Flying EAST this Christmas?

[Keith]

:uneasy:You might lose more than FACE on this airline: :stunned:

A pilot for a ******** carrier requested permission and landed at FRA ( Frankfurt , Germany ) for an unscheduled refueling stop. The reason became soon apparent to the ground crew: The Number 3 engine had been shut down previously because of excessive vibration, and because it didn't look too good. It had apparently been no problem for the tough guys back in ***** : as they took some sturdy straps and wrapped them around two of the fan blades and the structures behind, thus stopping any unwanted wind-milling (engine spinning by itself due to airflow passing thru the blades during flight) and associated uncomfortable vibration caused by the suboptimal fan.

Note that the straps are seat-belts....how resourceful! ?After making the "repairs", off they went into the wild blue yonder with another revenue-making flight on only three engines! With the increased fuel consumption, they got a bit low on fuel, and just set it down at the closest airport (FRA) for a quick refill.

That's when the problems started: The Germans, who are kind of picky about this stuff, inspected the malfunctioning engine and immediately grounded the aircraft. (Besides the seat-belts, notice the appalling condition of the fan blades.) The airline operator had to send a chunk of money to get the first engine replaced (took about 10 days). The repair contractor decided to do some impromptu inspection work on the other engines, none of which looked all that great either. The result: a total of 3 engines were eventually changed on this plane before it was permitted to fly again.

You have been warned - cheapest is not necessarily bestest....


Edit: Should this post be in the JOKES forum?

 

[David Morton]

I don't know what to say. In 1990 in BA we had an incident in Piarco (Port of Spain) when one of our Classic 747s was taxying out. It seems a pufter (one of those who go home on the other bus - one who dances at the other end of the hall) had come to the airport to confront his ex 'partner' who had fallen for another non-woman. He apparently rushed out of the building again but now he is AIRSIDE and steals a car and disappears across the airfield. The 747 is coming the other way with all its taxi lights on and this stray pufter rams his car under the no 2 engine. The skipper had come to a stop by now and was sitting there with all four idling. The pufter ran away into the dark for a moment then re emerged on the right hand side and took a head long run and jump into the No 3 engine. He emerged out of the back having gone through the Bypass stage of the engine.
I say He. Well, he was extremely unwell by now and in hundreds of sections as he exited. Several of the passengers and some of the talking Freight (Cabin Crew) on the Starboard (right hand side) witnessed it and the latter needed counselling and were off work for many many months. They can often be just a little bit too precious.
The Fire section would not touch the aeroplane (Boihazardous) so the Captain, the F/O, and the Engineer borrowed a water cannon and hosed the now totally shagged no 3 engine out and then secured it for a management ferry to Miami to replace the engine.
Some say that the pufters Tag wristwatch was undamaged and was still ticking. Maybe thats wishfull thinking by wearers of Tag Heuers.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piarco_International_Airport
Scroll down and see Accidents and Incidents.

 

[Rick Muck- Mark IV]

This was dispelled some time ago, see Snopes

 

[Pete McCluskey.]

Scary, I wonder which passengers did without their seat belts? A tribute to the engine manufacturer that the thing was capable of getting off the ground.

 

[Keith]

Sorry guys - Mr Muck is quite correct - the damage caused to this engine was actually by a missile strike, not poor maintenance. Sorry to have misled you all it certainly was not my intention, however Ricks story is a lot better than mine :blank:

It does prove conclusively, that truth is very much stranger than fiction.

You will notice,that I removed all reference to the specific airline - just in case.

 

[David Morton]

Spilling mistake in my post above - I should have written BIOHAZARDOUS but got my
keyboard upside down again.

 

[Sid]

I think the ultimate FOD-ed engine story involves a BA 747 - the one which lost all it's engines after flying through a volcanic ash eruption but was still landed safely after what must have been some extremely good flying and decision making by the crew.

 

[David Morton]

Yes - A nightmare scenario. It also happened to a KLM 747-400 inbound to Narita and diverted into Anchorage when it flew through the cloud of volcanic dust eruption from Mount Redoubt. KLM Flight 867 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia It was interesting in as much as there were two crew in the flight deck instead of three (747.400 rather than the classic [.100 or .200 series]) so the myth that the engineers spread that the .400 was unsafe due to lack of flight engineers was dispelled. The BA version of a similar event was in the Borneo/ Jakarta area and, allegedly, only the Copilot and Flight Engineer were in the flight deck when the incident occurred. SKYbrary - Volcanic Ash The Captain - Eric Moody - was, allegedly, down in 1st Class chatting up some body - and only joined the others in the flight deck sometime later in the enforced descent. Apparently he landed the aeroplane in Jakarta with no forward visibilty as the windscreens had been sandblasted. Jakarta was not a Cat 3b Instrument Landing System (Autoland) aerodrome so an accurate approach and landing was the order of the day as a blind landing would have been impossible difficult to achieve. He is often on Sky TV almost every time there is in aeroplane incident. The BA story gained much higher profile because of 'after dinner speaking' and Eric Moody makes a good living from it in his retirement - the incident oft being recanted on Sky TV.
I flew that same aeroplane a few times (G.BDXH) after the event and the smell of the dust remained in the system until I believe it was eventually scrapped.
KLM? You never hear about it.