Posted on 05/24/2013 6:17:17 PM PDT by oxcart
A British Airways jet carrying 75 passengers was forced to perform an emergency landing at Heathrow today with smoke and flames pouring from one engine.
Eye-witnesses reported seeing a fire in the right-hand engine of the Airbus 319 as it was forced to land just minutes after it took off at 8.17am bound for Norway’s capital Oslo.
Residents on the Heathrow flight path said there was an "almighty blow-out" from the aircraft as it flew at just a few thousand feet above them.
BA said the jet, which is now being examined by investigators, had developed a "technical fault". Suggestions that it was grounded by a bird strike will form part of the investigation.
Passengers were evacuated from the aircraft, BA flight 762, using emergency slides and up to 10 fire crews raced to extinguish the flames. At least three passengers were treated by ambulance crews for minor injuries.
The emergency landing forced the closure of both runways for half an hour, as incoming flights were diverted to other airports in the South-East and many others were cancelled. Clive Cook, who lives on the flightpath, said: "The actual engine itself was on fire. This plane was coming over and suddenly the tone of its engine changed dramatically. I’d almost say it sounded as if it was like a blow-out or an explosion."
Another eye witness, an armed forces member calling himself only Aiden, said he saw smoke "swirl off the wing tip" as he drove near the airport.
He added: "The plane was coming right over my head and I had to brake because when I saw the starboard engine it was all blackened.
"The reverse thrusters, the flaps on the side of the carriage were open. The port engine was all clean and normal. The starboard one was all flames inside and fully blackened."
A third eyewitness, named only as Jamie, was working in his garden near Stamford Bridge in Chelsea. He said: "All of a sudden we heard this almighty noise. We could see the right engine on fire — it was horrendous. You don’t see things like that every day.
"Your thoughts are with the people. If we could hear it that badly then what were the passengers going through?"
The stricken aircraft had taken off on the southern runway but performed an emergency U-turn on to the northern runway, which remained closed today as it was blocked by the jet.
Passengers faced severe delays as the airport operated both arrivals and departures with only one runway — effectively running at half capacity.
The drama happened on a very busy day for Heathrow as about 100,000 travellers pass through it for the start of the bank holiday getaway. BA will be carrying more than 463,000 customers over the entire bank holiday weekend, with 128,000 travelling tomorrow and another 116,000 flying on Monday.
The inquiry will be carried out by BA, the Air Accident Investigation Board and the Civil Aviation Authority.
Or a contained fan blade failure.
I’m sure it could have been a bird strike, but such engines are tested with all sizes of (grocery store prepared) chickens and turkeys to validate that any such strike won’t threaten the safety of a flight.
HF
I thought it was two guys trying to get into the flight deck. Whom to believe??????
Birds....
Different flight. Although that could have been birds, too.
UK investigators have opened an inquiry into the British Airways Airbus A319 incident at London Heathrow which resulted in substantial damage to both engines.
Images show that the fan cowl doors on both engines have been torn away, with clear discolouration on the rear of the starboard International Aero Engines V2500 powerplant.
The UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch says it has started a probe into the event involving the aircraft (G-EUOE) which had just taken off as flight BA762 to Oslo.
Excerpt
Guess I should read more closely.
Just another day at the office.....
Gonna cost a lot of Pounds to steam clean all those seats.
Looking at those pictures, I’m not sure it was completely contained. That engine is a mess.
}:-)4
“Eye-witnesses reported seeing a fire in the right-hand engine of the Airbus 319...”
The number 19 strikes again!
Images show that the fan cowl doors on both engines have been torn away,
Two different planes, one flight leaving Heathrow suffered an engine failure.
second plane, enroute from Pakistan to Manchester had the two d!ckheads trying to breach the cockpit!
TWO engine failures.
It's looking like ground maintenance failed to properly latch the engine covers, and they blew off both engines during the first few minutes of flight.
Video from onboard: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2013/may/24/heathrow-emergency-landing-from-plane-video
Totally agree with you. I’m just making fun of the
Suggestions that it was grounded by a bird strike will form part of the investigation.
For one possibility see this thread:
“FAQ: The V1-VR Terrorist Runway Kill Zone (RKZ) Frequently Asked Questions”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/3015719/posts
“If any two engines on a large multi-engine jet can be disabled in the RKZ by a terrorist attack, the aircraft will not be able to gain enough altitude to return to the airport and will almost certainly crash. The availability of inexpensive, GPS-guided autonomous model aircraft and helicopters (drones and UAVs) that are capable of precisely targeting the runway path of each jet engine in the RKZ makes terrorist attacks increasingly probable.”
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