send the janitor over with a broom...
USC Football team plane…how does this happen?
- Thread starter RhondaHonda
- Start date
How do you think they lowered the front (gracefully) ? I can't imagine they just allowed the suspension (?) to absorb it then again, it's built to absorb landings.
either way you're waiting. i alway try to get up quickly so i can egress the plane and find my favorite spot to eat or drink at that particular airport.
Why wouldn't the stick be built into the plane and be able to be lowered by the crew inside before letting passengers off?
I was a ramp agent in the the late 1990s and worked the Saab 340 mostly. The Saab used a tail stand too. As soon as you opened the cargo door, the tail stand was clipped into the cargo compartment floor. So, the first thing you saw when you opened the cargo door was the tail stand, and the last thing you saw when you closed the door was the tail stand - or that you forgot to store the tail stand. Excellent design. Boeing unfortunately doesn’t use anything resembling logic in their 737 designs.
Probably just tell the remaining passengers to walk towards the front one at a time. I would guess it's like making an emergency landing heavy, where they just need to inspect the landing gear. Even then, it probably dropped back slower than a landing and without as much weight. It was able to fly, so the damage couldn't have been that bad. That's got to be something where it's taken out of service and thoroughly inspected before going back to transporting passengers.
It probably didn't help that the bags were taken off before everyone was off the plane. Where would they normally be in the baggage hold?
Gosh. And oddly, American, United, Southwest and others don’t seem to mind a bit. This tail-tipping phenomenon has happened what, once? With no damage to the aircraft or passengers.
First get everything on the ground well out of the way, because it is going to tilt down out of control, and also up on two wheels it is prone to swing around in the wind. Unless the wheels are very well chocked, which I suspect the ground crew also failed to do.
I would think the landing gear would handle this fine. Damage from what was effectively a tail strike would be the main structural concern.
I believe it has one in front as well. To help it pole vault off short runways at high gross weight.
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Can’t understand why Boeing dropped money on a mid … when they could of built a composite 73 replacement with big round nacelles to carry better engines. I’m not seeing 73’s abroad anymore … just flocks of 320/321 NEO’s
It’s happened before, Boeing failed to identify the risk in the plane development, and the fix was a pole.
Because the ground crew failed to place the pole before the passengers deplaned, it happened again.
The pole to prevent this is not optional, it’s a requirement for parking the airplane.
A pole that makes up for one of the many design defects in this airplane.
Think Astro said Southwest pushed for Boeing to build this airplane. Just sayin’
Southwest doesn't have a 737-900. That's the longest version of the 737 from the Next Generation series. The biggest they go is the 737-800.
I'm wondering how that works. This United -900 that tipped over landed in Lewiston, which I understand has a pretty short runway and the -900 requires much longer runways for takeoff if fully loaded. Some of the airports in Hawaii don't have long runways, like OGG and LIH. I looked up some of the routes like SEA-LIH and Alaska uses the -800.
That’s a interesting question. Part of the answer might be that getting these freed up planes for other routes and the 900 could be used on routes that were always full thus giving them fleet flexibility of sorts.
Alaska is unique in a way. They started out as a west coast/Alaska airline then grew regionally and finally started adding longer routes as they went on. Their Mexico flights are usually full, that was before C19 of course. Hawaii was a huge success as well. Their Anchorage flights of course are always full.
They most likely could use shorter Lewiston runways because they wouldn’t have had much of a fuel load coming from/going to LAX. Fuel load affects the 737-900 massively.
The times I’ve had “issues” with runway length in the 737-900 it’s almost always a transcon flight with close to max fuel. Or higher fuel loads (~35,000 - 40,000 lbs) , plus temps above 100F and/or higher airport elevation (roughly 2,000’+ MSL).
I’m not too knowledgeable on flights to Hawaii among the various airlines, but browsing FlightRadar24, the 737-900 is fairly rare. Tons more -800s, MAX 8s and MAX 9s which all have better range and performance than the 737-900.
I am a bit amazed Alaska Airlines does SEA - Hawaii with the -900. That’s >2,300 NM. My guess is the low airport elevations help departure performance out of there, plus Kona has 11,000’ of runway, which is pretty good, especially for a sea level airport. Either way, I wouldn’t be surprised if they even weight limit (reduce passenger/cargo loads) on those flights when the winds are unfavorable - that’s just a guess though.
I’d imagine those Alaska Air 737-900 flights to/from SEA are also done with Full Thrust, “Engine Bleed” air off and Zero tailwind component allowed. On normal takeoffs, the engines will supply the “bleed air” to pressurize the cabin. But, by tapping high pressure air from the engine compressor section, you lose a bit of performance. One way (usually the last option) to gain a bit extra power for takeoff is to shut off the engine bleed air valves, and leave the APU running for takeoff. You then let the APU bleed air pressurize the cabin for the first few thousand feet of climb. Then you switch the bleed air source back over to the engines and shut the APU off for the rest of the flight.
I see “Engine Bleeds Off” required once every 6 months or so. It’s pretty uncommon, and a bit of an extra hassle. You’re reading a separate checklist on your iPad while you’re doing all your other tasks before and after takeoff.
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Been there, done that. That was the most interesting passenger terminal I've ever been to, along with using air stairs, where it might have been the first time in decades I'd used any. Well - maybe other than in parts of Asia where it was a bus taking us from the gate to where the plane was parked.
HNL does have the reef runway. The most interesting runway surroundings I've ever seen.
While the 737 has been extended pretty durn far, sounds like you are saying that having a tail stand for an airplane is a design flaw?
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