Retracting landing gear (China)?
 

So I'm standing with a bunch of other non-pilot plane-spotters watching AC depart runway 18L at ZSSS (Hongqiao Shanghai). A local carrier Airbus A330-200 takes off normally and disappears into cloud a little while later... with its landing gear still down! Question for professsional types; don't you want to retract the landing gear ASAP after clearing the runway? On this day Aviation Weather said broken cloud 2600 feet, ceiling 2600 feet. PS Actually I was the only plane spotter, the other folk were concentrating on catching fish in the canal.

Non-pilot avgeek here. My HK$0.2 is that the flight crew forgot to retract the gear since I can't find any info regarding when not to retract the gear shortly after takeoff. Waiting for actual pilots to comment here; this case is interesting.

It's quite normal and is caused by hot brakes, they'll leave the gear down until the brake temperatures drop to a safe level.

If the runway was wet and the temperature near freezing it is common to leave it down for a bit to dry everything out before retraction.

What??? Actually what what. A330 Will not have hot brakes issue at least not on a normal turnaround and drying the breaks. I beg this is just sarcasm.

unless you account for it in the perf calcs you completely invalidate your second segment

wet brakes. Really!!!

What a crock, I’ve read some garbage on here over the years but this is up there with the best of them.

Whilst it is not common, the explanation about hot brakes will be the most likely reason.

Good observation, and reasonable question. The A330s I flew had no brake cooling fans and on short turn arounds, or taxi routes that required multiple brake applications, brake temperatures could become a concern. It was standard practice to keep the gear down for a while to cool the brakes. We only did this when factors such as fuel, wx, ATC and terrain/climb gradients weren't a factor. In the event of anything out of the ordinary occurring you could always raise the gear and sort the problem out, realising that you might later on get a warning of hot brake temperatures later. It was always pre briefed as it is a potential threat and a deviation from standard practices. I hope this answers your question.

Could well have been that they forgot. It also could have been an allowable dispatch with a single brake unit deactivated?
That would mean leaving the gear down for one minute after lift off to allow the main gear wheels to stop spinning. Normal retraction applies pressure to the brake units during the retraction sequence, but with a brake unit deactivated that won't happen.
But it was China....... Who knows.

Okay flight simmers it's simple. The MEL allows departure with a brake (there are eight) u/s. This needs the gear to be left down for some time after lift off. Nothing to do with forgetting or wet runways.

Good to get lots of varied opinions. :O

Hot brakes, a brake unit unserviceable and departure from a contaminated runway are reasons to leave the gear down after take off on Airbus types. In the case of an engine failure in these circumstances, the gear should be raised. In the brake unit failure case, the time for retraction after rotation is one minute (A320) and two minutes (A330).

Oh I see now. The gears can be left down for a while for it to dry or cool down.

Thanks all for taking the time to reply. So likely reasons: forgot, hot brakes or a brake/s deactivated.

Dange, thanks for your recollections on dealing with hot brakes. The model you flew had no brake cooling fans. Would that still be the case today?

bigbird, interesting to hear about the deactivated brake thing. Question; if a brake were deactivated, how long would it take for a wheel to stop spinning? Surely 5 or 10 minutes... no?

Don’t they normally use 18R for departures out of Hongqiao? ;)

Two small questions if I may:
If you do raise the gear in " In the event of anything out of the ordinary occurring" do you lower the gear later or need to take any other action? And how do you protect from actually forgetting the gear down for good?

left..right!
 

Ah yes, you're no doubt correct. Looking at the map again, and where I was standing on the side of the G318 highway, it probably did depart on 18R not 18L. You can't get away with anything on this forum. Ha ha

A previous post quoted the time delays applied for two typical narrow- and wide-body types.

I'd be amazed if any wheel could carry on spinning for 5, let alone 10, minutes.

You should have asked him.

Thread drift.....
Pre 9/11 I was lucky to get a cockpit ride on a 757 into Heathrow. On approach a combination of circumstances ended up with us being a bit too close to the aircraft in front. The captain reduced speed to minimum, announced that over the radio and the plane behind us replied "I can't fly that slow". We got landing clearance just before we crossed the perimiter track for 27R. Full braking caused the brake overheat warnings to go off as we taxied towards 28L and T5. Having consulted the manual they decided that the plane would have to take extra time on the stand to let the brakes cool.

Ha! I'll wave next time I depart! :ok: