Posted on 03/07/2005 4:56:18 PM PST by Paleo Conservative
WASHINGTON Federal Aviation Administration officials said on Monday that they were preparing to take strong action against British Airways, including a charge of "careless and reckless operation of an aircraft," because of the airline's decision to allow a Boeing 747 to fly from California to England with one engine inoperable. Under normal circumstances, the United States would not take action against British Airways because such issues would be handled by Britain.
But senior U.S. aviation officials have become so concerned about the actions of the flight crew and its supervisors in London that they were preparing direct action.
"We will pursue every legal option available to us," said an FAA spokeswoman, Laura Brown.
British Airways expressed surprise over the developments.
"I am surprised that anyone at the FAA would make such statements," said Steve Shelterline, general manager for the 747 program with British Airways.
(Excerpt) Read more at iht.com ...
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Boeing should get a design award for making such a great bird.
....from California,...everybody 'pedals'.....
Thank you America Boeing 747 is very good AirPlane!!I do not know what persons write this Thank you
The 747 is what you get when you tell the B-52 design team to make a big airliner.
I'm pretty sure that an Airbus equivalent wouldn't fare nearly as well with one engine out.
Where do you live?
Exactly. The engines on the Airbus A340 are not as powerful. I'd bet if one one of them failed, the plane would immediately fall out of the sky.
This proves that Boeing's products are superior in quality.
(((.)))
10-4. The flight was not jeapordized in any way by flying on three engines - it could have continued with two, for that matter. The FAA picks its fights poorly, IMO.
In the 1970's I was on a 727 to Chicago from NYC. There was engine problems and they shut down the center engine. There was no talk of an emergency landing. The captain simply announced that it would take another 30 minutes to land in O'Hare. Obviously a transatlantic flight is a little different but the safety standards have been increased. Today we would have landed in Detroit.
The issue is not whether the plane could have made it, it's about the wisdom of starting a long flight with such a major equipment failure. Unless you are certain that the failure is isolated to the engine and won't cause malfunctions elsewhere, the most responsible course of action is to land ASAP.
They broke the operating manual procedures....
I don't know about it falling out of the sky, but as I recall from reading, if a four engine Airbus loses an engine, it drops the opposite number on the other wing back to idle "in the interests of preserving control" (and, I suspect, because the computer doesn't really know what to do with asymmetric thrust). As we all know, Airbus does not allow the pilot to override the computer in any way. Put these two together, and wonder what happens when you lose an engine on takeoff.
I'd rather fly a Boeing, thanks....
Of course. The AirBus is just another dirty Fokker.
Not allowing to override the computer? That's a flying deathtrap!
I'll stick with Boeing as well.
To land ASAP would require dumping fuel for a couple of hours to get down to maximum landing weight. An alternative to dumping fuel would have been to continue on to Chicago, Toronto or New York and switch planes. There are plenty of airports to divert to along that route in case more problems arose.
Certainly the WTO will step-in and take action against our unilateral display of sovereignty? /sarc
Nope. The Airbus design philosophy is "pilots are all idiots, and we know better than the man in the seat does." The flight envelope is preprogrammed, the control limits are hardcoded and do not include allowances for hard evasive manuvers. There is no override, there are no manual controls, if the computer goes out the plane falls out of the sky.
The Gimli Glider would not have been the amazing event that it ended up being if it had been an AIrbus.
No they didn't, certainly not the flight manual for the 747-400. Can you cite otherwise?
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