View Single Post
Jeff Higgins Jeff Higgins is online now
Registered
 
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Higgs Field
Posts: 22,776
Great photos here:

Notgelandeter Airbus: Trümmer auf Batam - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten - Reise

From an AOG guy's perspective, that hole in the top of the fuel cell (the duller gray area aft of the black line) is going to be tough to fix. It's in a continuous, structural skin that very well may (depending on their design) span the entire wing. At a minimum, it spans half the wing, depending on where it might taper out on the outboard side. The hole forward of the black line is all just fiberglass or other composite leading edge panel, which is easy to replace.

There are typically 3-4 of these span-wise panels comprising the upper side of the wing center box, the main structural member of the wing that doubles as a fuel tank. The rest of the center box is made up of the lower wing panels and the front, main, and rear spars, plus any intermediate or partial spars. The piece that penetrated this upper panel had to go through either the front spar or the equivilent panel on the lower wing. In other words, at a bare minimum, it looks like possibly two major structural members of the wing have been compromised. Parts that we don't patch - we replace them. It ain't cheap to do that...
__________________
Jeff
'72 911T 3.0 MFI
'93 Ducati 900 Super Sport
"God invented whiskey so the Irish wouldn't rule the world"
Old 11-04-2010, 11:44 AM
  Pelican Parts Catalog | Tech Articles | Promos & Specials    Reply With Quote #3 (permalink)