What: Schroeder Fire Balloons G34/24
Where: Villiers-Saint-Denis, Aisne France
When: May 13th, 2012, 7:00
Who: 4 aboard, 2 fatalities
Why: Fifteen minutes after takeoff, the craft struck power lines and crashed.

The basket caught fire immediately after touching the power line, instantly killing the pilot of the balloon and a sixty year old passenger.

Two brothers aged 20 and 24, were flown by helicopter to Percy hospital in Clamart (Hauts-de-Seine). One of them is badly burned. One brother who clung to the fabric of the balloon was injured by the fall over Charly-sur-Marne.

Thirty firemen and thirty policemen were on the scene.


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Wing Damage, low fuel, Fog, Flat tire to Air India

In Jaipur at 9:30 on January 5, 2013, after having to divert due to visibility issues, an Imphal-Delhi Air India flight was out of fuel and made an emergency landing in Jaipur damaging a wing and suffering a flat tire. The video says the wing damage was due to a tree-strike after the tire burst.

The Gauhati to Delhi flight diverted Jaipur due to dense fog but in Jaipur too, the pilot landed in fog and low visibility. 168 passengers and 5 crew were aboard. We have heard no reports of injuries on the Airbus A320-231 #VT-ESH but the damage looks pretty bad, if the twitter post is of the correct incident. (That’s the correct # as far as we can tell.) You can click through our link to the twitter discussion.

Emergency services responded to the scene.

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Atlas Oops.

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.

See video of successful take off

KPTV – FOX 12

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Jet Airways Punked?

Ostensibly to check the crew’s ability to handle an emergency–the check pilot with the status of a passenger and not to touch the flight controls –pulled the circuit breaker on the commercial Delhi-Mumbai flight. Instantly the autopilot tripped and the flight director disappeared. The pilot landed the plane manually, albeit with a higher-than-normal descent rate. The EGPWS warning system was not engaged. An internal investigation is apparently underway, but one wonders why the name of the pilot in question has not been made public.

Putting all the passengers aboard a commercial liner in danger is not something that should be swept under a rug.

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Octogenarian Lands Plane Beside Unconscious Pilot/Spouse

What: C And S Manufacturing Corp Cessna 414A en route from Marco Island, Collier County, Florida to Cherryland Airport in Sturgeon Bay Wisconsin
Where: Wisconsin
When: April 2,2012
Who: 2 aboard
Why: After her husband John passed out at the controls of their Cessna, eighty-one year old Helen Collins took some quick lessons “on the fly” and managed to land the plane, with minor damage.

Air Traffic Control talked to her until pilot instructor Robert Vuksanovic took his plane up to fly by her as he coached her down. The distress call came at 5:05 pm. after Collins was three hours in flight from Marco Island, Florida. On landing, Helen and her husband John were hospitalized; John was declared dead at 6:38 p.m. Helen had back pain, minor bumps and bruises and a broken rib, but her son Richard Collins did not lose both of his parents that day.

A heroic effort from ATC, Collins and flight instructor Robert Vuksanovic.

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NTSB Denies Petition on 1996 Crash of TWA Flight 800
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NTSB Denies Petition on 1996 Crash of TWA Flight 800


The National Transportation Safety Board today denied a petition for reconsideration of its findings in the investigation of the 1996 crash of TWA flight 800.

The petition was filed in June 2013 by a group called The TWA 800 Project. Petitioners claimed a “detonation or high-velocity explosion” caused the crash.

“Our investigations are never ‘closed’,” said Acting Chairman Christopher A. Hart. “We always remain open to the presentation of new evidence.”

Before responding to the petition, NTSB staff met with the petitioners’ representatives and listened to an eyewitness who described what he saw on the night of the accident. After a thorough review of all the information provided by the petitioners, the NTSB denied the petition in its entirety because the evidence and analysis presented did not show the original findings were incorrect.

Black Box

Part 1

Black Box

Part 2

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Canadair Jet Cockpit Side-Window Shatters in Flight

What: British Air on behalf of Air France Canadair CRJ-100 en route from from Barcelona to Paris
Where: 15 passengers
When: May 26th 2009
Who: 15 passengers
Why: Near Limoges, the right cockpit window shattered, causing the plane to experience sudden decompression. the plane landed safely at Limoges. Cockpit crew had some injuries from flying glass.

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