Cpos From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 31 posts, RR: 0 Posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 2526 times:
Last month I was on a DL Shuttle flight from BOS to LGA. Prior to pushback, the cabin filled with what looked and smelled like steam from the AC. We evacuated the a/c without incident. The crew did a great job keeping everyone calm. The 50 or so passengers all exited through the jetway as we still had not finished our pushback.
Anyway, I have two questions.....
1) The captain came out to the gate and explained that in his years of flying the MD-88, he's never seen this happen. I guess some of the "Packs" in the air conditioning unit malfunctioned. This was the first flight out for this aircraft on that morning. They tryed restarting the engines and encountered the same results. Can someone please explain what he ment by "Packs."
2) Secondly, does anyone know where this plane is now. It was taken out of service at that point. I have flown three shuttle round trips since then and have not seen the aircraft in the rotation. N910DE.
Bucky707 From United States of America, joined Aug 2000, 1028 posts, RR: 4 Reply 1, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 2473 times:
Quoting Cpos (Thread starter): Can someone please explain what he ment by "Packs."
the packs are air conditioning packs, a unit which takes bleed air off the engines, compresses it, then expands it, which causes cooling. This is the air which is pumped into the cabin to keep it cool and to pressurize. If it is too cold, bleed air direct from the engines is mixed in to warm up air supplied to the cabin.
Wjcandee From United States of America, joined Jun 2000, 4553 posts, RR: 17 Reply 2, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 2441 times:
Curious. I don't know why you would evacuate. If it looked like "steam" -- i.e. it came in with the force of a teakettle and dissapated quickly -- I have seen this literally fifty times in aircraft, including many times in the MD80. It happens (as does fog) when cold, dry air is blown into an environment of warm, moist air -- as it does when you open your fridge sometimes.
If it didn't dissipate, and instead filled the cabin with lingering, smoky, fog, then it could be the result of the ingestion by the a/c system of deicing fluid.
In any event, there was likely nothing substantially wrong with the aircraft.
Another decent civilian word as a definition of "air conditioning packs" is "heat exchanger". Same principle as that thing in the back of your refrigerator, but different design.
MD88Captain From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 1287 posts, RR: 22 Reply 3, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 2441 times:
Pnematic Air Compressor System. Or something like that. I've had them fill the cabin with "fog" in high humidity conditions and I've had them send smoke if they overheat. That happened on the 727 all the time and on the MD88 very infequently - But it has happened to me.
Cpos From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 31 posts, RR: 0 Reply 4, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 2364 times:
This was definately not just a fog. I was sitting in the second row and when I stood up, I could not see the back of the aircraft.
SESGDL From United States of America, joined Jan 2001, 3384 posts, RR: 11 Reply 6, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 2232 times:
Quoting Viasa (Reply 5): This three MD-88 wear now Delta Shuttle titels: N908DE, N910DE and N915DE
Sorry, there are more than that though. There MD-88s wear Shuttle titles now:
N908DE
N910DE
N911DE
N913DE
N914DE
N915DE
There may very well be more, but these are the ones that I have seen pictures of. Can anyone from DL help out? Are N909DE and N912DE also in Shuttle colors now?
TinPusher007 From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 963 posts, RR: 2 Reply 7, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 14 hours ago) and read 2084 times:
Quoting Bucky707 (Reply 1): the packs are air conditioning packs, a unit which takes bleed air off the engines, compresses it, then expands it, which causes cooling. This is the air which is pumped into the cabin to keep it cool and to pressurize. If it is too cold, bleed air direct from the engines is mixed in to warm up air supplied to the cabin.
Wjcandee From United States of America, joined Jun 2000, 4553 posts, RR: 17 Reply 8, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 2022 times:
Quoting TinPusher007 (Reply 7): Yea...shouldn't PACKS actually be PACS for Pneumatic Air Conditioning System? This was always my understanding of that acronym.
My 767 Flight Handbook calls them "packs" all the way through. The indicator lights above the "Pack Control Selectors" on the 757/767 overhead panels say "Pack Off". The handbook describes "packs" as "air cycle machines".
So...regardless of where the term came from initially, Boeing seems to regard the present-day term as "Pack".
DeltaL1011man From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 8577 posts, RR: 8 Reply 9, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 2014 times:
jeremy, i have the list of everything sent to me from DL TOC but its old (its show the 733 shuttles) but if i can ill see if my freind can tell me P.S. if anyone wants the list i can send it to you
"Oh look at the sUGAr falling out of the sky! Look at the sUGAr falling out of the sky!" LM 1922-2011 Go Dawgs! G.A.T.A.
SESGDL From United States of America, joined Jan 2001, 3384 posts, RR: 11 Reply 10, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 1989 times:
Quoting DeltaL1011man (Reply 9): jeremy, i have the list of everything sent to me from DL TOC but its old (its show the 733 shuttles) but if i can ill see if my freind can tell me P.S. if anyone wants the list i can send it to you
That would be great, thank you! If you need it, my email is j73198@yahoo.com
CVG2LGA From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 590 posts, RR: 1 Reply 11, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 1975 times:
Quoting SESGDL (Reply 6): There may very well be more, but these are the ones that I have seen pictures of. Can anyone from DL help out? Are N909DE and N912DE also in Shuttle colors now?
N912DE is in shuttle scheme, I snapped a foto of it at CVG one day at work. I just thought it was neat to see that and hadn't heard about the conversion yet. Also later when I got on board it on the right side of the aircraft opposite of the rear galley all the seats were gone? I would think they were making on the dare I say it MRTC idea. Any ideas as to why the seats were gone? Also this was a regular ops out of CVG could you imagine telling the 8-12 pax, sorry we literally don't have seats for you? Or "You are seated in the hangar sir...we apologize for that.
Tchau
DA-
They don't call em' emergencies anymore. They call em' Patronies.
CVG2LGA From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 590 posts, RR: 1 Reply 13, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago) and read 1719 times:
Hey I saw this at work today DL N398DA is still in shuttle scheme. Can anyone tell me when they pulled the 738's off shuttle? How long would it take to schedule this in for a repaint?
Tchau
DA-
They don't call em' emergencies anymore. They call em' Patronies.
DALMD88 From United States of America, joined Jul 2000, 2365 posts, RR: 15 Reply 14, posted (7 years 2 months 3 weeks 5 days 10 hours ago) and read 1636 times:
All of the ex shuttle 738 are currently being moded with first class and the titles are being changed. It takes about four days to do it. The paint part only takes a few hours. They just paint over the old ones with a roller and then mask it and paint the new title.
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