Coming out of Shanghai recently I called for gear up. The other guy moved the lever up but nothing happenned. The A340 undercarriage is controlled by something called an LGCIU (landing gear control and interface unit) which is essentially just one of the many computers. There are in fact 2 LGCIU’s which take it in turns to do their job, swapping over on each gear extension. When the gear failed to retract we recycled the lever in order to utilise the other LGCIU but still nothing happened. The next option was to reset both LGCIU’s in the hope that one would come back online. This is done by pulling out what looks like a circuit breaker on the overhead panel and interupts the power supply to that computer. Pushing it back in restores power and ‘reboots’ it. In our case this did the job and up came the wheels.
Hope that was simple enough!

My last flight in a long haul club cabin was in the mid 90’s and short haul several times over the last few years. Surely (beds and IFE aside) there should be no difference in service standards between club cabins?

…And for those who think I’m just looking for ‘dramatics’, you are wrong…

Perhaps we can be the judge of that if we can see the article first?

Well then on that basis alone Virgin has been ahead for years. A flat bed has been the standard Virgin Upper Class cabin for a few years now. It is so popular that last year Virgin started making large amounts of money selling their own design to other carriers too.

So finally BA show signs of wanting to catch up with the competition! 😉 😀 😉

Thanks for posting the picture of spamcan G-BMTB as it was the aircraft I did my PPL General Flying Test in 20 years ago!

Maybe a stupid question but what real benefit do HUDs give to a civil aircraft ?

So useful that easyJet took theirs out! Bearing in mind that we have zero decision height landing capability already without it I’m not convinced on the necessity for it. The danger is that if it is fitted but unserviceable it will then probably restrict your landing capabilty whereas without it fitted at all we have full capability!!!