is one of the design scenarios is an overload due to a wheels up landing - you want the engine to go up and over rather than under for obvious reasons. However CONSO is right - without knowing the exact angle and speed of impact it would be near impossible to get it to work 100%. Oh, and CONSO is also correct about the 'dry bay' in the area of the wing where the strut attaches (also helpful for uncontained engine failures).
BuzzBox, thanks for the clarification - I was unfamiliar with the limitations of the Doppler based windshear system in the desert.

CONFIG GEAR also comes on if flaps are in the landing position (F25 or F30) with the gear up. The EGPWS will also give you are warning close to the ground and not configured.

Even with what little is known at present, the circumstances of this event would appear to be quite different to those of the SQ incident, most obviously starting with an uncontrolled 'crash' landing and detachment of the starboard engine.

If they tried to go around because of a windshear warning, they should have left the gear down.
If they tried to go around because of a windshear not strong enough to trigger a warning, most likely a normal goaround would be the way.
This was a flight from Thiruvanantapuram. Good chance more than 200 of the passengers spoke little or no English. Getting them off the aircraft in a few minutes is fantastic! Never mind the hand luggage. It would have been near impossible to get that message through.
One thing puzzles me. The METAR winds I have seen are in no way strong enough to push a slide out of position.

It will be intersting to see what Emitrates will do with the pilots.
The Aussie first officer is lucky to have a local captain in this accident. Difficult to fire just one of them.
Unless this accident was due to the captains/crews actions.

No doubt they will both be ordered to resign.

No different to the Melbourne incident. Crew flown back to Emirates HQ following day....Handed pre prepared 'resignation letters'.....Goodnight Irene.

They don't muck about.

Local captain. Not so clear cut as you suggest, PoppaJo.

Cannot belief the "wheels-up approach" angle - so the crew ignored the GPWS warning regarding gear position till near touchdown? Configuration warning with flap 30 selected - No ways ....

Not a 777 pilot, but on the type I fly the call is 'go around, set flaps'.

Wouldn't be the first time that a pilot raised the gear when he'd been asked to raise the flaps, would it?

When reading this, is anyone else getting a booking.com advert for "926 properties in Dubai. Search now".
FYI FAR 25.561b (Crashworthiness) requires
"For equipment, cargo in the passenger compartments and any other large masses, the following apply:

(1) Except as provided in paragraph(c)(2) of this section, these items must be positioned so that if they break loose, they will be unlikely to:

(i) Cause direct injury to occupants;
(ii) Penetrate fuel tanks or lines or cause fire or explosion hazard by damage to adjacent systems; or

(iii) Nullify any of the escape facilities provided for use after an emergency landing."
Applies to wing mounted engines and is usually met by fuse links in conjunction with a range of break-away scenarios.

Agreed, plus the Electronic Checklist would not have been complete resulting in an EICAS warning.

There has been an incident in a B777 where the F/O who was the handling pilot, disconnected the Autothrottle instead of pressing the TOGA switch when commencing the Go Around. The Autothrottle button is located on the side of each thrust lever on the B777, the TOGA switches are located forward of each thrust lever. Not only did the thrust not automatically advance to GA, but the F/D's continued in the Approach mode instead of pitching up. Not saying this is what happened here but it is a more likely scenario for causing the aircraft to strike the runway while the gear was retracting. Inconceivable in a B777 that the crew can land with the gear retracted and not know about it.

The call is similar on the 777 - "Go around, flaps 20".

No, and it also wouldn't be the first time a go around has been initiated without pressing the TOGA switches, especially by ex-Airbus pilots, although I'm not saying that's the case here. I've seen it happen several times in the simulator: pilot pushes up thrust levers to commence a go around (without pressing TOGA), calls for Flaps 20, positive climb, gear up, meanwhile pilot takes hands off thrust levers and the thrust comes back to idle. Oops...

Were the crew in the EK Melbourne accident both expats?

Didn't they take some procedural shortcut in entering weight and balance data and not do the required crosscheck?

U.S. airlines often fire pilots after an accident if they find out they weren't doing their jobs, e.g. checklists and procedures. But, the union sometimes quietly gets their jobs back as with (I think) at least one of the pilots from the Southwest Burbank crash years ago.

I realize the EK pilots don't pay union dues.