You guys saw this right? Crazy!

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Danoff

Danoff

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http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/22/airliner.emergency.ap/index.html


So I was glued to my couch watching this unfold yesterday. I saw the plane come in for final approach. I couldn't blink as the rear landing gear touched down.... and then... very very slowly the front gear inched toward the runway. Then the smoke, the sparks, the flames.

Man that was some crazy stuff yesterday. I just couldn't stop thinking about those people in that plane and how they all knew how bad the situation was. I thought they were going to die. Seriously, I thought every single one of them were gonners.
 
Yeah, I've seen footage on TV. I was literaly cringing at what would happen. When the flames started I cringed even more. I'm glad all the passengers are fine though. 👍
 
Actually, the situation was a hell of a lot better than they made it out to be.

The pilot circled for 3 hours, so there would be very little fuel left onboard. It would be very unlikely that the plane would burst into a fireball. And, judging by the landing, the pilot knew exactly what he was doing, and also considering the massive length of runway at LAX, there was a very low risk of a catastrophic crash, if any.

Frankly, if I was a passenger onboard, I'd be very pissed off. It's an emergency, and the media is sensationalizing it just to get more ratings. People were scared for their lives, and it's a form of entertainment for anyone watching it on TV.
 
That's ridiculous! The passengers actually watched it all happening live on TV on-board the plane?! :crazy: I think I'd rather watch 'Alive' or 'Airport' than watch that...
 
I heard people were crying on board too. IMO I would still be scared, well anyone would be a little, but not crying scared.
 
How the hell did the front wheels manage to get sideways? how would the pilot have known how the wheels were situated???
 
The passengers watched it by choice. They chose to turn their television sets on and watch the news coverage... but still that does suck. I'd have been watching it if I had been on that plane though.

The situation was as bad as everyone made it seem. If that landing gear had come off (or more likely - collapsed) it would have torqued the plane. One of the wings would have cought the ground and the plane would have been doing cartwheels down the runway.

Seriously, I thought they were gonners. If I had been on that plane I'd have assumed I was dead. I was stunned that the landing gear held up.

Also, they were pretty close to the end of the runway when it stopped. Dirt was not far out of the camera shot.
 
barryl85
How the hell did the front wheels manage to get sideways? how would the pilot have known how the wheels were situated???
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For taxiing on the tarmac, the nosewheels can turn to some very high angles. How it got like that after takeoff is beyond me though... but the wheels wouldn't retract because if it's at that angle, it won't fit into where the cavity in the fuselage where the wheels stay during flight. And I guess there is a sensor that stopped the gear from retracting, which in turn activated a warning light. The pilot then flew past the air traffic tower so he could have someone tell him what exactly was wrong with the gear.
 
danoff
The situation was as bad as everyone made it seem. If that landing gear had come off (or more likely - collapsed) it would have torqued the plane. One of the wings would have cought the ground and the plane would have been doing cartwheels down the runway.

Seriously, I thought they were gonners. If I had been on that plane I'd have assumed I was dead. I was stunned that the landing gear held up.

Also, they were pretty close to the end of the runway when it stopped. Dirt was not far out of the camera shot.
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Again, the situation was not very bad because they were fortunate enough to have a very skilled pilot. The main reason the landing gear held up was because the pilot not only kept the nose in the air for as long as possible (greatly reducing the speed at which the wheels touched down), but also because he was extremely gentle when the nose could not stay aloft anymore. Had there been a lesser pilot at the controls who would have given a rougher landing, then yes, it could have been much worse.
 
Yeah we stayed up to watch it at about 3am here in the UK on sky news .... and for a second I thought the worst but was saying out loud as he was putting the back wheels down ... "go on lad! land that sucker" 👍 those flames were a bit scarey when the wheels disintegrated for sure!

The pilot done a perfect emergency landing and top marks to him :cool: I think he will be on many peoples Christmas card list for years to come 👍

Great footage from Sky news and thank god it it turned out so well .... made a right mess of the runway though! ... that crater must have been 2 miles long :scared:
 
Did you guys know that this is a regular occurance?

My wife's uncle used to be an airtraffic controller at Heathrow Airport. He's said that landing gear not fully engaging happens (at Heathrow) about 4 times a week on average!

Most of the time it's just the sensors that are at fault. What they usually do is ask the pilot to fly lowish past the control tower so they can spot weather the wheels are fully down or not. It never hits the news, and the pilot never tells the passengers about it unless its really serious and they think there's a chance of the landing gear failing when they touch down.

I know Heathrow one of the busiest (4th) in the world, but if it happens this frequently at one airport - how many times does it happen worldwide on a yearly basis?!?
 
TheCracker
Did you guys know that this is a regular occurance?

My wife's uncle used to be an airtraffic controller at Heathrow Airport. He's said that landing gear not fully engaging happens (at Heathrow) about 4 times a week on average!

Most of the time it's just the sensors that are at fault. What they usually do is ask the pilot to fly lowish past the control tower so they can spot weather the wheels are fully down or not. It never hits the news, and the pilot never tells the passengers about it unless its really serious and they think there's a chance of the landing gear failing when they touch down.

I know Heathrow one of the busiest (4th) in the world, but if it happens this frequently at one airport - how many times does it happen worldwide on a yearly basis?!?
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If its the sensors then it isn't a problem really. If they fly past the tower and the gear is down and they can't get it up, that's also not a real problem - because they can still land safely.
 
danoff
If its the sensors then it isn't a problem really. If they fly past the tower and the gear is down and they can't get it up, that's also not a real problem - because they can still land safely.
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Try telling the pilots that its not a problem when they don't know that the gear is locked in place for certain :)
 
I saw it live, since FOX interrupted something I was watching. It was twice as scary for me, however, because they were flying over Orange County, where I live. Also, a good friend of mine is on that plane. Luckily, no one was hurt.
 
That's one amazing close call, indeed.

Last time I crossed the Atlantic, it was 3 days after these events occured, on the same route, same airline, same aircraft model:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1514582.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1507270.stm

To make things even more reassuring, our flight was delayed for about 15 hours because of a technical problem. :crazy: (fortunately Nice's airport on the Cote d'Azure was located just besides the beach)

Although the investigation later found that the pilots shared a part of the blame for what happened (apparently it could have been avoided if handled differently), gliding an airbus loaded with 304 people onboard, with no fuel to land on a small island in the middle of the Atlantic at night must be a bit hard on the nerves... 👍
 
jpmontoya
it was 3 days after these events occured, on the same route, same airline, same aircraft model:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1514582.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1507270.stm


Although the investigation later found that the pilots shared a part of the blame for what happened (apparently it could have been avoided if handled differently), gliding an airbus loaded with 304 people onboard, with no fuel to land on a small island in the middle of the Atlantic at night must be a bit hard on the nerves... 👍
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I saw the reenactment on discovery channel aircrash investigations (even though they didnt crash).
 
I saw the footage on TV. Amazing, cool and very scary.

This reminds me of the story I saw on TV about a jet plane that lost all electrical power. The engines, communications, controls, lights, etc. were all cut off. The plane became a big glider. A fan turbine popped out of the body, and the air spun a generator so they had limited power. The were in the middle of a great ocean, with no runways in sight. But, there was a tiny military island that had a runway long enough for the plane to land.

The problem was, it was several hours away. Yep, the jet glided all the way to it. But, it was a tall island with huge sea cliffs, and the island was small. The runway started and finished at the huge sea cliffs which meant a difficult landing, to say the least. If that wasn't bad enough, the island was heavily fogged over! Talk about stress on the job!

The plane landed safely, BTW. With no power at all.
 
Solid Lifters
This reminds me of the story I saw on TV about a jet plane that lost all electrical power. The engines, communications, controls, lights, etc. were all cut off. The plane became a big glider. A fan turbine popped out of the body, and the air spun a generator so they had limited power. The were in the middle of a great ocean, with no runways in sight. But, there was a tiny military island that had a runway long enough for the plane to land.

The problem was, it was several hours away. Yep, the jet glided all the way to it. But, it was a tall island with huge sea cliffs, and the island was small. The runway started and finished at the huge sea cliffs which meant a difficult landing, to say the least. If that wasn't bad enough, the island was heavily fogged over! Talk about stress on the job!

The plane landed safely, BTW. With no power at all.
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Thats the incident jpmontoya mentioned on the last page post 17 https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showpost.php?p=1905521&postcount=17

The Airbus A330 right engines fuel hose busted and all the fuel was spilling out, the pilots X fed (crossfed) the fuel as the fault checklist told them to because the right tanks were getting low, big mistake as now they lost all the fuel which means they lost the generators and power now they are a glider. the small propeller that pops out of the bottom of the plane is for hydraulics not electrical power, Because they lost electrical power they had to rely on mechanical instruments.
 
VIPERGTSR01
Thats the incident jpmontoya mentioned on the last page post 17 https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showpost.php?p=1905521&postcount=17

The Airbus A330 right engines fuel hose busted and all the fuel was spilling out, the pilots X fed (crossfed) the fuel as the fault checklist told them to because the right tanks were getting low, big mistake as now they lost all the fuel which means they lost the generators and power now they are a glider. the small propeller that pops out of the bottom of the plane is for hydraulics not electrical power, Because they lost electrical power they had to rely on mechanical instruments.
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That must be the same story I saw. They never mentioned the pilots were partially the blame. They said the fan acted like a turbine, for limited power. I guess that was for hydralics only, like you said. But, I understood it was for electrical power as well. It makes sense they had backup batteries for that, though.

I'm beginning to think they weren't flying for hours as a glider either. I read up on the story a bit, and it states a huge aircraft jet plane can only travel 85 miles with no power. I doubt that took several hours. Perhaps, 45 minutes at the most?
 
Yeah I think the turbine is for basic electrical aswell, but hydraulics is the main concern.
 
I couldn't imagine sitting there watching my own plane crash. You would see the plane do whatever a plane does in a crash as you felt it, I'd much rather just have it happen with my limited view from my seat.

I would rate it as one of the worst feelings ever. However that pilot did a brilliant job 👍
 
I was quite impressed with the pilot also. It was such a gentle landing. 👍 I was watching this live and was posting in "What are you watching" thread as it unfolded.
 

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