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Monday, April 23, 2007

Safety News In Brief

Date	Incident
Porpoising (a Pilot Induced Oscillation with a difference): see video at tinyurl.com/2pqfx8 From the comments on avsim.ru (where the video was originally posted): "Russian military multi-engine flight school; 2 students on their 2nd solo. No injuries but A/C was written off (nose-gear went through the floor, plus other damage). Left-seat student was expelled, the other is to repeat a term." From the annals of that ever poignant aviation series: "Cheap lessons learnt dearly..."
19 Apr	VIRGIN Atlantic may sue Airbus claiming the front end of its A340-600 super jet is dangerously overweight. To rebalance the jet, the airline has had to reduce fwd hold cargo loads by up to five tonnes a flight at a cost of millions of pounds a year. The extra weight is caused by beds, stand-up bars, bulky furniture and TVs fitted in premium cabins. Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson is unwilling to cut out any luxury items for fear of making the option less attractive to high-paying passengers. But without sacrificing cargo space, the safety of travellers cannot be guaranteed. Flying one tonne overweight costs the equivalent of 12 passengers daily. Flying five tonnes overweight, each jet would be losing income equivalent to 21,900 passengers a year. Virgin insists it did not know of the problem until it had bought 19 of the jets, which carry 380 passengers.
18 Apr	Canadian actor Eric McCormack reportedly caused a stir on a flight to Vancouver when he was told his son's booster seat had to be stowed with the baggage. McCormack was on an Alaska Airlines flight from Los Angeles with his wife and their 4-year-old son Finnigan when crew members told him the booster seat was too big. The star was told the seat violated airline regulations and had to be stowed and he protested volubly - until an attendant turned over the seat to reveal a warning label, 'Not to be used on aircraft!'
17 Apr	The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) say no charges will be laid against the airline at the centre of one of Australia's worst air disasters. Fifteen people died when the Transair Metroliner crashed two years ago at Lockhart River in far north Queensland. An ATSB investigation showed Transair had failed to report 25 safety incidents in the two years leading up to the crash. Seven were serious matters such as a cabin pressurization warning. The DPP was alerted to the incidents but says it is now too late to prosecute because of a 12-month statute of limitations. The airline lost its airline operating certificate some few months after the crash.
17 Apr	The UAE General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) will be hosting the International Federation of Airline Dispatcher's Associations' (IFALDA) Annual General Meeting and World Airline Flight Dispatcher's Conference on May 7-9, 2007.The theme of the Conference in Dubai is 'Exploring New Frontiers in Flight Dispatch/Operational Control'.
15 Apr	The International Air Transport Association told its 251 members in 2005 that to maintain their membership, they would have to submit to an extensive safety audit. Six carriers became ex-members for failing to initiate their audits by the end of 2006. The audits must be finished ? and flaws corrected ? by the end of next year, and officials expect to expel another half-dozen or so carriers then. IATA provides vital commercial functions, like settling up between airlines when a passenger uses a ticket on one carrier to board another carrier's plane. US carriers cannot enter code-share agreements with foreign airlines unless those airlines have had safety audits. Successfully audited airlines are listed at tinyurl.com/28rwu9
13 Apr	Cabin crew had difficulty communicating with passengers during a 2005 Flybe DHC-8 emergency landing at Edinburgh UK because the crew were wearing smoke hoods, according to a UK accident report. The report said the smoke prevented the cabin crew from seeing the length of the cabin and "severely hindered communications with passengers". It added that the hoods had proved a barrier to "both hearing and being heard". As a result of the hearing difficulties, the cabin crew did not hear calls made from the flight deck. During the incident several passengers had asked if they could also have breathing protection, but the report said that "smoke protection for passengers is not a requirement on public transport aircraft". The report said there were 153 cases of fumes, abnormal odor, smoke or haze in either the flight deck or cabin, or both, of UK- registered passenger planes in the three-year period to August 2006.
13 Apr	ICAO's 2006 safety report says there were 13 aircraft accidents involving passenger fatalities on scheduled air services worldwide for aircraft with a maximum take-off mass of more than 2250 kg (usually seven passengers or more). Total passenger fatalities numbered 755. In 2005, there were 712 passenger fatalities from 17 accidents. Despite an increase in passenger fatalities, the accident rate, measured in fatalities per 100 million passenger-kilometers, increased only marginally from 0.0191 in 2005 to about 0.0193 in 2006 - due to an increase of around 5 per cent in passenger-kilometres. For non-scheduled operations, there were 13 accidents involving fatalities for aircraft with a maximum take-off mass of over 2250 kg in 2006 - the same as in 2005. These accidents accounted for 81 passenger fatalities in 2006 compared with 249 in 2005.

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