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Monday, December 3, 2007

Safety News in Brief

Date	Incident
NTSB Meeting Agenda Time and Date: 9:30 a.m., Tuesday, December 4, 2007. (open to the public.) Place: NTSB Conference Center, 429 L'Enfant Plaza SW., Washington, DC 20594. Amongst matters to be considered: (see image at tinyurl.com/35goab) 7772A Aircraft Accident Report--Inflight Cargo Fire, United Parcel Service Company Flight 1307, McDonnell Douglas DC-8-71F, N748UP, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, February 7, 2006. ( reportedly a fire that originated in a pallet of lithium batteries).
29 Nov	The Australian Transport Safety Bureau released a report today on the collapse of a QANTAS 767-300 captain during an overnight flight from Nagoya, Japan, to Cairns on July 9 this year. The copilot heard a bang and turned on the cockpit lights to find his captain lying unconscious on the floor. The 2/ic called the cabin service manager via intercom and was forced to leave his seat to pull the captain clear of the locked inward opening cockpit door, to allow access. The captain was later assessed as afflicted by the norovirus gastro-intestinal illness that was prevalent at the time. Report is at tinyurl.com/36s66k
28 Nov	The latest revision of the European Commission's list of airlines banned from operating in the European Union has excised from the list Pakistan International Airlines and the Surinam carrier Blue Wing Airlines. PIA's corrective action plan is seen as containing "long-lasting sustainable solutions to avoid the same problems recurring in the future." The EC also says that it will also continue to "monitor closely and verify various Russian air carriers on which the Russian authorities have imposed operating restrictions." The EC considers that a combination of national actions and mentoring guidance by the EC's Air Safety Committee has turned around many of the airlines on their blacklist, but not to the extent that sanctions should yet be lifted. Meanwhile last week, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono urged the EU to act swiftly to lift their ban, saying Indonesia was making every effort to improve aviation safety. However an EU Transport Commission spokesman said Wednesday that improvements were still needed. European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso promised to send a team of experts back to Indonesia for the next three-monthly EC review of the blacklist.
28 Nov	All 442 F-15 A through D models in the Air Force inventory were regrounded this week after inspectors looking at the November 2 crash of an F-15C found "possible fleet-wide airworthiness problems," a statement from the Air Force said. Engineering tests on the aircraft have found problems with metal frames -- called longerons -- which hold the fuselage together. The original flight ban on more than 400 F-15 fighters was lifted just over a week ago. The fleet will now undergo more rigorous inspections and repairs. The E model, in production since 1989, is not grounded. Some of the F-15 A through D models have been flying for 23 years.
27 Nov	After becoming aware in May of some substantial lapses in the area of Bulgarian aviation safety and regulatory anomalies, the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) is now back in the new EU member country to observe whether its recommended measures are being implemented. Six months ago EU authorities stripped the licences from four local cargo airlines. Much earlier, in February, Air Sofia, Bright Aviation Services, Skorpion Air and Vega Airlines had lost their rights to service flights... and were already blacklisted for flying in EU airspace as a precautionary measure over "grave deficiencies" in safety procedures. As a EU member state Bulgaria is subject to regular checks by EASA, which provides certificates to companies for operation in the bloc's air space and is responsible for introducing common safety and environmental standards at European level. The EU's air space also includes Switzerland, Iceland and Norway, despite them not being part of the bloc.
27 Nov	It's becoming increasingly unacceptable for airport authorities to allow operations on runways with less than the ICAO recommended runway end safety areas. Sydney airport will now close one of its main runways to permit its RESA to be extended to 90 meters. The $65 million project means Sydneysiders will have to endure increased aircraft noise and the possibility of flights being diverted to other airports. The east-west runway safety area at Sydney Airport will be extended to 90 meters. During periods of strong cross-winds, flights to and from the airport may have to be delayed or even diverted to other airports while the east-west runway remains out of use. This project could take up to a year, beginning in April 2008.
26 Nov	The RAF has admitted that nearly 900 fires had been reported in the past 20 years on Nimrod patrol and surveillance planes - one of which exploded in September, 2006 over Kandahar Afghanistan killing all on board. A report, completed in 2004, says there had been 880 incidents on the planes in which those on board have reported fire, smoke, burning or fumes. The incidents occurred between 1982 and 2004, and it is said RAF crew members had been burned and even forced to fight the fires with hand- held extinguishers. Ministry of Defence documents also confirmed that incidents continued after that report was completed three years ago. a Freedom of Information disclosure detailed how, two years before the accident, the MoD did not act on manufacturer BAE Systems' recommendations that a fire detection system should be fitted.
25 Nov	An ICAO call for airlines to have safety management systems (SMS) in place by January 2009 will probably not be met in the USA as the Federal Aviation Administration and other stakeholders attempt to perfect how the tools are used in practice. The FAA this week held a safety conference to review lessons learned and best practices from the international aviation community in order to further define standards for proactive safety programmes that could help airlines identify hazards, mitigate risks and monitor how well intervention strategies are working. An advisory circular on the topic was issued in June 2006. SMS is intended to permeate a safety awareness culture within FAA and the airlines and avoid any subtle erosion of standards that might come about due to inattention to detail and a lack of awareness at management levels of operational matters.
24 Nov	The TSB investigation of the Air Transat A310 rudder loss over the Caribbean on 06 March 2005 has found that inspection methods and protocols for composite structures is deficient. In other words, the Air Transat impending rudder failure had been present (and the underlying deteriorating structural problem had gone undetected) for quite some time. The explosive separation of the rudder from the aircraft, together with the findings of the examination of the A300/A310 fleets, determined that inspection programs for this type of composite rudder are not adequate for the timely detection of developing defects. The consequences of a rudder separation include reduced directional control and possible separation of the vertical tail plane (or fin). There are no design features in the Airbus sandwich panels to mechanically arrest the growth of disbond damage or in-plane core failure before the damaged area reaches critical size (i.e. such a feature was not specifically demanded for certification). See report Number A05F0047 at tinyurl.com/2su7ao
24 Nov	Qatar airport will soon use Qinetiq's Tarsier radar to monitor its single 4,572- meter-long runway, which is one of the longest in the world, for FOD (foreign object debris). Doha International Airport's ability to continuously inspect runway surfaces day or night, in all weather conditions, with no disruption to aircraft movements will then need to be weighed against the effectiveness of the traditional "drive up and down" visual inspection methods - which famously failed to work for Concorde at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. That French Concorde struck a small strip of inflexible titanium that had fallen off a departing DC-10, setting in train a disastrous tire failure, fuel-tank rupture and engine failure.
24 Nov	No charges were brought against a Virgin Atlantic Airways first officer who was arrested at Heathrow last month after allegations relating to his blood-alcohol levels. The 42-year-old pilot, who was to fly as the third crew member on the Virgin A340 from Heathrow to Miami, was arrested Oct. 28 a few minutes before the flight was to leave. Blood tests showed that the pilot, who was serving as a relief crew member on a service to Miami on 28 October, was under the legal alcohol limit for aviation workers. Virgin Atlantic says the pilot "will not be charged with any offence" as a result of the findings. The carrier adds: "The pilot is now expected to resume flying duties." In April another Virgin pilot was similarly cleared to return to work following a negative blood-alcohol test, conducted after he was held at Heathrow on 31 March ahead of operating a service to New York. The UK news comes days after a Midwest Airlines pilot was also cleared of alcohol charges after being taken off a flight in Minneapolis.
23 Nov	Houston and Miami-Dade departments have been chosen by the FAA to test the use of unmanned aircraft in urban environments. "At this point, the project is strictly on a research level," said Martha Montalvo, executive assistant chief of Houston police. Houston police officials have considered using remote-controlled aircraft for spotting traffic hazards and in search and rescue missions. The department's helicopter pilots will be assigned to the unmanned aircraft duties. The drones will be aircraft provided by Insitu Inc. of Bingen, Wash.
21 Nov	A tech working on a 747 at an airstrip near Marana, Arizona was badly hurt when the landing gear collapsed and he was trapped under the plane. The worker was part of a crew disassembling the retired passenger jet at Pinal Airpark. The landing gear suddenly retracted and the plane fell, trapping Stanley Nye in the gear compartment. He was eventually freed and taken to a Tucson hospital, where he is in a critical condition. The port outboard maingear-pin was pulled, and someone in the cockpit pulled the gear lever to up, according to reports. Gear is normally held in position by overcenter locks and hydraulic pressure - with pins as a backup.
21 Nov	The Delft University of Technology has come up with an imaginative variation on the aircraft control theme that should allow damaged aircraft to remain controllable. Physical loss of a podded engine, a fin or a debilitating hit by a MANPADS missile can spell disaster for the current crop of airliners. Delft has demonstrated how the greater calculation capacity of modern computers and progress in the underlying mathematical theory can make it possible to develop multi-axis control systems that can accommodate levels of damage and asymmetry that would otherwise be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to contend with. Delft publicly demonstrated the technology in a simulator on November 21 for civil and military aviation representatives. The Group for Aeronautical Research and Technology in Europe (Garteur) is an international partnership that has been researching what is now known as Fault Tolerant Control. Another participant in this project is the Netherlands' National Aerospace Laboratory (NLR).
20 Nov	By using a powerful enough algorithm, it is possible to map atmospheric disturbances by using the wind-finding function of the Weather Service's Nexrad radar and mapping a continuous 3D mosaic of where the air is most in turmoil. This information can then be regularly and routinely transmitted to airplanes enroute, allowing their crews to route around any unwelcoming aerial maelstroms that lie ahead of their route of flight. That's the theory of turbulence "nowcasts" and it does seem to be working for United Airlines. They've had the turbulence detection system under test and believe in it. The system uses a formula developed by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and is called Nexrad Turbulence Detection Algorithm (NTDA). It works by real-time analysis of wind distribution data gathered by radar sites and crunching the resulting numbers into predictive patterns. On present plans the system will have coverage over the full continental U.S. by 2011.
19 Nov	Emirates Airlines plan to equip its entire Boeing and Airbus fleet with Honeywell's RAAS (runway awareness and advisory system) to increase its pilot's situational awareness during taxi, takeoff and landing. RAAS is a software upgrade to existing Mk V and Mk VII EGPWS computers. Using GPS data, RAAS issues cautions and advisories based on the aircraft's position and movement when compared to airport locations stored in the EGPWS Runway Database.
15 Nov	EASA has approved A320 Family aircraft for Category IIIb precision approaches using a MLS (microwave landing system). The approval was granted to British Airways, the first customer for the system. BA will start using MLS at Heathrow airport on its A320s and A321s. MLS uses micro-wave signals that are less susceptible to interference, such as antenna screening by aircraft movements or buildings, than an ILS (instrument landing system). Cat IIIb approval for MLS means users will be able to use it to conduct precision approaches with a decision height lower than 15 meters/50 feet. MLS operations are very similar to those using ILS, with straight-in approaches along the runway axis down a standard three degree glide-slope.
14 Nov	The factual report for the Near Collision at 34,000 feet of Far Eastern Air Transport Flight EF306, Boeing 757-200 and Thai International Airways Flight TG659, Boeing 777-300 99 NM South of Jeju Island, Korea on November 16, 2006 is available at: tinyurl.com/yw9qo9

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