Qantas flight experiences hole in aircraft..(CNN report)

[whatkindoffreshhell]

Hole in Qantas jet forces emergency landing
Qantas 747 makes emergency landing in Manila after hole appears in fuselage

Passengers report a loud bang and air swirling around the cabin

The flight was heading from Hong Kong, China, to Melbourne, Australia

No reports of injuries among the 346 passengers and 19 crew, airline says


(CNN) -- A Qantas flight from Hong Kong to Melbourne made an emergency landing in the Philippines on Friday after a hole appeared in the fuselage and the cabin lost pressure suddenly.

Qantas pilot Captain John Francis Bartels looks at the damaged fuselage in Manila, Philippines.

"There was an almighty crack," one passenger said. "We dropped a bit in the air, but other than that it was fine."

"There was a big bang," said another. "I knew there was a hole somewhere, but I didn't know what was going on."

Marina Scaffidi, 39, from Melbourne, told The Associated Press: "There was wind swirling around the plane and some condensation."

She said a hole extended from the cargo hold into the passenger cabin.

Michael Rahill, 57, an architect from Melbourne, told AP the bang sounded "like a tire exploding, but more violently."

Images of the Boeing 747-400 after it landed showed a large hole where the leading edge of the wing attaches to the fuselage.

There were no reports of injuries among the 346 passengers and 19 crew, the airline said in a statement. Oxygen masks were deployed during the emergency

 

[ITRADE]

Rather large? Holy crap, that is BIG......

 

[whatkindoffreshhell]

Did you see the video from inside the plane? The oxygen masks are hanging while the beverage cart is still working the aisle!

Think that plane is beer cans?

 

[USCREW]

Isn't this Qanta's first event ever?

Or maybe I've heard that they have never had a crash?

 

[UAL_TECH]

Pilot: outsourcing work is to blame

Excerpt:

A SENIOR Qantas pilot said yesterday's mid-air calamity could have been the result of the company outsourcing maintenance to Malaysia.

"This could well be the direct result of Qantas having stand-in engineers, or from outsourcing maintenance to Malaysia," he said.

"It has been talked about a lot here and we have been told to be extra vigilant when you walk around the aircraft.

"With Qantas outsourcing maintenance to Malaysia, (it) is certainly worrying a lot of us pilots.

DOH!!!

B) xUT

 

[usairbear]

Qantas has never had a fatal accident, but on September 23, 1999, they had quite a spectacular incident while landing in BKK.

http://www.atsb.gov.au/aviation/editorials/e00012.aspx

 

[Crapdog]

This was caused buy a BOMB. Its too far forward to be caused by the cargo bay fire bottles. Baggage is supposed to stay in their containers. Bomb Threat Link

 

[UAL_TECH]

This was caused buy a BOMB. Its too far forward to be caused by the cargo bay fire bottles. Baggage is supposed to stay in their containers. Bomb Threat Link
View attachment 7767

It 'could' be a bomb, nothing defined yet, only speculation, the threat was 6 days ago (19 July 2008).

B) xUT

 

[tech2101]

It 'could' be a bomb, nothing defined yet, only speculation, the threat was 6 days ago (19 July 2008).

B) xUT

Maybe a bad stringer splice or doubler?

 

[ITRADE]

It will be easy to rule in or out a bomb. The residue from the explosive will be everywhere. And given that stuff inside the hold didnt get to far, there will be parts everywhere.

Here's my question: from the photo, it looks like luggage and clothing up against the hole.

I thought most all luggage loaded onto jumbo jets was loaded into LD4s (or LD3s). Wasn't that a result of PanAm 103?

 

[Crapdog]

Luggage has to be in a container except in the bulk cargo area aft of the aft cargo bay. The floor is wide open with minimal floor panels just to walk on. They make expensive bomb proof Kevlar containers but only EL AL uses them. There was some talk about making then mandatory but they'll only do that if there is another mass killing. Normally airlines carry a spare tire in the bulk cargo area but they may have had one in a maintenance container or even a large crew oxygen bottle. There could have been scuba tanks on board also. All this is pure speculation. Whats really scary is aircraft maintenance in third world countries because of the lack of background over site. A radical mechanic could place hidden bombs behind cargo bay wall panels that would go off at the same time. Could you imagine 50 airplanes blowing up at the same time? This has been discussed in the US but there are no ears in Washington.

 

[UAL_TECH]

Here is another 'WAG'...

Qantas jet drama ‘due to oxygen explosion’

Excerpt:

A source close to the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) in Australia said: “It is looking extremely likely that one or more of the oxygen tanks exploded. It’s never happened before so nobody knows what caused it. It could be as simple as some cargo shifting and smashing into it, which shouldn’t be able to happen.â€￾

The investigators added, however, that it is too early to discount metal fatigue, whereby the fuselage is weakened over time by the expansion and contraction of the plane during take-off and landing. This creates tiny cracks in the fuselage which are invisible to the eye, but which can eventually give way.

As well as the debris, investigators also found that the floor above the tanks had been pushed upwards, which is more consistent with an explosion.

The CASA source said: “In a normal depressurisation, if a fuselage had metal fatigue and a hole was suddenly ripped in it, everything would be sucked down and out. But in fact the floor above the bottles has been blown upwards, which is more consistent with an explosion.â€￾

B) xUT

 

[whatkindoffreshhell]

MANILA, Philippines (AP) -- Investigators found fragments that appeared to bolster the theory that an oxygen tank exploded on board a Qantas jet, forcing it to make an emergency landing with a car-sized hole in its fuselage, an official said Monday.


Qantas pilot Captain John Francis Bartels looks at the damaged fuselage in Manila, Philippines.

A valve and other small fragments that were found would be tested to determine if they came from the tank, which is designed to provide oxygen to passengers during an emergency, said Neville Blyth, a senior investigator from the Australian Transport and Safety Bureau.

"We recovered ... a valve from an oxygen cylinder," Blyth said. "It is likely that that valve is from the missing cylinder."

The fragments were found close to where the missing tank was stored beneath the passenger cabin, he said.

If the valve and other small fragments are determined to have come from the cylinder, further investigation would be required to determine why the tank burst, he said.

The 747-400 had to make an emergency landing in the Philippines after a quick descent from 29,000 feet Friday. The more than 365 passengers and crew, who reported hearing a loud bang before the plane suddenly depressurized, were not injured.

Meanwhile, Qantas Chief Executive Geoff Dixon said Monday that the company did not know what caused the mid-flight blast but suggested the cause was likely mechanical and not human error.

"Obviously there is every chance it is something to do with the aircraft, and it is something that may have well been out of our control. More than likely it was," he said at a news conference in Sydney, Australia.

He described Friday's events as "a very, very bad accident."

Months ago, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration warned airlines to inspect oxygen cylinders on their planes.

The air-worthiness directive, issued in April and effective in May, followed a report that certain oxygen cylinder supports in Boeing 747-400s may not have been properly heat-treated, which the FAA said could cause oxygen leakage and subsequent fire hazards.

David Cox, Qantas' head of engineering, told reporters on Monday that the FAA directive applies to a different type of oxygen system than the one being scrutinized in the Qantas emergency. The cylinders covered under the directive are located in a different part of the plane than where the Qantas aircraft sustained damage.

Three of Qantas' aircrafts were affected by the directive and all were inspected by January 2007, Cox said.

Sydney-based Qantas Airways has been ordered to urgently inspect every oxygen bottle aboard its fleet of 30 Boeing 747s, which is expected to take several days.