posted 10-07-2004 01:48 PM                       

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Do a search on "Gimli Glider" (sorry Daryl! [Embarrassed] ) for the story of an Air Canada B-767 that became a glider one day in July 1983. Not to worry, the amazing story has a happy ending.

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posted 11-11-2004 01:54 PM                       

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October 20, 2004

MONTREAL – The Canadian pilot who was hailed as a hero for gliding a packed, powerless airliner to an emergency landing in the Azores three years ago made mistakes that allowed all the jet's fuel to drain out through an engine leak, a Portuguese aviation agency said Monday.

Portugal's Aviation Accidents Prevention and Investigation Department said the leak was caused by improper replacement of a Rolls-Royce engine on the Airbus 330 jet operated by Canadian charter flight operator Air Transat.

Capt. Robert Piche avoided calamity for the Air Transat flight's 306 passengers and crew when he flew the big jet for 65 miles without power, gliding through darkened skies to make a landing-gear-crunching landing at the Lajes Airport in Terceira.

The only injuries – to 16 passengers and two crew members – came during the evacuation of the plane on the Lajes runway.

Piche said the report represents the final chapter in the incident and would not comment further.

Piche's deft command of the flight's last 19 minutes, when the jet was without engine power, has been cited as one of the finest piloting achievements in modern aerospace.

But in its 103-page report on the "all engines-out landing," the agency suggested Piche's heroics might not have been needed had the crew followed proper procedures in detecting and dealing with a fuel leak in the right engine.

The investigating agency said the crew did not correctly evaluate the engine-leak situation, and then did not follow the proper checklist.

Instead of shutting down the fuel lines leading to the right engine, the crew cross-fed fuel from the left-engine tanks to the source of the leak. That allowed all of the jet fuel to drain.

"The flight crew did not recognize that a fuel leak situation existed and carried out the fuel imbalance procedure from memory, which resulted in the fuel from the left tanks being fed to the leak in the right engine," the agency said.

The 103-page report details the events that led up to the Aug. 24, 2001, flight from Toronto to Lisbon, which took off with more than enough fuel to reach its intended destination.

Problems began days earlier when Air Transat's maintenance crew replaced the jet's right engine with one that had not been retrofitted for an updated configuration.

Air Transat technicians did not review a Rolls-Royce service bulletin that would have indicated a hazard in mismatching fuel and hydraulic lines, the agency said.

As a result, a fuel inlet tube on the newly installed right engine failed after chafing and hard contact with a hydraulic line, the agency said.

About four hours into the flight, the crew noticed unusual oil readings in the right engine, and then a fuel imbalance between the left and right inner-wing tanks.

The flight crew diverted to the Azores as the fuel problem worsened. About 150 miles from Lajes, the right engine flamed out. The left engine followed suit 13 minutes later.

Flying without engine power, the passenger cabin dark save for emergency lighting, Piche brought the Airbus down to a hard, tire-shredding landing.

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Air Transat Flight 236
By Devon Leslie
It had been a relatively calm flight on the morning of August 24th, 2001. Air Transat Flight 236 out of Toronto was heading to Lisbon, Portugal to deliver a new batch of vacationers. The Airbus 330, cruising at 39,000, sped through the atmosphere at .84 Mach while her passengers slept. She was the pride of the airline, and she let everyone know as the whir of her Rolls-Royce engines sang to the occupants. Only the aircraft fuel computer knew the dark secret brewing on the right wing. A secret that had been interpreted as a fuel imbalance in the right tank. It was only a matter of time before the secret would shake every occupants' courage to their knees.

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Pilot hero of Azores jet landing made errors-report
Mon Oct 18, 2004 04:47 PM ET
By Robert Melnbardis
MONTREAL, Oct 18 (Reuters) - The Canadian pilot who was hailed as a hero for gliding a packed, powerless airliner to an emergency landing in the Azores three years ago made mistakes that allowed all the jet's fuel to drain out through an engine leak, a Portuguese aviation agency said on Monday.

Portugal's Aviation Accidents Prevention and Investigation Department also said improper replacement of a Rolls-Royce (RR.L: Quote, Profile, Research) engine on the Airbus 330 jet, which was operated by Canadian charter flight operator Air Transat, led to the fuel leak.

Air Transat is owned by vacation travel company Groupe Transat A.T. Inc. (TRZ.TO: Quote, Profile, Research) , while European aerospace group EADS (EAD.PA: Quote, Profile, Research) owns Airbus.

Captain Robert Piche avoided calamity for the Air Transat flight's 306 passengers and crew when he flew the big jet for 65 nautical miles (120 km, 75 miles) without power, gliding silently through darkened skies to make a landing-gear-crunching landing at the Lajes Airport in Terceira.

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