Hats off to the crew of USAirways 1549

[pierre smith]

...Since both engines went TU, what drives the hydraulics for control of the airplane? Batteries or APU?

Thanks,

[jsharkey]

...a small windmill that drops out of the fuselage and spins in the breeze to generate enough power to keep essential controls working.

[airguy]

I was in the LAX terminal waiting for a flight while all this was unfolding, and I heard a couple pilots talking about systems and procedures on the A320. They SOUNDED like they knew what they were talking about....dunno....both these guys were corporate pilots with ATP experience.

Anyhow, the gist of the conversation was that coming out of that airspace, the crew would have still had the APU running at that point in time for hydraulic and electrical.

[Bubblehead]

As a former USN guy, I have decided that given the aquatic nature of this incident the Navy should give the pilot a special award.

I have not decided yet whether it should be US Naval Aviator's wings or Submariner's Dolphins!

[rvbuilder2002]

Originally Posted by wrongway john

We prop folks should be thankful for our shreaders, which should make them mince meat before they hit our windshields.

wj

It is not really relative to this thread, but a propeller does nothing to protect us from birds. Particularly at high speed. In the 360 deg space covered by the propeller the blade cord only covers a very small portion of it. With the relatively slow RPM the propeller turns, a bird can easily get through without being hit.

[David-aviator]

Originally Posted by pierre smith

...Since both engines went TU, what drives the hydraulics for control of the airplane? Batteries or APU?

Thanks,

The later Boeings have a RAT....ram air turbine. The 707 was total manual control with cool aerodynamic balance chambers at each surface. The 727 was hydraulic with manual reversion.

The Douglas 9's and MD80's have manual controls with several thousand miles of cables. The rudder has a hydraulic boost package.

Don't know anything about the Airbus series except they are advanced electric. There was at least one Airbus accident at an air show where the crew got disconnected from controlling the airplane and it electronically flew into the ground. There was a story early on when the 320's began service in this country .... a crew entered a holding pattern and could not leave....that probably did not happen but it was a good story about automation in those days.

When I fly these days and file a report here I frequently refer to scanning for the enemy. That means birds like geese, turkey vultures, eagles, hawks and of course other airplanes. One has to scan constantly because one minute they are there and then they aren't. I get nervous just looking down long enough to change a radio frequency, the enemy is everywhere and very difficult to see, they are so relatively small. Generally, if an evasive maneuver is necessary, I climb as most of the time a bird will dive. He's probably thinking the airplane is a bigger carnivore and its time to hit the deck, not unlike a jumped fighter in WWII.

[cbo111]

I believe those **** Canadian Geese took out an AF AWACs Boeing 707-320 in Alaska back in the mid-90's. They definitely have more kills against our Air Force than any adversary since Vietnam.
Chuck Olsen
Tehachapi
RV-7A

[jmbrwn]

I flew the A320 for 8 yrs and think it's a very good airplane. Some airlines takeoff with the APU running. My airline does not. With the loss of both engines, the RAT (Ram Air Turbine) could be extended to provide hydraulic power to operate the flight controls. If the APU were not running, the RAT would also provide electrical power. Electrics would only be provided for the essential instruments for flight.
Most accidents involving the Airbus (all aircraft for that matter) are pilot error. As advanced as the aircraft is, it does exactly what you tell it to do.

[rvbuilder2002]

Originally Posted by David-aviator

Don't know anything about the Airbus series except they are advanced electric. There was at least one Airbus accident at an air show where the crew got disconnected from controlling the airplane and it electronically flew into the ground.

In this particular case (I don't know about others) the crew did not get disconnected. The flight control computer was designed to prevent the crew from stalling the airplane. They were doing a slow flight (relative) fly by at an airshow...got it behind the power curve, and waited too long to push the power levers up. Because of spool up lag time, etc., the speed continued to decay and regardless of how hard both pilots pulled on the pilot control input devices (I don't know if they can really be called sticks) the computer would not let the AOA increase beyond a programed value.
I believe their was some major software rewrites after that accident.

[ajay]

Not to negate the pilot and crews fortune and professionalism, but 1549 reached a peak altitude of 3200 ft http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/...h-hudson_N.htm
and it would have been closer to either return to La Guardia or take the 7000' 19 runway at Teterboro than ditch it where they did. I know everything is 20-20 in hindsight, but it will be interesting to see why these options weren't taken.

ajay