[HN Gopher] Getting a 787 back in the air after a diversion
___________________________________________________________________
Getting a 787 back in the air after a diversion
Author : ycombonator
Score : 141 points
Date : 2020-01-04 03:22 UTC (19 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.flightradar24.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.flightradar24.com)
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| Meanwhile a month prior things didn't go so well for American:
|
| https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7504393/American-ai...
| supernova87a wrote:
| You know, behind these on-the-surface feel-good / oh-that's-cool
| stories is generally a less positive tale of deferred maintenance
| and poor choices by AA (and other airlines) that leads to this
| kind of rescue flight being necessary.
|
| The article was from 2016, and the question you want to be asking
| is, "how often _should_ a 2 year old 787 be having engine issues
| requiring unplanned diversion? " and is AA's maintenance regime
| causing them to encounter these situations more than is expected?
|
| What you will generally find is that because of labor costs in
| the US, and the thin maintenance margins that our carriers are
| incentivized to follow (partly also because penalties for
| stranding passengers is quite low), these kinds of diversions are
| more frequent than other airlines operating better-maintained
| long-haul routes.
|
| Things are always breaking on airplanes. How much proactive
| maintenance is conducted is up to the airline, and determines how
| much builds up before 1 out of many issues on the minimum
| equipment list rises enough to ground the aircraft. It's quite an
| active decision for an airline, actually. In this case, AA
| maintenance probably made a decision (under all the other
| constraints they face) to fly the 787 to Shanghai (where they
| don't have a full maintenance depot) with some marginally
| performing or slightly-overdue-for-recommended-replacement engine
| part. And then on the return the strategy backfired.
|
| Consider that when you wonder, "is it just me, or why does
| airline X seem to have so many more delays and aircraft swaps
| than others?"
| Aloha wrote:
| You got a source for any of this?
| supernova87a wrote:
| Nope. People in maintenance departments don't generally write
| blogs about this, and it's not like an airline is going to
| help publicize their issues. And judging by how even my post
| is downvoted, they're not likely to either.
| ryguytilidie wrote:
| I like this thing people are doing where they're like,
| "huh, my post on Hacker News was downvoted? must not be for
| content, must be because, um...its DEFINITELY because
| airlines arent going to publish negative things about them,
| theres definitely a logical connection there!
|
| ...?
| CaliforniaKarl wrote:
| As this is aviation-related, of course there is a Wendover video
| on this topic, and indeed covering this specific incident!
|
| Small Planes Over Big Oceans (ETOPS Explained) (2017) [video]
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSxSgbNQi-g
| WalterBright wrote:
| Back when I worked at Boeing they had the AOG (Airplane On
| Ground) crew to do this sort of thing. Their job was to be on
| call 24/7 and do whatever it took to get that airplane back in
| the air, and they pretty much had a blank check to do it.
|
| Naturally, they were the best mechanics Boeing had.
|
| An airplane makes money only when it is flying. When it is
| sitting on the ground, it loses money at a prodigious rate. A
| large focus of the engineering on the 757 I worked on was to keep
| that airplane flying as much as possible.
|
| I understand that Microsoft has a similar crew they can dispatch
| to any customer to get their business software working again.
| This is how Microsoft is able to successfully compete against
| free software.
| _trampeltier wrote:
| "Naturally, they were the best mechanics Boeing had."
|
| I know people who do this kind of work, but are they really the
| best? - As long you hold a screwdriver in your hand, you are
| No.2 in salary. - Family, your child has birthday, something to
| show you in school or sport? Forget it, 5 minutes before it
| starts, you get always a call. So you have no family (anymore).
| - 9 to 5 nah.. more like 9 plus 5 hours to work a day. -
| Friends, forget it you don't have any. But of course they have
| storys to tell. But why would you choose a such life?
| ethbro wrote:
| Because some people will always want to be the best.
|
| And one of the more difficult things when you're that sort of
| person is finding a rewarding challenge up to your skills.
|
| Or as a president once quipped, "Why does Rice play Texas?"
|
| Because it is hard.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Exactly right. It's no fun getting the easy jobs. It's very
| sweet getting something done that everyone else said
| couldn't be done.
| __sy__ wrote:
| "Prodigious Rate" -- To put this in context, the latest numbers
| I saw is about $125 per min of unscheduled delay. It also
| doesn't take that many delays to wipe profitability to zero.
| CalChris wrote:
| A plane sitting on the ground _costs_ revenue.
|
| The highest revenue per hour route is JFK to Heathrow at
| $24,639 [1]. A 787-800 costs about $8000/hr [2]. So that's
| about $277/min of revenue. Yeah, $125/min sounds about right
| for an average route.
|
| [1] https://www.planestats.com/bhsw_2014sep
|
| [2] https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1398091
| ethbro wrote:
| Well, expected revenue looks a bit difference when you're
| leveraged to the hilt and have interest payments scheduled.
|
| My understanding is that very few airlines outright own
| their planes.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Even if they own the planes outright, the interest cost
| of the airplanes remains the same (because the money tied
| up in the airplane could be otherwise put to use earning
| interest).
|
| For example, conventional wisdom is that owning your own
| home outright is a Good Thing. But if mortgage interest
| rates are low, taking out a mortgage and investing in
| something that pays more than that interest rate is a
| Better Thing.
| cesarb wrote:
| > But if mortgage interest rates are low, taking out a
| mortgage and investing in something that pays more than
| that interest rate is a Better Thing.
|
| Yes, but there's extra risk that way. That strategy
| depends on either the investment returning enough every
| month to pay the mortgage for that month, or another
| funding source (like a salary) being available every
| month to do so. If for some reason neither are available
| on a given month, you risk losing your home.
| bronco21016 wrote:
| It varies. Some airlines are printing money like it's
| their job and have very savvy purchasing teams. Large
| piles of cash spent on second hand aircraft can really
| help soften the blow when times get tough. Although in
| the current market some are even spending cash on NEW
| airframes which is really kind of crazy.
|
| But speaking globally, I would say you're likely right.
| The majority of airlines are very heavily leveraged and
| as soon as the economy softens we'll see at least a few
| casualties again.
| bitexploder wrote:
| Southwest had a really memorable slogan: "wheels up" and the
| business really rallied around that priority ruthlessly for
| many years. It was pretty cool and gets used in business
| analysis as an example a lot about how to achieve big goals.
| sokoloff wrote:
| One such (very lightweight) analysis:
| https://www.cnbc.com/id/43768488
|
| It really is a great systems thinking story. Set the
| overall context and goal and then figure out how to
| optimize for the thing that drives results.
| ethbro wrote:
| The _How I Built This_ podcast on Southwest [0] with
| Kelleher (since deceased) is an amazing episode. Both for
| trivia and giving context to what it takes to be
| successful behind the scenes.
|
| Kelleher (a lawyer by training) ran a private practice
| while litigating a _3-year_ lawsuit against airline
| incumbents at the time... before Southwest flew its first
| flight in Texas.
|
| And when asked "Why?" As in, why didn't you stop, return
| to law, or do something easier, he basically said
| "Because it didn't seem fair. Or right. That they could
| keep us from flying."
|
| I'm sure he had his fair share of sharp business
| decisions, but he came across as a truly great human
| being.
|
| [0] https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/national-public-
| radio/how-i...
| WalterBright wrote:
| A corollary is that airline operations revolve around
| maximizing the amount of time their airplanes are flying and
| loaded to the gills with payload.
|
| The word "payload" is not a misnomer :-)
| jvolkman wrote:
| There's an episode of "World's Toughest Fixes" that follows an
| AOG team during the replacement of a 767 pressure dome.
|
| https://www.google.com/search?q=Worlds+Toughest+Fixes+S01+E0...
| dbarlett wrote:
| Probably the same
| incident:https://www.airspacemag.com/flight-today/airliner-
| repair-247...
| sethgibbons wrote:
| > I understand that Microsoft has a similar crew they can
| dispatch to any customer to get their business software working
| again.
|
| Given how much Microsoft software tends to "blue screen of
| death" it's no wonder they have to keep a crew on standby.
| philshem wrote:
| > I understand that Microsoft has a similar crew they can
| dispatch to any customer to get their business software working
| again.
|
| There is a saying that these teams are dispatched by private
| jet and consist of 8 executives and 2 engineers.
| kmbond wrote:
| > I understand that Microsoft has a similar crew they can
| dispatch to any customer to get their business software
| working again.
|
| Yikes well I work for a large corporation that uses tons of
| Microsoft software, and we use their dispatch team
| constantly. Granted, we are probably one of their largest
| customers. It's great to have such a resource. But the fact
| that we need it doesn't speak well for Microsoft -- I would
| prefer if we didn't need such a dispatch team on a constant
| basis.
| peterwwillis wrote:
| The fact that most people don't need to call said team
| might say more?
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| I imagine these 8 executives are there to lay down
| suppressive fire, keeping customer's management at bay so
| that the engineers can go in and fix the problem
| uninterrupted.
| ethbro wrote:
| Point. It'd be a bit aggressive to fly trained German
| Shepherds in with the engineers.
| Moto7451 wrote:
| Hehe. The comparison is both amusing and apt. I'm often in
| the "executive" position in this scenario and this barrier
| between the angry team/customer/partner and the people
| doing engineering work really pays in spades. The people
| doing the "real" work on both sides usually avoid animosity
| and the management teams slugging it out in conference
| rooms usually understand that the dance they're doing is
| just business as usual and not personal. When the
| separation is violated you can have engineers doing shoddy
| work because they're stressed or emotionally overloaded.
| Early in my career I was in that situation and made some
| very pointed comments that the company's CEO had to smooth
| over.
|
| If you do a really good job at handling the communication
| separation the business relationship is stronger after and
| each side better understands one another's needs and
| motivations. My foot in mouth moment ended up turning into
| a larger business arrangement because the CEO turned it
| into a positive experience.
|
| While not a universally perfect negotiating book, I've
| found "Never Split the Difference" to be an interesting
| tome on making the best of adversarial business situations.
| ethbro wrote:
| NStD is something _everyone_ in the business world (or
| who aspires to be) should read.
|
| The fact that much of what we say, especially in times of
| stress, isn't what we _really_ care about is easy to miss
| in actual practice.
| technofiend wrote:
| That job actually sounds like a lot of fun. Thank you for
| tip on _Never Split the Difference_.
| sethgibbons wrote:
| I'm not surprised Microsoft has a standby team, given how bad
| their software is
| molecule wrote:
| (2016)
| wayne wrote:
| Ah, that was back when AA and Alaska were much closer partners,
| before the Virgin acquisition... I was surprised when reading
| the article that Alaska was so helpful.
|
| https://thepointsguy.com/2017/12/last-call-alaska-american-a...
| pauldelany wrote:
| Had to build a runway for one take-off to get this private jet
| back in the air in 1983:
| https://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/features/humanintere...
| sajomojo wrote:
| It just seems like a very bad idea that twin-engine planes can
| fly so far from an air strip. If the #1 engine had failed as well
| it would have been game over. There's no possibility of gliding a
| 787 for 2+ hours and hundreds of miles.
|
| If the FAA wanted to prioritize safety, it would still require
| the use of four-engined planes, as it used to for most long ocean
| routes. The desire to fly twin-engine planes over the ocean is
| entirely driven by a desire to maximize airline profits.
|
| Admittedly, it does appear that modern twin-engine planes are
| reliable enough that it's not entirely crazy. But it would only
| take a couple of fatal engine failures to make it seem really
| dumb in retrospect.
|
| People are weirdly dogmatic around this ETOPs rule change by the
| FAA. There is almost no one questioning it and yet the entire
| motivation is purely monetary. The FAA and airlines continue to
| push the limits further and further.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ETOPS
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| _It just seems like a very bad idea that twin-engine planes can
| fly so far from an air strip. If the #1 engine had failed as
| well it would have been game over. There 's no possibility of
| gliding a 787 for 2+ hours and hundreds of miles. _
|
| You're right, and that's why 787s with Rolls Royce engines had
| their ETOPS certification reduced from 330 minutes to 140 or
| 180 depending on which version of the engine the frame has.
| jrockway wrote:
| ETOPS seems to have done pretty well. As far as I know, no
| ETOPS-certified twinjets have been lost due to both engines
| failing. There are a couple cases of the jet running out of
| fuel (the famous Gimli glider and Air Transat Flight 236), but
| that is going to be bad no matter how many engines you have.
| There are cases of airplanes flying into volcanic ash clouds
| and losing all engines; but more engines doesn't help you if
| the air around the plane kills engines. There are some poorly-
| engineered planes with 3 engines that have had a single-engine
| failure bring down the entire plane (United Airlines Flight
| 232).
|
| ETOPS is not just some rubber stamp for a particular model of
| airplane that manufacturers self-certify (hello, 737 MAX
| debacle), but rather a process applied to (airframe, engine,
| airline). You have to service particular engines to particular
| standards to be allowed to fly ETOPS, and it depends on the
| airline. I could go to the store, buy a 777 and hire 4 ATPs and
| fly a 777... but I wouldn't be allowed to fly it ETOPS, for
| example.
|
| All in all, the program seems massively successful to me. It
| saves fuel, which means cheaper flights and less CO2 being
| generated. That's a good thing. The main downside seems to be
| medical emergencies; I remember some stories about the aircraft
| that flew EWR-SIN... it has some special corpse compartments to
| stash away the inevitable deaths that occurred 9 hours away
| from an airport. (It had 4 engines, but engines don't perform
| heart surgery on passengers.)
|
| The reality is that engines are pretty reliable. 2 is the right
| number.
| sajomojo wrote:
| Thanks for the thoughtful replies, all. I still don't buy the
| idea that this change was made with public safety as the top
| priority. I do get that it might be a reasonable trade off of
| safety/profits. I really do hope the ETOPS rule changes turn
| out to be a good choice over the long term.
| mulmen wrote:
| ETOPS is not new. The 767-200ER entered service in 1985. We
| live in the future you are alluding to. Your concerns have
| not been validated by reality.
| jrockway wrote:
| The safest way to avoid aviation incidents is to not have
| planes at all. From there, there is a continuum of how much
| risk you want to take on.
|
| If we add many safety bells and whistles to planes, it
| would mean nobody could afford flying. If people couldn't
| afford it, they'd use other transportation methods. Those
| methods might be more dangerous than flying. So it wouldn't
| actually increase the safety of travellers. Oceanliners and
| cars are far from 100% safe, for example.
| meristem wrote:
| ETOPS-like rules have been in use since late 70's. It is an
| evolving standard with different craft types being approved
| for different ETOPS. While some current frames are rated
| ETOPS 330 or 370, this type of operation began officially
| with planes allowed to do only 90-minute ETOPS.
|
| If flying commercial over oceans, it is either ETOPS, A380,
| or a current type of 747 (747-8).
| Piskvorrr wrote:
| Volcanic ash is a completely different beast from normal ops:
| you could have four engines and it still wouldn't be enough,
| prompting what was perhaps the most British announcement in
| the history of aviation, as narrated here: https://everything
| 2.com/title/The+most+engine+failures+in+on...
| [deleted]
| WalterBright wrote:
| > If the FAA wanted to prioritize safety, it would still
| require the use of four-engined planes, as it used to for most
| long ocean routes. The desire to fly twin-engine planes over
| the ocean is entirely driven by a desire to maximize airline
| profits.
|
| That intuitively makes sense, but it's incorrect. The FAA
| certified twin engines over water because it's safer. Half the
| number of engines mean half the failures, and half the risk of
| cascaded failures from the failing engines.
|
| Statistics bear this out. Twin engines are safer.
| sajomojo wrote:
| Can you point to the statistics? I'm sure modern twin-engine
| planes are more reliable than very old four engine planes but
| what about modern vs modern?
| WalterBright wrote:
| No. I was simply told this by the other engineers at
| Boeing.
| CaliforniaKarl wrote:
| The ICAO has accident statistics available here:
| https://www.icao.int/safety/iStars/Pages/Accident-
| Statistics...
|
| You'll probably have to do some processing, but the answer
| should be in there!
| jacquesm wrote:
| Contrary to your assertion the two engined craft are just as
| safe (or safer!) as the four engined craft because of changes
| in procedures. Fuel management, weather forecasting, general
| engine reliability, lubricant reserves are all different and
| much more stringent for a twin engined jet over water on a
| straightline route. The effect is the aircraft is less long in
| the air anyway which has a big effect on the risk calculation.
|
| The main motivation is money, that's true, but the secondary
| motivation, the environment is also important and the math
| really does work out to a negligible safety difference
| (advantage twins) that to date has not led to the observation
| of numbers that would indicate a deviation from the predicted
| reliability figures.
|
| Finally, the chances of something going wrong on a twin engined
| aircraft vs a quad are higher for the quad because it is a much
| more complex system. So yes, _if_ an engine fails a four
| engined plane would be able to deal with it better but the
| chances of something going wrong are twice as high.
|
| In the 60's, when the 747 was designed the reliability of jet
| engines was such that four engines was more or less a must but
| we are now a good 50 years away from those days and our ability
| to deal with complex reliability issues has gone up
| substantially (recent Boeing issues notwithstanding). The A380
| has four engines because it is simply too heavy to take off
| with only two engines.
|
| Engine shutdown is so rare now that pilots can go a whole
| career without encountering it even once and typically it is
| the monitoring system that has a fault rather than the engine
| itself but you would shut down the engine anyway in those
| situations as a precaution.
| sajomojo wrote:
| Doesn't the fact that the twin-engine planes have to submit
| to more stringent ETOPS requirements mean the FAA believes
| they're less reliable than four engine planes?
| jrockway wrote:
| 2 engines of the type that they put on 4 engine planes are
| less reliable than 2 ETOPS-certified engines. ETOPS-
| certified engines (actually engine, airframe, airline
| combination) are going to be more expensive than engines
| where you have three extras next to them.
|
| I could build a jet engine in my garage and the FAA
| wouldn't let me fly 270 minutes away from an airport with
| paying passengers on it just because I made four of them.
| Certification is always going to be important.
| mulmen wrote:
| That's not a reasonable conclusion. The 787-8 and _747-8_
| are both ETOPS-330 certified.
| ryguytilidie wrote:
| I'm genuinely baffled at how you're going back and forth
| between authoritatively talking about how ETOPS is
| definitely scary, unsafe and new, but you also clearly know
| nothing about it.
|
| Why not research a thing BEFORE deciding you have a strong
| opinion about it?
| fulafel wrote:
| If we are concerned about loss of life resulting from air
| travel, the main issue is co2 emissions. We should drastically
| refuce especially long distance air travel.
| lsc wrote:
| I dunno, man; I think it is _deeply weird_ how we put so much
| effort in to airline safety, but let anyone drive essentially
| anything on the road, without even requiring more than
| homeopathic liability insurance, and only the most cursory of
| skill tests. (In California, it 's totally legal to drive with
| $35K in liability insurance; and not all of that needs to cover
| personal injury!)
|
| I personally think that any additional safety effort ought to
| be put into making cars safer, and not just safer for the
| occupants, but safer for the poor SOBs who they run into. I
| mean, sure, I'm not saying we should decrease airplane
| regulation (except maybe in the security theatre bits) but I
| think there's a lot more to be gained, safety wise, by
| regulating cars more than by regulating airplanes more.
| [deleted]
| DuskStar wrote:
| The only thing that a 3rd+ engine helps with in this context is
| uncorrelated engine failures. (Correlated ones - like "oops we
| used the wrong fuel units" or "that volcanic ash cloud sure is
| pretty" - are the same for two engines as they are for 4)
|
| These failures are really, really rare. A very conservative
| approximation would be one in 100,000 flights. (That would be
| once every other day in the US, for reference. Like I said,
| conservative) That means you'll have _both_ engines fail
| randomly every 100,000,000,000 flights, which frankly no one
| cares about.
|
| Carrying around an extra engine for the 1 in 100+ Billion
| situation it'll be useful isn't a good idea. It'll probably
| kill more people than it saves, for that matter - how many
| extra compressor disks will be thrown into cabins because of
| that?
| sajomojo wrote:
| Except this ignores that the motivation was not increased
| safety but money. It does seem true that twin-engine planes
| can be quite safe but if Boeing/Airbus were motivated to
| create the safest possible plane, it would probably have four
| engines.
|
| I doubt the US President will be flying on a twin-engine
| plane any time soon. They'll choose the safest (American
| made) option. Probably an updated 747 model, no?
| DuskStar wrote:
| And my point was that motivation is irrelevant, and I would
| find it quite plausible that a two engined airliner would
| be safer than a four engined jet. Two fewer things to
| explode, after all.
|
| The president flies a 747 for size and prestige more than
| safety. Safest option would be to recommission an Iowa and
| use it as an armed ocean liner or something and skip planes
| entirely. Or just to stay home.
| Piskvorrr wrote:
| If we're talking about a command center, "stay at home"
| is not safe at all. Even Google Maps knows the
| coordinates and elevation for 2600 Pennsylvania Avenue
| (or Cheyenne Mountain, or Area 51, or whatever). Hence,
| Air Force One.
| furgooswft13 wrote:
| Presidents often fly on a 757 when the destination airport
| cannot accommodate the larger 747 [1].
|
| They also fly on Marine One (helicopter) which is probably
| less safe overall than any modern airliner.
|
| 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_C-32
| burfog wrote:
| If you must allow for the failure of one engine, adding more
| engines reduces weight.
|
| 2 engines: You need to install and carry 200% of the engine
| power needed to fly the plane.
|
| 3 engines: You need to install and carry 150% of the engine
| power needed to fly the plane.
|
| 4 engines: You need to install and carry 133% of the engine
| power needed to fly the plane.
|
| It is really quite interesting that twin-engine planes are
| cheaper to operate than planes with more engines. The engines
| in twin-engine planes should be larger and thus more
| expensive in every way. It seems that larger engines must be
| discounted somehow, either by the manufacturer or by the
| maintenance crews, or that there is a scaling factor that
| hugely effects efficiency of large passenger jet engines.
|
| For example, are maintenance costs dominated by paperwork?
| That could be enough to overcome the extra expense of needing
| powerful equipment to lift and otherwise manipulate the parts
| of a huge engine.
| nemetroid wrote:
| Flight with inoperative engine(s) is altitude constrained.
| The aircraft is going to be able to _fly_ with one engine
| operative, but not at its usual altitude, so the 200
| /150/133 idea doesn't really hold.
|
| Further, larger engines are more efficient than smaller
| ones. You pretty much want to install the largest engines
| you can fit. It's the underlying reason for the 737 Max
| debacle.
| burfog wrote:
| Engines are sized for failure at take-off. At that time
| they are at maximum power, the aircraft is heavy with
| fuel, and the ground is mighty close.
|
| I see no evidence that larger engines are more efficient
| than smaller ones. Larger total frontal area (counting
| all engines together) is more efficient, as is a higher
| bypass ratio. Both of those tend to lead toward larger
| engines, but you could leave those unchanged while
| modifying the number of engines.
|
| For example, switching from 2 engines to 8 engines, you
| could maintain the same frontal area by changing the
| diameter from 10 feet to 5 feet. The bypass ratio, which
| is the portion of air that bypasses the combustion, could
| be 12-to-1 or 10-to-1 or whatever, and need not change
| with engine diameter.
| joemag wrote:
| I found it interesting that a town of 100 had a runway capable of
| landing a 787. Was it built specifically for these kinds of
| scenarios, i.e. as an earliest diversion point for trans pacific
| flights?
| andrewem wrote:
| Wikipedia says it was built for as US Army airfield in World
| War II. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_Bay_Airport
| bwooceli wrote:
| Cold War. Almost an 11,000 foot runway.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| I'm going to bet those GE Aviation technicians that they charter
| anywhere to fix planes are unbelievably talented, experienced and
| well paid. I bet they've got all the best stories.
|
| Also: on the first page, second paragraph of the special
| coverage, what does "Check Airman" mean?
| __sy__ wrote:
| "Check Airman" -- likely a 3rd pilot in the cockpit, probably
| for observation/rating. Since this is a 9+ hour ETOPS* flight
| (over-ocean), there should be at least 4 pilots on board
| anyways. Airline ground flight ops will also get involved.
|
| * ETOPS: Extended-range Twin-engine Operational Performance
| Standards; jokingly referred to as "Engines Turn Or Passengers
| Swim"
| redis_mlc wrote:
| Check Airman is a company instructor pilot.
|
| They check out other pilots and write procedures.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| _I 'm going to bet those GE Aviation technicians that they
| charter anywhere to fix planes are unbelievably talented,
| experienced and well paid. _
|
| Airframe manufacturers like Airbus and Boeing have similar
| teams (AOG - Aircraft on Ground). The logistics and skills are
| just staggering. Delta dented a 757 pretty hard in Azores last
| year and had it patched up and back in the US pretty darn
| quickly. Stuff like this is exactly why neither the Russians
| nor Chinese are any threat to the Airbus/Boeing hegemony.
|
| https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1429525
| t34543 wrote:
| Anecdote: My dad did this in the 70s. I believe you're correct.
| He was working overseas and was frequently dispatched to
| countries without modern repair facilities such as Saudi
| Arabia.
|
| One story that stands out is he asked a local worker to warm up
| the APU. The worker proceeded to build a fire under the APU,
| destroying it. What he meant was start it up and let it run
| until it reaches operating temperature.
| jcims wrote:
| APUBBQ
| dehrmann wrote:
| I might get some of the backstory halfway off, but my
| grandfather was in Alaska during WWII for the construction of
| the Alaska Highway. They tried to never turn off truck and
| equipment engines because if you did, you had to build a fire
| under them to get them warm enough to start again.
| acomjean wrote:
| Cars in northern Canada sometime have block heaters
| installed for cold starting.
|
| How cold should it be before you use it? Ask the internet:
|
| https://www.theglobeandmail.com/amp/globe-
| drive/culture/comm...
| Waterluvian wrote:
| Standard in every car I've owned in Canada. Never needed
| it.
| tonyarkles wrote:
| Based on your name, I suggest coming west, but not too
| far west :). Trying to start a car at -40 in SK is
| rough... if you've got a good battery and thin oil you
| might be able to, but it's so much nicer after the block
| heater's been going for a few hours.
| refurb wrote:
| Cold weather starting is MUCH better on cars than it was
| 30 years ago. Fuel injection made a big difference.
|
| I had to use a block heater (and battery heater) a number
| of times. But once I moved to a late 80's car, I almost
| never had to use the block heater.
| fnbr wrote:
| In my experience, it's all cars in Canada- I've never
| seen one that doesn't have it (other than imports). I
| guess you could probably get away without it on the west
| coast.
|
| Most cars do start though. It's really a maintenance
| issue, where it's bad for your car to start it at -30 (as
| the linked article says). In my experience, a newer car
| in decent shape will start consistently.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| Yeah my E39 doesn't have any sort of heater and it came
| from BC. I've not seen anywhere to plug a block heater in
| though BMW did sell auxiliary coolant heaters (from
| Webasto). Of course if I lived in a climate where block
| heaters were required a BMW wouldn't be my first choice.
| The heated seats and steering wheel come in handy more
| than I thought they would tho.
| lb1lf wrote:
| -Block heaters are quite common in Norway, too - and
| while my old diesel will start in -30C without one, it
| does not like it. (I cheat, though - the starter motor is
| pilfered from a light truck, and two batteries with
| approx. 800 CCA each work in parallel to make it turn
| over; it was a necessity as there is no electricity where
| we park the car before heading for our cabin in the
| mountains...)
|
| In addition to less engine wear, it also works wonders
| for fuel consumption and makes the car comfortably warm
| in a couple of minutes.
| jacquesm wrote:
| You'd have a very hard time starting a diesel without a
| block heater. When I lived in Canada I kept an older Ford
| (a 1949 one!) around for winter use because the diesel
| tractor was that much harder to start. You can make
| things a bit better by mixing about 5% gasoline in with
| the diesel to avoid the diesel becoming flaky but that
| has limits too and the Canadian winters can throw -40
| Celsius at you with some regularity.
|
| Block heaters are a must in that environment.
| freeone3000 wrote:
| I live in the habitable zone near the US and while I've
| heard of one, I've never seen one.
| dsfyu404ed wrote:
| Gasoline powered cars in good repair will start just fine
| any any temperature the North American continent can
| provide. Block heaters are to speed warmup and reduce
| wear.
| greglindahl wrote:
| Engine block heaters are a part of optional or standard
| cold weather kits in cars sold all over the colder places
| in the world.
|
| Electric cars have the standard advice to leave them
| plugged in overnight in cold areas.
| jandrese wrote:
| Old farm tractors used what was called "farm oil" in the
| old days. Basically the cheapest form of fuel you could buy
| since it was effectively a byproduct of the refining
| process. It was closer to paraffin wax than diesel, solid
| at room temperature. In order to start the tractor there
| was a second tank with diesel that was used until the
| engine warmed up enough to melt the primary fuel. If your
| tractor stalled out and you couldn't get it started again
| quickly the fuel would solidify in the lines and you would
| have to light a fire under the tractor to get it started.
| WalterBright wrote:
| The Germans in Russia in WW2 would use fires to warm
| their tanks and airplanes to get them to start.
| jacquesm wrote:
| They still do this in some places in Russia.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I might add that lighting a fire under a gas engine that
| likely has leaks and drips is a pretty ballsy thing to
| do.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Usually done for big rigs, diesels not gas engines.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Airplane engines are gas!
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| _Airplane engines are gas!_
|
| Sure, small ones with piston engines. Sure. Most anything
| running a turbine uses Jet-A which is closer to kerosene
| / diesel than gasoline.
|
| If you're leaking fuel you've got bigger problems than
| how to safely heat up the engine.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Jet aircraft were little-used during WWII.
|
| (There were some, late in the war, but only just.
| Otherwise, all aircraft were piston-driven, running
| avgas, a/k/a petrol / gasoline.)
| dehrmann wrote:
| Modern prop planes tend to use high-octane gas. Jets use
| jet fuel (kerosene), which is really a light diesel.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I didn't have airplane engines in mind when I wrote that
| (tanks = vehicles) but given the thread context and your
| airplanes reference I see how that could happen, same
| thing with 'block heaters' elsewhere in the thread, I
| take it that is in the context of other vehicles (heavy
| equipment, tractor-trailers, buses and so on).
|
| And yes, some airplane engines use gas but the majority
| of them runs something that in constituency is closer to
| regular diesel than to gas.
|
| Kersone is #1 diesel!
|
| AV gas is another matter entirely but I'm not aware of
| any jet that would use it, though that might be a fun
| thing, and given that turbines can run on almost anything
| combustible it will probably work to some extent but I
| don't think it will be a happy ending unless the engine
| is really designed for it.
|
| Btw, this is an interesting start-up:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESdHyNtHpqs not cold
| weather but I'd hate to fly that in any conditions.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Being WW2, these were piston engines running avgas.
| ethbro wrote:
| I guess the sole redeeming thermodynamic property of the
| operation would be that most seals would expand as they
| heated?
|
| Still, I imagine that was a "light fire, move away"
| procedure!
| kortilla wrote:
| It's rare to have an engine that just drips fuel.
| Lubrication oil for sure, but straight up petrol leaks
| for a non-running engine require a lot of things to be
| wrong.
| WalterBright wrote:
| You're talking about a very heavily used airplane in a
| barely usable airfield with desperate mechanics, often
| under attack, adverse weather, and parts shortages.
| weaksauce wrote:
| Or an sr-71
| grogenaut wrote:
| hey at least they decided not to use hypergolic fuel in
| the sr-71 tho having a jet that was on fire all the time
| would be pretty bad ass looking. Titanium would probbably
| handle it and it'd eventually warm up the skin and close
| the gaps.
| m4rtink wrote:
| IIRC, there are some issues with Red Fuming Nitric Acid &
| titanium, possibly resulting in sudden explosions under
| some circumstances.
|
| Hydrazine + nitrous oxide could be fine though, but
| better check first before use. ;-)
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Whilst the SR-71 didn't run on hypergolic fuel (because
| reasons -- including leaky tanks and supersonic skin-
| heating, so JP-7, which specifically has a _high_ flash
| point was used for fuel), the _ignition_ system for the
| aircraft, including its afterburner ignition system, used
| hypergolic fuel (triethylborane) to initiate combustion,
| with a limited number of ignition cycles aboard each
| mission.
|
| Afterburner light-ups were limited by the availability of
| TEB aboard.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triethylborane
| grogenaut wrote:
| I remember thinking from one of the books on the sr71
| equating restarts to setting off a stick of Dynamite in
| the tailpipe... But I was younger then and didn't know
| about these fuels. Thanks for the details
| fencepost wrote:
| The more modern takes on this likely include "greasecar"
| diesel conversions that still have a small diesel tank,
| plus the different summer and winter blends of diesel
| fuel itself (since "A" diesel that gels at 5C is going to
| be a problem in a lot of places).
| greglindahl wrote:
| Is this the same as the "bunker oil" burned by big ships?
| Wikipedia seems to think so:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_oil#Bunker_fuel
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Yes.
|
| The WWII Liberty Ships utilised a triple-expansion steam
| engine, fired by bunker fuel. Both the expended steam
| _and_ the boilers were used to fluidise the fuel to
| flowable tempertures -- the steam circulating either
| through or around the feed tanks, and the fuel line
| itself passing _through_ the boiler and flame trench
| before final injection.
|
| There are two remaining Liberty Ships in the US -- the
| John W. Brown in Baltimore, and the Jeremiah O'Brien in
| San Francisco.
|
| Pay a visit and one of the engine-room crew can tell you
| the details.
|
| The generaly kluginess and hackiness of the design
| instantly brought to mind what many software projects
| I've worked on might look like if physically
| instantiated. Though the Liberty Ship design is by far
| the more robust and useful than most.
| frank2 wrote:
| American liberty ships used steam engines because US
| industry had been building cargo ships for the Brits and
| wanted to avoid the delay of switching to a more modern
| design. The Brits specified steam engines so they could
| run the ships on coal so they wouldn't have to import the
| fuel.
| lb1lf wrote:
| I once owned a Lada Niva, which while it was overall a
| rather - to put it charitably - interesting car to own, it
| excelled during wintertime.
|
| The engine sump was incredibly heavy; when inquiring as to
| why, I was told the idea was that you could light a
| (small!) fire under it to make it easier to get the engine
| cranking in severe cold.
|
| That's Soviet engineering for you!
| newnewpdro wrote:
| Sounds right, they describe this method in Alaska Crude, an
| interesting old book photo-documenting the development of
| Prudhoe Bay Oil Field.
|
| The engine and gear oil would freeze solid. Required fires
| under differentials, oil pans, etc. just to get the oil
| liquid again.
| WalterBright wrote:
| My family was stationed near London for a time. My father
| told me later that once an airline pilot mistook a WW2
| strip for the Heathrow runway (!) and landed there, using
| every inch of it to get it to stop. The strip was too short
| to take off from, so what to do?
|
| They stripped everything off the airplane they could.
| Seats, interiors, galleys, everything. They put in just
| enough fuel to hop over the trees to Heathrow. He said they
| did it, but barely.
| netsharc wrote:
| I'm trying to google a similar "we landed here but now
| it's too short for us to takeoff again" story which IIRC
| happened in California, but I can only find this incident
| that happened with a cargo plane in Kansas: https://www.t
| heatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/11/giganti...
| therockspush wrote:
| This has happened more than a few times in Wichita. They
| are usually aiming for KICT but hit other airports. We
| had to file a flight plan out of Jabara for a private jet
| that was actually trying to land at KICT for maintenance.
| Didnt make the news but we did have to plan for the
| minimum amount of fuel.
| fhars wrote:
| Spantax used to do that in Hamburg, scroll down to
| ,,Incidents" on https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg_F
| inkenwerder_Airport
|
| The interesting thing is that ,,the end of the runway" is
| actually a major river.
|
| And a Vuelling flight almost made the same mistake two
| years ago (but today it would be less critical as they
| have extended the runway to accommodate A380s some time
| ago).
| raverbashing wrote:
| I was wondering why didn't the crew elect to divert directly to
| Anchorage, reading the event description
| http://avherald.com/h?article=49f44548 it seems they were 2h from
| CDB and ANC would be another hour from there. Not sure what's the
| ETOPS rating of that aircraft but it might not have been 180min
| (though even longer times are common now)
| t0mas88 wrote:
| No sane pilot would fly an extra hour in a twin with a failed
| engine if it's not necessary for safety (e.g. weather and
| runway length are considerations, the rest isn't really
| important in case of an engine failure)
|
| The plane doesn't just fly nicely with one engine, it will yaw
| and become much less stable. You will also usually be
| descending (drift down procedure) because the single engine
| service ceiling is lower than normal cruise. And the autopilot
| doesn't work so you're flying manually, for all of the
| diversion.
|
| You really don't want to be doing that any longer than
| necessary. You have also no redundancy left, so continuing
| means you're increasing risks. Even more so because you'll
| increase your remaining engine to max continuous power
| stressing it more than usual.
| Denvercoder9 wrote:
| If you're down to one engine, you opt for the nearest safe
| haven, independent of how long you're rated to fly on one
| engine. You don't tempt fate.
| raverbashing wrote:
| Not necessarily the nearest if you have a couple of airports
| at approximately the same distance, but in this situation I
| guess it makes sense to land ASAP and CDB is ok.
|
| Some emergency situations will have the plane fly back to its
| origin even if there are closer airports (source: have been
| in one), some others will have you land at the closest
| airport _period_ even if might not be 100% suitable.
| andr wrote:
| If you enjoyed this story, you might enjoy the story of a
| seaplane having to get back to LaGuardia from New Zealand the day
| after Pearl Harbor: https://medium.com/s/story/the-long-way-
| round-the-plane-that...
| gokhan wrote:
| Fascinating read. Thank you.
| keyme wrote:
| Wow! They should really make a movie out of this
| Aloha wrote:
| What an absolutely incredible story!
|
| https://www.amazon.com/The-Long-Way-Home-Revised-ebook/dp/B0...
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