BA Flight lands short of Runway

[Stephen]

Originally Posted by BBC news

Passengers have been led to safety after a passenger jet landed short of the runway at Heathrow Airport.
The plane was British Airways flight BA38 from Beijing to London.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7194086.stm

Scary Stuff

Only seems to be a few minor injuries, although the aircraft under carrige appears to be badly damaged as the landing gear seems to have collapsed on landing.

[Osem]

Yes - 3 minor injuries thankfully but the media are already doing their best to turn it into something more serious before the facts are properly known. Ah well it's a quiet news day so all the in-depth analysis will come in handy to fill up some air time/pages nicely.......

[BBKing]

It is pretty serious though, that end of Heathrow is notorious for crosswinds and turbulance caused by the large hangars. They're in the middle of redeveloping them, which might be interesting. Mind you, if you're going to bend one, doing it a couple of hundred yards from your main base is a pretty smart place.

Looks from the latest BBC image that the main undercarriage leg has come up through the wing. That's gonna be costly to fix.

[Osem]

Now the calls for further expansion at Heathrow to be shelved begin ...... Everyone wants to fly but nobody wants an airport. Implications for BA, implications for Boeing, implications for Heathrow - this will keep them going for days.

[Damien]

Yup, Cue excessive panic, calls for laws and bills to be introduced, campaigns by one of the tabloids to ask BA 'not to crash planes' etc etc

[Stuart]

"There seems to have been regular dousing of foam on the port engine which obviously probably was the hottest one where the plane landed.

"Certainly there is a lot of activity and lots of vehicles with flashing lights all around the plane."

I am no expert, and I haven't been in a plane crash, but the above is pretty much what I'd expect. They tend to douse the engines in foam whether they are on fire or not, purely because they will be very hot, and unless cooled, can be a fire risk.

[Xaccers]

Grey evacuation chutes? I thought they were supposed to be bright yellow to make them highly visible, not stealth grey?

I bet the local shops are doing a roaring trade in wash powder.

[BBKing]

Just driven past the airport, Plod was out in force on the M4 in the form of three Transits with the full blue flashing going. Two hours late, guys, what's the rush?

Everyone wants to fly

No, everyone wants to go high-speed rail if Eurostar's progress on eliminating airlines on London-Brussels since St. Pancras was opened holds up. Flying's so damned annoying these days that for distances up to 4 hours city-to-city rail wins and in any case Heathrow's an appalling site for a major airport.

Radio 5 lady interviewing a switched-on aviation chap, tried to push the 'hero pilot' line. 'No', came the answer, 'once you've hit the ground there's not much he can do'. Nice to hear some sense. I'm looking forward to someone saying he missed a school or something. It's quite likely it was either a misjudgement by the pilot or strong crosswinds (it's very gusty out there, enough to slam a car door if you don't hold it open).

[Osem]

Originally Posted by BBKing

Just driven past the airport, Plod was out in force on the M4 in the form of three Transits with the full blue flashing going. Two hours late, guys, what's the rush?



No, everyone wants to go high-speed rail if Eurostar's progress on eliminating airlines on London-Brussels since St. Pancras was opened holds up. Flying's so damned annoying these days that for distances up to 4 hours city-to-city rail wins and in any case Heathrow's an appalling site for a major airport.

Radio 5 lady interviewing a switched-on aviation chap, tried to push the 'hero pilot' line. 'No', came the answer, 'once you've hit the ground there's not much he can do'. Nice to hear some sense. I'm looking forward to someone saying he missed a school or something. It's quite likely it was either a misjudgement by the pilot or strong crosswinds (it's very gusty out there, enough to slam a car door if you don't hold it open).

True but it ain't going anywhere soon and given the general oppositon to airports, wherever they are, I'm afraid we're stuck with it.

[handyman]

Originally Posted by BBKing

Looks from the latest BBC image that the main undercarriage leg has come up through the wing. That's gonna be costly to fix.

I would have thought from that picture that it would be a write off.

The wing and fuselage are badly damaged and that is a lot of the structural integrity gone.

[bmxbandit]

Perhaps both pilots had the fish for lunch?

From the way it looks to have landed, would think landing short was intentional. Why, we'll have to wait and see. Only 3 minor injuries is encouraging, though.

[Bob]

I wouldn't imagine they would be allowed to use it again...but then what would I know

Most importantly, no-one has been seriously injured - and well done to the cabin crew

EDIT: Just seen one of the wheels totally separate from the plane

[Pierre]

Strange, planes can land themselves nowadays.

No point speculating, but a passenger on the plane just said that they were given no warning so that would probably rule out the idea that the pilot purposly landed short.

Chances are he was caught out by something.

Lucky, very lucky. I'd have certainly filled my trousers .

[Uncle Peter]

Nasty, looks like the hallmarks of a low speed wind shear accident. Thank heaven nobody was killed or seriously injured.