Pakistan International Airlines flight PK-760 had to divert and make an emergency landing in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on November 11th.
The Boeing 777-200 plane heading from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, to Lahore, Pakistan, was diverted after it lost cabin pressure.
The plane landed uneventfully. All passengers and crew members remained safe.
Click to view full size photo at Airliners.net
Contact photographer
What: American Airlines Boeing 757-200 from Miami,FL to Boston,MA
Where: Miami
When: Oct 26th 2010
Who: 154 passengers and 6 crew
Why: A half hour after takeoff, the plane developed rapid decompression at 31,000 feet requiring oxygen masks, an emergency descent and a return to Miami.
Maintenance found a one by two foot hole in the hull.
Maintenance, Maintenance, Maintenance!
Even with AD Directives issued, this was still missed. Was there telltale evidence prior to this event that could have prevented endangering 154 passengers and six crew?
The hole in the hull is not unprecedented. Sixteen months prior to flight AA-1640, Southwest Airlines (SWA) flight 2294, (another Boeing suffering a hole in the hull in July 13, 2009), the FAA has already issued Airworthiness Directive 2010-01-09 mandating inspection requirements. At that time, they ascribed the hull failure to a design fault: Fuselage skin failure due to preexisting fatigue at a chemically milled step.
It’s an easy enough thing to visualize-picture slightly squeezing an empty cola can, then blowing into it; and repeating the process, over and over. In a soda can, it would not take the 20 years this plane has been flying for the stressed areas to develop a crease, and eventually crack.
Not that a soda can is expected to sustain the significant pressures at 10,000+ feet, nor does it have the design flaw of chemical milling, nor is its skin made of single and double bonded layers. If it were, one could theoretically presume and anticipate metal fatigue to occur at the weakest location–the edges of where the metal is double-bonded.
In the Southwest Airlines event, it was observed that the progression of metal fatigue tends to be higher at the borders between chemically milled and non-chemically milled bays.
The inspection requirements in SB 737-53A1301 require inspections to detect cracks in the vulnerable areas (the chem-mill step) to avoid sudden fracture and failure of the fuselage skin panels.
Did this plane undergo “repetitive external non-destructive inspections to detect cracks in the fuselage skin“?
Carriers out there, when there are directives which indicate potential problems, pay attention!
If not for the stellar performance of this flight crew, this plane would have been a statistic.
Thank you, John D King for sending the links.
Austrian Airlines flight OS-65 made an emergency landing in Vienna, Austria, on October 26th.
The Boeing 767-300 plane took off for Chicago, Illinois, but had to turn back due to multiple bird strikes.
The plane landed uneventfully. All two hundred and ten passengers and thirteen crew members remained safe.
AirAsia flight Z2-612 made an emergency landing in Manila, Philippines, on June 15th.
The Airbus A320-200 plane flying from Davao, Philippines, was descending toward Manila when the crew requested emergency assistance due to an engine failure.
The plane continued for a safe landing. All one hundred and fifty-nine passengers and six crew members remained unharmed.
By now you have probably heard already about the Atlas Air Boeing 747 which was en route from New York to Wichita, Kansas…and landed at the wrong airport. The intended destination was McConnell Air Force Base, which has runways long enough for the 747 to take off and land. But the actual destination was Col. James Jabara Airport which has no control tower, is much smaller, and does not accommodate the big jets.
Somewhat ironically, the plane’s cargo was a B-787 fuselage going to Boeing.
The Atlas Air 747 needs a 9,200 foot runway. Because it had used up enough fuel, it was light enough Thursday to successfully take off from Jabara’s 6,101 foot runway. The cargo flight landed safely at McConnell. Two pilots were flown from New York to Wichita to make the flight. Below is a video of the take-off.
Click to view full size photo at Airliners.net
Contact photographer Tiago Palla
What: United Boeing 777-200 en route from San Francisco to London
Where: San Francisco
When: Apr 12th 2012
Who: 195 passengers aboard
Why: After taking off from San Francisco, the left side of the United Boeing 777 was struck by lightning. Passengers described the flash of light and the big bank. Oxygen masks deployed. No one was injured. Weather suspended other flights taking off from that airport until the storm blew through.
Pilots informed ATC, and dumped fuel before returning to land safely. The plane remained on the runway as officials inspected the aircraft. Passengers were put up in local hotels and scheduled to take an alternate flight Friday afternoon.
A small plane had to divert and make an emergency landing on Interstate-85 near Lexington, Davidson County, North Carolina, on November 16.
The plane, en-route from Dayton, Tennessee, to Silver City, New Mexico, had to divert due to an engine trouble.
The pilot tried to land at Davidson County Airport, but could not make it.
The plane landed safely. No one was injured.
