3DoorsDown From United States of America, joined Oct 2005, 368 posts, RR: 0 Posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 15065 times:
KIRO news is reporting that an MD-80 on a flight from SEA-BUR had a hole open up in the fuselage about the size of a sheet of paper. They also said the ground crew has been questioned and they admitted to knocking a piece of equipment into the fuselage and not reporting it.
EMBQA From United States of America, joined Oct 2003, 9286 posts, RR: 13 Reply 1, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 15052 times:
Quoting 3DoorsDown (Thread starter): They also said the ground crew has been questioned and they admitted to knocking a piece of equipment into the fuselage and not reporting it.
D'oooh that's bad news.
"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog"
Rage323machine From United States of America, joined Oct 2004, 80 posts, RR: 1 Reply 2, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 15028 times:
Glad to hear everyone is ok!!!!
I think we should get that hole checked out pretty soon!!
AmericanAirFan From United States of America, joined Jun 2004, 397 posts, RR: 3 Reply 3, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 15024 times:
Hmm sounds silly not to report damage by the ground crew. Good thing everyone is safe.
"American 1881 Cleared For Takeoff One Seven Left"
MDorBust From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 5, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 14949 times:
Just a thought... but when a union who is in dispute with an airline about non-union labor suddenly reports immediately after an accident that it was the non-union guys fault... umm... grain of salt time?
Aerobalance From United States of America, joined Sep 2000, 4634 posts, RR: 51 Reply 6, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 14912 times:
Never good to play with the lives of passengers. Not good at all - shame on them.
MiCorazonAzul From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 7, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 14836 times:
This is an awful story. My first thought was, wouldn't the pilots notice such a hole during their pre-departure walk around? At any rate, maybe this happened after that and if that's the case, shame on those who didn't report what happened. They should be charged as criminals.
LesMainwaring From United States of America, joined Dec 2005, 539 posts, RR: 3 Reply 8, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 14810 times:
OPNLguy From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 9, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 14769 times:
Years ago when I catered for Dobbs at IAH, I had my truck positioned to meet a Braniff ORD-IAH flight that was about to terminate for the night. When the 727-200 blocked-in, Braniff personnel would not let me approach the aircraft, and a bunch of suit-types started gathering around the F/O's wingtip and looking up.
Turns out that another catering truck had hit the wingtip at ORD, damaging the trailing edge white position light, which we could see all mangled up as the aircraft rolled in. They hadn't told anyone until the aircraft was almost at IAH. Neither Braniff nor the FAA were exceptionally happy about this.
We were always taught that if you had the misfortune to hit an aircraft, stop and tell someone about it, and take your lumps right then and there. The alternative of keeping one's yap shut in the hopes that the aircraft would get out of town and be someone else's problem downline was not only stupid, but potentially dangerous. What should have been common sense for someone obviously overtasked their ability to think.
Shortly afterwards, Braniff put out an edict that mandated that all 727-200 aft galleys would henceforth be catered from the CAPTAIN'S side of the aircraft. Approaching, as well as backing away from a 727-200 aft galley was much easier from this side, since the driver always had a better view of the wing's trailing edge--much more so than having that wing on the other side of the truck. Problem was that both Braniff and United had their galleys on the F/O's side, and this new edict meant having to lug all the catering containers across 3 seats and an aisle to get to the galley.
Major pain in the butt....but I digress.
The contract ramp folks should have said something at the time the damage occurred...
AASuper80 From United States of America, joined Dec 2005, 51 posts, RR: 0 Reply 10, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 14738 times:
Glad everyone is safe!!!
AS doesn't seem to have very good luck with their MD80s... I wonder if they put them on another Mad Dog?
Artsyman From United States of America, joined Feb 2001, 4741 posts, RR: 43 Reply 11, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 14728 times:
Should the pilots not have seen this on a walk around. This is why airlines have multiple levels of checks and redundancies.
FlyMeToTheMoon From United States of America, joined Jul 2004, 242 posts, RR: 1 Reply 12, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 14727 times:
Now this is serious and real news, not the "Oprah's jet struck a bird" whine! Glad everyone is OK, I would not want to be in the skin of the poor dude responsible for the hole in the plane.
Now here's a can of worms opening up: Does anyone think this would have occured had AS used AS rampers - someone with some ownership in the carrier - rather than the flunkies employed there now?
IMO - when you have ownership in something it's much harder to let it get screwed up than if you're just an outsider looking in.
FL1TPA From United States of America, joined exactly 9 years ago today! , 258 posts, RR: 0 Reply 14, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 14602 times:
A couple of replies are asking why the hole wasn't caught during the FO's walk around prior to departure. The Captain or FO MUST preform a walk around inspection of key points on the aircraft prior to departure - basically anytime while the a/c is on the ground. He must've completed it before the incident occurred.
Also, the ground personnell are supposed to do a walk around inspection of the aircraft prior to pushback to ensure all doors, hatches and panels have been securely closed before taxi. I'm sure they would have seen a gaping hole in the fuselage.
Complacency in following procedures and irresponsibility on the part of the ramp crew would be my guess.
FL1TPA
"Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffin' glue."
September11 From United States of America, joined May 2004, 3623 posts, RR: 23 Reply 15, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 16 hours ago) and read 14590 times:
Quote from article in the link above ...
It wasn't immediately clear what caused the 12- by 6-inch hole near the cargo door on the plane's left side, but a union official told KIRO 7 Eyewitness News that a non-union baggage handler operating a conveyor machine knocked the hole in the jet.
Silver1SWA From United States of America, joined Mar 2004, 4535 posts, RR: 26 Reply 17, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 16 hours ago) and read 14515 times:
Quoting FL1TPA (Reply 17): A couple of replies are asking why the hole wasn't caught during the FO's walk around prior to departure. The Captain or FO MUST preform a walk around inspection of key points on the aircraft prior to departure - basically anytime while the a/c is on the ground. He must've completed it before the incident occurred.
Also, the ground personnell are supposed to do a walk around inspection of the aircraft prior to pushback to ensure all doors, hatches and panels have been securely closed before taxi. I'm sure they would have seen a gaping hole in the fuselage.
I'm not sure about the policies at AS, but WN has an agreement with the FAA that allows the pre-flight walkaround to be done by the ground personel. The only time the F/O does a walkaround is at the beginning of the day, end of the day, or any flight they take over during a crew change.
This ramper is in some serious $!@# if the reports are true. You cannot expect that just because an aircraft is out of your hands and on its way to another city, that you are clean of any responsibility. It will always trace back to you. The NTSB and the FAA will surely be knocking on this guy's door if they haven't already.
I can't and won't go into detail, but I was involved in a slight mishap during pushback recently. While everything turned out alright and the flight continued on without incident I followed procedure and wrote up a report just in case something did happen and I had someone knocking at my door. It really is scary and things out on that ramp need to be taken very seriously.
Again, IF TRUE, this guy is in some serious trouble along with everyone else that saw this, or was aware of it happening without reporting it.
ALL views, opinions expressed are mine ONLY and are NOT representative of those shared by Southwest Airlines Co.
OOer From United States of America, joined Oct 2005, 1395 posts, RR: 2 Reply 18, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 16 hours ago) and read 14481 times:
I thought that AS had outsourced the groundhandling at SEA?
SHUPirate1 From United States of America, joined Sep 2003, 3661 posts, RR: 19 Reply 19, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 16 hours ago) and read 14456 times:
Quoting OOer (Reply 21): I thought that AS had outsourced the groundhandling at SEA?
They sure did...Menzies does it...
Burma's constitutional referendum options: A. Yes, B. Go to Insein Prison!
Lincoln From United States of America, joined Nov 2004, 3887 posts, RR: 8 Reply 20, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 16 hours ago) and read 14397 times:
Quoting Dc10s4ever (Reply 4): Sounds like a whiz quiz is in order for those rampers
You know, I've never worked on a ramp (or in any capacity for an airline -- but I have the utmost respect for those who do), but I would imagine that the "whiz quiz" would be administered if the person(s) responsible pointed out the accident prior to departure... I would imagine that by failing to mention the 'small' hole and letting the plane push as if nothing had happened could be considered 'gross misconduct' and immediate termination... Loss of pressurization is, I imagine, a quite significant incident as far as those things go, and the results could have been deadly.
Quoting OPNLguy (Reply 19): Maybe he was trying to make a hole for a cargo door on that side with the belt loader...
"Gosh darn it, they forgot the left cargo door on this one... We can fix that [bang] [bang] [bang], darn, still not quite big enough, but this will work."
"Uh, how do we close it?"
"Don't worry about that"
Lincoln
CO Is My Airline of Choice || Baggage Claim is an airline's last chance to disappoint a customer || Next flts in profile
StuckinMAF From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 21, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 16 hours ago) and read 14383 times:
Quoting Rage323machine (Reply 5): About 20 minutes into the flight at 26,000 feet, a loss of cabin pressurization caused the oxygen masks to deploy. The crew immediately put on their oxygen masks and instructed the 140 passengers to do the same.
A LOSS of pressurization? I don't see how the hell it could ever get pressurized with a hole that size in it to begin with. Looks to me that they should have known there was a problem by the time they were up to about 8,000 - 12,000 ft!
Oh well, nothing a couple of good strips of Duct Tape wouldn't fix!
DeltaMD11 From United States of America, joined Dec 2002, 1698 posts, RR: 38 Reply 22, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 15 hours ago) and read 14312 times:
Quoting StuckinMAF (Reply 24): A LOSS of pressurization? I don't see how the hell it could ever get pressurized with a hole that size in it to begin with. Looks to me that they should have known there was a problem by the time they were up to about 8,000 - 12,000 ft!
From the way the incident reads, I'm thinking that when the aircraft was struck with the ground machinery that the hull integrity was compromised. As the aircraft was approaching cruise speed and altitude that portion of the fuselage gave way under stress leading to the depressurization. Surely the aircraft could not have pressurized with that size of a hole in it to begin with.
Just my $0.02
Bryan
Too often we ... enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought. - John Fitzgerald Kennedy
Pilotpip From United States of America, joined Sep 2003, 3081 posts, RR: 12 Reply 23, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 15 hours ago) and read 14271 times:
There is also more than one layer of 'skin' between the passengers and the outer fuselage. That had to be one hell of a ding.
BTW, stuff like this happens much more often than you would think. Union airline employees do it too. Labor tensions are the only reason you heard about this one. People make mistakes, and given the shear number of flights and equipment running around means that stuff like this happens much more often than you'd think.
Aerobalance From United States of America, joined Sep 2000, 4634 posts, RR: 51 Reply 24, posted (7 years 4 months 3 weeks 2 days 15 hours ago) and read 14235 times:
[quote=DeltaMD11,reply=25]Quoting StuckinMAF (Reply 24):
A LOSS of pressurization? I don't see how the hell it could ever get pressurized with a hole that size in it to begin with. Looks to me that they should have known there was a problem by the time they were up to about 8,000 - 12,000 ft!
From the way the incident reads, I'm thinking that when the aircraft was struck with the ground machinery that the hull integrity was compromised. As the aircraft was approaching cruise speed and altitude that portion of the fuselage gave way under stress leading to the depressurization. Surely the aircraft could not have pressurized with that size of a hole in it to begin with.[/quote
I'm thinking this also.
"Sing a song, play guitar, make it snappy..."
25 3DoorsDown: Not sure what other skin you are referring to unless you are talking the insulation blankets and the sidewall panels. Neither of these would keep the
26 Wedgetail737: Doesn't AS management have any suspicion that these incidents with AS aircraft is fall out from getting rid of AS rampers to outsourcing them? It's pr
27 LegendDC9: That's kinda odd... Why would they make the point that a UNION official made a statement that a NON-UNION baggage handler caused this? Which union is
28 DeltaGuy: More often than you'd think. Less quality workers = more accidents. Simple. DeltaGuy
29 IAirAllie: A union employee would report it because they would have the security of knowing that there would be a fair investigation and due discipline proceedu
30 HikesWithEyes: The passengers went to BUR on a 737-400. That was the only available aircraft and crew to substitute.
31 Pictues: has happened before when Worldwide did Alaska's ramp, not a s bad, but they hit a B737-400 with a Belt Loader and put a dent in it, it wasn't reported
32 GentFromAlaska: I'm no structural mechanic. My read on it is a stress blow-out prior to 26,000 feet, at which point the flight turned around and headed back to SEATA
33 Wedgetail737: Aircraft skins aren't all that thick. Plastic deformation (dents) weakens the material significantly locally. Therefore, that portion of skin could no
34 Jerry911: Many years ago (1976), when I was throwing bags for Air California at SNA, we were told by management that if we bumped an airplane with a piece of eq
35 Wedgetail737: While I worked for DAL at OAK for two summers, I was told the same thing. Replacing structure on an aircraft is NOT a cheap repair and structural dama
36 Deltaflyertoo: Indeed it happened at 26,000 feet. The oxygen masks came down and on local LA tv a pax showed pics he took on his phone of everyone wearing them and t
37 Tozairport: YGBSM!!! I can't believe some of the things SWA gets away with. I would never want to fly a plane that a qualified person hadn't done a pre-flight ch
38 Smcmac32msn: I don't even think those rampers deserve to take a whiz quiz. I'd understand giving them one if they admitted it before the plane left the ground (an
39 LegendDC9: You mean the comfort that the union would fight even for the most incompetent of employees to keep their jobs after causing major damage? A poor empl
40 FXramper: Ding ding ding!, We have a winner, at FX, it's the company policy, to terminate any employee that does not report an a/c strike immediately. There are
41 Tundra767: My friend was one of the flight attendants on this flight. She said it was crazy.
42 AndrewUber: What the hell is that? Who said it was outsourced? And if so - does that mean that all outsourced help bangs into airplanes without reporting it? You
43 Doug_Or: RE: f/o walkarounds- The first officer's walkaround won't catch damage from loading equipment because its done prior to loading.
44 Wedgetail737: There are some news reports with pictures from the MD-80 in flight with the masks deployed and some videos of one passenger. Take a look at: www.king5
45 AJRfromSYR: How much do you think that guy got for selling the picture of himself with the O2 mask?
46 M404: Here is a more complete story http://www.redorbit.com/news/technol...tle/index.html?source=r_technology
47 Matt72033: but you have engineers on the ramp who are qualified! i reckon you'll find that an engineer is much likely to spot anything out of the ordinary than
48 Cfalk: Not silly - criminal. They should be charged for gross negligence andof course, fired. If the union decides to defend them, then the airline should s
49 Silver1SWA: Good for UA.... What doesn't make us rampers qualified? We are trained in this you know...and we do find things and point them out to the crew. For e
50 AJRfromSYR: Maybe the pilot should do the C/D checks also? Making the pilot do it is not out of safety but tradition.
51 SWAOPSusafATC: I find it funny that you think it is unsafe. You really think and airline so focused on safety would just tell a ramp agent to "look around for anyth
52 Sleekjet: ABC showed the video on "Good Morning America" this morning and also interviewed the couple. Amazing.
53 LTBEWR: This involved AS flight 536, SEA-BUR, on Monday, Dec. 26th. Take off was about 3:50 pm, the emergency occurred at 26,000 ft. about 4:10 pm. There was
54 SHUPirate1: These were NON-UNION employees. The union employees were fired on May 13, 2005 at 3:00 AM.
55 BigOrange: The bump created a crease in the plane's aluminum skin, which opened up into a 12- by 6-inch gash as the plane came under increased pressure at 26,000
56 N754PR: There are some bloody stupid people on this planet, and in some places they can have other people lifes in their hands...
57 F86sabre: It was likely more of a gouge than a crease. Dents don’t generally lead to much loss of strength unless the skin is badly yielded. Creases result in
59 Okie: I believe there was a thread about 2 months back about Menzies not reporting accidents at SEA. I don't have time right now to do a search maybe someon
60 Starrion: Well, once the aircraft is repaired and the lawsuits from all the passengers are settled it should be interesting to see how much AS has "saved" by ou
61 Tod: ...and with the rates that Menzies pays it won't be a big step backwards to a job that requires that you ask "do you want fries with that?" Tod
62 Bicoastal: These costs are the same regardless of in house or outsourcing. Believe it or not, some union/in house guys make mistakes and are dishonest, too. Ala
63 Swissy: Everyone stating that Union workers working safer than no-Unionized should get a reality check!!! This incident should not have happened but it did an
64 MaverickM11: "but a union official told KIRO 7 Eyewitness News that a non-union baggage handler operating a conveyor machine knocked the hole in the jet." Shall we
65 N234NW: The Seattle Times quotes a passenger as saying: Would this be the oxygen generators heating up as they produced oxygen for the passengers?
66 Swissy: MaverickM11, You are right, the list would be endless Cheers,
68 IAirAllie: Yes which is criminal. That someone was a contracted non-union worker too worried about saving his own ignorant hide to report this incident. There a
69 N1120A: Take a look at the numbers and see who does this more often There is no need to "rally up" anti-outsourcing talk. All you have to do is look at the n
70 Tozairport: By engineers I assume you mean mechanics. They are not at all stations, but at maintenance stations they too do a walk-around. The mechanics are high
71 Tozairport: I bet WN would have the rampers do that too, if they could. OK, tell me this. What did your training consist of. Was it a video, a systems class, a w
72 Tundra767: Hopefully enough to learn that they are called Flight Attendats not Stewardesses. Sorry a little pet peeve. My firend was telling me the same thing t
74 Flyman33178: http://jeremyhermanns.org/me/alaska-...ssurization-and-panic-at-30k-feet/ this guy happened to be on the flight...pictures included.
75 KATL757: Short thread here: Menzies, Ugh! (by Cessna172RG Aug 21 2005 in Civil Aviation)#ID2284348 Another shortie with some Menzies mention: RE: Alaska Airli
76 Lono: There you go.....there is the count.... There is no way to defend AS's getting rid of the union rampers..... someone is going to get hurt/killed befo
77 Matt72033: you may call them mechanics out there, over here there engineers! who signs off your aircraft to fly, someone must sign the CRS? that person would be
78 BoomBoom: He can always get a job at McDonald's. They probably pay better anyway... You get free burgers. My friends who work for AS can't afford to buy food a
79 Coronado990: Ahhhhh..., wouldn't that create a slight problem?
80 Flyboy7974: are there any pictures of the actual hole on the md-83 once it got back to sea? my friend that works at bur said this caused quite a scare in the term
81 LMP737: My experience has been if you come clean right away you will probably get to keep your job. Unless of course you were doing something that was blatan
82 Wedgetail737: IMO, cheaper doesn't necessarily mean better. The concept was a good one, if Menzies was able to provide a lower cost product. But aren't the Menzies
83 ER757: The report on channel 5 in SEA was comical. First they showed footage of an MD80 taking off, then a 737 taxiing, neither time mentioning what type of
84 Matt72033: oops! my bad! that should read closed! lol wats this whiz quiz everyones on about?[Edited 2005-12-29 01:12:07]
86 Worldjet777: Glad to hear everyone is OK! Somewhat reminiscent of the 1960's movie "Airport" where a man blows a hole in the side of a 707 but everything turns out
87 Wedgetail737: The news media indeed did reveal that the airplane involved was a MD-80. The fact that news media showed other airplanes Alaska flies other than the M
88 TheGreatChecko: You know, I had forgotten about AS letting all of their grounds crew go and contracting it out. I guess this is what happens when you award to the low
89 SWAOPSusafATC: I am operations so I didn't go through it. I did see a ramp class being shown the walk around and what to look for with there trainer. I do know that
90 PlanesNTrains: Not being sarcastic? With all due respect, you slammed them with this: in the same post. Why the venom? You make it sound like there is only one way
91 Silver1SWA: First of all, I was not the one that said that. Yes we were shown a video in our classroom training at our local station. We were also given a packet
92 Tozairport: Nope. I did the same thing when I was a ramper at UA. Totally different thing, though, to start up an APU and ride brakes to a gate versus preflight
93 Gift4tbone: It seems everyone is blaming this on the fact that the worker was non-union. I do not believe it has even a small inkling to do with union/non-union e
94 EA CO AS: I think the Menzies experiment at AS has proven to be a dismal failure so far. My $0.02 worth...
95 ANCFlyer: T'was I . . . . Question is, how much longer will AS toss good $$$ after bad? And if they decide to can this experiment as a failure and re-hire AS e
96 HAWK21M: If the report is true.Then the Erring Employee should have reported it. Surprisingly it was not detected by the crew during their Walkaround too, & Mx
97 PlanesNTrains: Did you start doing walkarounds at this experience level? The reason I ask is that you imply that your experience level is a defining factor in you b
98 Silver1SWA: Yes, we will agree to disagree I suppose. But I am curious about a couple things. First of all, how does choosing who can do a pre-flight walk-around
99 Cessna172RG: Ok, I may have skipped ahead of some of the responses here, but I have a few things to mention... First of all, because I work at SEA, I get to see Me
101 HAWK21M: If they are 10% of what you described.Its high time they were shown the Door.Cost saving or Not. regds MEL
102 IAirAllie: As stated before the walkaround is done first thing so the damage occured AFTER the walk around so it is not very surprising that the crew did not de
104 Matt72033: but engineers do a walkaround right before pushback!
105 OPNLguy: Irrespective of whomever did, or could do a walk-around, it's not all that hard to imagine that a crease on a light-colored fuselage with rain failli
106 Gift4tbone: Amen. BUT, and this is a big BUT, do the former AS employees want to come back to work? If it is was me, I wouldn't. Maybe they can hire brand new em
107 OPNLguy: Jungle drums indicate he's been suspended, and his ID badge returned to the Port of Seattle. Final disposition is pending the results of the NTSB inv
108 Tozairport: It's just another shortcut that allows for quicker turns. This saves dollars at the expense of safety, IMO. Like everything else, experience will ale
109 Silver1SWA: I'm not sure why, but you ignored my statement about how it really would not be a big deal as far as turn-times go. I don't know...I just don't see h
110 IAirAllie: Not standard practice in the US. Engineer means something different here. If your definition of Engineer is equivalent to our Mechanic then it still
111 Tozairport: I didn't mean to ignore your statement, I just didn't elaborate enough. A good walk-around takes 5-10 minutes on the 757. I can't imagine it is that
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