747

[JonARNZ]

Crikey these posts mount up quickly. Anyway, for my sevenhundred and forty seventh post I found some interesting shots I took a few years back.

You can't beat this paintjob. First and only time I have seen this bird...



This is a compilation photo, this is a brand new 747 flown from the factory to be fitted out in Auckland, taken a few years back now..



The same 747 from the fence..



Not sure how many will remember the incident in Auckland with the Singapore 744 tail strike? Appeared they miscalculated the weight so had thrust settings much lower than needed. Just avoided running off the side of the runway but dragged there ass along the runway for some time before finally getting airborne, dump fuel and make an emergency landing back in Auckland. I snapped these a week or so after the incident..

[Ex ANZ Eng]

I remember the Singapore one Jon, I was at work out there that day.
From memory he had got his all up weight wrong, and set V1/V2 much lower than what was required for the weight.
He ended up trying to rotate early and all it did was drag the backside virtually the full legnth of 050.
One of my collegues watched the take off run and he swore it was not going to make it.
From memory he could not dump fuel because he had a fire warning light come on for the APU.
All that was holding on the apu doors/frames (the skin was completley gone), was the fire wires.
From memory he did 1 fly by the tower and then came in and landed, grossley over weight and fast.
The landing was very hard and you could have sworn that the wings were going to smack the tarmac when he hit.
It sat at work for several weeks until a team of boeing engineers, about 20 to 30 of them, turned up to do the repairs.
They bought containers full of the special tooling to remove the entire tail section.
The rear pressure bulkhead had been damaged and had to be replaced.
They were awesome to watch, 2 shifts 24/7 until finished.
We were used to having alerts, but they were usually false alarms, but this one had the full emergency turn out.
They were very, very, lucky that day.

[Ian Warren]

Great pics Jon ,
Lucky peoples... airport footage was shown day so after the incident , Ex ANZ Eng do u recall the regestration ? a Japan Airline 74 did very simular accient , only to crash later due to that over rotation back rub compressin the main bulkhead .

[JonARNZ]

I read they got to within 5 meters of running of the right hand side of the runway due to not being able to see the ground. Very nasty business.

[Brennanx]

This is from the accident report.


On Wednesday 12 March 2003, at 1547, flight SQ286, a Boeing 747-412 registered 9V-SMT, started its
take-off at Auckland International Airport for a direct 9-hour flight to Singapore. On board were 369
passengers, 17 cabin crew and 3 pilots.

When the captain rotated the aeroplane for lift-off the tail struck the runway and scraped for some
490 metres until the aeroplane became airborne. The tail strike occurred because the rotation speed was
33 knots less than the 163 knots required for the aeroplane weight. The rotation speed had been
mistakenly calculated for an aeroplane weighing 100 tonnes less than the actual weight of 9V-SMT.

A take-off weight transcription error, which remained undetected, led to the miscalculation of the take-off
data, which in turn resulted in a low thrust setting and excessively slow take-off reference speeds. The
system defences did not ensure the errors were detected, and the aeroplane flight management system
itself did not provide a final defence against mismatched information being programmed into it.

During the take-off the aeroplane moved close to the runway edge and the pilots did not respond correctly
to a stall warning. Had the aeroplane moved off the runway or stalled a more serious accident could have
occurred.

The aeroplane take-off performance was degraded by the inappropriately low thrust and reference speed
settings, which compromised the ability of the aeroplane to cope with an engine failure and hence
compromised the safety of the aeroplane and its occupants.

Safety recommendations addressing operating procedures and training were made to the operator, and a
recommendation concerning the flight management system was made to the aeroplane manufacturer.

[Ex ANZ Eng]

Sorry Ian, I dont remember the reg.
From what my mate said when he was watching the take off, he said the nose lifted normally and that was as far as it went, it scrapped along most of the runway.
Rotation was past DHL at the end of 05, he panicked because he was sure it was going to go straight off the end and in to the creek.

Some other incidents I saw ;
There was a BA 747-400 that srapped the bottom of no.1 engine one night, apparently he got caught in some shear in the flare, that would have been an impressive bank angle.

It was quite common for the 767-200's to have a unlocked nose gear light.
Apparently there is a micro switch up in the gear bay that actions in the down and locked position to get a nose green, but they were susceptable to fod from the tyres and would not work coming up red.
They would burn fuel of, fly by the tower, and then do the smoothest landing of the pilots career.
It always amazed me how long they could keep the nose gear off for so long before touching down.

One evening while on night shift, I got to witness a Eagle Air Banderante do a wheels up landing on 05.
It was on a ferry flight from Hamilton after being serviced and had undercarrage probs.
When they jacked it up a mag light torch dropped out from one of the main gear bays.
One of the engineers that was involved with the service had left it in there by mistake.
They knew who he was because all tools have to have your name or some form of identification engraved on them.

Phil