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Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

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Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#151

Post by MSFT_Edging »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #115
MSFT_Edging wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand "don't take any bags as we deplane down the emergency slide", but the hold is weird. I'd probably get arrested in the process of being like "No the bag with my important possessions I keep next to me on purpose is coming with me" They were probably rushed off due to being unsure about fire hazards, and people digging through carryons for wallets and stuff would probably slow that down a lot, considering…

The right time to grab wallet was after the pilot explained the issue and next steps.

Probably didn't want everyone standing up in the aisle messing with the overheads all at once.

Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#153

Post by gambiting »

nunuvit wrote: post #129
nkozyra wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not saying this should be an alternative , but having read a lot of transcripts and video of things like this, I wonder why there aren't outside cameras that would potentially give pilots a visual indication of plane conditions outside? Is it just the cost of supporting resilient cameras? A lot of incident reports have flight attendants or copilots leaving to try to make visual confirmation of things that it seems wo…

You'd gain nothing, they can already see it with their eyeballs, and they don't require anything else like faster response or a different viewpoint. You'd lose in terms of putting another hole in the aircraft and maintaining another system, and you'd still need the manual procedure in case the camera didn't work.

....how can they see the area where the front gear is from within the plane?

Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#154

Post by EMM_386 »

ipnon wrote: post #95
Tepix wrote: post #7

Did they know in advance that they were having problems? Edit: Answer: Yes ... the crew initiated a go around due to a unsafe nose gear indication, climbed to 4000 feet and entered a hold to work the checklists. After working the checklists the crew declared emergency and requested emergency services on stand by. The aircraft performed a low approach to runway 36L, positioned for another approach to runway 36L and la…

There is an algorithm for everything in aviation. If you suspect your landing gear is not functional, you typically fly by a tower and have them make visual confirmation. Then you have another algorithm (they call them procedures) for how to land without gear. The airport likewise has a checklist of everything to do in this case. All of these procedures are hard won, the NTSB uses every hull failure and fatal acciden…

> There is an algorithm for everything in aviation

This is how I got my commercial pilot's license, and I'm a senior software engineer.

It just "clicked" with my brain to follow specific procedures ("algorithms") for absolutely everything. Checklists, strict rules, "flows", handling emergencies. It all felt natural to me.

They will throw random stuff at you during checkrides. Pull the power back on one of the engines right after takeoff saying it failed, fail instruments that you were using to navigate, blindfold you ("foggles") and put you almost upside down and then say "recover!".

But you have everything so ingrained in your mind by that point that it's almost robotic. You just look at the inputs (almost upside down, engine #2 is gone, no attitude indicator, whatever it is) and know what the output is supposed to be (roll to unload Gs, lower the nose, full power, check the standby AI, etc).

I happen to work well when there are strict rules and procedures. If this, then that.

Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#155

Post by mulmen »

sowbug wrote: post #81
pavel_lishin wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the aircraft are designed to handle the stress. I wonder how the runway fares after this.

Not answering your question, but a bit of interesting trivia for you. Large passenger airplanes routinely take off with too much fuel to land safely. If one took off, circled the airport once, and landed, then it might actually break apart on landing because of the mass of the fuel being sloshed around as the airplane touches down. That's why planes preferably dump or burn off excess fuel before an unscheduled early…

I don't think the airplane is going to break up, just that it would need inspection and perhaps repair if touching down over weight.

Blancolirio covers this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4D2Kj0t4t9s

Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#156

Post by nradov »

ghaff wrote: post #139
bbatsell wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Delta and Hawaiian are the two US operators. Hawaiian loves it, and is struggling to replace it. They use them for island-hopping. Modern airliners don't do well in this use case — modern engines have been engineered to tight tolerances to extract fuel economy, and their thermal designs rely on the cold air at cruise altitude to keep them healthy. Island hops are too short and too low for that to hold. The engines on…

The Hawaiian Islands are sort of an interesting case. Island hopping is short for jets (and a lot of people don't really like flying small props). But they're really too far apart for a ferry service between the major islands; it was tried at one point but went out of business.

The Hawaii Superferry went bankrupt mostly due to political and environmental protests. Distance between the main populated islands isn't very far.

Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#157

Post by xwdv »

telotortium wrote: post #144
xwdv wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You guys have wallets? Seems like the only possession you’d really need to do anything useful is your phone.

> You guys have wallets? Seems like the only possession you’d really need to do anything useful is your phone. I wouldn't want to be stuck away from home on a flight without some physical ID. Also don't want to completely rely on Apple Pay to buy anything (not to mention that some stores still don't take Apple Pay).

First of all, contrary to popular belief you don’t need physical ID at airports, you can go through another process to have your identity verified, it takes longer but it’s trivial.

Second, any place that doesnt take Apple Pay is not a place you should do business at. Even lowly kiosks and vending machines accept Apple Pay now. The places that are NOT accepting Apple Pay are a red flag, they are doing something nefarious by holding onto the old system of credit card processing (there are benefits and incentives to use contact less payments and places that refuse are actively missing out for a reason, there is literally no good reason to not take Apple Pay).

Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#159

Post by kube-system »

Tepix wrote: post #7

Did they know in advance that they were having problems? Edit: Answer: Yes ... the crew initiated a go around due to a unsafe nose gear indication, climbed to 4000 feet and entered a hold to work the checklists. After working the checklists the crew declared emergency and requested emergency services on stand by. The aircraft performed a low approach to runway 36L, positioned for another approach to runway 36L and la…

For context: passenger jets have a positive feedback system that indicates to the pilots whether or not the gear is in the correct position. When they operate the control to raise or lower the gear, there are corresponding indicator lights that confirm whether or not the gear has successfully moved to the commanded position. Part of standard procedure is to lower the gear, and then verify that all of the indicator lights confirm that the gear has successfully moved into the correct position. If they are not working properly, it is apparent from the indicator lights. They will then know that they will have to abort the approach and run troubleshooting checklists for that particular issue.

Re: Delta flight lands in Charlotte without front landing gear

#160

Post by alistairSH »

gambiting wrote: post #153
nunuvit wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd gain nothing, they can already see it with their eyeballs, and they don't require anything else like faster response or a different viewpoint. You'd lose in terms of putting another hole in the aircraft and maintaining another system, and you'd still need the manual procedure in case the camera didn't work.

....how can they see the area where the front gear is from within the plane?

The pilots "see" it with sensors.

The tower sees it with a set of binoculars. Hopefully.

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