Qantas jet in scare landing......

[Alanslegal]

just saw this article on smh.com.au

Qantas jet in landing scare - World - smh.com.au

 

[littl_flier]

And the onward QF2 flight to SYD is delayed 4.5 hours as a result with estimated departure at 2200 at present.

 

[Evan]

By power do they mean cabin electrical power or the aircraft systems power or the whole plane ?

No doubt they will find the reason, if the AC is only a few hours delayed it could have not been too complex to find, must not have had to pull the whole thing to peices to identify what failed.
E

 

[Mal]

Can anyone make sense of the Qantas Departures for Bangkok at the moment?
Tuesday
QF2 Sydney 17:25 (Mon) 22:00 (Tue) Estimated
QF2 Sydney 17:25 18:05 Departed

Was the QF2 from yesterday delayed in London and departed late, and is now this affected plane? Whereas QF2 from today was ok and should arrive on time?
Or did the actual incident happen yesterday delaying QF2 for ~24 hours, and that's now due to leave a bit later tonight? Doesn't help when the article on the website is post dated

 

[Evan]

I read in the Australian that i was a complete and total power failure, and running on batterys...... as in all 4 engine generation units were no good and presume the 2 extra generation units on the APU were also not usable.

Sounds like it may have been an interesting flight

E

 

[Mal]

So it was Monday:

Qantas jumbo jet in near-disaster | The Australian


Interesting set of events! Surprised the first we hear about it is over 24 hours later...

 

[Evan]

Interesting set of events! Surprised the first we hear about it is over 24 hours later...

I guess we did not hear becuase all the passangers may have known was some cabin lights off then on again in battery backup mode ? its possible only the flight crew knew.

This is your captin speaking... Passangers we have just dimmed the lights for landing

E

 

[Platy]

Since the back up battery power is only good for a limited time, such a total power system failure could have been a fatal event if there were no landing opportunities (eg trans pacific flight) :shock:

 

[serfty]

More here ...

Qantas jet 'could have crashed' | NEWS.com.au

Flight QF2 with 344 passengers on board was about 15 minutes from Bangkok when the highly unusual failure took place and a back-up system kicked in/ ...

Qantas chief pilot Chris Manning and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau yesterday confirmed the incident took place as the plane returned from London. "The back-up system was activated and the aircraft landed safely," Captain Manning said. ...

Mr Walsh said he understood the aircraft's systems went into a degraded mode under standby power to reduce the drain on the batteries. The 747-400 has four generators, one on each engine, plus two generators on the auxiliary power unit that sources said could be linked to the main system in an emergency.

A Qantas engineer ... said the battery back-up and standby inverter would supply power for up to an hour.

 

[Yada Yada]

Sounds like it may have been an interesting flight

To say the least!!! :shock:

Makes me wonder about QF's safety/maintenance standards. :!:

 

[NM]

By power do they mean cabin electrical power or the aircraft systems power or the whole plane ?

It was electrical power. Engine thrust continued to operate.

This is a very rare situation and not just a generator failure. The 747 has an electrical generator on each engine plus at least 1 (could be 2??) in the APU that could be used if required. So to drop to battery power only, I assume the problem was more in the power management function that in the generation process.

I would expect the aircraft will be significantly delayed as the Thai and Aussie authorities argue over who should investigate, and flight data recorder and probably even coughpit voice recorder info is extracted for analysis. I would not be surprised if Boeing wants to have its own engineers investigate.

 

[littl_flier]

The flight in question shows as departed at 00:35 this morning.

MON 07 JAN
QF2

Sydney

17:25

00:35 (Wed)

Departed

So Qantas must have found a replacement aircraft presuming the other one is still sitting in BKK with it's flight recorders being inspected etc.

 

[NM]

The flight in question shows as departed at 00:35 this morning.

So Qantas must have found a replacement aircraft presuming the other one is still sitting in BKK with it's flight recorders being inspected etc.

Either that or they found some staples to make a quick repair :shock:

 

[serfty]

Either that or they found some staples to make a quick repair :shock:

How long does it take to fly staples from Oz to BKK?

 

[NM]

I believe the aircraft involved was VH-OJM. It was scheduled to arrive Tuesday morning around 6:30am. The Wednesday morning QF2 arrival (today) was operated by VH-OJQ. The delayed Tuesday morning QF2 arrival is showing as estimated 13:35 today (Wednesday) - departed BKK at 00:35 according to QF site. So that is about 31 hours late. Normally when a flight is delayed more than 24 hours they change the flight number so as not to confuse it with the regular operation of that flight on the day, so it will be interesting to see how it appears closer to 1:30pm.

 

[JohnK]

Maybe the time has come to let go of some of these older aircarft!

Anyone know what happened to QF5 on Saturday afternoon? It did not depart as scheduled and re-scheduled to depart at 8:00am Sunday morning but when I was at the airport it was re-scheduled again to 9:40am. Not sure what happened after this time as I boarded QF74 and after waiting for late passengers to board and an aborted take-off we finally took off just over 2 hours late....

 

[moa999]

Maybe the time has come to let go of some of these older aircarft!

Definitely nowhere near the oldest plane in QFs fleet and I don't think the 747-400s will be retired any time soon particularly as they are being upgraded with new fabrics and Y+. The 747-300s are at least 5-7 years older.

VH-OJM is a 747-438 and probably came online in about 1991.
(OJA-OJR were delivered between 1989 and 1992)

 

[moa999]

Comments on SMH website are hilarious
Reader's Comments: Qantas jet 'could have crashed' | News.com.au

Also summarising from PPrune
Latest Qf Incident,where Will All This End - PPRuNe Forums

Aircraft was VH-OJM
Power outage being blamed on a galley flood shorting a number of components as a water barrier was not or not correctly installed.

Before anyone blames outsourcing
Last C-check on this plane was done by the former Sydney heavy maintenance group

 

[serfty]

"Insider" thread on PPRuNe.org:

• Latest Qf Incident,where Will All This End - PPRuNe Forums

...Fleetwide inspections have kicked in already since yesterday, no 744 was allowed to take off without those inspections done, all dripshields to be inspected, galley above too ...

 

[Evan]

It was electrical power. Engine thrust continued to operate.

Should have been more clear, i was wondering at the time before i read the second artical if it was only cabin power or flight deck power only.

1 short in a water heater can take out a 747 ??? wow and people are worried about hacking A380/B787 etc from inflight computer access. I am just amazed that all power (cabin and flight deck) is all routed through one point.

And according to the specs...

1 generator per engine and 2 for the APU so a total of 6 on the AC.

As NM also suggested Boeing have dispatched and engineer from what i read and the AU and Thai authorities are argueing who should investigate etc after the flight recorders have been recovered.

If the error really is what one newpaper artical suggested and being a water heater expect to see a notice to all fleets operating worldwide to check and recitfy.

E