Plane Goes Down at NYCs LaGuardia Airport

[whirlcool]

The Southwest First Officer in that Turkey Buzzard incident received a lot of small glass shards in his face and arms but totally recovered to fly another day. And jet aircraft windscreens are much thicker and have many more plies in them than auto windshields do, so you could imagine the force.

The plane in DC that hit the 14th street bridge was Air Florida flight 90. The final cause of that aircraft was that the pilots didn't prepare the aircraft properly for operation in snow/icing conditions. They were in too much of a hurry to get on their way as they were already several hours behind schedule. Believe it or not they were both southern guys who hadn't much experience flying in winter weather.

Over the years I have seen planes come in their their radome (the black nose of the aircraft) smashed and shattered. Blood and guts from birds hanging off of wings, etc. It's an known aviation hazard.

Also when in the area of an airport, please make sure you hold on to things like Wal Mart bags, food wrappers, etc. Foreign Object Debris (or FOD) is just as much a hazard to jets as birds are. Airports usually have people inspect the taxi ways and runways every few hours for this stuff. Every year there is a national convention called the FOD Convention where airport managers get together to discuss this stuff. When you work on aircraft in hangars the mechanics have to keep a careful count of all their tools and work pieces and aircraft parts to make sure nothing gets away from them and could get ingested by an aircraft engines.
And there have been a few cases of aircraft hitting dear on takeoff of landing too.
Jet engines suck in air at an amazing rate. Thing of the intakes like large vacuum cleaners. Ever hear a jet take off and hear that buzzing noise as the plane is approaching you? That sound is the air being sucked into the engine at near supersonic speeds. Believe it or not, people get sucked into jet engines too.
The 5 year death free time frame is for Commercial Aviation here in the US. In General Aviation (everything from small two seaters to biz jets) people are killing themselves for stupid reasons almost as bad as they do in automobiles! Very few accidents occur from actual mechanical failure.

For those who would like more information, please follow this link and click on index of months.

http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/Response2.asp

 

[tolivac]

I am glad the First Officer in the Turkey Buzzard strike was not real seriously hurt.Bet it was sure startling!!
Yes-I can agree Jet engines can be the among the most powerful "axial blowers" on the planet-yes sort of similar to canister vacuum motors or Axial blowers used in air return for large HVAC systems.Have such a fan out here at the transmitter site-call it the "airplane Blower"used to pull in air for some of the transmitters-has a 20hp motor-course thats nothing to the higher HP of aircraft engines.Yes I have herad that buzzing noise from jet engines.Good to know that its the air flow.Also there is the hazard of the air blast that comes out of the BACK of the jet engine-saw some film clips on YouTube of cars being torn apart and blown away by the air blast.was a demo for 747 type engines.
one time I was flying into Ft Walten Beach Fla-their small airport is part Eglin AFB.Was a Northwest flight I beleive-but on a smaller prop type plane.as we were taxing to the terminal a deer was standing by the shoulder of the taxiway watching taxi past him-glad he didn't step in front of that plane.they do that with cars out here.
Oh yes good point about trash and litter being pulled into engines-also the debris can damage plane tires that are moving fast.Isn't that what caused a Concorde to crash outside of France?The Concordes wheel caught a peice of debris from another plane that used the runway before the Concorde.The foreign object was thrown up by the Concordes tire through its fuel tank.
I also remeber the Air Florida wreck-The improperly prepared and deiced plane causing the accident.And the weather conditions-beleive it was freezing rain and sleet mixture that night.Don't think I would want to fly in that.also that same night there was a bad accident on the METRO subway-a train in a tunnel derailed when it tried to back up.
Somewhere at home I have a DVD of amazing accidents people have survived through-and one of them was just that-an aircraft carrier deck crewman that got sucked into a jet engine.He was caught in the air duct leading to the engine air intacke He remember the engines spinning blades just in front of him.Like any other machine-airplanes have their own unique hazards.Oh yes-the edges of aircraft engine fan blades are very sharp-to cut down on resistence to the airflowing thru them.Would suppose anything pulled through that jet motor would be shredded.
I remember a man that used to work out here at the transmitter site with me-he used to work for the Air Force on aircraft radars-under the radome in the planes nose.And bird strikes were a common problem for him-replace radomes and the antenna behind it.
And on that accident outside of Dulles-The crew flying that plane was unfamilair with the conditions around Dulles and the weather was one of those cold freezing rain type days.the plane crashed at full speed into one of the foothills in Virginia outside of Dulles airport.

 

[gyrafoam]

There were a lot of other issues contributing to the crash of Palm 90.Failure to select engine anti-ice on,was a serious issue. It was established that lack of training (specifically resourcement management) played a large part in this crash.
Sadly if the F/O (once realizing the EPR wasn't right) had just followed his instincts and shoved the power levers forward, there was sufficient power available and they just might have made it.

The Dulles (IAD) crash previously mentioned involved a TWA Boeing 727-231 (N54328) December 1, 1974. Bad wx was certainly a contributing factor, the original destination airport, Washington's "National"(DCA) airport was closed due to poor wx.(IAD wx measured ceiling at nine hundred overcast, visibility five, light rain, wind zero nine zero degrees variable at three zero knots (gusts to three six) with an altimeter setting of two niner seven zero. Flight 514 had to divert to IAD airport. One of the issues here was that TW's 727 crews did not normally fly into IAD and were not familiar with ops into it. The charts, maps and approach plates for Wasington airports were deficient. The FAA failed to correct the problems in a timely manner---they had been aware of the specific uncertanties concerning the approach to runway 12 for years. The the Approach Controller issued an approach clearance while the aircraft was still nearly 45 miles out---on an (then) UNPUBLISHED route---without clearly defined altitude minimums.
AND the Approach Chart the crew was using (which had to be approved by the FAA) gave inadequate depictions of altitude restrictions on the profile view of the chart for the VOR/DME approach to runway 12 at IAD.
So although the wx did place a part (turbulence was certainly present), there were many other issues involved in this crash. Nonethless the crew used 1800 as the minimum altitude on the approach and it was too low.

One good thing that came out of this crash was the FAA issued a mandatory notam, ordering ALL U.S. airlines to install ground proximity warning devices by Dec. 1, 1975.

 

[whirlcool]

Here's a video of the passengers scrambling out of the aircraft seconds after landing...... It seems like it was only 3 or 4 minutes until the first boat arrived. Just amazing.

 

[redcarpetdrew]

Whirlcool, You've been kind enough to answer my questions before, so here's another...

As I understand it, the A320 is flown by a joystick and a computer. I also understand that the engines provide power for the aircraft. If the pilot lost both engines, how did he have enough power to keep the avionics online and power the control surface motors? Was there some sort of battery backup or some kind of apu? I always kind of wondered how that worked...

RCD

 

[whirlcool]

I don't mind answering your questions at all.
Most aircraft that are electronically controlled (like the Airbus series of passenger aircraft)and some Boeing aircraft have a device called a Ram Air Turbine, or RAT that is like a little windmill or propeller that pops out of the aircraft's fuselage or wing into the slipstream. Normally it pops out on its own when the computers detect that both generators have stopped producing power. After the wind starts turning the RAT within a matter of seconds you have enough power to the flight deck to operate the MEL and the hydraulic pumps for items such as flaps, slats and landing gear.
Here is what the RAT on a 757 (which I fly) looks like:

 

[tolivac]

Oh yes-remember the "RATS" for military aircraft-are used to power aircraft systemand for weapons pods.There is a 20MM rotary cannon pod that can be retrofitted to some planes that USE the RAT to power the pod-doesn't have to be connected to the planes power system.Of course in that situation the pod cannot be fired unless the plane is in flight.Thats great that civilian planes use RATS.The RAT sure saved those folks lives that were riding on that plane!!!And I beleive others have p[ointed out-besides the flight crew-much thanks to the cabin crew for getting the people off that plane pronto before it sank!!Guess people will pay attention to the aircraft safety demos now!-and oh yes-read the safety brochure in the seat pocket.

 

[redcarpetdrew]

Thank you

That must be one of the least known but most important parts on that plane! I've never seen that before but it makes all kinds of sense. Kudos to the devious little engineer brain that came up with that system and made it strong enough to deploy at high airspeeds without just getting ripped off!

RCD

 

[tolivac]

The "RATS" used on military aircraft must withstand supersonic speeds on some of their aircraft-esp the weapon pod.I think some of the equipment engineered for aircraft is amazing-planes are pretty neat and amazing machines-vehicles-whatever you wish to say.On many military planes the RAT is enclosed in a cowling or just another air slot on the body of the plane-theirs may be in use all of the time-a back up to the backupand so on.I think the RAT should be pointed out in the airliner safety brochures in the chair pockets-could be a reassuring factor for passengers.In the 20mm cannon weapon pod the RAT that runs it is just above the barrel opening in the front of the pod.Its not the propellor like-windmill device shown in the picture.The gun pod is meant to be strapped onto airplanes that normally don't have built in cannons.I forget offhand which miliatry airplanes these were for.Becuase of the very high firing rate for these guns-the ammo is in a very large drum magazine-there are no links holding the shells together like on regular belt fed machine guns-At the high firing rates rotary cannons operate at-links would foul them.Some of these the spent shells are routed back into the magazine.A signal to the gunner shows the weapon is empty.