German Chancellor's A-340 Diverts to CGN enroute G-20
 

From Deutsche Welle:


https://www.dw.com/en/angela-merkels-plane-experiences-technical-defect-en-route-to-g20-summit/a-46514663

She normally travels on A340 16+01 Konrad Adenauer.

The plane departed TXL and indeed turned around near AMS.

From adsbexchange.com:

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....a41a2ed3a1.jpg

Not a Bonn voyage, then ?

A social media update:

This incident is characteristic for German Military and Government.

Dear Cargo,

The reference to "close shave" was clearly prompted by your reference to "fuzz". Starbear was trying to amuse us all, and in my case he succeeded.

Bull at a Gate

From the article linked above:

They were squawking 7600 inbound to Cologne according to ADS-B tracking logs. Latest reports seem to indicate that they had a massive failure in their comm radios.

According to Der Spiegel there was a backup plane in Berlin but it was decided to be too risky to fly all the way to TXL lost comm and the decision was made to land overweight in CGN on 14L. Fire trucks were rolled to spray the hot brakes.

The Chancellor and her entourage were bussed to an official residence in Bonn to spend the night. Another Luftwaffe plane is scheduled to fly out in the morning to MAD to put the VIP's on Iberia 6849 MAD-EZE. Perhaps the backup plane has its own problems and they trust a scheduled airline more for the long trip.

The Luftwaffe's problems with aircraft readiness even in the VIP fleet are nothing new as others have observed here.

Complete failure of comms with ground
 

Gernan magazine Der Spiegel report the a/c lost the ability to communicate with the ground and the crew had to use satellite telephones to effect the diversion. On landing at CGN they were given a very short rwy, the a/c was full of fuel, and the effort required to come to a stop then stuffed up the brake systems.

Not exactly the greenest of airliners, you would have thought they would have had some A330's in the fleet.

Interestingly they took the shorter runway for their overweight landing to keep the longer one open for the UPS night hub. That's german pragmatism.

Less Hair,
Do you know for sure if they were landing overweight? And if so do you even remotely think there was a performance issue in relation to the chosen runway?
Or do you always land on the longest available runway, never do intersection, flex or derated takeoffs?
No need to answer the question.

They were fueled up for Buenos Aires and landed after one hour - without any problems. Fire brigade was in place to cool those hot brakes.

This aircraft is a former Lufthansa A343 which was completely overhauled by LHT in Hamburg. I don't see where it's age plays any role. This aircraft is maintained by Lufthansa Technik so the usual comments about German military comments probably shouldn't apply.

2nd A340 also in EDDK, but no crew.....
Kanzlerin gestrandet trotz Ersatzmaschine

The crew of No. 2 had been kept at readiness but got released right after takeoff of No. 1. Afterwards their legal duty time left was not enough to go to Argentina anymore.

Interestingly the linked article claims that the affected system also prevented the discharging of fuel so the AC had to land fully loaded...

Yes, Die Zeit is also reporting : "It is currently assumed that a fault in an electronic distribution box, which control both the radio system and the system for discharging the kerosene", see https://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschl...el-g-20-gipfel

Nope, apart from the two A340 they only have six A310 (five of which are MRTT and the other is inherited from Interflug), a couple a A319 and an A321.

Right after takeoff, around the Wolfsburg/Hannover area. Satcom did the job.

Then why continue out to the sea? Were they hoping to dump only to discover that the pumps were also done in?

They called Merkel up front first from some talk in the back and she agreed to turn around. That is not much flighttime.

No. 2 is on it's way to pick her up afterwards.

Apparently, the failed box is called "transformer rectifier unit". A number of flight displays and some hydraulics were also affected.

So why was there independent power for all the other stuff, but the three radios were all routed through this TRU?

The press corps and various mandarins distributed themselves on any possible commercial flight still available today, mostly in economy. Iberia ex MAD was the only option left for the Chancellor and her team. Other G20 heads of state were already on their way. She will miss her date with Trump too... this creates major protocol head aches.

The A310 used to be the transport mode before the two A343 were purchased from Lufthansa in 2010. The A319 are configured as CJs but don't have the range to get to EZE. The A321 (also used LH) has just joined the fleet after a 2 year retrofit.

A fuelstop is no big deal. Better than spending another night in Germany before starting to move.

With the support of your foreign office and the military you can certainly get some diplo clearance. What's the problem? We are not talking about overflying North Korea.
This is the only point about owning a fleet like this. Short notice VVIP-travel.

God, it's amazing how many experts are on here. Merkel should hire this lot in future, then she'd not only get there on time, she'd probably arrive before she left.

I thought Airbus fitted a RAT in order to solve the electrics / rodent problem?

... should have fitted a CAT....

2 Crews, or 1 Augmented Crew, could probably push the Duty Time "envelop" a few hours, if the aircraft swapping at CGN would not take very long ...