QF32? - A380 Emergency Landing at Changi
 

Just heard on 2Gb that an A380 had red and white panels fall off in flight and landed at Changi.

Any info?

Darren

QF32 returns to Changi with engine problem 4/11/10
 

Full article here: http://www.smh.com.au/world/qantas-j...104-17f49.html

Got a bit concerned after @flightblogger on Twitter sent the following message:

FLASH: Reports coming out indicating a QANTAS A380 has crashed in Indonesia enroute to Singapore.

Twitter then erupted with a lot of conflicting reports about the incident, debris being found in Indonesia etc.

Amazing how quickly information (and misinformation) can spread!

Just noticed in the article "Looked like a big plane. Like a Boeing 737-400...

Just glad it wasn't something more serious, like people were expecting.

Dan

Hope this is just news hype.

As long as its landed Ok in SIN.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/wor...-1225947831695

Geoff

They just said that it landed safely. :)

If this story is correct?

All is ok thankfully .

Geoff

According to PlanePlotter, pick up a HFDL transmission from VH-OQA QFA32 LHR to SYD over Singapore.

Looks like engine trouble.

This pic is allegedly QF32 http://i51.tinypic.com/ilketf.jpg

SMH has updated their story too.

http://www.smh.com.au/travel/travel-...104-17f49.html

This picture has just surfaced of debris http://twitpic.com/33pxs1

Dan

So, is there another plane that crashed, or just all speculation?

The photo shows what appears to be part of an engine cowling - must have been a rather big failure.

Reports on ABC TV 24 say that it has landed safely.

From News Ltd

"Reports are still sketchy but authorities in Indonesia and Singapore have confirmed the plane, an Airbus 380, is now on the ground in Singapore."

Initial reports were very wrong.

As Dan mentions re: information and mis-information. It can be very dangerous and upsetting I am sure to anyone that knew of pax on the flight.

Main thing, its a good result.

Geoff

Jason, at the moment it appears to only be a single engine failure which was bad enough that parts of the engine cowling appear to have fallen on the Indonesian island of Batam.

The reports seem to indicate that the rest of the aircraft has now safely landed back in Singapore after dumping fuel.

EDIT: Snap... three of us replied at once. :)

Certainly another serious and disturbing incident for the ATSB and others to look into, but doesn't appear to be anything catastrophic at this point.

Another pic has surfaced, appears to have been taken from onboard QF32

http://yfrog.com/0quh4dj

Dan

Thanks Rob, looking at those photos it looks like the whole engine cowling. Would love to see what the engine looks like on the ground

Happy 90th Qantas!

Looks like it was Nancy Bird

http://www.qantas.com.au/regions/dyn...010/nov10/5029

She is haunting it

SMH has some pictures of the engine damage. Certainly looks serious.

http://www.smh.com.au/travel/travel-...ml?autostart=1

Changi Airport Group spokesperson has just announced the following:

An A380 Qantas flight, QF 32, bound for Sydney, Australia, departed Singapore Changi Airport at 0956 hours today. For technical reasons, the aircraft turned back to Changi. It landed safely at 1146 hours.


So looks like we will see OQA missing in action for a short period and another 5th pod (on A380 or B744?) will be sent to Singapore for the replacement of the damaged engine? And isn't OQA just back from C-check from Frankfurt? Looks like the Qantas engineers will make some noise about outsourcing of maintenance works overseas...

Nancy is haunted!!:p

Whoops just saw Sarah's response. That's the word around QF!!

Nancy is way too young to be having these problems :mad:

I like how the SMH article now has this line:

You can only hope that this autobot reponse was before the Batam debris imagery started coming out.

Meanwhile their approach to Twitter is poor - twitter is where the misconceptions about the incident got completely out of hand, but their official twitter team (as linked from http://www.qantas.com.au/travel/airl...w-us/global/en ) could only say this:

http://twitter.com/qftravelinsider/status/29637434349

Basically their engagement with Twitter at present is purely marketing... not a great look when expectations today are that official Twitter accounts should be about customer engagement, not just promotion.

Agree with you Robert. I'm disappointed (as an avid Tweeter) that Qantas don't have an official Twitter feed. qftravelinsider is the closest we get and it's purely marketing and holiday advice.

I'm not saying Qantas need a twitter feed, but a lot of other airlines do and in a situation like this it would certainly be of benefit.

Maybe we should put our hands up for a job at Qantas to look after their twitter feeds for them? Would get us access to the 90th anniversary celebrations too!

Dan (@dshibi)

The interview with Ian Woods (aviation expert I guess) on channel 9 4.30 news put a calming level headed opinion to an otherwise excitable broadcast.

He stated that this is what they train for and that landing on 3 engines is basically similar to landing on 4.

I do have to say though that the pic of the debris through the front of the wing is pretty full on.

Qantas press conference shortly.

She's just come back from a C check as well!

It was a standard engine failure, handled like all others, but the damage to the engine and wing is significant. Rolls Royce would be concerned at the damage, hopefully it is not a flaw with the engine design.

Anyone know what engines EK and SQ have on their 380's?

EK has EA engines.
SQ have RR engines.

Thanks Brian.

Might see OJR back in service!

Qantas suspends all A380 services

Qantas now reporting that they will suspend all A380 take off's until they get further info from Airbus / Rolls Royce -

Yep... from the news so far, there doesn't seem to be anything particularly notable about the air return. Only real issue at the moment is why we're having yet another uncontained engine failure, which is one for the ATSB (or whoever has juristiction here) to look into (and I think there are questions for QF maintenance in there as well, not just the engine manufactuer, but that's for the investigators - no point speculating about this now).

The side lesson, as I mentioned, is that QF once again have to look at their engagement strategy with social and traditional media. Slow responses and knee-jerk deny deny deny responses mean you'll lose control of a story very rapidly these days.

EDIT: Okay interesting move to suspend A380 ops, that ratchets the intensity of the story back up again.

Does Qantas have enough spare 747's to cover the A380 suspension ??:confused:

No, they don't. 2 aircraft are currently in Avalon and i'm not sure of there status, but it looks like there will be some significant disruptions

From SMH website

Perth?? :confused: I'm sure they will be one of the worst affected....

They would be pulling A333's off routes to cover 744's pulled off there routes to cover A380 routes if ya can understand that.:eek::eek:

I have a friend on QF12 tonight. They have been sitting on the plane for the past hour or so... and have only been just told that they won't be flying tonight.

What about landings?

I would think that London passengers would be more affected

There appears to be an aircraft going to SIN as QF6021 at 2000, replacement aircraft?

I have a friend on that flight too. He was all excited about the experience and getting settled in and then just 45 mins ago said he wasn't going anywhere.

Dan