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Brian--
I see your point, and agree. My point being: none of us was there, none of us have all the info, none of us should judge. I'm all for "hangar flying", discussing incidents, and learning. But comments like: "then decides to continue to England anyway. Un-freakin-believable!!" are in no way constructive, IMO. I looked at every public profile on this thread before posting, and not one said "BA 747 Captain" under occupation. I did make an assumption--from what I saw--that the average reader on this thread has no idea what an Equal Time Point is, what a circular divert calculaiton is, has never chased through a specific fuel consumption chart or a specific distance chart--especially for a 4 engine jet that weighs over 700K lbs, has never coordinated a "re-release" with dispatch for an oceanic crossing, etc, etc. If you do, good on ya. So hopefully you can understand my point of view here. Big difference between "learing" and calling somebody out for what you perceive as a mistake. Joe |
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Additionally, it has been said on here and in the news reports that the chance of a second engine failing is extremely remote. This is incorrect. People confuse the 'probability of two failures' with 'probability of a second failure, given a first failure'. The latter is the case here, and the chance of the second failure is just as high as the chance of the original failure. This assumes that the failures are independent. If they are not independent the chances of failure go up. I've never flown an airliner, but I have travelled from L.A. to england in a 747, and I can tell you that once you leave th US you spend the rest of that flight over water and terrain that would mean almost certain death in a forced landing situation. I'm standing by my position that this was a money decision and couldn't have possibly been safety motivated. |
Fair enough. You've flown from LA to England (and back I assume? Maybe even a couple of times?) as a passenger, so you're obviously an expert.
I'll gvie you a hint..EVERYTHING the airlines do is a money decision--from the number of olives on the first class salad to the insurance payouts after the 747 attempts a forced landing in Greenland and everybody dies. (BTW, that is what ETP and circular divert calcs are for...forced landing in a 74, that's really funny!) I retract all my previous posts, and apologize for trying to inject some factual, realworld experience and information into the discussion. :rolleyes: Back to my fuel tanks-- Joe |
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I didn't list it in my profile since I'm retired, but I have flown the 747-200 and the 747-400. Yeah, I know what an ETP is and I'd say he was a little short of it when he decided to continue. A re-release with dispatch for an oceanic crossing was literally hours away and of no consequence. In ground school we used to muse over which engine was the least important and I'll admit the number 2 is probably it. If you can't get to your filed altitude (a tough proposition with only three burnin') then it's obvious that your fuel plan is blown. Now I don't know about BA, but my airline never gave me an gallon more than the minimum (unless it was real cheap at the departure point). A point I'll admit to is that a "suitable" airport would be one where you could arrive with a weight below the max landing weight. No one wants to dump a jillion gallons of JetA over LAX for an hour or more and still do a max gross landing. I'd say the guy had a reasonable plan until he passed Toronto, Montreal, or New York. Weather is a possible factor in his decision to continue on, but I'll bet dollars to doughnuts that BA couldn't find a replacement engine in the three cities and talked him into goin' for it I'm sure it can't be found now, but ACARS messages can be viewed on the internet - if you know where to look. I'll bet those would make interesting reading... |
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Four engine machines generally do quite well on 2 engines although it does involve some pucker time because it happens so rarely. The landing is fast because of Vmc and less than normal flaps. Every crew has a chance to prove they can deal with it during a 6 month simulator check. Same for twin crews on one engine. Three engines from LA and across the pond - that's pushing it. If the engine had quit up over the artic or half way across, no big deal at all. But if UK rules bless it from LA, so be it. The most hazardous part is the bad press. 99.9% of airline flying is routine and nearly boring. Crossing the water on 3 engines would be interesting. Most crews fly half a life time and never see an inflight shut down, the engines are so reliable, chances of another quiting are very remote. Crank in a little rudder trim and check the charts for a new power setting. (Call the dispatcher and make sure it is legal to press on) Generally, range is as good on 3 as 4 engines. The only thing that can screw it up is wind at the new altitude, or being mandated to lower than chart altitude due to traffic. (Years ago, USAF guys flew C-130's from the Greenland ice cap radar sites non stop to Texas by shutting down 2 of 4 engines, until some pencil pushing desk bound type decided it was dangerous.) I guarantee that messing around with these experimental airplanes is a more hazardous than any commercial and most military operations. So, be careful and lets not stew over these 747 guys too much. :) dd |
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They had plenty of gas.
According to this link, the crew landed with more than enough fuel onboard. They diverted because they were deficient in how to balance out the total fuel load with only three engines and "thought" they wouldn't be able to get fuel out of a particular tank, FWIW.
http://www.aaib.dft.gov.uk/publicati...36__g_bnlg.cfm |
This is an interesting thread indeed.....as others have said most of us have very few of the actual facts and big picture. Sure it sounds pretty stupid, but if you only knew how many DC-10's, 747's, 340's, L10's and other Non ETOPS birds have regularly crossed the pond with one engine out you'd really blow a gasket. This is one publicized incident (and not recent at that) where everyone heard about what happened. Comically, I have to laugh about the "not finding and engine", because it's probably true :) Borrowing or leasing an engine is a big deal, especially given the fact that most of the US operators run GE's and P&W's, whereas some/lots of the BA's have RB's on them. There is only two mainline pax operator of whales in the US (NWA & UAL), additionally given the fact that most of the box haulers are classics makes this a likely scenario. Ferrying engines around of that size (even with the fans dissasembled) isn't an easy task either...hence the old 747 "5th engine" pylon years ago.
Before starting my avionics shop, I've spent many years in the airline biz, and indeed things like that have so many variables that it's hard to guess what really happened from our rather ignorant perspective. I've had the good (or bad) fortune to spend time working at many dozens of different airlines around the globe (on every continent except antarctica) and one universal thing is always the bottom line! Anyway, it's interesting to see how something this strange started so much bickering - like it makes a difference. The airline biz is such an unbelievably strange animal, that unless you've spent much time in (in a whole variety of different departments), it's literally incomprehensible how things atually work. George can probably chime in about that as well. Like someone said, those guys generally know how much that extra leaf of lettuce costs them - but then they do some really stupid things that cost hundreds of times that amount. If you've been in the biz, you won't be surprised as to the general problems with todays airlines. Ok, I'll stop! Just my 2 cents as usual. Cheers, Stein. |
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