BG> I'm still missing a lot of news, but from what I've seen to date,
BG> it's starting to look like the nosewheel didn't collapse at all,
BG> mainly because it was still retracted (and the bay doors were still
BG> closed) when the aircraft touched down. True or not, it sure looks
BG> like someone fucked up badly, either in the tower, or in the cockpit.
BG> My money's on the control tower just quietly.

RS> Dunno, nothing much the tower can do to make the nosewheel not
RS> get lowered.

BG> Apart from informing the pilot,

RS> There was a claim that they had told him twice.

BG> Presumably the flight voice recorder will verify this if it's true.

Now that the preliminary enquiry results have been released, it appears
that they did tell him, but the main landing gear was already on the runway
by then, and it was a bit late to do anything about it except keep the nose
off the ground as long as possible and then lower it gently and listen to
the expensive grinding noises.

Like I said initially tho, its hard to see that the fundamental fault
was the towers. The fundamental problem was that the nosewheel wasnt
down. Sure, it would have helped heaps if they could have told the pilot
that earlier to allow him to go around and see if he could get it down,
but thats not the cause of the problem.

Its as yet unclear just how the pilot managed to get the main gear
wheels on the runway without noticing himself that the nosewheel wasnt
down. The automatic warning system on the gear did apparently notify a
problem. The details from the preliminary report I have seen didnt go into
too much detail on this bit, presumably he managed to convince himself
that the nosewheel was down, even tho the automatic warning system said
there was a problem.

RS> The enquiry results are supposed to be announced about today,
RS> so I guess it will all come out in the wash.

BG> Hope I haven't missed it.  I drove home yesterday, and all I could
BG> get on FM was close to 800km of woeful fucking country & western
BG> music, so I listened to a Pink Floyd tape instead (about 8 times too).

Looks like you have. It was in Saturdays paper. Forget which days TV
news, must have been Friday or Thurs tho.

BG> and having him dump fuel before landing.  Don't forget that the
BG> aircraft's tanks were almost full.

RS> Nope, part of the reason they turned back from virtually Bris
RS> was that they were shedding fuel on the way back to Sydney.

BG> Didn't know that.  I thought they might have forced the aircraft
BG> to circle and dump fuel off Sydney, and was surprised when they
BG> didn't. Now I know why.

They actually had the warning of the low engine oil pressure close to
Bris. Shut that engine down and came back to Sydney, dumping fuel on the
way. Presumably because it was easier to get an engine swap if required
in Sydney. OTW it appears to have ruined that pilots day rather severely
overall |-)

It was the first officer who actually landed the plane. The other one
was a full check pilot tho, so its going to be interesting to see what
the story is about the confusion over the nosewheel. Presumably we wont
get that until the full report. They have apparently sent some of the
nosewheel stuff back to Boeing, but its not clear just what caused them
to do that in detail.

Might be a good idea to avoid Ansett for a while. Just had another today,
Fokker to Norfolk island with a landing gear problem there. That follows
another recent situation where some cut wires were found in a plane,
currently assumed to be deliberate sabotage. Someone doesnt like them |-)

--- PQWK202