RE: Future of 3 engined commercial liners

I agree with Kabir. I doubt we’ll see another tri-jet as modern twins are so economical and passengers now seem to fully accept ETOPS on long haul flights. Several decades ago (in the US) you could only get a 300′ minima for a precision approach in a twin jet whereas you could go down to 200′ if you had 3 or more engines. This was a principal reason for the Americans pushing tri-jets until this rule was abolished and common sense occured. The original spec for the 757 was a tri-jet!

RE: Anyone know the best day f

Condor, JMC and Sun Express (in Turkey) do not take on the Thomas Cook identity until this winter. The only aircraft in TC colours are the 5 ex-JMC A320’s operating as Thomas Cook Airlines in Brussels.

RE: Pic Of The Day-MD 11

The MD12 was the potential winner for McDD but its critical wing section did not satisfy the authorities during stall tests and had to be redisigned, losing all its benefits.

RE: Landing on water

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 12-07-02 AT 01:31 AM (GMT)]While there would be an initial deceleration from the underslung pods, they wouldn’t remain in place for very long as they are only held on by three ‘fuse’ pins, each about 1/2 inch diameter. These are designed to shear under abnormal loads and (believe it or not) shed the engine. Unfortunately in the case of the El Al 747 at Amsterdam these were in poor condition and caused one engine on one side to separate hitting the one next to it on the way. The QRH (quick reference handbook) for the 757 and 767 contains a checklist named ‘Engine fire, severe damage or separation’ so as you can see inflight separations are taken seriously by Boeing even though they are not common.

Keeping the wings level is a major consideration when ditching as is achieving the lowest possible touchdown speed. As previously mentioned, orientation of the flightpath to the swell is important (less so with bigger aircraft unless the waves are huge).

A year or so back, while doing a 6 monthly sim check I was given a dual engine failure (757-200) climbing out of Tenerife at 18000′ due to volcanic ash ingestion from Mount Teide. When both engines quit you lose all electrics (the APU is not normally left running during flight unless you are doing an autoland or have had certain system failures). There we were at night in a 110 ton glider in total silence staring at black EFIS screens. The engine starters are air driven (off the APU which is not running and needs 1 minute to start up) so the only chance to start the engines is to windmill them requiring at least 300 knots. To achieve 300 knots you will be going down very fast and the QRH states that you need to allow 30 seconds between each movement of the fuel switches. Add to this the fact that the engines you are trying to start are coked up with volcanic ash and we considered ourselves lucky to have got one engine started at 2500′ (we never managed to get the other one going). If both engines had failed to start there would have been bugger all time to contemplate the niceties of the best way to put the thing in the sea so the basic principles I mentioned in the second paragraph would probably be the only ones considered.

Interestingly I spent 3 hours of my life today overflying the Sahara and I have to say I think i’d rather take my chances with a ditching than a crashlanding in the desert.

Hope this helps.

RE: JMC131K/L

The 757-300’s only operate ex-LGW and MAN. The NCL crews are mostly not trained on the 300 as they would rarely get to fly it. Personally I prefer flying the 200 as the whole advantage of flying a 757 is the sheer performance. This is watered down on the 300 series.

Larnaca was pleasant today. Sharm-el-Sheik tomorrow!

RE: Farnborough 2002

And Boeing are crying into their beers wondering why so few people buy their products any more!!! Come on Boeing, pull your finger out!

RE: Landing on water

DC 9 ditched in the carribean 25+ years ago after some dreadful decision making by the flightcrew. Aircraft floated for long enough for the people to get out before it went under.
With respect to the Ethiopian 767, the reason that their ditching was so unsuccessful was that the hijackers were fighting with the flightcrew as they were trying to ditch!