Posted on 09/21/2005 4:21:43 PM PDT by kingu
A Jet Blue aircraft just did a low altitude flyby of Long Beach airport after reporting some concern with their forward gear. The television helicopter caught an image of it - the gear is turned sideways and tilted.
Aircraft is heading out towards the ocean to drop fuel, will turn around, and attempt a 'soft field' landing, keeping the nose up as long as possible.
Please pray for all on board.
Those wheels don't look good
some confusion...actually flight from Burbank to JFK...nose gear would not retract after takeoff...did low level fly over Burbank tower...confirmed problem...flew out over ocean to dump fuel. Reporters making the understandable connection to Long Beach airport since JetBlue has been using that airport for years while they just started service to Burbank a few weeks ago.
I wonder if they have those big Oshkosh crash trucks at LAX?
How could they possible omit a fuel-dump capability?
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Good question.
Nah, if memory serves ValueJet is Airtran now. I seem to recall that was one of those merge-to-buy-a-new-name kind of buyouts. JetBlue's a different animal.
I'm guessing they have more room/longer runway for this at LAX...just in case.
VIDEO of FOX coverage:
http://thepoliticalteen.net/2005/09/21/jetblue/
whats the freq for long beach tower ?
I am
Oh that is not good....
The coverage of this is pretty amazing. Prayers for all aboard.
Lord have mercy.
News reports are saying it came out of Burbank???
Guess I should get my camera loaded, if it comes back to land at Long Beach.
ironic. french landing gear can't tell forward from sideways.
Yep, as long as they can maintain that attitude. When the nose comes down, the front gear will probably snap off. Hopefully, they will have scrubbed off enough speed by then and will still be able to steer with engines and rear-wheel brakes.
It would be wise to get as much weight to the rear as possible, I would think. I don't know if there's access to the luggage compartment or not, but I'd be there stacking and securing that stuff to the rear.
Lemme ping what I got, courtesy of calcowgirl
Flying around in circles dumping fuel, but Shep said airbuses can't dump fuel!
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