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United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

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Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#231
post #57

Oddly enough, something similar happened today just a few kilometers from where i live. https://www.aviation24.be/airlines/longtail-aviation/boeing-...

today was quite weird for Boeing airplanes, as well as for United. United Flight 1832 (a 737-8) from Cancun to Houston had a single engine shutdown on the way and had to divert to New Orleans.

I'm an Air Traffic Controller at Houston Center, and a regular user of this website. Today I was the Radar Associate controller in the Ocean West sector when that aircraft flew through.

The Radar Associate works alongside the Radar Controller, and performs coordinations and other actions to assist the Radar Controller. It is the Radar Controller who talks with the aircraft on frequency.

In the Ocean West sector, the Radar Associate controller coordinates with Mexico's Air Traffic Controllers to determine safe routes, altitudes, and crossing times at the FIR boundary, as well as pass along any other pertinent information.

I won't answer any questions about today's event here, but if anyone has any other questions, feel free to ask. I will also double-check the FAA's social media guidelines when I go back to work tomorrow. So, if I don't answer your question today, please check tomorrow.

TF or "Tango Foxtrot" are my operating initials - something which every Air Traffic Controller has and is unique per facility. We use our operating initials to identify ourselves when we perform coordinations via the landline.

I was also a Radar Associate controller at HCF Center (in Hawaii) for United Flight 1175, a Boeing 777, from San Fransisco to Honolulu when it lost its engine cowling back in 2018.

The views expressed here are my own and not necessarily those of FAA.

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#232

Probably a dumb question, but why don't the pilots cut the fuel to the right engine after they know it's on fire?

Someone in the comments mentioned that that isn't a fuel fire; its materials in the engine that are burning.

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#233
post #134

That quoted ground observer. Do they work for the NTSB or something? I am 110% certain that if I saw a plane on fire in the sky, I would not have the presence of mind to remember the term "cloud deck", let alone the rest of those details. Ground observer: "Good sir, I do say that the cloud deck was quite low so I didn't get a good look, but the engine was mildly louder than usual, and possibly had smoke, but perhaps…

It's very likely that they're an AvHerald reader. It's the absolute de facto gold standard website in its field, and sensationalism and drama is not appreciated -- a large chunk of the usual audience are aviation professionals. My dad was a pilot, and I've got some few hours myself. You can bet that if either of us watched this event happen, we'd mentally be documenting it as best as we possibly can, both to try to p…

I can draw some parallels between that and a healthy SRE culture. Except for the casualties, of course. Wondering if the first SREs who created the guidelines had aviation industry experience.

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#234
post #3

How's that possible it managed to fly with only one engine ?

The other engine provides enough thrust to keep the plane airborne. The pilots (and likely other onboard systems) compensate for the asymmetric thrust with the rudder. As scary as it looks, this is one type of event that pilots routinely train for, both to get their initial multi-engine certification, and on their airlines’ simulators.

> The other engine provides enough thrust to keep the plane airborne.

We could hear the remaining (loud) engine as the plane flew over. Our house is less than 2 miles from where the parts landed and right under its flight path.

The boom just before that sounded like a sonic boom and shook our house perceptibly.

There's been some property damage (a smashed truck top and a big hole in a roof) but no reports of injuries to this time (18:45 Mountain time).

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm wading into waters that are way over my head here, but my understanding is that it is possible for software to be provably correct, in the mathematical sense of "proof." I'm well aware of the admixture of folklore, experience, and caffeine-fueled inspiration that constitutes much of the software that runs our world.

I think being able to prove that a program can be correct is getting close to P=NP territory.

It's very difficult but there have been strides in that direction: http://web1.cs.columbia.edu/~junfeng/09fa-e6998/papers/sel4....

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#236
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BREAKING NEWS: More people died of COVID today. I see see often headlines in my Google news feed saying something along those lines. I've stopped clicking on YouTube videos that give me no idea what they are going to be in the thumbnail/title. For example on Linus Tech Tips second channel ShortCiruit a good chunk of their videos do this. Latest one from 3 years ago in my sub box "I almost hurt myself open this...." a…

I'm in the same boat .. actually, I'm more set in my ways, if the title doesn't tell me what it's about, I don't bother looking at the thumbnail. Here are some titles from recent videos: I REALLY Love Building Computers!! Never seen one of these before... Sorry. Your gaming laptop sucks now. Maybe upgrading is pointless….. Linus was right. It's such click-bait, and so annoying. It's sad about LTT too. I can't find it…

>but I saw a video of his talking about this. He doesn't actually like these titles, but claims to have proof they improve viewership counts

Veritasium also had video on this topic: https://youtu.be/fHsa9DqmId8?t=1041

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The straightforward captions are also delightful: > The aircraft seen in flight > The engine inlet in a garden > Engine debris on the Broomfield soccer field

Counterpoint to the last two: - it's just a front yard (It would make a good CAPTCHA question - select all photos of gardens. Anyone choosing a photo of this yard before the debris landed there would fail.) - there's more than one soccer field in Broomfield

I'm pretty sure "garden" is being used in the British sense, roughly corresponding to "yard" in American English.

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#238

Simon (the founder & proprietor of The Aviation Herald) is an incredible force for good in the world. His work on that site, for well over a decade now, is legendary.

Fun fact: the response header [1] of that website suggests it is powered by Apache and Perl. Which is amazing in itself. And it's still responsive despite being #1 on HN.

[1] Apache/2.2.17 (Unix) mod_ssl/2.2.17 OpenSSL/1.0.2r mod_perl/2.0.4 Perl/v5.10.0

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#239
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BREAKING NEWS: More people died of COVID today. I see see often headlines in my Google news feed saying something along those lines. I've stopped clicking on YouTube videos that give me no idea what they are going to be in the thumbnail/title. For example on Linus Tech Tips second channel ShortCiruit a good chunk of their videos do this. Latest one from 3 years ago in my sub box "I almost hurt myself open this...." a…

Offtopic to OP but regarding Linus Tech Tips: I also stopped watching 90% of all LMG (his company) videos (on all their channels) because of the clickbait forcing me to click onto things that I am not interested in, only to quickly leave the video. I am not going to watch what I don't want to watch whether it has a clickbait thumbnail and title or not, so they just annoy me more with this. I have not voiced my opinio…

Yeah it seems like almost all of their videos are using clickbaity titles now especially on the secondary channels like ShortCiruit. My viewership of their videos has really dropped. I'm sure they have seen results from gaming the recommended videos but I'd be interested to see if it has affected how many average viewers they get from the subscribed people.

Man first you had to get AdBlock, and recently it feels necessary to use SponsorBlock, and now it feels like there needs to be a new one called ClickBaitBlock which maybe swaps the video titles for a user voted new title similar to SponsorBlock. I'd actually install it if it existed.

Re: United B772 at Denver on Feb 20th 2021, engine inlet separates from engine

#240
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BREAKING NEWS: More people died of COVID today. I see see often headlines in my Google news feed saying something along those lines. I've stopped clicking on YouTube videos that give me no idea what they are going to be in the thumbnail/title. For example on Linus Tech Tips second channel ShortCiruit a good chunk of their videos do this. Latest one from 3 years ago in my sub box "I almost hurt myself open this...." a…

I'm in the same boat .. actually, I'm more set in my ways, if the title doesn't tell me what it's about, I don't bother looking at the thumbnail. Here are some titles from recent videos: I REALLY Love Building Computers!! Never seen one of these before... Sorry. Your gaming laptop sucks now. Maybe upgrading is pointless….. Linus was right. It's such click-bait, and so annoying. It's sad about LTT too. I can't find it…

Here's the video where Linus goes into it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DzRGBAUz5mA

I'll give him credit for being straight about it.

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