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Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

theguardian.com

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Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#341

Post by alistairSH »

Arch-TK wrote: post #96
bravesoul2 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it a thing? Everything else in aviation seems to have good amounts of checks, balances and buffers. It feels the same to me as skimping a couple percent on fuel or doing less frequent maintenance. Both also reduce turnaround time.

Usually some form of mis-management which in this case may have put pressure on the pilot to accept a shorter take-off option due to some minutes of time saved. Sometimes pilots also might get their priorities wrong. There's a concept of "get-there-itis" which is also a common cause of crashes but it's currently unclear if it was a factor in this case. I imagine in a while we will all be able to read the investigatio…

A recent, famous case of "get-there-itis" would be the 2020 Calabasas helicopter crash (that killed Kobe Bryant and several friends/family members).

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#342

Post by joncrane »

leetrout wrote: post #11

FlightRadar24 shows them doing an intersection departure with only half the runway. Assuming this is accurate I would think this is a terrible idea in a large, heavy aircraft (and I realize they might not have been heavy for this flight). When I was flying I would regularly hear airliners refuse intersection departures past a few hundred feet from the end of the runway due to company SOPs. https://www.flightradar24.c…

they backtracked and used the full runway

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#343

Post by randomNumber7 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #119
SecretDreams wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's footage after takeoff of it descending with the air ram deployed, no engine power, gears down, and flaps up. TBD on the cause, but loss of engines for some reason seems to be the case. I do agree that a lot of info comes out first week that isn't all right. I'm just reciting what's been shown in videos.

> I'm just reciting what's been shown in videos Of unknown provenance, with unknown visual artefacts, et cetera . Even if completely legit, with context and thus chain of causation obscured to the point that discerning ultimate and proximate causes is impossible.

Some people trust their own thinking to judge what they see.

We know it called mayday and then lost communication. It also stopped transmitting GPS data.

Looking at this it likely lost all electric power. The electric power comes from generators driven by the turbines.

If you lose both turbines you lose electricity. You also lose the hydraulic system so you can not get in the gear or change flaps.

Occam's razor checks out.

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#344

Post by bombcar »

foenix wrote: post #253
brunohaid wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good question. False sense of routine, experience? Definitely a pet peeve. Was flying as a passenger on a really small airline (8 seater plane, Green Air) out of San Jose in Costa Rica. We got cleared for takeoff ahead of a United 737, at most 500 feet into the humongous runway for that plane. Yet the pilots still put in the 2 minute effort to taxi back to the beginning of the runway, even though they could have easi…

Pilot here: even in my small Cessna I will backtrack do you know why? Because it gives me that money more options to work with in case something goes wrong with my take off.

The most useless things in the world are runway behind you, altitude above you, and fuel in the fuel truck.

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#345

Post by tim333 »

storus wrote: post #333
msravi wrote: post #255

Apparently, there's a survivor. https://x.com/sidhant/status/1933160167816007842

Seat 11A. That's interesting, typically most survivors are located in the back, this one was in the front-center.

The plane seemed to come down tail down so I guess that end would have absorbed the shock more. 11A is front left by the way.

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#346

Post by gopher_space »

LostMyLogin wrote: post #294
nindalf wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pro tip from an absolute rando: don’t bother with any source of breaking news. Read a weekly paper that summarises the important stuff. If something is truly pressing, you’ll hear about it from friends or coworkers.

Suggestions for some sources to read? I know the Economist, anything else others would recommend?

Christian Science Monitor, Mother Jones.

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#347

Post by randomNumber7 »

buildsjets wrote: post #261
detaro wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most airplanes can dump fuel, but it's not an immediate thing, so not really applicable here (and obviously doing it over a city is to be avoided as well). It's primarily needed for weight management in planes that can take off heavier than they can safely land. I.e. if the plane had enough control to abort the flight and return to the airport, then it might have been appropriate.

No. Most airliners CANNOT dump fuel. This capability is limited to long range wide bodies, like this 787. Neither the 737 nor the A320, which constitute the majority of commercial air traffic, can dump fuel. Fuel dumping is normally performed at an altitude where it should be able to evaporate before hitting the ground, and it takes a long time, maybe 15 minutes to get from full fuel to maximum landing weight. Using…

A more dispersed fire. The amount of fuel isn't changed by dumping.

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#348

Post by __m »

bartread wrote: post #73
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #25

Gentle tip from a lifelong aviation enthusiast: wait one week before reading on causation. Exposing yourself to first-week speculation isn’t just unproductive, it’s often counterproductive since the actual findings can rhyme with the false speculation closely enough that you wind up muddling the two in your mind.

Yeah, I think I might wait for the MentourPilot take on this one. I can't see any benefit in speculating. Horrifying that it came down in a residential area with almost all its fuel still on board though. The aftermath is beyond belief.

Compulsive debuggers, probably not uncommon here

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#349

Post by newhope1978 »

nindalf wrote: post #306
LostMyLogin wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suggestions for some sources to read? I know the Economist, anything else others would recommend?

Economist for me. I don't know of any other sources that can reach the same level.

of what, bias?

Re: Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with more than 240 onboard

#350

Post by sokoloff »

dylan604 wrote: post #291
bartread wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I think I might wait for the MentourPilot take on this one. I can't see any benefit in speculating. Horrifying that it came down in a residential area with almost all its fuel still on board though. The aftermath is beyond belief.

9/11 showed us the damages of a plane crash with a full load of fuel can do and goes to show why dumping fuel is part of the procedures when planes are coming inf for a landing under "strained" conditions.

Fuel dumping is overwhelmingly to prevent or minimize an overweight landing and subsequent brake/tire overheating and inspections. It’s got not much to do with minimizing fuel-fed fire after impact.
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