Emirates A345 tail strike
 

From the ABC

There are photos of the damage on PPrune and it looks like the fuselage skin was 'removed' in places as some stringers are certainly visible. Some more information is on the site as well including a possible heavy landing and damage to the landing gear.

link to the pprune photos here http://www.pprune.org/d-g-reporting-...strike-ml.html

The ATSB report may be a intersting read when its released.

those pictures seem to show some pretty significant damage!

now start the rumours lol

Oops.

Another factual report from Avherald
 

This report is from the Avherald at http://avherald.com/h?article=416c9997&opt=0

PPRune mentions a rumour that freight shifted to the rear on rotation - that potentially adds an interesting element to the factual matrix and perhaps shifts the focus to the loadmaster more than the flight crew.

I always was under the impression that Airbus (FBW) aircraft weren't able to over-rotate, amongst other things?

I believe all airliners have a minimum "unstick" capability that often entails scraping the tail.
The choice between grabbing a whole lot of elevator, scraping the tail then dumping some Jet-A and returning to discuss the issue or ending up as a smoking pile of wreckage in the gullies of Keilor Park.. pretty simple decision in many ways.

The question why the 'bus had not become an Airbus by the end of the runway.. interested on the real answer to that.

Cheers

I'm thinking about thousands of litres of Kerosine dumped "overhead the ocean at Port Phillip Bay" :mad:

More facts needed
 

Each report seems to raise more questions than it answers. Right now over weight and unbalanced load seems plausible, but where the hell were they at V1? An RTO might have been safer than a tail scrape, but I agree a tail scrape was better than Keilor Park or southbound on the Calder Freeway.

Mike,

When fuel dumping in flight is required, it must (where possible) conduct a controlled dump in clear air above 6000ft and in an area nominated by ATC.

This requirement means that from above 6000ft the fuel would have vapourised before hitting the ground/water.

Phillip, unfortunately if they were overweight, then V1 is a useless figure. It is highly dependant on weight, so when they got to their V1 point, depending on if Emirates calculate it as a "stop" or "go" speed, it may well have already been too late to stop on the runway.

That said, in order to achieve this the aircraft would have to be a LOT heavier than they thought, or a very significant tailwind above what they had calculated as they tried to get airborne (eg windshear). An extra 5 tonne or so is unlikely to cause this.

If the load shifted during rotate, they may not have had any notice until they were trying to actually get airborne, in which case there isn't much they can do but try and wrestle it into the air and make it fly. That said, the troubling part is that it used up every inch of runway (and a few more!). Freight shifting could certainly cause a tailstrike, but I can't see how it would lengthen the takeoff by the rather signficant amount that it did.

Mike W, would you rather them attempt to dump fuel over a clear area (where possible above a height where it vapourises before it reaches the ground) or would you rather jeapodise the safety of an aircraft? The jet needed to dump fuel to return. Its not ideal, but when it has to be done, it has to be done.

The aircraft was in one of the standoff bays when I arrived in Melbourne on Saturday morning, it is still in the same place today, tug attached, as I wait for my flight back to Sydney.

Guess they will have to work out were to put it for a much longer stay than normal.

Aircraft was parked down at G6 (freight ramp) from early Saturday Morning.

I think you saw the other EK flight at the stand off bay Grahame.

ERG this morning was parked inside one of the John Holland hangers this morning, nose facing out, with hanger doors 3/4 closed.

Now it is parked outside, down the southern end of the hangers, facing south.

Was outside facing south this afternoon.It had a security guard sitting right underneath where the damage was.

Thanks Chris. I didn't realise that's what would happen and I had visions of an oil slick like the one in Queensland recently.

Cheers, I feel better now.

No worries, that's what it's all about! ;)

This is what I want to know as well. I surprised the media hasn't picked up on how close this was to a major disaster. I know I shouldn't speculate, but the over rotation could be that they saw the end of the runway coming up and just rotated just to get airborne at the minimum unstick speed.

There's talk of an engine failure as well, just before the tail scrap. So I'm waiting for a few answers.

From another source: It hit the runway end lights and the localizer antenna past the end of runway 16 and several access panels were ripped off during the tailstrike, the landing reportedly caused additional damage to the gear.

In daylight Saturday morning it was established, that the airplane was still on the ground when it passed the runway end during takeoff, according gear tracks were found in the soft ground past the runway end.

Very close to a MAJOR disaster!!

Hasn't been a real good 2 or 3 days for aviantion has it? Am also very very surpriosed by the lack of media interest in this, I had no idea about it until logging on today. I'll refrain from saying anything else but I think were are all probably having similar thoughts about the interest this would of caused had this been another airline involved?

Anyway, what I am really interested about is the use of a "Maltese Cross" as mentioned on the PPrune forum. What is it and what is it used for?

Main reason for being interested is that I am Maltese and have a Maltese cross tattooed on my back :-) Have never come across it from a aviation point of veiw though!

Cheers

M

It seems there was no opportunity for a RTO at that late stage, the end of the runway would have been so close by the time the decision was required they have would have been foced to take-off regardless of what had failed or otherwise or they would have ended up as a smouldering wreck.

Mark,

The "Maltese Cross" is an indication on the flight instruments called a Sidestick order indicator.

This is an abstract from the Joburg incident they talk about on PPRUNE which explains it a little.

Hope that helps.

Quite simple, really

It wasn't a Qantas Airbus

.... and it wasn't flying over a low frequency transmission point in remote WA to add to the speculation.

The media could report on this, but there isn't much more they can add to sensationalize the story. Nobody was injured, and because it was late at night the drama had unfolded before camera crews could rush to the gate to interview terrified passengers. This one was just too boring to report.

yes - question the competence of the flight crew!!!

No, not after its done its rounds on internet forums such as this and PPruNe and others...what more could the media possibly add!?!

So, what was it Nick...?

...or...
Let's get real folks - of course there's going to be much more interest in it if it's Qantas...we're in Australia and QF IS the flag carrier after all! Plus, Qantas is a publicly owned company so therefore it may have ramifications on its share price, whereas EK is a foreign carrier. There's probably a 10-fold level of interest amongst Joe Public when something happens to Qantas, compared to that of a foreign carrier which would really only interest the trade media and enthusiasts such as ourselves.

I'm not saying it's right, but it's just the way it is!

What if they were Australian Pilots?? (I don't know if they were or not).

I don't think you realise just how close it came to disaster. Read the Joburg incident.

Hard to say at this stage if the crew were at fault although we could speculate there was some sort of human error somewhere along the line.

This one has definately been "under reported", although that isn't a bad thing for the industry. The less media getting the facts wrong the better.

That said... I think it deserved more reporting than it has got. This was definately a close one... probably the closest we've come to a major crash in Aus for a while.

Regardless of what has caused the issue (no doubt that it will be revealed in good time), the crew has responded appropriately by keeping the aircraft close to the aerodrome while dumping fuel, permitting a very quick return if it was required (which ultimately happened).

They didn't attempt to pressurise the aircraft and continue, unlike some other carriers. (Not that they would have made it very far this time).

So even if human error caused the tailstrike (we don't know what caused it yet, and it certainly doesn't point to the pilots yet) they flew the aircraft appropriately in an emergency, so kudos to them.

Tail strike test of A380
 

Here's a fairly dramatic YouTube of an A380 minimum take off speed test with a tail strike for good measure - it doesn't initially look like over rotation from the camera angle but it obviously is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dhCn...eature=related

Tailstrike avoidance briefing for A340
 

And here's an interesting document:
http://www.skybrary.aero/bookshelf/books/195.pdf

Not really relevant to this issue at hand. Nice video just the same. They intentionally put the tail of the aircraft on the ground. You can find it for every late passenger aircraft during their testing phase (747,777). They have special tail bumpers installed and it is to find the "minimum unstick speed.".

In relation to the A380, I seem to recall that they burnt through the bumper and the aircraft skin on one of the first tests. I'm sure someone can confirm that.

You are right about that, it was shown on the NatGeo shows that followed the A380 program.

Pilots resign after Emirates A340-500 accident
 

Flightglobal is reporting that the pilots of the ill fated Emirates A345 tail strike at Tullamarine have resigned however still no info on what happened.

Link

OK well try this from The Herald Sun tonight:

EXCLUSIVE: A FULLY-LADEN jet came only centimetres from crashing at Melbourne Airport, it has been revealed.

Aviation officials say last month's accident involving an Emirates plane carrying 225 passengers was the closest thing to a catastrophic plane crash Australia has ever experienced.

The Sunday Herald Sun can reveal the plane, bound for Dubai, used all of the 3600m-long runway 16, but failed to become airborne until the last second, when the pilots pulled its nose up so sharply it smashed its tail into the ground at the end of the runway.

It was less than 70cm from the ground when it wiped out airport strobe lights 170m from the end of the runway.

It then took out a navigation antennae before barely clearing the airport's boundary fence half a kilometre away.

"It was as close as we have ever come to a major aviation catastrophe in Australia," one aviation official said.

Took a fair while for this to get front page!

After reading the above post, stressed out?:confused:

saw Peters' post on the news.com.au website this morning as "National breaking news"...
What a joke being breaking, as it was reported on other websites including $ydney morning herald the day after it happened...

Was also on the CH7 Sunrise news ticker thingy this morning. I tought there might be some more news on this or a report release ... apparently not :rolleyes:

The Sunday Telegraph in Sydney ran a very small story in todays paper, just a couple paragraphs & it appeared a fair way in, somewhere around page 15, not exactly page one. Their website had a much larger, more in depth article.

From the Daily Telegraph / Sunday Telegraph website:

A FULLY-LADEN jet came only centimetres from crashing at Melbourne Airport last month, it has been revealed.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau has placed it in the most serious category of aircraft mishap available to it - an accident, rather than an incident.

An ATSB investigation update shows the accident was labelled a "significant event" by investigators, who also listed damage to the aircraft as "substantial".

"During the take-off the aircraft's tail scraped the runway surface. Subsequently smoke was observed in the cabin," the report says.

A Sunday Herald Sun investigation has confirmed that the flight - EK407 to Dubai - almost failed to become airborne and barely made it over the airport perimeter fence, half a kilometre away.

Damage to the $220 million plane is so severe that the airline is considering writing it off rather than repairing it.

The fully-laden Airbus A340-500 was believed to have been travelling about 280km/h when it reached the end of the runway without becoming airborne.

At the last minute, the two pilots "rotated" the plane - or pulled its nose up into a steep ascent - causing its tail to crash into the end of the runway.

Despite its steep climb, the plane was still so low that it wiped out strobe lights that were only 70cm high and positioned 170m from the end of the runway.

It then took out an antenna, believed to be near a small building, before barely making it over the 2.44m wire perimeter fence.

Aviation expert Dick Smith said something had gone badly wrong.

"It's the closest thing to a major aviation accident in Australia for years," he said.

"The people (passengers) are incredibly lucky, it was an overrun where the plane didn't get airborne."

Mr Smith said Emirates was a "very good airline" and it was strange the pilots had resigned immediately after the accident.

"Emirates' standards are very high and they have a lot of Australian pilots," he said.

"What I'm startled by is that there hasn't been a more immediate announcement. We should get some urgent advice from the ATSB. This is one of the most serious accidents you can imagine."

A Melbourne Airport spokeswoman confirmed the size of the strobe lights, which are on a grassed area between the end of the runway and the perimeter fence, which runs alongside Operations Rd.

"The height of the runway strobe lights is 0.7m above ground level," she said.

According to rumours out of Emirates Airlines the crew may have mistyped a 2 instead of 3 in the weight data entered into the FMS, so that the FMS computed takeoff data for the airplane 100 tons lighter than it actually was.

Emirates Airlines decided on Apr 21st, that the airplane will be repaired in Melbourne to a point, where it can perform an unpressurized ferry to Airbus Industries in Toulouse, where repairs will be completed.

Please refrain from quoting the whole previous post in your post, it is not necessary, thank you - mod

How would that data entry error go unnoticed or undetected? And how would it result in the tail strike? Could it be as simple as an incorrect rotation velocity calculation?

On the second point, what's the highest altitude for a non-pressurised ferry flight? Would the crew wear oxygen masks or would they simply stay below 10,000 ft?

Philip, I'll try to explain it the best I can.

There are two separate issues: Incorrect speeds, and incorrect thrust.

On takeoff, a tailstrike can happen for a number of reasons, but the most relavent in this case is the aircraft is just not going fast enough to lift off, the pilot continues to pull back, and the tail scrapes along the ground.

The question that we next ask is why was the aircraft not going fast enough. In some cases, it is just that the crew have incorrectly calculated the rotation speed. When this occurs, you'll see the tailstrike happen at the normal rotation point, say 2/3rds the way down the runway.

In other cases, it is that the aircraft is rapidly approaching the end of the runway, and it just doesn't have the required speed. The pilot has to rotate to try and get it off the ground before the runway disappears, and it is just a little too slow to fly, and so strikes the ground. This is what has happened in this case.

The causes are similar, but distinct - In the first case, it is simply a caclulation error of the takeoff speeds, but correct thrust/weight. In the second (and likely in the Emirates situation), the aircraft was significantly heavier than the performance data used, and so the speeds may or may not have been correct, but the thrust was wrong for the weight.

The reason that this second one becomes an issue is because of derated takeoffs. We reduce the engine thrust on every takeoff, to be the minimum required (plus some good buffers), in order to reduce engine wear. It is a very well established practice on all aircraft types, and certainly not something new.

Here is the catch. If the aircraft take off thrust was based on being 100t lighter than what it was, obviously there is just not going to be enough thrust to get you to the required speed on the runway available at the heavier weight, which is what looks like might have happened here (although we don't know for sure).

So, thrust lower than what is required to accelerate the aircraft to its takeoff speed on the runway means rotating at a slower speed than the aircraft can technincally perform at, resulting in tailstrike.

As to depressurised flight, well, good luck to them.