SAA201 From South Africa, joined May 2001, 489 posts, RR: 3 Posted (5 years 9 months 1 day 21 hours ago) and read 26987 times:
Extracts from a message from the Chairman of the SAA Museum Society. Further news and pics will be available on the Society's website http://www.saamuseum.co.za soon
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Lebombo Has Landed
At four minutes past eight, South African time, on an overcast and dull
Friday morning 5 March 2004, the retired South African Airways Boeing
747-244, ZS-SAN, "Lebombo" touched down at Rand Airport, Germiston, just
outside Johannesburg. It was a case of third time lucky for the landing had
been postponed twice due to poor weather conditions on 14 and 28 February.
A substantial crowd had been waiting at Rand since about six a.m. and erupted in cheer and clapping as the grand old lady was placed firmly down on runway 11. As planned she stopped near the intersection of runway 11/29 and 35/17. After the exchange of congratulations over the radio the crew announced the shut down of the four big Pratt & Whitney engines, the APU (auxiliary power unit) however was kept running so that steering and brakes could be operated. The responsibility of towing the aircraft was handed over to a very experienced and highly capable SAA Technical crew who's task it was to move the aircraft to its parking area. A tug was connected and the jumbo began to head for the designated parking area in front of the terminal
building. However the tug wheels lost grip on the grass and after several
unsuccessful attempts to try and assist the tug with a fire tender a
decision was taken to taxi Lebombo across the grass under her own power. The four engines were started and in a few minutes the old girl was on the taxi
area in front of the terminal. The tug was reconnected and the aircraft
manoeuvred to her parking spot.
Lebombo is sure to attract attention for she can be seen from as far away as
Alberton and most of the roads that lead to Rand Airport. An interesting
point is that when standing in front of the entrance to the Rand Airport
Terminal building one can see her tail towering above the buildings. A good
bit of marketing for SAA no doubt!
Lebombo will remain parked in front of the terminal building for a short
while until a concrete hard-stand has been prepared next to the TAC
building.
Lebombo's crew consisted of:
Captain: Dennis Spence
Captain: Stuart Lithgow
Senior First Officer: Phil Parsons
Senior Flight Engineer Officer: Dennis McDermott
Chief Flight Engineer Officer: Peter Kiely
Also on board was Gerry Du Toit from the South African Civil Aviation
Authority.
It was an emotional time for it was the last flight of Senior Flight
Engineer Officer Dennis McDermott and Chief Flight Engineer Officer Peter
Kiely. It was fitting indeed that their last flight was on an aircraft
destined to be preserved and not sent to a breakers yard.
----
Over the next few days there will no doubt be hundreds of
professional shots available, but for those who can't wait, follow
this link for some of my amateur snaps:
http://photos.groups.yahoo.com/group/asanews/ (Click on Lebombo
landing at Rand)
Andz From South Africa, joined Feb 2004, 7258 posts, RR: 14 Reply 5, posted (5 years 9 months 1 day 5 hours ago) and read 26581 times:
The runway was widened at the approach end and the ground on both sides of the runway was compacted to make the landing safer, I watched from the roof of the terminal building and it was spot on!
SAA201 From South Africa, joined May 2001, 489 posts, RR: 3 Reply 6, posted (5 years 9 months 12 hours ago) and read 26485 times:
From a Yahoogroup:
Ok boys and girls ... here is it all from the Captain's mouth for you : (Tx
Captain Dennis Spence)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
The aircraft empty weight was 164 000kg and we had 20 000kg fuel on board.
The aircraft was TOTALLY airworthy and every component was serviceable, it
even has toilet paper in all the toilets!!!!!
We had a snag before start with the PMS (Performance Management Computer) so
one was ordered from stores and it was fitted before we departed.
Take-off weight was 183 000 kg and the V1/VR speed was 125 kts. Max thrust
was 1.6 EPR but we de-rated to 1.55. We applied nearly max thrust on the
brakes and it had acceleration that made the M3 drivers look like they were
standing still. We rotated just after intersection Lima, some 3000 ft from
the beginning of 03 Left, and climbed away with a body angle of nearly 30°.
We were given vectors for Rand from the west, but because of some cloud we
only became visual too late to commence the approach, so we were re-vectored
and approached from the south. We joined right-hand downwind for 11 and got
the gear and flap 30, landing flap out early. As there is no approach aids
on 11, we plotted an ideal path using the DME at RAV. The threshold height
of 11 is 5500 ft AMSL at 0,7 DME RAV, so by the simple rule of 300 ft per
nautical mile, we had our path plotted.
3,7 DME : 6400 ft
2.7 DME: 6100 ft
1.7 DME: 5800 ft
We did not want to touch early, because of the "lip" on the approach to 11,
so we had a chalk line at 50m (150 ft) drawn across the runway to ensure
that this would not happen, because of the visual illusion of such a narrow
runway ( 15m wide compared to 60m wide at JNB). The distance from the nose
of the aircraft to the rear of the gear is 114 ft, so we would not want to
touch down before the nose was at this line. Also, the demonstrated landing
distance from the flight performance manuals, and computed by the
performance engineers at SAA is 3000 ft. This is using ONLY brakes and NO
thrust reverse, but we must remember that this is for a new aircraft with
new brakes, not one with 107 000 flying hours on it !!!!
To ensure that we minimized the possibility of an over-run of 11, we then
put another chalk line at 3600 ft from the end of R/W 29, so if we were not
on the ground by this mark, we would go-around and have another attempt. In
the Simulator we tried various scenario's using JNB 30L , NO aids, except
for the 300 ft/NM [plot, a 5 kt crosswind and a 5 kt tail wind, NO reverse
thrust, and every time we managed to stop before intersection Lima.
Well it worked at Rand, and we did NOT scratch the paint !!!
I managed to keep it on the centre line and touch down at the point we
wanted - Bug speed at the weight of 178 000kg was 118 kts, but on short
final with the wind at 070/08 I elected to fly it at 115 kts. When Dennis Mc
Dermot, our Flight Engineer called 20 ft on the radio altimeter, I closed
the thrust levers and planted it firmly onto the runway, aircraft carrier
style. Well most of our energy dissipated rapidly, and by using medium
auto-brakes, until I lowered the nose wheel, we managed to stop just before
the intersection of 11/35. Stew just "cracked" the reversers, in case we
need them, but because the engines will be removed and used again, we did
not want to ingest any debris, as ALL the engines were overhanging the
runway. The brake temperatures did not move higher than the mid green range.
Vambridge From South Africa, joined Apr 2001, 80 posts, RR: 0 Reply 7, posted (5 years 8 months 4 weeks 1 day 2 hours ago) and read 26383 times:
Hi Guys
I was also there when she arrived at Rand on Friday. What a bittersweet day.
It was truly an emotional scene. Many of the people around were also there when she arrived at Jan Smuts on her delivery flight in 1971.
I had wonderful flashbacks of spotting her regularly since 1987 when I started spotting. I have wonderful memories of spotting at the end of 03L when she departed for Hong Kong on SA 286 in the early afternoon, with the airport hot and high, and the aircraft heavy.
I used to lie flat on my back on my parents driveway on Thursdays and Saturdays when the 747-200's still flew SA 252 in the late afternoon. I had my binoculars and could see lots of detail as they flew overhead on the
Eland 6A.
Lebombo had such a romantic life, spending all of it at one single airline, seeing the world in many different era's and decades.
To the crew of the last flight, well done on some excellent flying.
To the old girls, and especially to Lebombo, may you inspire many more pilots, and thanks for giving me many happy memories.
Lxlgu From South Africa, joined Sep 2000, 1057 posts, RR: 2 Reply 8, posted (5 years 8 months 4 weeks 1 day 2 hours ago) and read 26338 times:
What memories!
As cabin crew I had many a happy flight on Lebombo
I remember a LIS/ROM/ATH flight where we used to turnaround and head
back ATH/ROM/LIS
We had 3 hour layover in ATH and a TWA crew came on board and had
coffee with us as they had a 3 hour stopover as well!
Those were certainly the days
JGPH1A From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 9, posted (5 years 8 months 4 weeks 1 day 2 hours ago) and read 26327 times:
Shame, nice they found her a good home. "Lebombo" was the only SA 747 Super B I never flew on, I managed to go on all the rest. Very very fond memories
- First ever 747 - ZS-SAM "Drakensberg" SA225 14AUG80 LHR-LPA-JNB
- Gold Class roundtrips to HKG for the weekend
- First ever trip to NYC - JNB-SID-SA - New York">JFK on ZS-SAP "Swartberg"
- First non-stop to Europe, round the bulge JNB-FRA-AMS - ZS-SAO "Magaliesberg"
- Seeing that big ole orange tail at all those airports round the world, and every time it said "Home".
07/09/89 SA260 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAL JNB LIS FCO Tafelberg
13/07/90 SA261 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAL FCO LIS JNB Tafelberg
14/08/80 SA225 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAM LHR LPA JNB Drakensberg
28/10/88 SA286 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAM JNB MRU HKG Drakensberg
29/10/88 SA287 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAM HKG MRU JNB Drakensberg
24/05/88 SA228 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAO JNB ABJ LHR Magaliesberg
04/11/88 SA286 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAO JNB MRU HKG Magaliesberg
05/11/88 SA287 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAO HKG MRU Magaliesberg
06/11/88 SA193 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAO MRU DUR JNB Magaliesburg
23/02/89 SA252 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAO JNB FRA AMS Magaliesberg
25/07/92 SA9262 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAO JNB BCN ORY Magaliesberg
01/08/92 SA9273 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAP ZRH BCN JNB Swartberg
04/10/92 SA201 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAP JNB SID SA - New York">JFK Swartberg
01/07/93 SA260 SAA B747-200 ZS-SAP JNB MXP AMS Swartberg
06/09/90 SA282 SAA B747-200M ZS-SAR JNB MRU TPE Waterberg
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