Posted on 12/29/2014 2:21:51 PM PST by moose07
A Virgin Atlantic passenger plane has landed safely at London's Gatwick Airport after discovering a problem with part of its main landing gear.
Virgin flight VS43 with 447 passengers and 15 crew was travelling from Gatwick to Las Vegas when it had to return.
The Boeing 747 circled over southern England for several hours dumping fuel before making a bumpy but safe landing just before 16:00 GMT.
Gatwick's runway reopened at 19:03 GMT after being closed by the emergency.
Budget airline Easyjet said 12 of its flights due to land at Gatwick on Monday had been diverted and 32 due to depart from the airport had been cancelled.
In a statement, Gatwick Airport said: "The airport is now facilitating inbound and outbound flights but it will take some time for normal service to resume.
"We advise passengers to check with their airlines on the status of their flight. Updates will also be posted on the Gatwick website and on Twitter."
The statement said the airport was working with its airline partners to provide food, drink and welfare facilities to those affected by the delays and cancellations and volunteers were helping provide advice.
Arriving flights had been diverted to other London airports, while departing aircraft were severely delayed while the Virgin jet was being assessed on the runway.
More at site. Including Images.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.co.uk ...
Would have mad sense to me if they had continued on to Las Vegas and made the landing there. It would have burned off fuel and got the passengers where they wanted to go.
Stop talking sense.
Did they ever explain what the issue with the landing gear was?
Somebody must have noticed it had disappeared into the fuselage after takeoff.
Nothing as of yet.
“Eyewitnesses reported the jet was flying at relatively low altitude and the pilot appeared to be trying to “shake” the landing gear down.
Nick Hughes, who was on board, said the crew made several attempts to try to free the landing gear.
“They put the thrust on quite heavily and then dipped down, I think, to try and loosen the gears but obviously nothing kind of worked.
If any part of the landing gear doors were involved they'd not be able to exceed safe gear extension speed either (else the airstream would rip off the doors).
They did the right thing.
Being a British carrier, I believe the decision to return was made due to location (maintenance and repair facilities).
Also, they probably wanted to avoid those pesky American lawyers. Thanks.
Good to hear they are all safe.
landing gear is for sissies.
There are two kinds of pilots, one’s who have landed with their gear up, and one’s who are going to land with gear up.
Center line perfect landing.
That’s what pilots are paid for. Not to fly the plane, but to know what to do when something goes wrong.
If VA has no repair facility contracted in Vegas, it makes no sense to fly there. Also if the issue caused a fault in getting the gear fully up, then they can’t make the trip. I recall a flight from the US to the UK that was made with an engine out and they got a ton of bad publicity. I believe it was British Airways back in the 70s.
:~0
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