Second Jeju Air 737-800 experiences mechanical issues following deadly crash The disastrous crash of a Boeing 737-800 in South Korea over the weekend, which killed 179 of the 181 people onboard, was followed by a second incident involving Jeju Air. On Monday, the flight was forced to return to its origin due to a reportedly similar landing gear issue. It's still not clear what caused Jeju Air flight …
"attempting a similar landing at Southampton"
Southampton wouldn't be so bad. There's the M27 at the south end with a number of low walls and a handful of unlucky cars to slow it down followed by a nature reserve. At the north end there's a traincare depot with a number of empty trains and collapsible buildings helping to scrub speed. An expensive mess but survivable.
All airports will now need to wargame their largest plane sliding off each end of each runway at 150mph.
EMAS relies on landing gear digging in and through the surface and the aircraft being below 80 knots - the design criteria are an intact and largely undamaged set of gear
Belly landings risk skimming over EMAS as the contact pressure is unlikely to be high enough to break the frangible surface and belly skids tend to be LOOOOOOOONG - meaning the speed will likely be higher than the designs maximum for EMAS anyway
Small dragon teeth for rasping the bottom of the aircraft might seem like a reasonable idea but they'd likely rip open fuel tanks and make any fireballs worse rather than actually slowing things down
This kind of sitiation is difficult to deal with and very few airports are designed to cope with a long end-of-runway excursion. Heathrow has the M25 at one end and housing at the other, whilst Gatwick has a motorway and a railway station
It's early days, but my money is on the pilots suffering situational overload, failing to lower the gear (which explains the long landing) and then perhaps trying a go-around instead of just deploying spoilers, etc. The aircraft had a nose-high attitude during the entire skid, which is not what you want if trying to slow down quickly
I'm a local and not worried about that. The approach from the south does fly near the docks but not over them. It virtually follows the River Itchen from the dockhead where the Itchen joins Southampton Water all the way to the airport although the river ceases to be large and tidal around a kilometer short of the runway.
> it could've been a thousand dead
Not a thousand, but Teterboro Airport NJ USA is tightly bounded by highways. I remember when it was literally open field; those days are gone. "February 2, 2005,.. Bombardier CL-600...hurtled off a runway at Teterboro Airport, skidded across US 46 and slammed into a warehouse during the morning rush, ..... Later that year, Congress ....directed the FAA to install 1,000 feet (300 m) arrestor beds at all U.S. airports." I think they even did the arrestor at the tiny municipal airport near my house; the Koreans instead built a hill to protect some infrastructure?
As someone who was born in Lowfield Heath (use your map people and wonder why the A23 makes a right turn as it heads north out of Crawley...) before the new airport [1]was built, the issue if the A23 and London to Brighton mainline is ONLY relevant IF landings are done that way, after an approach from the SW.
As the prevailing wind is from the SW most days, landings are done with an approach over the railway/M-23/A23. Anything running out of runway will crash through the perimeter fence, across a minor road and into fields. The sticky wealden clay will soon bring the thing to a halt.
[1] I say new airport as there was an old airport before WW2. The remains of the control tower (aka the Beehive) can be seen on the right as the A23 swings left to run alongside the railway and go under the south terminal. There was even an airport station. What is now Gatwick Airport station was once called Gatwick Racecourse.
That's the Gatwick point here. As I understand it, the Korean plane belly landed in the "wrong" direction because it lost all power during a low pass being made in the right direction, presumably for the tower to inspect the bird strike damage. I imagine all airports will need to rethink their design for this scenario.
And the reason Gatwick is worse than most is the railway line where it could meet 100mph trains with hundreds of people and no chance of stopping. Roads, carparks and buildings aren't great either but the potential outcomes must be better than rail.
Airports that can't be made safe should be closed. Gatwick would be ideal for housing. Heathrow also isn't fit for purpose as a first world hub airport (Emirates' CEO called it a WW2 relic) so close this too for much needed housing and build a brand new hub airport somewhere along HS2.
Demolition.
While you are at it, take the 'Sussex Gulag' aka Crawley with you. It is nothing more than a blot on the landscape. I say that because I had the misfortune to live there for 20+ years.
Even a 'Project' on the edge of Moscow was nicer than that shithole.
Improve perhaps but it was always a compromise because of the need to change at Old Oak Common. If HS2 was instead integrated directly into a new airport, just south of Coventry for example, connectivity for HS2 passengers would be massively improved plus Old Oak Common would still be useful as an interchange.
"build a brand new hub airport somewhere along HS2."
Anyone with half a brain knows the whole point of HS2 was to get people to fly in and out of Birmingham. Basically a London extension.
It certainly wasn't for the benefit of anyone else.
Virtually all UK airports have the same problem of poor connectivity and/or being hemmed in. Just like railway lines, you can build one in the middle of nowhere and people will immediately build housing near it, then complain about the noise, etc (look at the history of UK's old lines)
It's hardly unique to the UK. The Dutch spent a lot of time and effort making Schipol easily accessible from anywhere in the Randstad as well as protecting the overruns and yet someone still managed to drop a 747 on a block of flats
I've witnessed a crash where a plane went across a main road. This was a bird strike on take-off of an HS-125 from Dunsfold (home of Top Gear). The aircraft lost both engines and belly flopped across the main Horsham-Guildford road and came to a halt in a field just beyond the road. All on board were uninjured. Sadly, it took the roof off a passing car during the crash landing. On board was the wife and children of one of the Hawker Siddley test pilots. He was in the control tower and saw it all happen.
They were unlucky.
|The same luck or lack of it would apply to a plane crash landing at Gatwick.
The aerial photos show that the 737 impacted on the field on the East side of the M1, hopped over the carriageway and impacted the bank on the West side to the right of the extended centre line. A piece of undercarriage that was stuck on the central reservation barrier came off in the first impact and landed there.
The approach the the runway at EMA is perpendicular to the M1 and the M1 is recessed into a cutting at that point.
Google Air France 358 Toronto crash - apparently it was really smart that we had a big ditch with a road and a stream running through it just beyond the end of the runway (more your sort of 20+m deep and 50m wide and 100m long sort of thing) without putting some sort of cover over the top of the thing or making it a tunnel.
> Main road?
Presumably the A281.
Where I think the crash above happened has now gained a roundabout in preparation for a load of houses. The road is already over-capacity and naturally there's no talk of reopening the old railway line that runs nearby...
lot of things might have gone wrong with that landing. not enough time to do the checklist. there was a news briefing where i believe there was speculation that the wrong engine might have been shut down. Can't see the wings or engines from the cockpit. Bird strike on a single engine shouldn't have brought the plane down normally. there are redundant systems to lower the landing gear, might even have been a manual way if total power failure if they had time. Direction of takeoff or landing on runway depends on wind direction and in an emergency it's any way you need.
Running out of runway doesn't automatically result in a fireball. One of our local airports, Burbank, has the east-west runway -- the one that planes land on -- end abruptly at a road Hollywood Way). There's a blast screen, a wire fence and the sidewalk (pavement). Since this is the runway that's used for landings and all landings come from the west towards this street coming into Burbank is always exciting. To add to the thrills there used to be a gas (petrol) station over the road from the runway but it was removed after a 737 ended up in it.
See:- https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2000-mar-06-mn-6031-story.html
(Compared to this Gatwich's got plenty of room before the A23 and the railway.)
I guess the question here is - is it the planes or is it the airline maintenance (or some weird form of sabotage)?
It could be an age related plane issue, but given that two incidents happened in the same week for the same airline when this is an old plane with loads of them in the sky across the globe... I'd start with the airline.
They aren't similar symptoms. The second flight had a 'landing gear issue' shortly after take-off. So either the landing gear failed to retract or the system couldn't determine it's state. They turned around and landed. Wouldn't have even made the news if it wasn't for the previous crash.
The crashed flight appeared to make no attempt to prepare the plane for landing. No landing gear deployed, no flaps, no spoilers. One thrust reverser deployed. It doesn't appear that there was any kind of problem with the landing gear.
Once the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder are analyzed there will be answers, but currently it's looking like the flight crew made a series of mistakes following a bird strike on #2 engine.
The consensus of opinion amongst armchair experts is the plane had a birdstrike on #2 engine and the crew shutdown the good, #1 engine. This meant they had to curtail the already initiated go-around and perform a teardrop turn on limited or no power, panicking while doing so and thus failing to prepare for landing (flaps and gear down).
That seems to be the only plausible explanation that fits the existing, publicly available facts.
> the crew shutdown the good, #1 engine
It's happened so many times, there's a Wikipedia category for it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Airliner_accidents_and_incidents_caused_by_wrong_engine_shutdown
They're all different types of aircraft, so there doesn't seem to be a common bad UI or design thread.
I've recently been watching a lot of Mentour Pilot on YouTube - an excellent series of thoughtful, in-depth analyses of air crashes and near misses, well worth watching.
Almost every single time, I see elements of bad UI design that wouldn't be tolerated on basic PC applications. I've started to wonder when the last truly clean-sheet ground-up new aeroplane design happened, using everything we now know about proper subsystem interaction, UI/UX and human failings of perception and action. It seems to me that all the big planes are just a mish-mash of systems layered upon systems with other systems crow-barred in between them, resulting is many, many unintended and unforeseen interactions which lead to pilot confusion and crashes.
Still, what do I know?
GJC
I'd put money on the year starting with a "1".
The whole "Systems layered upon systems" thing will be a direct consequence of the time and effort it takes to get these core systems certified (for more examples of taking shortcuts to avoid recertifying, just look at the 737-MAX and all the issues that faced). The difference between getting a whole new unified stack certified compared to building a new system on top of an existing stack will be utterly vast, so if the existing stack already has the kinks worked out, why change it?
The other issue is that when somebody does go about making a whole new software stack for their planes, you'll just end up with a similar problem in 20-30 years.
Fully agree on the horrid UX that pilots need to deal with. I've always found business software to be markedly inferior to consumer software in terms of usability. Personally I think that this is because the people using the software tend not to be the people paying for the software - a situation that happens much less in the consumer space.
> The whole "Systems layered upon systems" thing will be a direct consequence of the time and effort it takes to get these core systems certified (for more examples of taking shortcuts to avoid recertifying, just look at the 737-MAX and all the issues that faced).
Not to mention all the retraining that would be required, its bad enough with cars that have the wiper and indicator stalks on differing sides of the steering wheel, never mind trying to fly a plane. Plus accidents have been caused by controls on one mark of aircraft working differently (but seeing very similar) on the next
IFIRC, the Kegworth crash was caused by shutting down the wrong engine, but in that case the pilots thought they were shutting down the failed engine, but a crossed pair of sensors somewhere in the wiring loom deep in the fuselage gave them the wrong information. That was a clear case of a potentially lethal fault being designed into the loom, as both left and right plugs were identical, and could be (and were) transposed during routine maintenance.
In 1989 I was living and working in Rugby, and remember it happening only a few miles North of us.
From my armchair I seem to see hot exhaust gases coming out of the engines so to me neither of them looked to be shut down.
It's all very odd. It seems the pilots wanted that plane on the ground PDQ and, as alluded earlier, didn't properly configure the aircraft, touched down half way down the runway with engines running.... It's a mystery to me, I will be looking forward to the interim analysis of the FDR and CVR.
In addition, they were on final approach and configured for landing prior to the bird strike. They should have just continued to land. If both engines had been damaged in the strike they wouldn't have aborted. Which supports the opinion that they shut down #1 by mistake. I suppose there could have been a subsequent second bird strike on the abort, but it's not supported by the video and would require exceptionally bad luck.
Ironically, flaps and gear down would have helped them. Flaps, because once lined up for the runway they needed lift and not speed. Since they underestimated, or didn't account for ground effect, putting the gear down would have shed speed to help offset the fact that they wasted 1/3 of the runway.
Far from the first time that this has happened:
Kegworth Air Disaster (UK East Midlands, narrowly missed the M1) 737-400, 1988 (47 fatalities)
USAF Bombardier E-11, 2020 (4 fatalities - all n board)
TransAsia Airways Flight 235, Feb 2015 (43 fatalities, 17 survivors)
Azerbaijan Airlines Flight A-56, 1995, Tu-134 (52 fatal)
South African Airlink Flight 8911, 2009, 1 fatality BAe Jetstream
Transair Flight 810, 2021, Boeing 737-200 freighter (0 fatalities)
Air India AIRBUS A320-21 VT-GOS, 2017, Delhi (Landed safely after engine restart at very low altitude. Change of underwear required)
I can probably cite a dozen other occasions on large transport aircraft (i.e. 18 seater and above). Having flown gliders and light aircraft, I find modern jets over complicated and pilots often overloaded with spurious information when soething does go wrong. Sitting in a simulator with a pilot friend (as an abserver) I counted over 30 separate warnings (verbal and on the screens) within a 3 minute interval. For example, during an engine failure exercise there were warnings about fuel flow, engine temperature, speed, angle of attack, altitude, thrust etc, some of which were repeated multiple times by "Bitching Betty".
Yikes!
As stated below, this seems to be a common error. Without power, deploying gear, flaps and spoilers could have stalled the plane short of landing, resulting is just as bad a situation. That is, if with both engines shut down would there be enough power to even deploy them.
This aviation expert [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzmptA6s-1g ] "Blancolirio" notes that if the wheels are not down then the flaps and spoilers will not deploy. But the landing gear can be deployed by hand by pulling on emergency cables - the video even shows footage of the emergency cables being deployed. So if they had done that (manual deployment) then the flaps could have been deployed. The flaps/spoilers lockout will be released even if the landing gear is up when the aircraft is under 10 feet from the ground. But they were floating for over the runway quite high so ....
Yeah, the only common point is "landing gear".
If the 2nd flight had just taken off, then the problem would have been a failure to retract. Crew ran the checklist for that, got the gear locked down again, and returned safely. All good, everyone safe.
The fatal crash seems to have multiple factors. Bird strike(s) (a compressor stall was caught on video as it made it's first approach). Then a very hasty turn and landing attempt, with no flaps / gear / spoilers deployed. So factors Other than just a landing gear fault. A single engine failure or problem lowering the gear (or even both) isn't a reason for hasty crash landing. When those things happen, the crew declares an emergency, but has time to circle and properly prepare for landing, maybe even burn off excess fuel to reduce the landing speed and fire risk. But if BOTH engines had failed, then it was a matter of looking for the least worst place to crash land, and they got it wrong.
Then there is the issue of a concrete / dirt wall for the navigation lights at the end of the runway, that the plane ended up hitting, while still doing ~150 mph. Most airports have those systems on lightweight structures that will sheer off if hit by an overshoot / undershoot plane, or practically at ground level just short of the tarmac. Either way it's not the proverbial "brick wall on the motorway". Wellington (NZ) airport has it's issues, but if you crash landed like this you would probably end up with a mostly intact plane in the harbor, with a some chance of surviving.
The problem is that 150 mph is faster than the aircraft should be traveling when it reaches the ground, let alone after it has skidded a long ways. So they clearly landed at far above the normal speed, and overshot the touchdown location (they landed halfway down the runway) so it was a comedy of errors. You almost have to suspect some form of sabotage or rogue pilot type situation at some point for so many things to go wrong at once.
The flaps were retracted when it landed, so it would’ve been coming in faster than usual.
This unfortunately this tends to create a ground effect where the airplane begins to ride on top of a cushion of air. So the aircraft floats down the runway only lightly scraping the pavement and not putting the full weight onto the ground, which is needed to stop it.
What is it about The Register and Boeing? In Australia both Qantas and VIrgin have 737 700's and 800's which have flown millions of passenger-miles without any dramas. Concentrating on the aircraft make just gives the airline a "get out of jail free" card, if indeed there were issues with maintenance or pilot training. Does the Register think its readers are too dumb to comprehend that almost all commercial aircraft accidents are caused by a combination of factors? (Swiss cheese accident model)
Thank you!
I'm the last one to give messed-up Boeing a pass, but this has absolutely nothing to do with the make&model. It could have happened with an Airbus or an Embraer. By every account and analysis I've so far seen from what I consider reputable aviation analysts (rather than MSM), this points at severe crew mistakes from the moment of the bird strike.
That's way all media is. Every story I've seen emphasizes that it is "Boeing", because they know they're more likely to get clicks than if they didn't mention it. If it was an Airbus they would not put that in the title, because fewer people would read it - they'd think to themselves "well that's just an outlier since I know Boeing is the one with all the problems".
Let's change this up a bit...
"A 2009 Chevy Malibu crashed when the vehicle failed to stop due to bad brakes. Other vehicles owners also report recently having brake problems. Embattled manufacturer, Chevrolet, has not yet responded to media inquiries as they try to start the year on a positive note."
Seriously. A 15 year old bird, at least a 2nd hand owner, operated in countries with regulations far removed from the United States....Hey, let's all blame Boeing! I agree, blame Boeing where they deserve it, but the constant battering for every tiny thing is getting old.
Well remember what happened to Audi in the late 80s here in the US with the "unintended acceleration" claims. There may have been a few legit instances of that but most were people who hit the wrong pedal in a panic situation and later insisted they were victims of a vehicle defect that caused so much acceleration that no matter how hard they pressed the brake they couldn't stop the car (which anyone who has ever driven a car knows is ridiculous) Took a decade or more for Audi to recover its US market, and the legacy of that is having to hold down the brake when shifting an automatic out of park (not that this is a bad thing, but that's why it became a thing)
So you don't even have to really screw up to lose your reputation. Just get enough bad press. Boeing is absolutely deserving of the poor reputation but now is getting a bum rap from the press in addition to that.
"no matter how hard they pressed the brake they couldn't stop the car (which anyone who has ever driven a car knows is ridiculous)"
Not ridiculous, happened to me when the throttle linkage of a brand new (under 1000 miles) Pontiac overcentred and ran away with me, and no matter how hard I pressed the brake, it just kept on accelerating. Only way to stop it was to switch off the ignition and wait for it to slow down. Local cops were not impressed at my 110MPH dash through Sutter, Illinois.
As someone else commented, MSM is pointing towards a horrifyingly-frequent wrong engine shutdown. Though until I hear something on this from someone like Juan@blancolirio I'll reserve judgment.
It would explain lack of gear and flaps/spoilers to try and extend the glide. "trimming for best glide" is something I got drilled into me every time my CFI reached for the throttle with an evil grin.In a retractable that means keeping things as clean as possible for less drag.
I had also wonder whether the pilots were familiar enough with the airport that they knew about the absolutely idiotically placed medieval siege defense wall that they put the Localiser on, keeping the gear up for a better chance to clear it. But if they already messed up with the engine shutdown, methinks they were headless chicken in the cockpit. They wouldn't have thought about that. Maybe. Probably.
I had also wonder whether the pilots were familiar enough with the airport that they knew about the absolutely idiotically placed medieval siege defense wall that they put the Localiser on, keeping the gear up for a better chance to clear it.
They wouldn't have been looking to clear it. If they were aware of it at all, they would have been expecting to stop long before they got to it. I think they trimmed for the abort and quit thinking rationally at that point. It has me wondering what their simulator requirements are and if they train for engine failures on approach.
Probably going to be a while, I'm looking forward to blancolirio analyzing the CVR.
The localiser was on the far end of the runway. They didn't need to clear it because they weren't flying over it. They touched down 1200 meters into the runway and skidded off the remaining ~1600 meters and then an additional 250 meters into the ILS berm. To be clear, they were touching ground for nearly a mile before hitting the berm and still estimated to be moving at 150 mph.
Not sure if you'll see this, but yes, my bad. I just watched the actual final flight path and while I had (naturally?) presumed they would have reflown the pattern for landing, I see that instead they did a 180 and came "against" the preferred landing direction at that time. Hence sliding along the runway and slamming into the localiser rampart.
Looking at the timeline, it's just shocking how quickly everything happened. From bird strike and mayday declaration to turning around and emergency landing was 3 minutes! 8:59 to 9:02.
Boeing bashing is fine when it's actually their fault but if there was a mechanical issue on this 15 year old plane then it's far more likely to be a maintenance issue than a manufacturing one, there isn't even any publicly available information that there were any issues with the plane before the apparent bird strike
You'd like to think so. But there have been cases in the past where aircraft have crashed down to mechanical issues caused by design rather than maintenance. The Boeing 737 suffered numerous "hard over" failures which didn't materialise until the aircraft had been in use for 10/20+ years.
We need to keep an open mind, but a bird strike doesn't stop a plane putting it's landing gear down.
There was a very experienced pilot of YouTube (not some rando, but someone I know for a fact is verified as such) who was doing a preliminary analysis, complete with Boeing's own manuals and diagrams, and has actually flown this model, showing that while the cause of the emergency was unknown at this time, the pilots definitely screwed up their emergency checklist. The biggest point being that aircraft's landing gear CAN deploy, and lock into position, without any hydraulic and/or electrical power.
The second incident points to a PROBABLE systemic failure of maintenance by JeJu Air.
So yeah, Boeing is still rotten to the core, but THIS time it MIGHT not be Boeing.
However, I'm not betting either way right now.
Holy cow, and now I see someone has pointed out a probable wrong engine shut down? Well damn.That will do it.
Shutting down the wrong engine is possible, black box will tell the story there. It's also possible they took birds in both engines. As pointed out above, the procedure for a bird strike / engine failure is to go around on the remaining (hopefully good) engine, and set up for a single engine approach. If they had started the go around, and then found the other engine was also damaged, at that point they had run out of good options. So they trimmed the plane for best glide (no flaps or gear deployed), got turned around and came in dead stick, and faster then normal. Only to find some muppet had put a concrete wall at the end of the runway.
(1) At Boeing (see the news since 2010)
(2) At airlines (trying to cut the cost of training aircrew. See the news since 2010)
(3) At airlines (trying to minimise maintenance costs)
(4) At Rolls-Royce (trying to cut the costs associated with building engines)
...and those are the bits I know about.....
So for airlines it’s all about revenue per seat that has a bum on it and availability. Everything feeds in to that. Fuel economy, maintenance intervals, weight, turnaround time at the gate, a million other factors too. EasyJet has just opened a new ops centre that can dispatch a replacement aircraft during the day if an aircraft is getting behind (as short haul inevitably does). Mr Ryanair is ranting about late delivery of new 737 Max when he’d recruited pilots and cabin staff to operate them.
For long haul, customers (especially in premium economy and business) are demanding their 3 to 6 grands worth so somehow the airline has still got to make its margins.
These Boeing incidents involving 737 variants are generally CFM 56 engines, and then they are generally not engine faults that are the cause.
RR and the other engine makers are not only under pressure to compete on cost and ongoing cost of use. But also they are expected to produce engines that are lighter, lower emission, quieter and with all that they are required to be more efficient and in operation and longer between maintenance. These miracles of engineering are getting a bit closer to the bleeding edge. RR, CFM (inc GE) and PW engines are all now having to reduce their promised component life due to more than expected hoped for wear, it's not surprising this happens.
For information, the cost of operating a Boeing or Airbus flight simulator is in the region of £500 per hour. This will usually include 2 sim operators who will set up various scenarios depending on the training. These will typically include engine failures on takeoff, landing and mid flight, various electrical failures, crosswind landings, instrument landings etc.
On top of thet you will have 2 pilots in the sim. Pilot preparation time is typically 2-3 hours and at least a 1 hour debrief afterwards.
I was fortunate to sit in with the sim ops as an observer in the early 90s.
My personal bet is on bird strike and / or engine failure combined with failure to follow correct engine-out procedures.
Normal procedure would be to continue take-off, stabilise the aircraft, review fuel / landing weight and either burn off some fuel or else fly a downwind leg and a stabilised single engine approach. The sort of thing that all commercial pilot are (or should be) trained for and prepared for.
Aviation experts at FlightRadar24 said the craft made a low-altitude flyover of the airport, likely in an attempt to have officials on the ground confirm the state of the plane and suggest next steps.
This is how you know they're not aviation experts. No one would overfly an airport in a commercial aircraft (even one as antiquated at the 737) in order to determine the state of it.
A few facts: almost every airport in the world has bird warnings from time to time. You might delay take-off for a flock of birds at the end of the runway, but unless there was an extremely compelling reason you'd continue an approach. If the birds appeared on short final, you fly through them and land. The risk to engines from bird ingestion is exponentially greater at high thrust than at approach thrust (at low thrust the birds tend to be diverted down the bypass ducts). Even if you lose one engine, you're almost at the runway and in the landing configuration, so WTF would you go around? Stopping distance on a limiting wet runway is less than 15% greater than with both engines running.
I don't know what happened here, but the birds are likely to be the least exciting finding in the investigation.
Procedures may have changed over time but I was onboard an aircraft in the late 80's/early 90's that did exactly that. After takeoff out of Denver the landing gear failed to fully retract. The pilots turned the plane around and after manually extending the landing gear apparently couldn't get a signal in the cockpit that the gear was locked for landing. We did a flyby of the tower, who apparently confirmed the gear looked like it was down. We assumed crash positions for the landing, but the plane landed without incident. If the hydraulics or electrics failed making a pass like this to get some idea from an external view doesn't seam unreasonable to me.
If this aircraft did have brake parachutes, they could have slowed down very significantly before hitting the obstacle.
Given that bird strikes are very likely and could coincide with landing gear issues, this would be an intelligent change ?
It works for fighter jets, will also work for airliners.
Installing parachutes would be an incredibly stupid idea. Because that replaces the risk of a catastrophic "overrun the runway" crash like this one with the risk of a "parachute deploys in mid-flight" catastrophic crash.
Much, much safer is for the relatively few airports with equipment mounted on solid concrete structures to replace them with collapsible, light-weight supports, as used by most airports already.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LF8NEkysBY
Seriously, put it behind some hard-to-accidently release system of levers.
https://www.ktbs.com/news/arklatex-indepth/the-parachute-that-brings-the-b-52-to-a-stop/article_3bd4583c-f9ae-11e8-9303-239e77afa2c0.html
If the air force can do it, it can be taught to commercial pilots. Just exhort them a bit, for good measure.
Can someone point to a picture of the B52 parachute levers/buttons ? Is it somehow connected with landing gear pressed or the like ?
More URLs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3gvvsGjUi8
According to ChatGPT
Several military and civilian aircraft use parachutes for braking, particularly during landings when extra deceleration is needed, such as on shorter runways or during high-speed landings. Below is a list of notable aircraft that use parachutes for braking, particularly in military and commercial aviation:
1. Boeing B-52 Stratofortress
The B-52 is equipped with a brake parachute to assist with slowing down after landing, especially on shorter or more congested runways.
2. Lockheed Martin F-16 Fighting Falcon
The F-16 has an optional brake parachute used for improving deceleration during landings, particularly on short runways or when additional stopping power is required.
3. Lockheed C-130 Hercules
The C-130, a tactical transport aircraft, uses a brake parachute to assist in landing on short or austere airstrips, aiding in rapid deceleration.
4. Concorde (Supersonic Passenger Jet)
The Concorde, a retired supersonic airliner, employed a brake parachute to help with deceleration after landing, especially given its high landing speeds.
5. McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle
The F-15, a highly maneuverable fighter, is equipped with a brake parachute to help stop the aircraft after landing at high speeds or on shorter runways.
6. McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet
Like the F-15, the F/A-18 uses a brake parachute to assist with deceleration, particularly during carrier landings or on short airstrips.
7. Aero Vodochody L-39 Albatros
The L-39 is a jet trainer aircraft that uses a brake parachute to help decelerate after landing, particularly on short or crowded runways.
8. Tupolev Tu-22M (Backfire)
The Tu-22M, a Russian strategic bomber, uses a brake parachute to assist in rapid deceleration after landing, typically on short or unprepared runways.
9. Antonov An-124 Ruslan
The Antonov An-124, one of the largest cargo aircraft in the world, uses a parachute braking system to assist with deceleration, especially when operating from shorter or less-developed airstrips.
10. Boeing 727 (Older Models)
The Boeing 727, particularly the earlier models, could be equipped with a brake parachute as an option to help stop the aircraft on shorter runways.
11. Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II
The A-10, a close air support aircraft, uses a parachute to aid in deceleration after landing, especially in rough terrain or on short airstrips.
12. Sukhoi Su-24 Fencer
The Su-24, a Russian attack aircraft, uses a brake parachute to help slow down the aircraft during landings, especially on short or improvised runways.
13. Boeing 747 (Rare Use)
While not common, some 747 aircraft in specialized operations may use a parachute braking system in emergency or high-speed landings.
14. Eurofighter Typhoon
Some models of the Eurofighter Typhoon use a brake parachute to assist with landing, especially in cases where a rapid deceleration is needed, such as on short runways or in emergency situations.
15. McDonnell Douglas AV-8 Harrier
The Harrier, capable of vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), can use a brake parachute to assist with deceleration during landing, particularly when landing on shorter or less developed airstrips.
16. Panavia Tornado
The Tornado aircraft, used by several European air forces, employs a parachute for braking, especially in situations where a high-speed landing on short or austere runways is required.
17. Pilatus PC-6 Porter
The PC-6, a Swiss-made utility aircraft, uses a brake parachute to aid in stopping the aircraft on short airstrips, often in mountainous or challenging environments.
18. Cessna Citation X (Optional)
Some models of the Cessna Citation X use a parachute braking system (similar to a ballistic recovery parachute) for emergency deceleration or stopping after landing.
19. Antonov An-26
The An-26, a twin-engine cargo aircraft, can also be equipped with a braking parachute for deceleration on shorter, unprepared airstrips.
20. Aermacchi MB-339
The MB-339, an Italian jet trainer, is equipped with a brake parachute to help slow down after landing, especially on shorter runways.
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