Nadi - Fiji Jet Fuel Contamination

[Quickstatus]

It doesn’t make the fuel a good conducto

I think that is the key.
Hydrocarbon fuel is an extremely poor electrical conductor - almost zero.

I had a look for some objective data for electrical conductivity
The units are Siemens per metre
Higher number = more conductive = easier to dissipate electrostatic charge

Seawater: 5
Pure Water: 0.000005 =5x10^-6
pure water considered an insulator.

Jet Fuel with antistatic additive 0.00000000005 = 5x10^-11

Jet fuel without additives 0.000000000001 = 1x10^-12 or 5 million times less than pure water.

 

[Quickstatus]

There are other media suggestions that no Jet fuel was delivered to Fiji between 23 June and 7 August

Sounds like this plus the unusable batch (static electricity) has resulted in the current fuel shortage

Fiji has released from Govt reserves 1.3M litres of Jet fuel to Nadi airport

Qf operated a 737 today
Quick look did not detect scheduled aircraft uplifting fuel elsewhere and FJ operating long haul flights with their a350

Restrictions continue - see NOTAM

NOTAM A0993/26

 

[luxury-lizard]

we flew out on FJ (SYD-NAN) on Saturday- no indication of any issues.

 

[t7_]

Fuel builds up static charge when it is pumped because of friction during fuel flow (and this may also happen during tanker or drum transport). That's why fuel tankers (or fuel pumping hydrant systems) and aircraft need to be properly earthed when being refueled to avoid excess static charge and particularly discharge of static which can cause vapours to ignite.

So sounds to me like this fuel has not been properly earthed at some points in its transport and handling and now has built up charge above what can be safely/conveniently discharged by the local infrastructure.

My source: 10 years as a RAAF Fuels Officer. They are right it is very rare - with proper handling, should not happen.

Thank you for that - I’ve been looking all over the net for an explanation of what ‘excess electrical charge’ means in this context, but all the newspaper articles just quote the same phrase and move on.

 

[Seat0B]

Thank you for that - I’ve been looking all over the net for an explanation of what ‘excess electrical charge’ means in this context, but all the newspaper articles just quote the same phrase and move on.

You’re welcome @t7_ I had a good old walk down memory lane thinking about this.

And welcome to AFF!