21 JAN 2008 _______________________________________ *Initial AAIB Report On BA 777 Accident Released *All Reported Lost In Angolan King Air Downing *Hawaiian Airlines May Cancel Airbus Order *Recovery teams remove BA 777 wreck from crash site *4 dead as planes collide in Calif. *GE jet engine backlog hits $5 billion in China *Indonesia plans rapid air safety program to lift EU ban **************************************** Initial AAIB Report On BA 777 Accident Released Says Engines Did Not Respond To Throttle-Up Commands Below is the unedited, initial textual report on the January 17 accident involving a British Airways Boeing 777-200. As ANN reported, the aircraft, inbound from Beijing, touched down short of the runway at London's Heathrow Airport, skidding to a violent stop that, fortunately, only resulted in some minor injuries to those onboard. Early theories regarding potential reasons why the Rolls-Royce Trent-powered airliner apparently lost power on approach were varied, with some obviously more credible than others. In their initial report released Sunday, officials with the UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch AAIB) confirm the plane's engines failed to respond to throttle inputs from the cockpit -- first from the plane's autopilot, then manual inputs from the plane's flight crew. What caused that potentially catastrophic scenario, however, has not yet been determined -- Ed. Following an uneventful flight from Beijing, China, the aircraft was established on an ILS approach to Runway 27L at London Heathrow. Initially the approach progressed normally, with the Autopilot and Autothrottle engaged, until the aircraft was at a height of approximately 600 ft and 2 miles from touch down. The aircraft then descended rapidly and struck the ground, some 1,000 ft short of the paved runway surface, just inside the airfield boundary fence. The aircraft stopped on the very beginning of the paved surface of Runway 27L. During the short ground roll the right main landing gear separated from the wing and the left main landing gear was pushed up through the wing root. A significant amount of fuel leaked from the aircraft but there was no fire. An emergency evacuation via the slides was supervised by the cabin crew and all occupants left the aircraft, some receiving minor injuries. The AAIB was notified of the accident within a few minutes and a team of Inspectors including engineers, pilots and a flight recorder specialist deployed to Heathrow. In accordance with the established international arrangements the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) of the USA, representing the State of Design and Manufacture of the aircraft, was informed of the event. The NTSB appointed an Accredited Representative to lead a team from the USA made up of investigators from the NTSB, the FAA and Boeing. A Boeing investigator already in the UK joined the investigation on the evening of the event, the remainder of the team arrived in the UK on Friday 18th January. Rolls-Royce, the engine manufacturer is also supporting the investigation, an investigator having joined the AAIB team. Activity at the accident scene was coordinated with the Airport Fire and Rescue Service, the Police, the British Airports Authority and British Airways to ensure the recovery of all relevant evidence, to facilitate the removal of the aircraft and the reinstatement of airport operations. The flight crew were interviewed on the evening of the event by an AAIB Operations Inspector and the Flight Data Recorder (FDR), Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) and Quick Access Recorder (QAR) were removed for replay. The CVR and FDR have been successfully downloaded at the AAIB laboratories at Farnborough and both records cover the critical final stages of the flight. The QAR was downloaded with the assistance of British Airways and the equipment manufacturer. All of the downloaded information is now the subject of detailed analysis. Examination of the aircraft systems and engines is ongoing. Initial indications from the interviews and Flight Recorder analyses show the flight and approach to have progressed normally until the aircraft was established on late finals for Runway 27L. At approximately 600 ft and 2 miles from touch down, the Autothrottle demanded an increase in thrust from the two engines but the engines did not respond. Following further demands for increased thrust from the Autothrottle, and subsequently the flight crew moving the throttle levers, the engines similarly failed to respond. The aircraft speed reduced and the aircraft descended onto the grass short of the paved runway surface. The investigation is now focussed on more detailed analysis of the Flight Recorder information, collecting further recorded information from various system modules and examining the range of aircraft systems that could influence engine operation. FMI: www.aaib.dft.gov.uk, www.ba.com aero-news.net ************** All Reported Lost In Angolan King Air Downing Bad Weather Hampered Landing Effort Angolan rescue crews have finished retrieving the bodies of the 13 victims from a Beech King Air B200 that crashed into the mountains of southern Angola, Africa, on Saturday. Early reports indicated as many as 25 people were killed in the crash, but the flight manifest confirmed 13 passengers aboard the Beechcraft King Air 200 (type shown above), reports Agence-France Presse. The plane was flying from the Angolan capital of Luanda to the southern city of Huambo, approximately 280 miles away, and encountered bad weather while preparing to land. Januario Silvestre Pena, director of the ENANA airport authority company, told RNA radio the weather in Huambo at the time of the crash was "absolutely terrible" and that the plane "crashed straight into the mountain." The King Air was owned by private airline Giro Globo, which operates charter flights in Angola. Among the dead was the owner of the plane, Valentin Anoes, 46, who was a senior member of Angola's ruling party, his son, and two Portuguese businessmen, Vasco Mendes de Almeida and Nuno Marques. An inquiry has been opened into determining the cause of the crash. Angola, a former Portuguese colony, is struggling to upgrade airports, bridges, roads and other infrastructure devastated by a 27-year civil war that ended in 2002. The current economic boom, fueled by oil wealth, has created a growing demand for air travel throughout the country and has strained the capacity of the state-owned airline TAAG. The southwest African country has a dismal record in air safety, primarily due to poor maintenance. As ANN reported, a TAAG 737-200 crashed last June in the northern city of M'banza Congo, killing two passengers and injuring many others. That crash caused the European Union to place TAAG on its blacklist, prohibiting the airline from flying to European destinations. FMI: www.angola.org/ aero-news.net ***** Date: 19-JAN-2008 Time: 8:00 Type: Beechcraft B200 Super King Air Operator: Gira Globo Registration: D2-FFK C/n / msn: BB-1026 Fatalities: Fatalities: 12 / Occupants: 12 Airplane damage: w/o Location: near Huambo - Angola Phase: Nature: Departure airport: FNLU Destination airport: FNHU Narrative: Crashed into a mountain. Weather was poor (rainy and foggy). Sources: Reuters, National Institute of Civil Aviation (INAVIC) (aviation-safety.net) *************** Hawaiian Airlines May Cancel Airbus Order Decision Rests On Faltering Talks With Pilots Hawaiian Airlines announced Friday it may cancel a $4.4 billion deal to purchase up to 24 new Airbus aircraft, due to a standoff with its pilots union. The deal for Airbus A330 and A350XWB jets was expected to be finalized this week, according to The Honolulu Star-Bulletin, to meet a deadline set by Airbus and engine manufacturer Rolls Royce. Pilots say the terms of the deal also must be approved by them. Pilots are asking for changes in their sick-leave accrual, improved rest facilities on long-haul flights and an end to the contract negotiations that have dragged on for more than a year. "They went out and they negotiated this deal and think we should just be jumping up and down for joy saying, "Thank you very much for getting these planes for us," and we'll go fly them," said Captain Eric Sampson, chairman of the Hawaiian Airlines unit of the Air Line Pilots Association. "The collective bargaining agreement doesn't let them do that. This has to be a negotiation." Hawaiian spokesman Keoni Wagner said the company won't comment on the ongoing negotiations. "We certainly can't commit our company to a future it can't afford, and we felt an obligation to warn the financial markets today that we have reached a point in negotiations with our pilots that suggests we may not be able to move forward with our fleet plan," he said in an e-mailed statement. Hawaiian's long-haul fleet currently consists of 18 Boeing 767-300 airplanes, and plans were to replace four aircraft in the next two years. The existing leases may need to be renegotiated instead. Stock analyst Nick Capuano, who covers the airline for Los Angeles-based Imperial Capital LLC, said the Airbus deal is a bonus, not a necessity, for Hawaiian. "It is certainly not necessary in terms of the health of the company," he said. "If they can't come to an agreement with the pilots, it's better that they not do it." Hawaiian's flight attendants reached an contract agreement late Wednesday. That agreement will remain tentative until a deal is reached with the pilots, according to Sharon Soper, president of the Hawaiian Airlines unit of the Association of Flight Attendants. "The whole deal is contingent upon everyone reaching an agreement," she said. "It is specific to working rules and conditions surrounding these new aircraft." The Airbus deal would result in a complete overhaul of Hawaiian's long-haul fleet and allow the carrier to fly nonstop from Hawaii to Asia, Europe, Australasia and the Americas. As ANN reported last November, the agreement calls for Hawaiian to acquire six A330-200s and six A350XWB-800s, with purchase rights for an additional six of each aircraft. Deliveries would begin in 2012. FMI: www.hawaiianair.com, www.alpa.org aero-news.net *************** Recovery teams remove BA 777 wreck from crash site Engineers have transported the wreck of the crashed British Airways Boeing 777-200ER away from the eastern end of London Heathrow's southern runway. The aircraft was hoisted and jacked onto low-loader trailers today and moved from the threshold of runway 27L, where it came to rest after the 17 January accident. Its presence had forced air traffic control to restrict runway use. NOTAMs had instructed airlines to depart from 27L wherever possible, in order to reduce congestion. Recovery work on the 777 also meant aircraft departing 27L had to operate from the N4 intersection - where 27L meets the short runway 05 - reducing available take-off distance to 2,407m. Investigators have yet to determine why the 777's engines failed to increase thrust on command during the jet's final approach to 27L, causing it to touch down short. The jet has been moved to a maintenance hangar. Source: Air Transport Intelligence news *************** 4 dead as planes collide in Calif. CORONA, Calif. - Two private planes flying about a mile from an airport collided Sunday, killing at least four people and raining debris down on car dealerships below, authorities said. The small Cessnas collided at 3:35 p.m. near the small Corona Municipal airport and a freeway in Riverside County, about 45 miles southeast of Los Angeles, FAA spokesman Allen Kenitzer said. Three of the dead were from the planes and the fourth was in a car hit by debris on the ground, Kenitzer said. Debris fell on car dealerships, and television pictures showed that the smashed fuselage of one of the planes landed atop a parked car. "The smaller aircraft ... just disintegrated into pieces, maybe fifty pieces coming down," eyewitness Jeff Hardin told KABC-TV. "The other aircraft pretty much stayed intact and started spiraling down." "We're going through the dealerships to make sure everyone's accounted for and nobody's injured," Corona Police Sgt. Jerry Pawluczenko said. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080121/ap_on_re_us/planes_collide ************** GE jet engine backlog hits $5 billion in China BOSTON, Jan 20 (Reuters) - As China's aviation industry takes off, General Electric Co's orders for jet engines in that country have hit the $5 billion mark, the second-largest U.S. company by market capitalization said on Sunday. Demand for jets in the world's fastest-growing economy is accelerating as a nascent local industry aims to take on Boeing Co and Airbus, a unit of EADS, the world's leading aircraft makers. "The growth in China -- not just the growth facilitated by the sale of aircraft by Boeing and Airbus into China, but also the indigenous creation of aviation in China -- is really exceeding everyone's expectations," said Chet Fuller, chief marketing officer at GE Aviation, in a phone interview. China's state-run AVIC I Commercial Aircraft Co Ltd has selected GE's CF34 jet engine to power the ARJ21-700 regional jet it is developing. So far AVIC I, parent of Xi'an Aircraft International Corp , has 85 firm orders for that 90-seat jet, scheduled for its first flight during the first half of this year. GE worldwide last year sold about 3,400 jet engines worth about $25 billion, with 428 of them going to China, Fuller said. The last of the $5 billion in Chinese orders are expected to ship in 2014. Most of GE's jet engine sales into China so far have been through CFM, its joint venture with a unit of French conglomerate Safran. GE's competitors in the jet engine business include Britain's Rolls-Royce Group Plc and the Pratt & Whitney arm of U.S. conglomerate United Technologies Corp. Fuller noted that GE is seeking certification to begin assembling jet engines in China. It could take two to four years to get all the regulatory approvals needed to do so, he noted. With revenue passenger miles -- a standard measurement of airline performance -- growing at about three times the world average, China is also one of GE's fastest-growing aviation markets. "It's not a small system anymore," Fuller said. "This is equivalent of all of American Airlines and Continental Airlines. These are big numbers. These are large systems with lots of airplanes in them." **************** Indonesia plans rapid air safety program to lift EU ban BANDUNG, Indonesia -- Indonesia is planning to rapidly improve aviation safety at select airlines in order to get a European Union ban on the country's carriers lifted, the transport minister said Monday. "Indonesia will try to accelerate the revocation of the ban by proposing a fast-track program," Transport Minister Jusman Syafii Djamal told journalists at a joint air safety conference with the EU here. Djamal said the program would help four Indonesian airlines -- flag carrier Garuda Indonesia, Mandala Airways, Premiair and Airfast -- improve safety standards to bring them in line with EU levels. The EU banned flights by all 51 Indonesian airlines in its airspace in June last year, citing safety concerns. Jakarta has strongly opposed the ban, but has so far failed to sway EU officials. A visit by an EU inspection team last November failed to convince them to drop the ban. "The four airlines (have been chosen because) we deem them to have the potential to enter Europe and also have cooperation with Europe," Djamal said. He said Garuda hoped to reopen flights to Europe, while Mandala had ordered a fleet of European-made Airbus aircraft and Premiair was a charter airline which is often contracted by European countries. Djani did not give details of how the government would help the four airlines improve safety standards. The European Commission's head of aviation safety Roberto Salvarani declined to say when the ban may be lifted, but said the conference was part of efforts to help Indonesia's improve its air safety practices. "We intend to ... assist them (Indonesian airlines) in the implementation of the safety measures required. The implementation of these measures will hopefully lead to the lifting of the ban at a certain point in time," he said. Salvarani said last November's inspections had shown that Indonesian safety practices had not improved enough to warrant a lifting of the ban, but said he was optimistic that things were going in the right direction. The June 2007 EU ban followed on the heels of several deadly air crashes, including an Adam Air jet that plunged into the sea off Sulawesi island on January 1, 2007, killing all 102 on board, and a Garuda jet which crashed in Central Java in March of the same year with 21 dead. The EU started its safety ban list in March 2006 after a string of deadly accidents that highlighted the fragmented approach to air safety in the then 25-nation bloc. It has been updated four times since then. http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/world/view/20080121-113821/Indones ia-plans-rapid-air-safety-program-to-lift-EU-ban ***************