Will the Remus be deployed to search for MH370? The Remus is the platform used to search for AirFrance 447, rated to 6000 meters. The AUV device was famously designed by the Naval Oceanographic Office, the Office of Naval Research, and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution – WHOI, in support of deep-water autonomous operations.
The video below discusses the AF447 and the Titanic search, among others.
The conversation about forbidding the transport of lithium metal batteries as cargo on passenger aircraft is based on fire risk these batteries present. Current fire control systems cannot suppress lithium metal battery fires, but the fears are that banning the transport will result in driving the shipment “underground.” What do you think should be done?
Read More
ICAO’s Dangerous Goods Panel Proposes Ban on Lithium Batteries in Passenger Planes
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.
Air New Zealand flight NZ-6 had to return and make an emergency landing in Auckland, New Zealand, on April 6th.
The Boeing 777-300 plane took off for Los Angeles, California, but had to turn back due to a hydraulic fault.
The plane landed safely. All passengers and crew members remained unharmed.
Malaysia Airlines flight MH70, en route from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysia, to Tokyo’s Narita Airport, had to return and make an emergency landing at 1:00 p.m. on August 23.
The decision for returning was made after the crew reported cabin pressure maintenance issues inside the plane. According to Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, director-general of Malaysian Civil Aviation Department, “It was not able to maintain the right pressure differential for the comfort of the passengers.”
The Boeing 777-200 aircraft safely landed back just 50 minutes after it took off. No one was hurt.
The passengers were accommodated in another flight which took them to their destination with a 2.5 hours delay.
What: Greater Houston Soaring Assn I.C.A. Brasov IS-28B2
Where: Highway 36 at Cougar Road GHSA-Wallis Glideport, Wallis, TX
When: June 17, 2012
Who: 3 fatalities, 3 aboard
Why: Investigators say that the glider was attached by rope 200 feet long, to another aircraft when it crashed during the climb. At 75 feet, the tow rope broke,
The pilot, his daughter in law and her son died in the accident. The victims were named as 68-year-old Fred Blair, the glider pilot; his daughter-in-law, 32-year-old Matilda Blair; and his grandson, 3-year-old Andrew Blair.
Ryanair flight FR-1438 had to return and make an emergency landing in Milan–Malpensa Airport, Italy, on December 16th.
The Boeing 737-800 plane took off for Palermo, Italy, but had to turn back after the crew received indication of a fuel leak.
The plane landed safely. Everyone aboard remained unharmed.
