Folks,
Re. any mention of hazardous materials in OZ., if you have any radioactive materials, don't mention it, if you want the ARFSS to come anywhere near you !!
From personal experience.
Tootle pip!

Not really. I've dumped 35 tonnes. It comes out VERY quickly. We didn't have a source of ignition in that instance, at least not outside of the can (aka combustion chamber). Nor did these blokes as they'd have shut the engine down. Not a spark to be had then....even so, if you're flying at 300 knots there's little chance of anything coming anywhere near the buggered up engine, or source of ignition, if you like.

From recollection, we used "charlie charlie" a lot when speaking with Calcutta and Mumbai on the HF radio crossing the Bay of Bengal. Not saying it was in a book anywhere, only that it worked. Anyone who flew the Bay of Bengal or the Arabian Sea without CPDLC would well recall the difficulty in getting the message across to our Indian cousins. "Charlie Charlie" was merely used to confirm Calcutta's full repeat of one's just-passed position report details. Quaint, by today's standards.

Anyway, well done Qantas. Would it be rude to say "down with Bruce Buchanan" in this instance? I guess not....being the mongrel dog that he is.

FFS, stop making bone comments :rolleyes:.

When the engine gets shut down the nasty sparky things reduce to virtually zero. Add to this the fact that the fuel dumping pipes are nowhere near the engines (and the nasty sparky things coming out the back) and you're faced with no source of ignition to get anywhere the vapourising fuel and, hence, no luck involved at all. It's almost as if someone thought of this ahead of time.....amazing!!

Yes, I know I'm being sarcastic but the stupidity of some comments and the attempts to over-dramatise never cease to amaze. :*



Edited to add: what Big White Bird said........he got in there whilst I was typing

Sorry to be a bore but "really well done" is not at all OTT in commenting on the skills of the Qantas crew.

I'm not saying they're as flash as a rat with a gold tooth or anything, even if there is a rat on the tail, just that this was a bloody big explosion and would've shaken the plane a bit. No worries but, and they got her back on the ground alright and in one piece.

Mr Buchanan should take a pencil, lick the lead tip and hopefully poison himself. Failing that, he might get smart and write down what "went right" in this latest event and what "went wrong" in a Gulfstream out of Kerry Island the other day.

You can check that out here

http://www.pprune.org/biz-jets-ag-fl...y-ireland.html

or here

Air Accident Investigation UnitFull List of Reports

Buchanan's trying real hard to wreck everything that's safe about Australian aviation. He should pull his head in. It's not all about money. I think another pilot said something similar, only far better. His name was and still is 'Sully'.

Anyway, well done fellas :ok:.

PS No worries, Pontius. Timing was mine, that's all mate. Cheers all the same.

video from pax
 

video from pax here

Esplode motore sull'aereo: atterraggio di emergenza - Video - RepubblicaTv - la Repubblica.it

Avianca
 

I remember it clearly. They didn't speak English, they told the controller a few times they had "minimum fuel" which doesn't mean anything anywhere. That would have been a good time for them to use a Mayday to get priority handling.

fuel dumping is pretty well understood...

but:

most planes can't dump fuel. the 747 certainly can. A rough guide is really big planes can...smaller planes can't....some 767's can, some can't. A few very rare DC9'30's can...but most can't. Boeing published a detailed list of their planes, and McD's planes too.

When the first experiments of dumping fuel were done, the fuel was dumped over an open fire on the ground to see if the fuel would ignite...remember its vapor by then.

It didn't catch on fire....and the altitude of 4000' agl is generally accepted as minimum dumping altitude.

on the gap departure, one is over the pacific ocean quite soon after takeoff.

I had an ASAC who used to use "Charles" or "Charlie" as often as he used "Roger" when we ran ASW problems. He was very old school in a lot of his radio comms, interesting to see the origin of the Charlie call.

I do not care for the media referring to a precautionary landing as an emergency landing.
But I guess it can't be helped. :(

For any members of the press reading this ...

Pan pan calls are for "a problem has come up, I need to land due to a malfunction" whereas "an emergency" or "In distress" call is identified by saying "mayday." Well, that's how we used to teach it. Panpan vs Mayday.

Looks to me that the crew correctly used panpan for their call to ATC.

Tip of the cap to the crew. :ok:

oddly enough, a four engine plane shutting down one engine is not really an emergency...abnormal perhaps, but not an emergency.

(certainly other factors may turn it into an emergency...fire that won't go out etc).

The world is slowly becoming two engine minded...and losing one engine on a two engine plane would be an emergency...

and there is the difference between panpan and mayday3

again, good job to the crew

barit1,

an uncontained failure is when high-energy debris is released from the engine. I have seen turbine blades puncture the casing of a Trent 800 and hit the fueslage, but it was still classified as contained by RR and the authorities, because the single blade did not have 'high-energy'. If this is a disc failure then it is most certainly going to be classified an uncontained failure.

Best Regards,

N1 Vibes

QF30 was shut down on the runway, and towed to the gate. But you are right about them being tough.

I'm not too sure that 744s have DU counterweights Saskatoon....

NOT just an engine failure..
 

Something to think about,
Assuming the engine is shut down and no fire exists, all may not be well. I have witnessed the damage the the "other parts" that an uncontained engine failure can cause. Punctures of the wing and fuselage, and possible damage to the engine next door( I know, there will be a couple of light twin guys saying BS ) , as I'm referring to a 4-engine type like the 747. I doubt the extent of any such damage can be fully comprehended when viewed from the inside. I guess what I'm saying is that AFTER the engine is shut down, the REAL emengency may be just around the corner.....

On a side note, I do remember seeing a picture of an American 757? that during a ground run up, an uncontained engine failure in #1 resulted in a "chunk" of that engine passing through the fuselage, and damaging the #2 engine. I could only imagine what would have ensued had the event happened at V1.

I've posted some pics of the damage:Flickr: sb_sfo's Photostream

The aircraft is resting comfortably in AA's hangar, and the 5th pod is coming off this afternoon. Note some debris exited the L/H side of the engine as well, though probably low-energy. Didn't see that any hit the fuselage.

Oops I goofed Thanks mrdeux for clearing that up...but still a great result for the QF 30 crew and the same goes for the QF 74 crew, both very different situations, handled superbly! :ok:

FirstStep:It was a 767-200. That was about the scariest scenario I've ever seen. In fact, a chunk of disk penetrated (and was stuck in) the #2 core exhaust nozzle, not damaging the engine proper, and I believe #2 would have kept running OK.

But given a slightly different trajectory, disk fragments could easily have penetrated the pax cabin, such as happened to an MD-80 on takeoff (Pensacola?)

N1 Vibes:

That low-energy/high-energy distinction is one I've never encountered. In fact, I know of a military engine that had some record of "chucking" blades through the case, and in order to achieve a civil TC, some added protection (external shield) was required.

In that case the FAA was having no part of a low-energy/high-energy distinction. A case penetration is a case penetration.

Engine failure and subsequent actions
 

No one should question the actions of the QF74 crew. Simply put, the engine suffered a severe failure (turbine blade shed) which caused a loss of thrust and engine vibration, internal and external damage and an obviously alarming, for the pax, discharge of sparks. The crew, rightly in my view, assessed the situation, advised ATC of a problem and proceeded to dump sufficient fuel to enable a landing below MLW and, after declaring a PAN, conducted an uneventful 3 engine approach and landing. Any discussion as to what they should or should not have done otherwise is pure speculation and serves no useful purpose. The operating crew were there, they had to make decisions based on available information and it seems to me that they did exactly what would be expected. Well done. PS. Inane comments like "Pretty lucky, dumping fuel with that source of ignition" serves only to highlight that some commenting on this forum have absolutely no system knowledge or understanding of what happens in the real world.

FirstStep:
The early NAL DC-10 accident in which #3 lost all fan blades is an example. One blade was tossed horizontally under the fuselage, disabling the #1 engine gearbox, ergo fuel starvation.

Some other shrapnel went high and was ingested by #2, although it kept running.

Another fan blade penetrated a pax window, and the unbelted passenger has never been found. :uhoh:

The investigators and regulators take a dim view of any uncontained failure having demonstrated sufficient energy to penetrate the engine casing itself (I'm not going anywhere in a discussion about parts out the inlet or tailpipe)

However the airplane manufacturer also has to design to accomodate (by minimizing the effects of) any uncontained engine failure and at this point there is a distinction made between high energy particles, low energy particles numbers and trajectories.

The good news (if any) from the standpoint of uncontained engine failures, is that disabling an aircraft to the point of affecting safe flight and landing is quite rare now-a-days. Of course on-the-ground events may have different outcomes.

This might be a little unpopular, but I'm not so worried about strictly-incorrect but perhaps still informative news reporting.

Some of us are experts here and know whether to use an "explosion" and an "uncontained" failure. But the general public doesn't, and the journalists have to write for the public.

In other fields, would you describe something as a "heart attack" or a "myocardial infarction"? A "court restraining order" or an "estoppel"?

I wouldn't mind so much if the terminology-specialists posted comments in the journalist's own publications (but then they might get flamed by the readers of those publications...). There's no real need to go on and on about their terminology here, when they probably never read this anyway...

Charlie Charlie
 

Audio from QF74 to Air traffic Control
 

The cockpit audio of this emergency.

Well done crew!

Video - Cockpit audio as QF74 handles engine failure - The Sydney Morning Herald

Barit1,

to be honest I'm with you, in that anything that can puncture/damage the fuselage should really be an considered as an un-contained failure. The definition I mentioned about 'high-energy' debris is generally trotted out by OEM's and is buried somewhere in FAA/EASA speak...

Best Regards,

N1 Vibes

Spark stream probably from the remaining blades contacting the damaged casing of the engine. I don't remember any latter-stage uncontained failures - any other examples?

Man I sure hope the excitement from all these incidents calms down soon!

-drl

Sparks were definitely caused from the blades letting go and causing bending of the other blades rear of the initial damage. The blades then rub against the casing causing the sparks. It also appears from the image that the disc has failed big time and you can see its on a angle. I suspect that there was a disc failure which caused the large hole in the side of the engine. It is very lucky that it departed in that area and also I am wondering if there was enough velocity for the wing to be impacted? Has happened before. Its also interesting the amount of cra* that people talk on here.

>"Sparks were definitely caused from the blades letting go and causing bending of the other blades rear of the initial damage. The blades then rub against the casing causing the sparks."

The sparks continued for some time, surely they shut the engine down more promptly than that ?

Shutting the engine down won't necessarily stop the internal rotation. There'd be a lot of air passing through what was left of the core.

Ford Tranist, Capt Claret,

see these photos of the LPT area:

Flickr: sb_sfo's Photostream

You will see that all of the blades have come off the rotor and are now lying in the rear of the engine. Perhaps if it is the IPT disc that came out (or part of the disc) the enormous imbalance as the disc came out, could have cause the LPT to run very eccentrically, forcing the blades to distort and impact themselves and the LPT stator vanes.

In fact one photograph shows blades mising right through to the HPT NGV's, meaning LPT 1,2,3 and IPT blades are gone. Considering this is a large amount of metal and the fan at the front of the engine was windmilling merrily, as the a/c still had significant fwd speed, this would be why the sparks didn't stop for some time.

This is of course pure supposition and rumour...

Best Regards,

N1 Vibes

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau has stated there was flap damage to the aircraft caused by ejected material.

MEDIA RELEASE : 02 September 2010 - ATSB examines damaged plane in San Francisco

Rob

Authorities begin Qantas jet examination | News.com.au
I don't understand, can't it be done / examined by the ATSB in Australia? Seems rather odd to me as QF have been using RR equipment since the B742 days. :confused:

Triebwerksexplosion - iptv.ORF.at

anothe stream if PAX video....

TIMA9X,
Maybe because a couple of weeks on expenses in Hong Kong is much more fun than Sydney.
Seriously, does QF still do RR overhauls in Sydney any longer??, or has it been offshored ??
Tootle pip!!

Doesn't look like a disk failure (in the still photo sequence). Looks like an interstage non-rotating part came loose and tangled with the blades. The tangling probably drove the part through the case letting some blades out along the way.

The engine compression system and turbines could have kept the engine running above idle, hence the sparks until shutdown.

Nothing out of the ordinary relative to the time frame for shutdown

back to the overhaul shop to look at assembly details etc.

Funny you should say that the RB211 does on the odd occasion have a segment of NGV migrate onto the first stage LPT. Shows up as rub marks on the blade platforms sometimes contacting the blade root radius. Allowable in the AMM for 20 landings!

after detection I presume.

So how is it first detected as an abnormality?

Seems like a very calm and professional cockpit crew. Classic and for me somehow very british the last sentence of the clip "Ground, please pass to the emergency crews that we are much obliged for their trouble". So you are sitting there, probably sweaty hands, nervous at least a bit I guess as you have a still sparking engine back there - and they send their apologies to the emergency services. Wow, they have my full respect! Compare that with the recentAA exchange with ATC at JFK...

It would only be picked up if a borescope was being done for.
a). Routine
b). If looking at something else.
The 20 landings limit is in place to plan the engine change. (for rub into the fillet radius I should add!)
IF the damage was caused by NGV's letting go. I think the manual might change:suspect:

From the photos, what appears to be a straight line fracture through a rivet hole and subsequent chaffing on the surface may be a clue

Lomopaseo and Gaspath,

have a look at this picture:

DSCF0020 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

You will see a green and white wire. This is the EGT thermocouple harness, the EGT probes are located at the IP turbine station on the RB211. You will also note the turbine casing has opened like a sardine tin lid. Turbine stator vane or blade material is never going to have enough energy to do that.

As for shipping the engine to HKG, RR have an engine facility here, HAESL, which in a sense is more easy for them to do the work. Because CX aren't doing any major work on their RB211's at the moment, the shop is 'twiddling it's thumb's'. Also geographically closer to Oz than Derby.

Plus a little californian bird tells me that it was indeed the IP turbine that let go. But after all this is only a rumour.

Best Regards,

N1 Vibes