Air France flight AF-292 made an emergency landing in Osaka, Japan, on April 18th.
The plane was flying from Charles de Gaulle Airport, France, when the crew received a low tire pressure indication for several tires and declared an emergency.
The plane landed uneventfully. There were 298 people aboard at the time; all of them remained safe.
An Air France flight had to make an emergency landing at the Moi International Airport in Mombasa, Kenya, on December 20.
According to the Police Spokesman Charles Owino, “It requested an emergency landing when a device suspected to be an explosive was discovered in the lavatory.” The plane was heading from Mauritius to Paris at the time.
The plane landed safely. All 459 passengers and 14 crew members remained unharmed.
Owino confirmed that an investigation has been launched to “determine if the device had explosives.”
Air France flight AF83 had to divert and make an emergency landing at Montréal–Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport, Québec, Canada, on December 8.
The Boeing 777-328, en-route from San Francisco International Airport, California, to Charles de Gaulle Airport, Paris, when it diverted due to an alleged bomb threat.
The plane landed safely.
No one was injured.
An Air France flight, operated by Cityjet, had to divert and make an emergency landing at Belfast International Airport, United Kingdom, on December 4.
Authorities said the plane, en-route from Paris, France, to Dublin, Ireland, was diverted due to Storm Desmond.
The plane landed uneventfully. There were over 50 passengers aboard at the time; all of them remained unharmed.
The airline arranged bus for the passengers.
An Air France plane had to make an emergency landing at the Pulkovo international airport in St. Petersburg, Russia, on November 30.
Authorities said the Boeing 777 was diverted due to apparent engine failure. The flight was en-route from Paris, France, to Beijing, China, at the time.
The plane landed safely. There were 269 passengers aboard at the time; all of the remained unhurt.
Air France flight AF065 made an emergency landing in Salt Lake City, Utah, on November 17.
Authorities said the flight, en-route from Los Angeles to Paris, was diverted due to a bomb threat.
The plane landed safely. None of the 497 passengers and crew members were harmed.
The airline said, “Local authorities are carrying out complete inspections of the aircraft, the passengers and their luggage. An investigation will be led by the authorities to identify the source of the telephone call.”
Air France flight AF55 had to divert and make an emergency landing at Halifax Stanfield International Airport in Nova Scotia, Canada, on November 17.
The plane was en-route from Washington, D.C. to Paris when the authorities received an anonymous bomb threat and decided to divert.
The plane landed uneventfully. All 262 passengers remained safe.
No explosives were found upon inspection.
Air France flight AF1816 made an emergency landing at Belfast International Airport in Northern Ireland, on November 12.
The plane, en-route from Charles de Gaulle airport, France, to Dublin, Ireland, was diverted after the pilot reported low fuel levels. Authorities said the plane circled Dublin airport before diverting to Belfast but could not land due to high winds.
The plane landed safely. There were 93 people aboard at the time; all of them remained unhurt.
About 100 Air France employees stormed a management and union official meeting on October 5, after the airline announced plans to shed 2,900 jobs in the next 2 years.
The airline, which is struggling to compete with global rivals, announced job cuts after failing to convince its pilots to work longer hours on same salary.
The airline’s human resources manager Xavier Broseta and the head of long-haul flights Pierre Plissonnier had to flee from the angry workers, with their shirts torn off.
Seven people, including a security guard, were injured in the incident.
French President Francois Hollande said, “Social dialogue matters and when it’s interrupted by violence, and disputes take on an unacceptable form, it can have consequences for the image and attractiveness” of the country.”
A criminal investigation has been launched into the incident.
Air France flight AF-1688 was forced to divert and make an emergency landing in Vienna, Austria, on October 3.
The Airbus A319-100, en-route from Charles de Gaulle airport, France, to Bucharest Otopeni airport, Romania, had to be diverted after the crew reported a burning odor on-board.
The plane landed uneventfully. Everyone aboard remained unharmed.
The passengers were accommodated in other flights.
Air France flight AF1059 had to return and make an emergency landing at Newcastle Airport, England, on August 31.
The Cityjet Avro RJ-85 plane took off for Paris but had to return shortly afterwards after the pilots reported cracked windshield.
The plane landed uneventfully and no one was hurt.
It is believed that the windshield cracked due to bird strike.
Seventy minutes after a mayday when a cargo of vegetables (peppers and flowers) set off a smoke alarm, Air France flight AF-733 made an emergency landing at Shannon Airport today at 9.55am. The flight was en route from Santo Domingo to Paris with 142 passengers and 14 crew when they diverted.
Emergency services, Shannon based Irish Coast Guard helicopter, the fire department, the RNLI lifeboat at Kilrush, and HSE ambulances were on standby as passengers disembarked via stairs. Passengers are being accommodated in the terminal as they wait for an alternative flight.
No fire or heat spots were detected aboard.
After AF447–the deadliest in the history of Air France–it is always alarming to hear of an issue aboard an AF trans-Atlantic flight. That Air France Rio de Janeiro-Paris flight crashed on June 1, 2009 and led to an exhaustive but successful multi-phase ocean search. On April 3, 2011, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution located the debris field.
While today’s thermal food was both alarming and anti-climactic, it was also a successful demonstration of contemporary aviation accident prevention. We are well familiar with how investigations of safety issues contribute to making flight safer, but rarely do we give credit to crew resource management. How the crew responds to the crisis, (even when it is just a sensitive alert that goes off), how well coordinated and cool-headed the crew is can mean the difference between life and death.
We don’t need to think of AF447, or even Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, to appreciate the integrated clockwork of a well-trained crew; but it does make us wonder if those crews were as well-trained as the one on this jet today, if either of those tragedies might have been prevented.
On September 10, the Air France pilots filed an official complaint asking a commitment from the airline’s management that the pilots will be not sent to Ebola-affected West African countries against their will.
The complaint, filed by a representative of the pilot’s union in France, François Hamant, seeks rights for the pilots for refusing to fly to the countries impacted by Ebola virus, without suffering from any kind of disciplinary or financial consequences.
This move has come just weeks after the airline’s cabin crew staff union circulated a petition asking the management to stop flights to the affected countries. It is feared that such moves would make these countries, especially the worst affected ones such as Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, further isolated from the rest of the world and hard-to-reach for international health organizations working for containing and combating the disease.
An Air France flight had to make an emergency landing at Lagos Airport in Nigeria, on August 10, due to some error in tire pressure sensor.
The incident happened as the schedule Paris-Lagos flight was approaching Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos.
A statement released by Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) confirmed that the plane landed safely and all 178 people aboard, including 168 passengers and 10 crew members, remained unhurt.
Captain of the flight explained that the sensor wrongly indicated a problem with the tire pressure. However, no problems were observed during inspection after landing.
On March 2, 2013, an Airbus A380 (flight 275) scheduled to fly from Narita International Airport to Paris aborted a takeoff on runway 34L at Tokyo-Narita. The takeoff was delayed because of a nose gear problem, and subsequently towed to the gate. After maintenance, the takeoff was rescheduled but aborted a second time because of the same trouble, canceling the flight. None of the 537 aboard were injured.
Air France 447 went down over the Atlantic in 2009.
The fly-by-wire A330 incorporates technology that prevents the airplane from entering a stall, but during a complete loss of airspeed information, however, the system reverted to manual control.
The final report said said the pilots were “completely surprised” by technical problems experienced at high altitude and engaged in increasingly de-structured actions until suffering “the total loss of cognitive control of the situation.”
CEO of the Flight Safety Foundation has been recorded said pilots generally manually manipulating the controls for only three minutes:one minute and 30 seconds each for take-off and landing.
“We are moving towards automated operations where the pilot isn’t even permitted to fly. That means the first time in your career you will ever feel what an aircraft feels like at 35,000 feet is when it’s handed to you broken.”
