[Rokke]

This ought to be good.

[Rokke]

This ought to be good.

[Red Dog #1]

Does anyone know if their mandating on board nitrogen generation/scrubbing or just some system pressurizing the tank with ambient air to prevent vaporization? $200,000 is dirt cheap for any major aircraft systems modification.

[microgood]

and aviation engineers took some time to come to full recognition of the fuel tank problem

Some time along with a lot of death threats from the CIA. The part I like the most is that the CIA themselves demonstrated how the front section plane turned into a missle and shot straight up into the heavens for a couple thousand feet and looked like a missle. Boy they must think we are dumb.

[DuncanWaring]

...the system will weigh 100 to 200 pounds, and will require some extra fuel use by the engines to provide compressed air...

To say nothing of the extra fuel use by the engines generating thrust to carry around the extra weight.

On longer (transoceanic/transcontinental) flights, this will amount to roughly 100 to 200 pounts of fuel.

Per flight

On each and every flight.

[Maria S]

“Flight 800 was initially thought to have been downed by a bomb or a missile, and aviation engineers took some time to come to full recognition of the fuel tank problem.”

Try http://www.twa800.com/index.htm

[woofer2425]

The Air Force's C5A has had an on-board liquid nitrogen system that keeps the empty space on it's fuel tanks filled with nitrogen. The aircraft is about 30 years old. So this technology has been around awhile. The cryrogenic system was difficult to mainain at times but seemed to work well.

[Doctor Stochastic]

As a result, the ground crews had not filled the center tank; it had a few inches of fuel at the bottom, and a lot of air.

Sort of a mini-FAE.

[The Wizard]

shoot down the missiles....that all you had to do to prevent TWA 800

[Captain Peter Blood]

As we all know the Boeing 747 has one of the best safety records in commercial aircraft. There have and I repeat there has never been a verified report of any problems with the central fuel tank on a 747, much less any recorded and verified explosions of the central fuel tank due to fumes or anything else.
The FAA is mandating this to cover their sorry butts because they could not explain what happened to Flight 800 off Long Island. Also the airlines don't have the estimated $250 Million to retofit all those planes.
This whole thing is a Crock!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[SevenDaysInMay]

SA missle defense.