This Almost Was Australia's Worst Air Crash | Emirates Flight 407
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- Опубликовано: 12 сен 2024
- Footage: @N125AS and The ATSB
A340 Image: Konstantin Von Wedelstaedt (www.airliners....)
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This is the story of Emirates flight 407, On the night of the 20th of march 2009 an emirates A340 was to fly from melbourne to dubai with 275 people onboard. The flight was to depart at 10:25 pm local time and the flying time was 14 hours and 8 minutes. Going off topic for a second it feels kind of weird seeing the emirates livery on a quad engined plane thats not the A380, I didn't know that they used to operate the A340 did you?
As they prepped for departure the pilots were busy in the cockpit getting the plane getting ready for the departure. The first officer was on a laptop known as the electronic flight bag, he would be using this laptop to calculate the takeoff metrics for runway 16. Its a simple process really, you put in parameters like the wind direction, take off weight, altimeter setting , temperature air conditioning , flaps runway condition and a whole host of data and it gives you the performance data for that take off, what power setting to set your engines to, their reference speeds that sort of thing. With all of that calculated they copied all of that data onto the master flight plan.
As the crew discussed the instrument departure from melbourne the laptop was handed to the captain who type the data into the plane's computers. The first officer was in contact with the tower for the clearances that they needed. The captain had finished entering the data into the flight management computer and he checked with the first officer and the master flight plan to make sure that he had done everything correctly. They checked again, the first officer read out the take off weight of the plane from the flight management system of the plane, the take off weight was 361.9 tonnes but the first officer read it out as 326.9 tonnes, he immediately corrected himself and stated 362.9 tonnes as their take off weight, one tonne was added to the take off weight to account for any last minute changes made to the plane. At 10:18 pm the plane was pushed back from the gate 7 minutes ahead of schedule. At 10:30 pm it was at the northern end of runway 16 ready to take off, a plane was on final and flight 407 was given the all clear to take off before it landed, the pilots lined up and set the engines to take off power.
10:31 and 53 seconds they hit the calculated rotate speed. The captain who was the pilot monitoring called out “rotate” the first officer pulled back on the stick. But the nose barely budged, the captain called out rotate again, the first officer pulled back even more the nose rose up slowly but the plane did not take off it was still on the ground. Sensing that something was wrong the captain immediately pushed the throttles to TO/GA or go around power. The four rolls royce trent engines reacted quickly. As the plane accelerated it ran out of runway. It went through the stop way and a grassy part beyond the runway but three seconds after full power was commanded the plane was airborne. It was a close call So close infact that the a340 had knocked out a light on the runway and the ILS Antenna for runway 16, runway 16 did not have ILS anymore but they were airborne.
Melbourne ATC came on and told the pilots that they had just had a tailstrike and so the pilots decided to land to assess the damage. They climbed to 7000 feet to dump some fuel so that a safe landing could be attempted, the plane was fueled up for a 14 hour flight and as of right now it was too heavy for a landing. As they climbed the relief first officer noted that the plane was not pressurizing the tail strike must have done some damage, the captain immediately asked the relief first officer to pull up the checklist for a tail strike, but he or she could not find it.
Pilot: We had a tail strike we would like to return to airport. Give me the localizer frequency.
ATC: Congratulations sir you just broke it.
a tail strick eh
“Strick” uh-huh
@@Tarc_ spelling nazi
nowadays you don't need ILS all the time, you can shoot RNP approach which is a precision approach just like the ILS using GPS
@@jase4270 Spelling is a zero-tolerance affair. Grammar can be context-sensitive. Spelling, however, is binary - if it's not spelled right it's not the same word any more.
I attended an airline safety investigator conference some time after this accident. An investigator from the ATSB gave a presentation into the investigation of this accident and findings.
At the end, questions were invited from the audience of about 350 professional senior aircrew and investigators. The first question was the obvious one: “ Why didn’t you discuss crew fatigue as a causal factor in the investigation and accident report”. After staring at the ceiling for about 10 seconds, the response from the ATSB person was shocking- “We determined very early in the investigation that fatigue was not an issue in this case”. You could have heard a pin drop! The audience could not believe what we had just heard!
There was, in pretty much everybody’s opinion, that interference into the investigation was influenced by the UAE government ( who owns Emirates) and the Australian government. Note that the ATSB is NOT a fearless, independent body as was the excellent BASI (which was dissolved because it WAS independent, effective and frequently embarrassed the regulator). There is absolutely no doubt in the minds of many that the UAE government told the Australian government that it did not want the state of fatigue for the crew ( which was know to be high) to be discussed in the report and the Australian government acceded to this request.
The crew were all terminated on their arrival back in Dubai.
Terminated from the airline or terminated from the mortal realm? Lol
Cutting out all the part in the middle, a competent crew should have realised that the engine power and rotate were not inline with the load of the aircraft.
As a design engineer, I always look at FINAL figures first and give them a reality check. It is the simplest and safest way to spot an error.
@@wilsjane Yeah, I’m hearing you. I always look at the Airspeed trend vector as a final filter to see to the aeroplane is accelerating as is should.
@@Slynsmiley Common sense is far more important than anything else in life.
Some years ago, a fully loaded 747 taking off from Heathrow reached V2 far earlier than expected, then started climbing like a sports car. Alarmed, the crew contacted ATC and requested FL10 warning of possible pan pan.
A few minutes later, they requested vectors to return to the airport, cancelling the pan pan prediction.
To cut a long story short, they had calculated their fuel in gallons and fuelled in litres.
The flight on route to Australia via Hong Kong was used to train cabin crew and the training officer jokingly told her trainees to hold fire as soon as the take of roll started, telling them that they were going to have to stop and fill up with petrol. She was actually surprised that they did not stop before V1.
A mistake like that is so easy and checking the figures would not reveal it.
PS, this happened around 40 years ago when I was working on a project at the airport. The training officer was our accountants wife. She is still working today, despite being nearly 70 and I always tell her that she could write a bestselling book based on her career with British Airways.
@@wilsjane That fuelling incident reveals a lack of redundant processes. During my airline career, we always had to confirm the fuel on board by 2 independent means (ie: calculated fuel on board vs fuel gauge indicator). Someone wasn’t doing their job on that B747. On the B777, we had to use 2 independent means AND it also had to be calculated by 2 pilots!
The Fuel On Board was also an item on the Before Start Checklist. When the challenge “Fuel” was read out, the Captain had to call the indicated reading and the First Officer had to check the amount off the Flight Plan. So, the response would be something like CA: “One two four decimal nine tonnes” and the FO ( looking at the Flight Plan) would say “Checked”.
We also had 2 people to do the Take Off Data Calculation on the Boeing Performance Tool. If we used that same laptop, we had to shut down the program before the other pilot did their calculations.
Lesson from Carpentry: "Measure Twice! You can Only Cut Once!"
You should work for NASA. 😂
I find this advice helpful in life, although not true in half of cases, when you cut something to be too long so it would require another cut.
There's an assumption in that statement. Measure and verify. Do you ask for a second opinion? Probably not, if ever. But, your statement, "measure twice..." is a good beginning.
Measure Twic
Cut Once
(intentional error)
Another lesson from carpentry:
If you cut a little too small, the piece is wasted.
If you cut a little too large, you can trim or grind the piece down to size.
You can get the exact dimensions in one cut, but it's better to make a deliberately oversized rough cut, and then trim to the exact dimension. Because 'in one cut' is not what matters.
In other words, make sure that any mistake will leave recovery options and margin for error.
I was binging your videos right now, to see a new one made me overjoyed. I am not ashamed to admit that for the last two weeks plane crashes and aviation in general have been my obsession
It’s quite fascinating haha
Details matter. Great explication. Thanks!
Welcome to our world!
same bro, we’ve all been there
Watching plane crash videos before actually flying, is not the best for my fear of flight
Regardless, the A340 lives on with a perfect safety record
@@C783H Pilot fk up. Preliminary results indicated that the plane landed 1,220 m (4,000 ft) from the start of the 2,743 m (9,000 ft) runway (much further along than normal) at a ground speed of 148 knots (274 km/h; 170 mph) - 140 knots being considered normal - with a tailwind, skidded down the runway and was traveling over 70 knots (130 km/h; 81 mph) as it overran the tarmac and fell into the ravine. Tire marks extended 490 m (1,610 ft) indicating emergency braking action.
The A340 doesn't have any fatal accidents
Wow, that's true. Even if this one had gone down, the plane would still be without safety issues. Humans on the other hand...
Fk up
Good planes but nowadays safety is waaaaay better than it was 30 years ago.
Consistent images of the same aircraft type and livery that you’re reporting on makes a huge difference and is less distracting. Well done great vid!
A330 at the end there...
Moral of the story: Don't overwork/rush the flight crew.
They got fired when they got back to Dubai 😂 The UAE government asked the Australian one not to discuss this in the investigation.
Don't employ blind people
@@Covid-bv4hp link please 🙏 lol
@@232K7 Forgot what the link is but just search EK 407 Wikipedia. From the page;
"After being interviewed by investigators, the two pilots of the flight returned to Dubai. The captain and the first officer were asked to resign from Emirates upon their arrival in Dubai, and both did so.[11]
The captain of Flight 407 had slept for only 6 hours during the 24 hours before the accident, while the first officer had had 8 hours of sleep in the same period.[2]: 18 [a] The captain had flown a total 99 hours during the prior month, 1 hour short of the maximum 100 flying hours allowed by Emirates, while the first officer had flown 90 hours in the same period."
Ofcourse nobody just "resigns" like that so they were most probably fired or would've been so had they not "retired by choice"
@@Covid-bv4hpI mean I can think of several other big airlines who would also fire them. Pilots have some of the least job security out there. Tbh this is a sociable offence, so many missed opportunity and failures of protocol
I'm currently a KC-10 Flight Engineer. We have to manually compute Takeoff and landing data (TOLD) and we do this exact procedure by using charts and such. We also do flexible takeoffs and trick the thrust rating computer to give us less power.
One very basic told card takes an average of 20 minutes to complete. We can use a computer once you show proficiency at manual TOLD. But most elect to still use manual TOLD
A lucky escape from a serious human error.
The Emirates management are know to overwork their crews , the pilot still did a good job at landing the plane safely!
Landing wasn't the main problem. They came within a hairs breath of crashing after the runway with a tank of fuel ready for 14 hrs of flying. Nobody would've survived.
There is no pilots overwork in this case.
The working hours for pilots are regulated and strictly monitored.
Over work cabin crews, maybe. Over work flight crews, no.
This is a take off. The crews have rest as this is not their hub.
Not true
Captain = 6hrs sleep in the last 24hr, FO = 8hrs. Captain = 99/100, FO = 90/100 company mandated max flying hours. The concept of “human factors” still has a long way to go in some parts of the world.
After the incident, the entire crew were returned to their normal layover hotel, (Hilton On The Park) and then received strict instructions from Emirates management that they were forbidden to communicate to any persons, including family over the incident and that their mobile phones would be monitored for any such activity. Goes to show that EK regards social media over crew welfare.
Not true , I was the 1st Class Flight Attendant that day , no one said that to me
@@jmarie2442 hmmmm
@@jmarie2442please tell us more! I’m very curious!! And if you are on Reddit, I would love to chat there with you. I have many questions about the life of flight crews!
The A340 was a great plane. It is sad that it is out of service, except from some government models waiting for replacement. Of course, twin-engine ariplanes are easier and less costly to maintain and the new engines are "more environmentally friendly and economical". As far as I know, the A340 is, up until now, free from accidents involving fatalities since its first flight in 1991.
It’s a great record to have, no fatal accidents with the A340, especially for a plane flying in service since 1993.....
@@andymacmac9151 thank the low sales. Even though 737 ng, a320, a330, 777 have fatalities, i consider them safer
@@aseem7w9 I few the A340 from Perth to Johannesburg, it's the only plane South African airways use between Perth and JHB
That's correct!
@@aseem7w9 None of the fatalities that occured on a 777 were due to technical problems though, but due to foul play (the both MH flights, and yes, I am fully convinced MH370 was brought down deliberately, a plane just doesn't veer off course, goes radio-silent and shuts off its transponder like this ... ) or incompetent pilots/negligent cabin crew/Darwin award-winning passengers (the three fatalities on the Asiana flight didn't have their seat belts on for landing afaik). The BA crash at Heathrow was the only 777 that crashed due to technical issues.
The city I live in and I never heard about this incident until today. Cheers.
herro fellow Melbournian
@@zeroducks1037 Small world. I'm out in the south eastern suburbs. Love this channel and have no idea how I came across it.
I had heard about the airline having an tail strike and it's location but not the flight. This has made me curious enough to dig up the official report.
Same Tim!
- Oh wait, I'm on RUclips I better dispute the authenticity of your claim and say by the power vested in me by RUclips I know more than you know about yourself and accordingly I say you never lived in Melbourne.
I'll crawl back in my box now ...
The country I live in and I never knew this either
You do such a great job bringing these flights to life! I, like many others have left many comments, there isn't an episode that isn't at least, very good! I'm leaving comments now to help with the algorithm that recommends videos! Great channel, you put in a lot of hard work and it shows! I wish you the very best in your life and your channel! Keep up your great work! Thank you!!
Love your videos dude, great work!
Related - at Southwest we used to enter our performance numbers the same way as the crew in this incident. Years ago we changed to a new system that basically inputs the numbers automatically for us (straight into the airplane's computer) so there's less likelihood of an error like this.
Tell South, we want some new planes. Sick and tired of those 737-700. Airbus Neo is nice. But would be great if Boeing can make a 757X.
"Runway 16 did not have ILS anymore, but they were airborne" lolol
Love the footage of the A340, keep up the good work, you deserve way more subscribers.
But the video footage is NOT of Melbourne Tullamarine.
Three cheers for Rols Royce engines, saving the day once again.
When did they save the day previously?
@@eUK95 on SO many occasions. 99% of engines on commercial planes are built by rolls Royce, they’re simply the best, the only thing that can defeat them is poor maintenance, that is human fault.
@@Dan-zc7ut nowhere near 99% ...and they have lots of problems with quality control...
About the only decent thing to come out of Derby
@@Willoz269 uhm that "quality control" you're talking about is mostly because of the airline company who's taking care of the plane. Go and watch some air crash investigations regarding the plane's engines breaking mid-flight or after takeoff it's mostly because the airline company isn't taking care of it properly. Also here's a link of how Rolls-Royce constructs and tests the engines if you don't believe me
👇 m.ruclips.net/video/2LZwkdGU0-g/видео.html
Edit: also ik the vid is called "for future engines" but they also do that on the engines before the engines go to the customer lol
So happy i found this channel today! Keep up the good work 👌
Clearly not Melbourne Tullamarine footage. I'll send you some.
@Aaron Poisel Melbourne Airport (IATA: MEL, ICAO: YMML) is not coastal. Avalon Airport (IATA: AVV, ICAO: YMAV), Melbourne's second airport doesn't match the footage either.
@Aaron Poisel I see by the power vested in you by RUclips you know more than locals.
ie You're nothing more than a complete goddam nobody talking crap about something you know nothing about!
It's the RUclips way, isn't it goose?
@@ThePaulv12 some of the footage 100% isn't from Melbourne Tullamarine you can clearly see a body of water behind it and at Tullamarine there is no nearby body of water.
Must be Nice Airport NCE, France
@Aaron Poisel I live in Melbourne no way this is any of the Melbourne airports unless it grew some extra mountains during the pandemic
Emirates was using the A340-300 and later the A340-500 for the long non-stop flights to Australia. I was flying in 2007 in their -500 from Dubai to Sydney.
Love Emirates A380 ..wonderful aircraft..and airline.
"Hey, you know where we should put antennas and stuff?"
"At the end of runways?"
"At the end of runways."
"Or maybe off to the side."
"No, the ends are better."
"Yeah. And maybe the occasional small warehouse."
Where else are you going to put the localiser?
Let's put the antennas somewhere else so planes don't line up properly with runways and crash instead...
This is why today, both the Captain and F/o have an EFB on each side to make independent calculations then you compare if both matches. Mistake like that is unfortunately easy to make.
I get the numbers 9 and 7 mixed up, as well as occasionally the numbers 2 and 3 mixed up, and that's been an issue with me since childhood.
Anybody can transpose a number or just read a number wrong.
I'm just glad that the captain made the right choices at the critical moments, even though he and the other crew failed to get the weight of the plane right.
Right, you don't base your flight on one calculation especially a critical part like takeoff. You triple check it.
How odd that there is that manual "break" in the controls - laptop calculates the correct numbers, and then the crew manually transfers these critical numbers to the actual aircraft computer. Seems having the laptop integrated would make more sense.
That’s how the A380, 787 and A350 work. Their EFB’s are built into the aircraft
Yeah, that just adds another potential for an error to occur if u ask me
Another great video from this uploader, who is quickly becoming the top producer in the field. Awesome.
Isn't it amazing how these planes weigh hundreds of tons and can fly all around the world? The Wright Brothers probably never envisioned this.
Your presentation is getting alot better my man. (Your writing is great as always...and good visual materials this time.)
But it’s not Melbourne airport.
instead of just multiple checks, they should have asked both pilots to independently enter the values into the computer without able to see what the other entered. It would be extremely rare for them to enter the same incorrect number.
Auditory processing of numbers is something many, if not most humans actually suck at. Especially when it is two numbers that are almost the same.
Great job told with simple English.Thank you.
Well done. Clear, concise and full of useful and interesting information. Thanks a lot. Good luck to you.
A fortune event in a series of unfortunate events had saved many lives that day.
The pilot had seconds to make the right choice... And he chose well.
Engines go BRRRRRRRRRRR
EK needs to closely monitor the fatigue issues of crew during their layovers. Particularly to Audtralia where layovers are merely 24hrs for crew after preparing and flying a 15hr flight.
Excellent presentation as always keep up the good work
As far as I remember, one of the major incident factors was, that both pilots flew the A-330 AND A-340 and therefore they switched from a 240 to 360 tonnes(??) airplane within a week or so and did not catch the problem. At least one more reason why it all happened.
But the program let them put 260 tonnes ???why dudnt it say " the hell an a340 is only 260 tonne ! Are u sure ? . Are u very sure ? Are u on crack ? ".
@@isilder Well, the airplane does not know how heavy it is and if you punch 240, instead of 360 Tonnen into the FMS, there is no limit exceedance and therefore no warning.
Failures like this one, more ore less eliminated cross-fleet flying in major airlines and in most countries you are only allowed to have 2 type ratings current (for commercial operations) at the same time, because airplanes are just to complicated to fly 4 or 6 types simultaneously.
@@isilder There should be some kind of weight scales in the landing gears, to at least have an estimate of your actual weight.
Emirates operated both the A340-300 and the A340-500 with footage of both used in this video. Interesting to note that Emirates had a not dissimilar incident with an A340-300 at Johannesburg in the mid 2000's.
I was involved in coordinating the response to the Johannesburg incident, which involved a brand new EK A340-500. It was the evening before Easter Friday 2004. No tail strike, but mistake in programming the take-off settings and they ran out of runway, taking out some of the approach lights for the opposite runway, shredding a few tyres and dropping debris from the holed fuselage fairing under the wing. They climbed out, dumped fuel and returned to land, but on landing the remaining main gear tyres burst and under maximum braking, the hot wheel rims managed to melt the asphalt. Fortunately no injuries or loss of life, but a damaged plane and lots of red faces.
@@lindenbirns124 was that not the A340-300, because I even remember the aircraft registration and knew the very competent pilots..??
@@biancacook8768 - you are quite correct and my apologies for the error. It was an A340-300, but it was the first flight on the -300 for both pilots. They had previously operated the -500 and the A330-200.
A J*t airways 777-3 flight from Amsterdam too had same fate where in last minute manual change of weight figure by load controller, 9 was read as 0 by captain and caused a deviation of 90 tons in takeoff weight resulted tail scrap while takeoff. Flight eventually has to return back .
Emirates operated them,then leased some to Sri Lankan...
Sorry, wrong information, Emirates never leased any A340 aircraft to Sri Lankan, Sri Lankan operated A340-300 much before Emirates operated the same (1st September 1994) and Sri Lanka was the first Asian nation to operate an A340-300. Emirates bought a 40% stake worth US$70 million, later it was increased to 43.6% in Air Lanka. Emirates decided to refurbish the airline's image and fleet, as the Government had the majority stake in the airline but gave full control to Emirates for investment and management decisions. In 1998, Air Lanka became SriLankan Airlines under Emirates management and acquired six Airbus A330-200s to join its fleet of Airbus A340-300 and A320-200 aircraft.
The aircraft involved in this accident is an Airbus A340-500, registered A6-ERG. Emirates operated 10 A340-500 and 08 A340-300. A340-300 was given to Emirates by Boeing, can you believe that? Yes, it's true, Singapore Airlines wanted to get rid of its A340-300 aircraft's, and wanted to acquire B777 aircraft, this was the time when Emirates' B777 delivery was delayed, so Boeing took the A340-300 aircraft from Singapore and gave it to Emirates as a compensation for the delayed delivery of B777. Airbus refused to refurbish those aircraft. Finally, Lufthansa Technik refurbished those aircrafts.
I was involved in the investigation of this said accident, those days I was working in EK departure control and the weight and balance and load sheet were done from our centralised load control unit in Dubai (all weight and balance for Emirates flights are still done from Dubai) and I was the few people who had access to the load sheet of his same flight.
@@smackachi damn
@@winniethepooh3800 hahahaha
It all makes sense now!
Glad to see you now only show planes and liveries concerning the topic, keep up the good work...
great work about an unknown incident, thanks!
Yes, I've flown on this route Auckland - Melbourne - Dubai on an A340 back in 2005. Incidentally that flight had a pump failure in one of the engines some where over the Tasman Sea, though as passengers, we weren't told about it until we landed at Melbourne.
What a beautiful airplane the A340 is. Great report.
Excellent description and explanation for those of us who aren't aviation trained.
Prior to the A380, we often saw the A340 and the B773 flying over on the inbound leg at our international airport.
My new favorite channel
Teacher: your marks are deducted because of wrong value you entered in numerical
Me: but I got the procedure almost right.
Plane: I'm gonna crash.
Even a slight miscalculation can be fatal...
Australian education system: but you are such a good boy for trying!!
100 tons difference on a 350 ton airliner is hardly a slight miscalculation. If they messed up the CG by that much, they would probably all be dead.
@@BaliMystic 205 instead of 305, I don't see any difference lol. Just kidding
in all fairness: you don't have checklists and computers in a math exam :)
Another great video. I almost thought this was a video about an A330 that took off from Brisbane with a blocked pitot tube after it was left uncovered and wasps blocked it up trying to make a nest (There is an ATSB report on this incident)
When you go through a procedure and remember that you’re the reason it was created.
Thank you, for highlighting human errors through this case study. Incorporated diligent checks and rechecks would definitely be very very essential for error free data calibration and perfect performance.
Congrats to the Captain for his decision and safe landings.
Take utmost care and exercise all caution seriously.
Let every day be a learning experience.
It is always human error, whether the builder, the ground crew or the flight crew. I am convinced, stats notwithstanding, that it is best to stay on the ground. Thanks to this channel for these remarkable vids.
babe wake up, Mini Air Crash Investigations posted a video
Making mistakes and then overlooking mistakes myltiple times, when an airplane is involved, can be deadly for a great number of people. Fortunately this particular situation ended fairly well considering what could have happened.
pilots were fired not because of the incident but because they talked about how shit Emirates was during a conversation at the gate. all recorded on the CVR
Ummm, I was the crew on that flight & I recall we were grateful for safe landing & no injuries & good Job to pilots for that point
I like this channel. A delightful new discovery! Thanks!
Really good video. I like that you have gone from generic aircraft to subject specific video and graphics. Thank you.
Love the footage you included
Yes used the Emirates A340 many times , was my fav.
0:30
YES!
my dad has an a340 model. He is not a pilot so no questions.
i love emirates airbus A380-800
Nice work mate
I could look at that A345 all day
The captain of Flight 407 had slept for only 6 hours during the 24 hours before the accident, while the first officer had had 8 hours sleep in the same period. The captain had flown a total 99 hours during the prior month, one hour short of the maximum 100 flying hours allowed by Emirates, while the first officer had flown 90 hours in the same period. Both were asked to resign by Emirates. (quoted from wikipedia)
1 hour short of maximum before a 14 hour flight. He should not have been on the flight deck. Depending on the reliefs available the first officer is also close to not being rosterable for the flight.
@@davidwright7193 I’m amazed that Captain didn’t realise he was 1 hour short. That First Officer also should not have been on the flight as he would’ve been over the limit nearly two thirds of the way through
Very interesting, thanks. Good to know the aircraft and crew still managed to take off and land again safely, despite the errors.
Didn't mention that they also cleared a brick building on the airport perimeter by only like 10 metres as well. They were bloody lucky.
Where is there a brick building at the end of 16 at MEL? Serious question.
So was the building! :D
It was only 50 CENTERMETERS.
Love your videos mate, very insightful!
This was a pretty major incident, can't remember it all. Bet the pilots wished the runway was 100mt longer . That's a huge difference in take off weights from low as 150 tonnes to 370 tonnes , just lucky the crew didn't input say 162 tonnes , could have been worse .
Probably find that isn’t possible. The computer would reject the value for being “below minimum range”.
I took the Emirates A340-500 quite a number of times in the mid to late 2000s, mostly to Sydney, but also Melbourne as well as a few trans-Tasman trips too. In those days, it was the only plane capable of doing the trip non-stop from DXB to eastern Australia. At the same time, Emirates also already had routes to eastern Australia (SYD, MEL. BNE) with stops in Singapore or Bangkok served by 777s. Several of these eastern Australia flights also went on to Auckland or Christchurch.
The pull of the A340-500 for me was that in F, there was the very first enclosed suites cabin on offer, all with aisle access in 1-2-1 config, and fares were relatively reasonable in those days as Emirates pushed for market share, and often Emirates F was cheaper than a legacy carrier's J. I am based in London, and in those days they still ran 777s with 2-2-2 config in F and big lazy boy seats on that segment, although for a short time the A340-500 also appeared on Gatwick routes. The A340-500 was also somewhat infamous for being a permanent fixture on the Zurich route for the pharma companies.
Those F suites are pretty much the same ones you'll find on the Emirates A380 and most 777s now, although there are now newer and bigger suites on a few select 777s. Still, that original suite design is over 15 years old and it still holds its own as a competitive product IMO.
On one flight I had racing driver Ralf Schumacher and his GF across the aisle from me on their way to the Aussie Grand Prix. On my trip back, I was sat at an adjacent table to Niki Lauda (RIP) having breakfast in the DXB F lounge (when there was only one F lounge in DXB), and again completely coincidentally ten years or so later, only three or four years ago, I found myself again at a table adjacent to him in another new DXB F lounge.
My only "incident" on the A340-500 was a go around at AKL during particularly bad weather, although since that time I became a pilot myself and realised that go arounds aren't anything to write home about, even though they don't happen every day to a pilot, they're certainly not uncommon or worth anything more than passing comment. I do always remember go arounds, whether or not I'm the pilot though!
Once the A380 was introduced, the A340-500 quickly became superfluous on these long routes.
wow great to read your knowledgeable comments! I have never flown enough to know so much about planes, seat configs, etc. Have flown etihad BNE-abu dhabi-LHR but never emirates.
@@VanillaMacaron551 I did fly through BNE at least once with Emirates, but ISTR that was on a 777: my partner at the time had family at Broadbeach near Surfers Paradise, so it was occasionally more convenient for our plans, although mostly we went into SYD and transited up to Coolangatta (OOL) which is much closer to Broadbeach than BNE.
Emirates was one of the few airlines that flew the Airbuss A340 - 500.
True
Weren't they even the Launch Customer, or was it Qatar Airways?
I find your videos absolutely fascinating!
I knew that Emirates used a340s, a lot of airlines in Australia do use “smaller” jets even for international & then swap over to a bigger one at the next stop (which for me was Abu Dhabi, as I was with Etihad). I know that many of our civilian airports have shorter runways, and very few can land the largest military planes except for strangely Rockhampton which is a smaller regional airport, but for several months a year there will be a mix of military aircraft which sometimes sound like they are on top of your house. It is always a good time to watch the aircraft, with a range of Australian, Singapore & USA military planes of all kinds and also helicopters.
Rocky is close to Shoalwater Bay Military Training Area.
If you ask nicely the yanks will build you huge runways at even the most remote locations. As long as they can use them for storing lots of materiel at them and use them too.
Er, Melbourne lands 747s, A380 easily. Even the giant Antonov An-124. Same with Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth....
Almost all the capital cities in Australia can land the super Jumbos easily. No different to any other country
I feel like maybe the information I had heard was wrong, or one of those weird things where they forgot to add *not a capital city* to it when they told us. I was told by the ADF.
I know nothing about aviation, but I think they should set it up so that two people have to manually enter the values. If they don't match then they both have to manually enter them again.
East Coast Jets Flight 81 hit an ILS antenna during a badly executed go-around, which caused the plane to immediately go into a severe bank, invert, and then collide with the ground. There were no survivors. I highly recommend doing an episode on it; the full CVR is publicly available but there was no FDR on board. The investigation had to focus on the CVR, ATC communication, and physical evidence. I'll warn you though, you'll never forget that recording if you hear it.
Emirates was involved very similar incident in Johannesburg, the plane was an A340. It overran the runway during take off.
Not a safe airline to fly anymore! They use their own trained UAE trained pilots that have no much experience and they overwork their pilots
doesn't TOGA stand for Take Off/Go Around ? Shouldn't the engines already have been set to TOGA for the Takeoff roll ?
No, since if they have sufficient runway, the pilots will ‘derate’ the engine to decrease wear and such. In airbus aircraft, this is referred to as ‘Flex’ power setting.
You are correct, TO/GA does mean Take Off/Go Around but with the takeoff, weather and runway condition data at hand you input that data into the FMC and that will calculate how much N1 you need as a percentage to give the optimum takeoff power from the engines rather than going to full power constantly. It saves fuel and reduces engine wear and vibrations which make it comfortable for passengers too.
Pilots do not use TOGA for Takeoff unless absolutely necessary
The narrator went to quite an effort to explain a flex takeoff in this video ...to no avail.
Same as Emirates incident in JNB a few years ago and SAA in JNB in APR21 (90tons miscalculated) . Both miraculously scrapped over the end of the runway and avoided major catastrophes.
We see more and more avionics being developed to detect potential runway overrun situations, alerting the crew if the deceleration rate is not sufficient to stop in time.
The exact same system could be used in reverse to detect too low acceleration during takeoff roll, which could have alerted the crew well below V1 speed.
Other systems that could prevent this could be a variable squash switch that measures how much the landing gear contracts and could thus measure the actual aircraft weight instead of relying on a figure entered by pilots only.
I was thinking the same thing. GPS can tell the plane which runway it's lining up for. Sensors in the landing gear can tell if the entered weight is at least approximately correct. Temperature and pressure are already sensed by the aircraft. Acceleration is easy to measure. There's no reason why the plane shouldn't kick up 7 kinds of hell if you aren't accelerating enough to take off.
It already exist on the A350: ruclips.net/video/MKtPlj932YY/видео.html
It already exists
safetyfirst.airbus.com/takeoff-surveillance-and-monitoring-functions/
@@theguillaumes2 that video just shows an RTO. Doesn’t say anything about the plane not accelerating quick enough
A340 is one of my favorite aircraft, sad it is continuosly less used. Love your videos though!
Take-off is the most dangerous part of a flight, and using less than 100% thrust to prevent engine wear is asking for trouble. If every take off used full power then you'd prevent loss of life...in the past, and in the future
And yet, the very reason flying is affordable to the masses is because of the extended time between repair/ overhaul of very expensive assets ( like jet engines). If every takeoff & climb was at max rated power, the time between inspections is reduced, the time between engine replacement due to deterioration is greatly reduced. This then means more spare engines are required to allow for unserviceable engines to be shipped, repaired / overhauled and returned into stock. We are not talking about Chevy small block V8’s here. We are talking 10 to 50 million dollars for each engine. Add that operating cost to each airline ticket and see how many people can afford to fly even on the cheapest airline.
@@davidsteer8142 The time between service intervals would only change by around 3%. Airlines could easy soak up those costs without moving it on to passengers. A small cost for a safer airline imo
And how do you get this figure? How many hours have you spent looking down a borescope inspecting engines to know that looking at a hot section that has spent its life at max takeoff parameters will deteriorate 3% faster than one that has had a life of derailed takeoffs? By the way, 3% margin in operating costs for airlines can be the difference between $100 million dollar profit to $100 million dollar loss.
@@davidsteer8142 I don't have to spend a minute looking down a borescope. The scientists and metallurgy experts have done that for decades! The fact remains that it's a small price to pay to save one life...let-alone hundreds! Keep peering 👀 Oh...I didn't say any part was to spend its life at max takeoff thrust...you did!
@@James-oo1yq Then I suggest you read the very 1st line of your 1st comment stating that every takeoff should be at 100 % thrust. Your words not mine. You still didn’t say where you got your magical 3% figure from. At least my argument comes from real life experience. I could bore you with several examples but you know.......I’m trying to keep it simple for the 12 year olds out there. More thrust equals more fuel. More fuel equals more heat. More heat equals much faster degradation of the hot section. Derated takeoffs keeps expensive engines on wings for years longer. Massive cost savings on a fleet of engines over the lifespan of the fleet.
Remember, planes can be made even safer than they already are now.......at a cost. That cost must remain practical. As long as the the ignorant public flock to the cheapest ticket to get to their destination, then that is the price the airlines will be aiming for to maximise yield per seat sold. If premature engine changes are driving up operating costs to the point that they have to price their tickets to a level that no one will fly on them, then they will join the long list of bankrupt airlines out there. This is the reason why a greater percentage of the population can afford to fly than 50 years ago. Edit. My apologies if my comment suggested that the engine stayed at takeoff power for the duration of the flight. They can’t. In fact they are limited for a couple of minutes to prevent ‘guess what’....they have a takeoff rating and a lower max continuous rating.
Emirates is by far one of the best airlines
Just jam those throttles forward to the stops! We ain't paying for the engines!
Reminds me when one's plane is late. The captain usually comes on the mike and assures the passengers they will try to make up some time... only to find when climbing to the appointed altitude you can feel the throttles come back to cruise mode. If they were keen to make up time then the crew would keep those throttles further forward. But, no.
Interesting video though. Shows how complicated and messy preparation for a flight can be... it thought deciding on how many socks to take was a challenge!
There are speed limits among other things. You cant simply floor it. There is more to making up time than going fast.
You can only do so much with the fuel you have on board.
This guy is the best narrator or whatever you wanna call it
Script reader.
I knew there was a near miss involving an Emirates jet at Melbourne's Airport Southern end, I initially thought the plane had clipped the outer fence. Thank you for telling what really happened that day. Do you know if the Pilots were fired after that?
I was driving my daughter home from rehearsals that night, and just outside of Mornington on the beach road, I spotted this plane flying low over the bay..and it just looked so wrong and crazy...a huge jet flying so low, it was out of place, there was just something wrong about it and I wanted to stop and get out look, but grumpy teenager said “ oh, Mum, you and your planes, can we please just go home 🙄”, so I didn’t stop. Next day, buried deep in the newspaper was a tiny little paragraph that just briefly stated that it was an Emirates flight that had clipped a fence on take-off then had flown around over the Bay to jettison fuel before returning to Tulla....it wasn’t on the main news at all, and it was years before the story came out properly...and then, just how much of an almost disaster this had been. I’m still kicking myself for giving in to grumpy teenager, because it really was quite a sight.
That would have been interesting to see - I actually live in Tulla
@@StarFyre it really was. I would have loved to have gotten a chance to have had a really good look at it...but, grumpy teenager..
@@StarFyre I’ve seen a few planes jettisoning fuel out over the bay over the decades, fortunately it doesn’t happen very often, but because this was night just seeing a big jet flying this low all lit up was certainly a sight.
That was awesome , mate no adds , is every thing ok ?
Everything’s fine 🙂
all takeoffs should be full throttle
That would over stress and damage the engines on the long term and eventually reduce the overall life of the engine. Therefore, a Flex Take-off is is being done by flight crews
It’s important for pilots, when working with computers to ask the question: does this solution make any sense? A 100 ton error was a huge deviation with respect to required thrust.
Three changes which might help in the future could be an expected acceleration or “rate of change of speed” meter or program, load sensors in the undercarriage at each landing gear attachment, or a simple load scale that the aircraft traverses on the way to the runway. 😎
I hear ya..
I LOVE your channel, and your videos.
I do not know anything about putting videos on RUclips. But some videos are MUCH quieter than others.
Never heard of this before, thanks
I like your videos. To the point and informative!
It sure is good to watch one of these where everyone got away safely.
Good coverage of the entire incident in a nutshell
This A340-500 was Scrapped in 2015
Yeah four engined birds are so rare these days :(
It took its first flight in 1991, was only a 24-year life. Meanwhile they JUST scrapped the last of the MD-88s (Delta would fly one of the few remaining over my house almost daily, I'm right under the ILS path for the 3rd runway at Lambert St. Louis International (KSTL)) and they are still operating so many Boeing planes designed in the 60s and 70s. 747s continue to fly but nobody wants the A380 anymore. Heck, I all I see now are 737s flying over my house. Planespotting has turned into watching Southwest 737s come in and take off almost exclusively... They've taken over half the airport but refuse to list Lambert as a "hub." At least I get to occasionally watch Boeing test fly their fighter jets, like the Super Hornets. They were testing the engines yesterday and you could hear it for miles!
Yep, very short life. Only built in 2004 and had its rear end re-built by Airbus after this incident.
@@MiniAirCrashInvestigation What about the Scenic Airlines crash at Grand Canyon Airport Arizona in about 1989 or 1990?
It was a A340-500 for long range sectors and common on this route at the time from Melbourne only but as for the runway 34 , was round 13k feet so ample room on normal evening take off and aircarft was not even max weight but poor calculation and I recall the incident well on media that night and also fact that ATC was watching it at a higher level for takeoff and did not see any anti collisions as they were looking higher when the aircraft was barely 200 feet off the ground and were lucky and dumping fuel over Port Phillip Bay was imperative and fortunate limited damage but if you insoect the reports and the pictures of the damage , was quite extensive. the flight crew returned to DXB the next day and were promptly dismissed but believe they are still flying for another carrier. (to be verified)
Crazy how the landing gear doesn’t have a scale built in to send weight data to the computer.
Being able to measure that much weight accurately requires heavy scales which would add to the planes weight. Scales could be added to the ramps or the the taxiway waiting area. It would help all planes while waiting.
@@wylieecoyote that’s true, like a truck weighbridge 👍
Yes you would think undercarriage movement and wing flexing could be used to give a decent figure certainly one to catch ludicrous discrepancies like this.
Ideally it shouldn't be necessary. Weight and CoG management of aircraft is a top priority task for pilots. For example everything is weighed. The basic empty weight of the aircraft is known, the weight of the passengers averaged above the weight of them, the weight of the baggage and cargo known, the weight of the fuel known.
Additionally I have to point out that you may not be aware that if you overload the back of your car well it might just sit too low but on an aircraft if you do the same only aerodynamic force controls the nose position and the faster you go the more control you have in pitch and vice versa. What this means is that weight is incredibly tightly controlled for balance esp as fuel burns it alters the CoG so everything needs to be placed in an envelope that allows for proper control of the aircraft as the fuel burns. You can't have a good CoG on take off then as the fuel burns the CoG goes outside the rear or front envelope and the plane becomes tail or nose heavy in normal flight then as you slow for landing crashes because there's not enough aerodynamic pressure to control the pitch - it's happened, it really has, and not just once or twice either.
There is no reason the crew should rely on scales to weigh the plane - ideally at least.
If you need to rely on scales something is seriously wrong. What made this bad is they knew the weight of the plane but didn't pick up the incorrect weight applied to the thrust management system and it appears there were other previous tail strikes on this aircraft before this occurred indicating similar thrust setting errors.
The Wikipedia entry on this flight is a quick read and it spells it out better than I can.
@@ThePaulv12 You are quite the contradiction. "There is no reason the crew should rely on scales to weigh the plane" then explain why weight is so important. Perhaps you did not understand. I was suggesting that once the plane is fully loaded and ready to take off, weigh it to get an accurate weight at the ramp or on the taxiway. I suggested taking the human error out of the commutation. You also said the "weight of people is known". How? Do they guess every person's weight as they enter the 777 with hundreds of people with their bags?
My suggestion is far superior and more accurate.
I noticed initially the visuals featured the A340-600 which was the middle landing gear had four wheels but later it features the A340-300 which has only two wheels in the middle landing gear. And it kept switching between these two models
Yes, I knew about Emirates A340
great video!
Perhaps having a human manually take information from one computer and inputting it into another isn't a good system. While it might provide for human verification of the data, perhaps the computers should talk directly to each other.
yes there must be a cross-check thing they could set up in the program
Scotty had a phrase in Star Trek... it went something like this... the more complicated the plumbing..the easier it is to stop up the drain.. just the phrase “laptop” is enough to make a real IT person drive and use a row boat.
I flew an Emirates A340 to Bangkok in 2014 (the return leg was on an A380). They retired their last A340 in 2016 I believe.
I keep hearing the word 'distraction' in this video and others too.
Perhaps worth repeating here: Perhaps one way to lessen these human errors: Have this 21st century technology effectively SPEAK out clear and loud enough something like "Your inputs are xxx for this spec, xxx for that spec...are values confirmed ?" The software forcing a SPEAKING COMPUTER to aurally ask for confirmation would and SHOULD make BOTH flight officers AGAIN have opportunity to BOTH answer YES or NO. If NO, then the software HALTS the procedure and CLEARLY speaks "ERROR, RE-DO" and waits for the error to be corrected and then the software AGAIN SPEAKS the new results and asks again for confirmation.
Would this "speaking procedure" add complexity to the process ? Likely only a SMALL amount of extra confirmation time would be added. Would and could this SPEAKING CONFIRMATION save lives, stop further mistakes and so forth ? YOU judge that, the FAA or that countries agency would judge that, the airline companies should at least give this idea a run-through...
I once flew on an Emirates A340 from Dubai to Dar Es Salaam in 2008. Also flew on the B777 and the A330 on other legs of this journey (LHR-DXB-DAR-DXB-LHR). They started rolling out the A380 as their main workhorse in earnest within a year of that trip, I believe.
I always liked the 4 engine airliners the best, now they are all out of production in the west. I find it sad.
I lived near Melbourne airport for 25 years of my life and remember this well thinking imagine the noise if it had of been a disaster