Shaheen Air incident at Lahore Airport (30 Dec 2014)

[Hamad]

I was yesterday at the Airport as I used to fly on EK625 to.DXB.
Due to the closure of the RWY the Fliht has been delayed three times and is now expected to depart today at 1.20PM.
I have never seen so much people and cars at AIIA as it was yesterday. Cars were parked outside the Airport.
I really hope they have done the job tonight and the RWY has opened.

[Abbas Ali]

Work in progress to remove Shaheen Air Boeing 737-400 (AP-BJN) from its accident site to get Lahore Airport primary Runway 36R/18L re-opened for flight operations.





Aircraft will soon be removed to get Runway 36R/18L re-opened according to a spokesperson of Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).

Foreign airlines are not using their large wide body aircraft on airport's secondary Runway 36L/18R, according to a news channel.

Abbas

[Abbas Ali]

Shaheen Air Boeing 737 removed from its accident site, according to DAWN news channel.

Abbas

[raihans]

Abbas, till now rwy 36L/18R in use so most probably rwy 36R/18L not yet clear for operations

[Abbas Ali]

According to Express News channel they have removed the aircraft from accident site and moved it to a parking bay.

Abbas

[Abbas Ali]

According to latest reports, Lahore Airport primary Runway 36R/18L is now available for flight operations after removal of Shaheen Air Boeing 737-400 (AP-BJN) from its accident site. The runway became operational at 2:53 PM.


City42 news channel showed AP-BJN being removed from accident site.

Abbas

[Rana]

Can any body tell about distance from touchdown to final position?

[TAILWIND]

Just Study the system before write some thing AMM 32-51-00 P 01.

I can only say 'lol'.

You can find how does system works . Even than cable is broken, THE PILOT should follow the procedure witch they have , he should control direction by PEDALS and thrust . But it is other matter that at touch down airplane was not 180 degree on the Runway surface and veered right off the runway and came to a stop on soft ground with both main gear struts collapsed. Happened like this
If it happened almost after touchdown , you can say pilot could not react immediately, may he have bad reaction and due to hi speed it happened . But if happened after more than 500m touchdown , then 100% pilot mistake who did not follow the procedure . Bad training, lake of experience, what you can say .

God help the poor pilot.
On a serious note, I must admit that I have no access to B734 AMM, yet I know for sure how B734 NWS works. And if the control cable running close to the strut are severed, the NWS is lost. And once the aircraft has decelerated below 60-70 knots the rudder looses effectiveness. Maintaining rwy centre-line with T/R is a big ask rather impossible, especially in such situations.

And Dear Mr Rana, reading AMM is neither mandatory before posting a comment on HOP, nor it is a certificate for someone's knowledge, which is amply reflected by one's posts. Stay blessed.

[Shahab]

Thanks for the very informative post Tailwind, I really appreciate that. Can you please also explain the acronyms that you used in your post? My guess is AMM is a boeing manual but what is NWS? What I understand (in plain english) is if the nose wheel control cable is severed (which is what likely happened in this case) then there is no way to control the nose wheel (hence steering) and there is a real possibility that the aircraft is going to veer off the runway. Is this something that pilots ever practice in a simulator. Can you please also comment on why the flaps are retracted, was it a flap-less landing? or flaps were possibly retracted after the accident.

[TAILWIND]

Thank you Shahab for your compliments. I am not at all an aviation expert, just a humble student with over 25 years of aviation experience, more than that I claim to be an aviation enthusiast.
AMM- Aircraft Maintenance Manual
NWS-Nose Wheel Steering

Thanks for the very informative post Tailwind, I really appreciate that. Can you please also explain the acronyms that you used in your post? My guess is AMM is a boeing manual but what is NWS? What I understand (in plain english) is if the nose wheel control cable is severed (which is what likely happened in this case) then there is no way to control the nose wheel (hence steering) and there is a real possibility that the aircraft is going to veer off the runway. Is this something that pilots ever practice in a simulator.

This is a tricky situation. In this case most probably, the pilots were not expecting the loss of NWS. Well pilots do practice the loss of NWS during landing roll and techniques like differential braking can be used. In this case IMO, the pilots if they heard the thud of bird hit, should have aborted landing, initiated missed approach, climbed to holding altitude and assess the situation. Then having considered all consequences of a bird strike, including loss of steering, attempt the landing prepared for possible scenarios. Some Boeing expert can tell, if there is an indication of loss of NWS control in the cockpit, (i doubt in case of a broken cable)

Can you please also comment on why the flaps are retracted, was it a flap-less landing? or flaps were possibly retracted after the accident.

What I read in Avherald the flaps were retracted after the aircraft came to a stop, however the speed brakes were not. As per evacuation checklist though, the flaps have to be extended to 40 (if not already) and speed brake retracted if overwing slides are to be used.
My two cents

[TAILWIND]

Thank you Shahab for your compliments. I am not at all an aviation expert, just a humble student with over 25 years of aviation experience, more than that I claim to be an aviation enthusiast.
AMM- Aircraft Maintenance Manual
NWS-Nose Wheel Steering

Thanks for the very informative post Tailwind, I really appreciate that. Can you please also explain the acronyms that you used in your post? My guess is AMM is a boeing manual but what is NWS? What I understand (in plain english) is if the nose wheel control cable is severed (which is what likely happened in this case) then there is no way to control the nose wheel (hence steering) and there is a real possibility that the aircraft is going to veer off the runway. Is this something that pilots ever practice in a simulator.

This is a tricky situation. In this case most probably, the pilots were not expecting the loss of NWS. Well pilots do practice (in simulator) the loss of NWS during landing roll and techniques like differential braking can be used. In this case IMO, the pilots if they heard the thud of bird hit, should have aborted landing, initiated missed approach, climbed to holding altitude and assess the situation. Then having considered all consequences of a bird strike, including loss of steering, attempt the landing prepared for possible scenarios. Some Boeing expert can tell, if there is an indication of loss of NWS control in the cockpit, (i doubt in case of a broken cable)

Can you please also comment on why the flaps are retracted, was it a flap-less landing? or flaps were possibly retracted after the accident.

What I read in Avherald the flaps were retracted after the aircraft came to a stop, however the speed brakes were not. As per evacuation checklist though, the flaps have to be extended to 40 (if not already) and speed brake retracted if overwing slides are to be used.
My two cents

[Rana]

On a serious note, I must admit that I have no access to B734 AMM, yet I know for sure how B734 NWS works. And if the control cable running close to the strut are severed, the NWS is lost. And once the aircraft has decelerated below 60-70 knots the rudder looses effectiveness. Maintaining rwy centre-line with T/R is a big ask rather impossible, especially in such situations.
And Dear Mr Rana, reading AMM is neither mandatory before posting a comment on HOP, nor it is a certificate for someone's knowledge, which is amply reflected by one's posts. Stay blessed.

[/quote]
Dear TAILWIND )) sorry I do,nt know what is your naem)) Just search in GOOGLE and you can find AMM there just for study.
Why I have wrote about AMM , because every aviator except illiterate knows that only the document where we can find how do,es any system works is AMM. If you want discus something , you should have system knowledge , if have poor knowledge , should follow official documentation and we know where to find. In my life there were 2 times such incident
1) Steering cable jammed due ti ice formation round cable in tube .
2) Same like Shaeen 737-400 cable broken incident.
After touchdown pilot found that he have steering problem but after safely touchdown and taxi reach to stand , no problem at all, we fixed it within 3-4 hours. But here ))))))))) broken of L/H MLG etc .
May be Shaheen pilot is also with good experience on F16 but not on civil aircraft and there are too many countries where it is prohibited to fly on civil passenger aircraft if you are previously a fighter army pilot.

[Abbas Ali]

On November 28, 2004, KLM Boeing 737-400 registration PH-BTC due to bird hit in nose gear experienced similar problem with similar result:

Details here: http://aviation-safety.net/database/rec ... 20041128-1

That aircraft was damaged beyond repair.


Click here to see large photo.

Abbas

[bigfish]

This incident is yet another reminder which shows the lack of preparedness of CAA, and Pakistani airports in general.

In the case of any accident/incident, it takes them forever to remove an aircraft from active runways, therefore closing the runway and causing loss of time and money and a great inconvenience to a great many passengers/flights/operations, etc.

It's like they just don't care, are not pro-active, and do not have the necessary equipments. At an airport which is operational daily, they should be better prepared for these type of situations, specially when bird strikes are "common".

[TAILWIND]

May be Shaheen pilot is also with good experience on F16 but not on civil aircraft and there are too many countries where it is prohibited to fly on civil passenger aircraft if you are previously a fighter army pilot.

Can you name any such country????