Qantas flight from Auckland to Sydney makes mayday call

[RichardMEL]

Honestly such a non story really but media whipped up such a frenzy with lines like "fears for flight" and all this stuff. I mean one engine landings obviously aren't ideal, but the aircraft are designed to operate just fine this way. Obviously I heard and hoped there were no issues - but I expected none and wasn't in a wild panic about the flight.

Anyway I am sure all the usual types will be out blaming maintenance and outsourced staff and all the rest (just waiting for the truly moronic to mix up the 738 with a MAX somehow and blame that) and whatever. fact is these things happen. Yes it was an event, but hardly a major thing imo.

Glad all are well and have a bit of a story to tell no doubt, but really everything worked as designed which is great.

 

[Quickstatus]

one engine landings

Did they actually shut down one engine and fly on one engine or did they just reduced thrust maybe on one and drifted down to FL200 from FL360 over the course of 1.5hrs.?.

 

[SeatBackForward]

Anyway I am sure all the usual types will be out blaming maintenance and outsourced staff and all the rest (just waiting for the truly moronic to mix up the 738 with a MAX somehow and blame that) and whatever. fact is these things happen. Yes it was an event, but hardly a major thing imo.

Oh yes the cesspool that is Twitter is already raging about the cutbacks and the alarm that this flight (quote) isn't even flown by Qantas Pilots, but by Jetconnect pilots...

 

[mrsterryn]

Honestly such a non story really but media whipped up such a frenzy with lines like "fears for flight" and all this stuff. I mean one engine landings obviously aren't ideal, but the aircraft are designed to operate just fine this way. Obviously I heard and hoped there were no issues - but I expected none and wasn't in a wild panic about the flight.

Glad all are well and have a bit of a story to tell no doubt, but really everything worked as designed which is great.

Have to say though as non technical person it was really interesting to see how the cause , failure of one engine, and effect loads of changes for flights occurs.
Perhaps in an odd way it reassures that here in Aust we do have a robust system in place to cope post landing ?

 

[nancypants]

There is a huge emergency services influx there. Loads of sirens earlier in mascot

Back when I was a paramedic, this kind of stuff was guaranteed to get a load of management types out of their offices. Plane always landed without incident weirdly

 

[Franky]

A Qantas flight travelling across the Pacific Ocean has made a mayday call with reports of an engine failure.

It's believed more than 100 people are on flight QF144 from Auckland to Sydney.

The flight is due to land at 3.10pm at Sydney Airport.

MSN

That would be the Tasman Sea...

 

[justinbrett]

That would be the Tasman Sea...

Which is part of the Pacific Ocean

 

[Franky]

Which is part of the Pacific Ocean

I was aware of that as well...

 

[RichardMEL]

Did they actually shut down one engine and fly on one engine or did they just reduced thrust maybe on one and drifted down to FL200 from FL360 over the course of 1.5hrs.?.

I can't answer that specific question - I haven't looked at the flight radar info or anything.. just going off the general media reports.. but my response is that if they did.. that's fine.

All these aircraft are certified to a certain ETOPS rating very specifically to be able to fly on one engine for the certified period. There was a lot of fuss about this initially with the 777's and transpac ops (would they get 180 min or 240min or whatever) but there are clear procedures and training to fly a twin - be it a 737, E190, 787 or 350 - on one engine for the required period of time.

Note bird strike will likely cause a landing, but essenially will shut down an engine and they are common enough.

 

[Rugby]

I wondered, strangely, if cabin service continued or whether everybody just strapped in for the remainder of the flight.

 

[Quickstatus]

general media reports

Sure. And that all we have to go with atm.

I tend to disbelief most media who tend to embellish news and facts.

Though with one engine failure one would think the aircraft would have just called AKL ATC rather than continuing. As the aircraft started to reduce altitude and speed fairly early maybe 30-40min in

 

[jpp42]

All these aircraft are certified to a certain ETOPS rating very specifically to be able to fly on one engine for the certified period. There was a lot of fuss about this initially with the 777's and transpac ops (would they get 180 min or 240min or whatever) but there are clear procedures and training to fly a twin - be it a 737, E190, 787 or 350 - on one engine for the required period of time.

Yes that's true, but that doesn't mean you can just blithely continue to your destination after an engine failure. Usually, the requirements on a single engine are diversion to the "nearest suitable aerodrome." This, does however often cause extensive discussion between pilots and armchair enthusiasts on the meaning of "suitable." It would probably be difficult to argue that Auckland wasn't suitable if the weather was acceptable, but I have no more information than anyone else on this.

In the days of 3- or 4- engine jets, it wasn't unheard of to continue on after one engine failed, but in recent years that practice came under fire by the US FAA, causing a row between the US and British authorities after the UK's CAA continued to defend the practice ( see British Airways Flight 268 - Wikipedia ). But as far as I know, everyone is in full agreement that "land at the nearest suitable" is the only appropriate action when you're down to a single engine from two.

Note - it might be that the engine wasn't actually failed, but reduced to idle thrust due to some kind of indication, and thrust was actually available but they preferred not to use it - this might change the rules on whether they're required to land at the nearest suitable? Maybe a question best asked over at Ask The Pilot .

 

[justinbrett]

Did they actually shut down one engine and fly on one engine or did they just reduced thrust maybe on one and drifted down to FL200 from FL360 over the course of 1.5hrs.?.

Very unlikely.

Most here have missed that on flightaware, the gradual decent lines for altitude are in white, along side the track on the map - this indicates the portion of the flight where it was out of radar range.

So no, it probably started decent much later, beyond the halfway point - those lines are just flightaware trying to guess what happened when it wasn't covered.

 

[Kiwi_Flyer]

Weird because they weren't past the point of no return? Guess we'll find out in due course

Yes. Within 40 minutes of takeoff when started descending. If it was serious at that point a return to AKL would have been much quicker than continuing to SYD.

 

[justinbrett]

Yes. Within 40 minutes of takeoff when started descending. If it was serious at that point a return to AKL would have been much quicker than continuing to SYD.

There is no descent recorded on flightware until within Australian radar range. They were at cruise on the NZ side and never descended.

Unless you have access to a source I don't have.

 

[oz_mark]

Yes that's true, but that doesn't mean you can just blithely continue to your destination after an engine failure. Usually, the requirements on a single engine are diversion to the "nearest suitable aerodrome." This, does however often cause extensive discussion between pilots and armchair enthusiasts on the meaning of "suitable." It would probably be difficult to argue that Auckland wasn't suitable if the weather was acceptable, but I have no more information than anyone else on this.
.

The issue with the engine was reported to have occurred about one hour out of Sydney. I'd suggest Sydney was the closest suitable.

 

[nancypants]

SMH has this line:

The mayday alert was later downgraded to a PAN (possible assistance needed).

Is this accurate? Strikes me as a backronyn

 

[Quickstatus]

cabin service

There will be some who will want compo

As the aircraft started to reduce altitude and speed fairly early maybe 30-40min in

Actually there is missing ADS-B data so the lines in FA are not correct - between 15:16 and 16:23

Edit as mentioned by @justinbrett

 

[QF WP]

SMH has this line:

The mayday alert was later downgraded to a PAN (possible assistance needed).

Is this accurate? Strikes me as a backronyn

It could be - plenty of flights have declared Mayday and gone to PAN PAN (or the reverse). If the problem wasn't as much of an issue as first reported (as they had it under control, as in throttling back to idle), then may be appropriate to downgrade to a PAN PAN

 

[oz_mark]

SMH has this line:

The mayday alert was later downgraded to a PAN (possible assistance needed).

Is this accurate? Strikes me as a backronyn

It is a backronyn.

(It derives from the French Panne (breakdown))