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US Airway plane crashes into the Hudson River

Hamradioguy said:
Something similar-with a much happier outcome- happened to our Vermont CAP Wing Commander some years ago. He was a commercial pilot...can't recall the airline...and departing Pittsburgh in a DC-9 when there was a loud noise, the plane shook, the right engine throttle went to shut off position and numerous alarms began sounding. He declared an emergency, started a go round back toward the airport and asked the first officer to go back to the rear of the cabin and see what damage there was to the engine. The first officer came back rather quickly and informed him that they'd lost an engine. When the Captain said that he knew the engine had quit, he was informed, "No, we LOST an engine...it's gone!"
They were very lucky- the engine had simply dropped off with no damage to the plane, and they made a safe landing. AA-191 flipped over and crashed almost instantly.
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The analysis of the crash was that it should have been a survivable accident. The DC10 flies just fine on two engines. the trouble was, as usual, a long list of small problems. First, the engine mount broke 8 weeks before when American used an unauthorized procedure to inspect the engine mount involving a fork lift truck. It saved about 200 man hours, but in this case the engine slipped and sheered a part of the bracket when the truck wasn't positioned exactly right. The break wasn't noted at the time. Then, when the rest of the mount broke at take off, the engine ripped out some hydraulics in the left wing leading edge which powered the the wing's leading edge control surfaces on that side. Things were fine for about ten seconds, until the hydraulics drained, and then the left surfaces retracted under wind pressure, and the plane started rolling.

Standard procedure in pilot training at that time was, when engine power is lost, to reduce power to the other engines, and the co-pilot, in control at the time, did so, running the engine speed down to v2, he lowest speed setting. As the roll progressed, a stall condition was encountered because of the low airspeed and the loss of lift in the roll. The pilot should have been warned about that by stick shaking, but the power to his shaker came from the missing engine. Finally, the shaker on the co-pilot side was off and could not be turned on with a seatbelt in place. 13 other pilots made 70 simulated flights with these constraints; not a single one managed to avoid a crash.

Changes made: mandatory shakers always on for both sides; elimination of the reduce power recommendation; adding this scenario to pilot training; admission of maintenance failures by AA, with equivalent legal liability. MacDac, of course, lost it all. That was the final blow to the DC-10's reputation. Five years later, they were all gone, and soon enough, so was MacDac.
 
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I remember watching a documentary years ago on the development of the B777 and something that stuck with me was how proud the engine manufacturer was that their new, huge engine for the plane was able to ingest birds up to the size of a turkey and not fail. They of course showed slow motion video of the birds being chucked into the running engines.
 
THE CHICKEN GUN STORY


Then there's that old story about the "chicken gun". A chicken gun was a device that aircraft engineering departments would use to test the structural integrity of various aircraft windscreen designs against bird strike.

The concept was to hurl a dead chicken at an aircraft's forward windshield at what would be the aircraft's cruising speed. Initial tests of various windscreens proved disappointing. Engineers tried countless designs, glass compositions and installation configurations but were unable to achieve success. The chicken smashed through each time!

This was the case up until a careful analysis of the testing procedure was carried out. After that, it was specifically noted in the operational procedures that for subsequent testing, under no circumstances would it ever be permissible to ever again use "FROZEN CHICKENS"... :D

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_Chicken_Gun

http://www.snopes.com/science/cannon.asp
 
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On the BBC video that was posted, there appears to be another airplane in the frame at 1:42 or so. The camera doesn't stay long enough or get close enough for me to figure it out, but it made me smile ironicly. Also not being from NY I have no idea what is in that particular location.

Anyone else know?

And more on topic I am quite pleased with the results as is everyone. Well done to the pilot and the rescuers!
 
iiwo said:
On the BBC video that was posted, there appears to be another airplane in the frame at 1:42 or so. The camera doesn't stay long enough or get close enough for me to figure it out, but it made me smile ironicly. Also not being from NY I have no idea what is in that particular location.

Anyone else know?

And more on topic I am quite pleased with the results as is everyone. Well done to the pilot and the rescuers!
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There was a helicopter near to where the plane ditched; it immediately started hovering over the spot. That may be what you saw.
 
rickps said:
Sounds like a Michael Crichton story - airframe?
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Ummmm, no more so than any of these crash stories often amounting to a long linked list of small, improbable errors. Airframe tells about an airliner that goes through some violent up/down maneuvers (like the vomit comet but harder and shorter duration) and kills a couple of passengers in the cabin. The inspectors run down a whole list of possible failure modes, do a lot of detective work, ending up with a substandard part (flap drive motor?)that was installed in the plane overseas (Indonesia?) that broke. The over-story is that a media mogul (sounds a lot like a certain Aussie) is trying to force out a tear-jerking, high blame pilot error story. Crichton is a woo cause supporter, former MD and expert in medical technology, and Japan basher, but is pro-aircraft industry in Airframe. All that's from memory about 5 years back, so take it for what it's worth.
 
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News is carrying a story that two days prior to the ditching the same plane had a problem with loud "bangs" coming from the right side. The pilot indicated that it was due to a stalled compressor in the engine but then got the engine restarted. It seems that at first the plane was going to make an emergency landing but then continued once the engine restarted. I think.

Interesting.
 
Skeptic Guy said:
News is carrying a story that two days prior to the ditching the same plane had a problem with loud "bangs" coming from the right side. The pilot indicated that it was due to a stalled compressor in the engine but then got the engine restarted. It seems that at first the plane was going to make an emergency landing but then continued once the engine restarted. I think.

Interesting.
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The captain of that earlier flight would have reported those bangs, and those bangs would be investigated.

As to media reporting to the same plane, it would not surprise me if they reverense the same flight number, which does not mean the same plane.
 
The over-story is that a media mogul (sounds a lot like a certain Aussie) is trying to force out a tear-jerking, high blame pilot error story.
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Actually, the media, trying to prepare a 60 Minutes-like expose - is trying to paint a picture of an aircraft manufacturer, trying to cover up a flawed design, when the real problem was an inexperienced pilot, overriding an auto-pilot that would have prevented the accident if left alone ..
 
Skeptic Guy said:
News is carrying a story that two days prior to the ditching the same plane had a problem with loud "bangs" coming from the right side. The pilot indicated that it was due to a stalled compressor in the engine but then got the engine restarted. It seems that at first the plane was going to make an emergency landing but then continued once the engine restarted. I think.

Interesting.
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I thought that compressor stall was mostly a problem with high performance military combat aircraft. Are commercial airliners with those high bypass fan jets susceptible to compressor stall???
 
This I do not know. Like Bell said, I think the problem would have been reported and repaired, if necessary. Though the newspaper report made it seem that it was not uncommon for it to happen and may not have required an action on the mechanics' part.
 
The pilot seems like one of the most experienced in the nation. The passengers were fortunate to have him as their captain.
 
leftysergeant said:
Sorry, but it just seems fitting that, given the union-busting and out-sourcing of jobs, including aircraft maintenance, that has occurred under Bush, on the day of his last hurrah, working class heroes showed the world who really makes this country work at its best.

(It aint the investor class.)
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(Shrug)

Pilot made difficult water landing -- "proof" unions, labor, and the left-wing democrats are GOOD.

Same pilot, same plane, maintained by the same ground crew, members of the same unions, fails to make the same difficult water landing and crashes -- "proof" capital and Republicans are BAD.

That's the problem with neo-Marxist thinking: no matter what happens, you've got automatic "proof" you're correct. But, as Sir Karl Popper noted, such unfalsifiable worldviews are more or less worthless.
 
Someone would really tell Lefty that "The Dictatorship Of The Proletariat" has been tried a number of times, and failed every time.
Neo Marxism is just "good" old fashioned Communism with a Happy Face painted on.
And his rants about the "Investor Class" just show what a never never land he is living in.
I am waiting for him to turn Obama when Obama does not try to turn the US into some kind of "People's Socialist Republic".
 
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dudalb said:
Someone would really tell Lefty that "The Dictatorship Of The Proletariat" has been tried a number of times, and failed every time.
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He knows THAT. Why else do you think he prefers to actually LIVE in the evil, corrupt, plutocratic, capitalistic west, instead of in some paraside of the workers?
 
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