Four commercial Jetliners have made emergency landings in last 36 hours

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Four commercial Jetliners have made emergency landings in the US, UK and Australia during the last 36 hours. In addition, a Military Jet crashed in Idaho, killing the pilot and a small plane in Australia crashed with an unexplained engine failure

Two of the emergency landings describe smoke filled cabins. All four describe engine failures.

I am also posting a story about a small plane in Australia that crashed today when the engines failed. Anybody have any statistics on these types of problems? I have done websearches and cannot find another time period with so many incidents in a short period of time.

Part of the reason why this may be important is the ongoing aviation gas crisis in Australia that still has over 5000 planes grounded. The oil industry is heavily reliant on computers. Could there be bad fuel elswhere?

There is also a TB 2000 link for an earlier story that has followup stories on the Australian planes problems.

1) Jet Makes Emergency Landing in Neb. (1-22-2000)

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) -- An American Airlines flight bound for Los Angeles made an emergency landing here Friday after its right engine lost oil pressure and filled the cabin with smoke. The plane landed safely at 7:05 p.m. at Lincoln Municipal Airport. There were no injuries reported among the 125 people aboard the Boeing 757. The flight was en route from Newark, N.J., to Los Angeles, said John Wood, executive director of the Lincoln Airport Authority. Joseph Sfez of Los Angeles said smoke in the damaged plane's cabin made it difficult to breathe. ``It was scary up there, very scary,'' he said. ``But the captain did a good job.'' The airlines sent another plane from Dallas to pick up the stranded passengers.

Link to Story:

http://www.insidechina.com/frames/frames.php3?url=http://www.newsday.com/ap/national.htm

2) What would cause the cockpit of a commercial jet to fill with smoke?

Australia: Jet makes emergency landing as smoke fills cockpit

1-20-2000

A Qantas jet carrying 68 passengers was forced to make an emergency landing at Darwin Airport this morning.

It is believed the plane was about 20 minutes out of Darwin on its way to Gove when one of the engines failed and there was smoke in the cockpit.

The pilot decided to return to Darwin and alerted the airport of his planes condition.

Emergency crews were placed on standby, but airport management say the plane touched down safely, and no one was hurt.

Link to story:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/nat/newsnat-21jan2000-29.htm

Link to TB 2000 thread on story:

http://hv.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=002N0r

3) LA-bound Alaska Airlines jet returns to Sea-Tac due to engine troubles

SEATAC, Wash. (AP) -- An Alaska Airlines MD-80 jet heading to Los Angeles returned to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport shortly after takeoff Thursday due to engine problems. There were no injuries, though one engine was shut down due to a compressor failure. Flight 222 took off shortly after 7 a.m. A ground crew member saw sparks coming from one of the plane's engines and alerted air traffic controllers, said Alaska Airlines spokesman Jack Evans. The pilot saw that there had been a compressor problem, essentially a backfire, on one of the engines and shut it down. He then told passengers to assume a crash position -- heads down -- and turned the plane around, landing once again at SeaTac. The airport's fire department was called out to meet the plane and escort it back to the gate. Evans said the engine was removed from the airplane and was undergoing tests to find out what happened.

4) Part falls off plane leaving London's Gatwick

LONDON, Jan 20 - An Airtours plane carrying 152 passengers made an emergency landing at London's Stansted airport on Thursday after part of an engine casing fell off during take-off from Gatwick,

Link to story:

http://www.sacbee.com/news/calreport/calrep_story.cgi?N76.HTML

5) Australia: Four have lucky escape from light plane crash

Four people have had a lucky escape from a light plane crash near Verona Sands in Southern Tasmania.

The Cessna 182 chartered by Tasair is believed to have crashed after its engine failed.

A Verona Sands resident was driving home when a distressed and bloodied young woman waved him down.

She told him the plane had crash landed in the D'Entrecasteaux Channel after suffering engine failure.

The three passengers - two young women and one young man - and the pilot floated to shore with the assistance of life jackets and debris.

All have been taken to the Royal Hobart Hospital suffering lacerations, shock, hypothermia and in the pilot's case a broken leg.

Tasair had chartered the Cessna 182 for back-up during the fuel contamination crisis. The plane's owner, Rick Gumley says the crash could not have been caused by contaminated fuel because it has not flown outside of Tasmania.

Link to story: http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/nat/newsnat-21jan2000-272.htm



-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), January 22, 2000

Answers

Here's another similar problem on January 1:

an 1, 2000 - 12:40 AM UPS Plane Makes Emergency Landing The Associated Press

ALLIANCE, Neb. (AP) - A DC-8 United Parcel Service jet was forced to make an emergency landing Friday in western Nebraska after an instrument screen blanked out and smoke entered the cockpit. Moments before the crew detected the smoke, they had joked about the possible perils of the Y2K computer bug.

"I hope we all don't disappear when it rolls over here," Capt. Joe Stidham said he told an air traffic controller before the plane's troubles.

Then smoke appeared, and the plane made an emergency landing at the Alliance Municipal Airport. The three crew members on board were not injured.

The problems were not believed to be Y2K-related, but the crew was unsure of the cause, Stidham said. After the smoke entered the cockpit, the crew put on oxygen masks and radioed the nearest airport.

The plane had left Louisville, Ky., and was due to arrive in Portland, Ore.

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), January 22, 2000.


Good finds, Carl! I'm awaiting a reply from a retired Air Force officer/aircraft technician. His skill doesn't involve commercial jets of course, but maybe he can shed some light.

I'd like to know which countries besides Australia have purchased Mobil's contaminated fuel. (I believe it's Mobil) Do computers handle the mixing of fuels? If so, what Y2k contingency plans were in place to prevent mixing errors?

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Tainted fuel concerns revealed two years ago: report

10: 25 AM AEST January 16 The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) reportedly knew about concerns over contaminated fuel almost two years ago.

The Sunday Age said its investigations had revealed CASA was alerted to a problem with the fuel pumps of Piper Chieftains, which cross Bass Strait daily, in 1998.

It said CASA had not investigated fuel-related parts failures, despite requests from operators for an explanation of the continuing engine component failures.

Schutt Aviation managing director Stan van de Weils told The Sunday Age he reported the problem to CASA in March 1998.

Air Transport Safety Bureau Deputy Director Alan Stray said it had been told three days ago there had been a previous problem.

"Since then we have requisitioned fuel samples we believe were taken at the time.

"Not only CASA but any other involved will be investigated."

Moorabbin pilot Peter Dow said CASA had known about the problem for some time, and the fuel pump failures on Chieftains should have been well documented.

"We were told it would go away and it did. Now it's back with a vengeance," he said. http://www.excite.com.au/news/story/aap/20000116/10/domestic/ fuel-casa-fed.inp

-- Lee Maloney (leemaloney@hotmail.com), January 22, 2000.


The military aircraft technician said fuel color is a good indicator of contamination. "Different grades are colored differently so that you can see what is being put in the tank...green, pink, etc. The wrong gas could cause you to crash." A variety of problems can cause engine smoke, backfires or incomplete fuel burn, so only by testing the fuel can you determine if that is the cause of engine failure.

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This article just in today from "The Australian" front page news:

Planes cleared but pilots fuming

By NICOLE STRAHAN and MEGAN SAUNDERS, 24jan00

THOUSANDS of aircraft are set to return to the skies today after a white substance discovered in fuel contamination tests a fortnight ago was yesterday found to be harmless.

Pilots and plane owners are livid that the apparently unnecessary grounding of aircraft by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority since January 10 left planes idle and businesses crippled.

CASA said yesterday its concerns over the white gel-like material found in contamination tests of Mobil fuel had been a furphy, but defended the decision to ground aircraft, citing safety as its paramount concern.

About 1000 test kits were being forwarded to light plane owners today to clear aircraft to immediately resume flying, CASA said.

"It appears the white gel is harmless, a complete and utter furphy," CASA spokesman Peter Gibson said.

Later in the day, CASA director Mick Toller defended the authority's decision to ground aircraft from the day Mobil notified it that a white substance had been found in tests for contamination.

"If you're going to get it wrong, always get it wrong on the safe side," Mr Toller said.

"My belief is that we didn't, that it was a sensible precaution, but I am delighted that we are now able to give the ability for some aircraft to get back in the air."

Aircraft Owners and Operators general manager Mike Hart said plane owners remained sceptical despite CASA's assurance the white substance was harmless and the tests were valid.

"I think we are shocked and appalled that after two weeks of considerable experimentation, testing and soul searching that the white substance turns out to be supposedly harmless and there are concerns about the quality of that advice," Mr Hart said.

The contaminated fuel crisis has grounded up to 5000 small planes across eastern Australia and cost the aviation industry possibly $100 million. Mobil has promised to compensate affected businesses through a $15 million hardship package, but class actions are on the legal horizon.

The fuel problem has had severe ramifications for businesses in regional Australia that depend on small planes for produce, medical supplies and tourism.

Despite the approval of tests, thousands of aircraft may remain grounded for at least a week if they are found to have a black Vegemite-like substance discovered in fuel systems just before Christmas, the original catalyst for concerns over the contamination of a batch of Mobil fuel.

Mobil moved swiftly yesterday to defend itself against accusations it had botched testing procedures.

"The white substance was never a reason for any of our action. It was just a piece of information that there was possibly a second form of the deposits," Mobil spokeswoman Samantha Potts said yesterday. Acting Prime Minister John Anderson yesterday supported CASA's approach to the crisis.

"I know the delay has been frustrating, but we all recognise that CASA cannot cut corners when lives are at stake," he said.

(Webster's Dictionary defines "furphy" as "a rumor, canard")

http://www.news.com.au/

-- Lee Maloney (leemaloney@hotmail.com), January 23, 2000.


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