Safe landing in Houston... to be a fly on a newsroom wall.

[Jims5543]

I saw the emergency landing on Fox. I was actually jumping between Fox and CNN. I stuck with Fox because Shep has a knack for putting his foot in his mouth.

He made it obvious that they were disapointed that the plane did not crash.


Kudos to the pilot for a perfect uneventful landing.

Both tires on one side of the planes main gear were blown out and well, just gone, only the rims remained.

Pilot put her down so gentle I doubt anyone in the cabin even noticed the tires were missing. Bravo!

[jjwood]

Yea -- we're a few miles away from the airport (in the Woodlands). The local TV coverage sure got our attention. For a while they were talking about the plane dumping it's fuel. Anyone know how many feet up in the air a plane would have to be for the fuel to 'evaporate' (or whatever it does) or does it actually hit the gound as fuel?

Kudos to the pilot and crew -- and all the gound personel ready to jump into harm's way. We're so glad it ended well.

IMO the TV coverage was a bit 'over the top', reminds me of Hurricane Rita coverage. More information and longer than we need.

[Mulhollanddose]

Originally posted by Jim Cesiro
I saw the emergency landing on Fox. I was actually jumping between Fox and CNN. I stuck with Fox because Shep has a knack for putting his foot in his mouth.

Ya, Shep is one of the many liberals that Fox thinks they need to uphold the appearance of objectivity.

[rattlsnak]

The ERJ cant dump fuel. So no worries!

[Tervuren]

Originally posted by jjwood
Yea -- we're a few miles away from the airport (in the Woodlands). The local TV coverage sure got our attention. For a while they were talking about the plane dumping it's fuel. Anyone know how many feet up in the air a plane would have to be for the fuel to 'evaporate' (or whatever it does) or does it actually hit the gound as fuel?

Kudos to the pilot and crew -- and all the gound personel ready to jump into harm's way. We're so glad it ended well.

IMO the TV coverage was a bit 'over the top', reminds me of Hurricane Rita coverage. More information and longer than we need.

I beleive tihs would be "burning it up" via the engines while taking a long time in flight.

[Joeaksa]

Originally posted by jjwood
Anyone know how many feet up in the air a plane would have to be for the fuel to 'evaporate' (or whatever it does) or does it actually hit the gound as fuel?

Kudos to the pilot and crew -- and all the gound personel ready to jump into harm's way. We're so glad it ended well.

5000 feet is generally considered the minimum for dumping fuel but even if you are that low, there are cars and such that will end up getting sprinkled. Higher is better in this case and we really prefer to be over water or non-populated areas when dumping is required.

Jim,

Actually landing with no tires on the rim would be easier than having two flat tires still on the wheels. Remember the Air France Concorde that went down? It went down because of a piece of tire that got cut by a piece of metal on the runway then going through a wing and into a fuel tank, which then caught fire.

With no remnants of tires on the rim there is nothing to flail around and cause damage when they spin up on the landing. Plain empty rims would spark a lot and yaw a bit to one side but that would actually be a fairly easy landing.

Joe (who has dumped fuel several times and hopes he does not have to ever do it again!)

[artplumber]

How complex is the fuel dump system that they wouldn't have it on a small, but modern jet?

[Seahawk]

Originally posted by Joeaksa
Joe (who has dumped fuel several times and hopes he does not have to ever do it again!)

Ditto.

[Joeaksa]

Originally posted by artplumber
How complex is the fuel dump system that they wouldn't have it on a small, but modern jet?

Peter,

There is just no rhyme nor reason about this. The Learjets that I flew for 20 years had a very good and simple system. 40% of the fuel was gone in less than 5 minutes then you landed.

The big birds that I fly now have a minimal dump, and they can take up to 45 minutes to dump 30% of the fuel if needed. Thats not much and 45 minutes is a long time when the red or yellow lights are flashing in the cockpit.

The Swissair airplane that crashed in Newfoundland might have been able to get down had the flight crew not used up so much of their time circling in the weather dumping fuel. We now know to hell with landing overweight, when there is an issue, get the bird on the ground and now.

The thing is that the dump system is used about .0000000001% of the flights, so its not considered very important. Until you need it that is.

Joe A

PS You really only have too much fuel on the airplane in one instance, when you are on fire!

[oldE]

Joe,

You only missed it by a few hundred miles. Swissair Flight 111 went down within sight of Peggy's Cove while turning to dump fuel before attempting to land at Halifax, Nova Scotia (YHZ).

Fly safe, eh?

Les

[JeremyD]

Thanks for the pilot info - very interesting. As far as the news weenies - they did the same thing here a few years ago - you could see the glee in their face about the potential hurricane coming ashore. After 4 in six weeks - and a couple of the dumbasses getting hit by flying debris - they changed their tone.

[DaveE]

Originally posted by Mulhollanddose
Ya, Shep is one of the many liberals that Fox thinks they need to uphold the appearance of objectivity.

Yeah, all those damn liberals on Fox!! It's disgusting!

[Joeaksa]

Les,

A few hundred miles in that area is in someone's back yard!

Sorry about that!

joe

[Tim Hancock]

I typically am about 6-8" off the water when I dump. Allthough an occasional Porta-John incident sometimes requires higher altitudes.

[Z-man]

Originally posted by Tim Hancock
I typically am about 6-8" off the water when I dump. Allthough an occasional Porta-John incident sometimes requires higher altitudes.

If you're using a porta-john, then unless you have one at home, that means you're not crapping in your own nest.

I guess that makes you a conservative Repulican.
Mmmm - cross-thread taunting....

-Z.