FedEx Freighter accident at Tokyo Narita

• TIB1224Y

  23 Mar 09, 13:04

  23rd March morning at 6 50 am JST. Reports as follows.

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  (CNN) -- The pilot and co-pilot aboard a FedEx cargo plane were killed when the plane burst into flames Monday while landing at Tokyo's Narita airport in Japan, airport and hospital officials said.

  Both crew members were American men, an official at Narita Red Cross Hospital told CNN.

  Video from the landing showed the plane bouncing at least twice on the runway and veering left as it turned on its side before bursting into flames. The fire destroyed the aircraft, which was identified by FedEx as a McDonnell Douglas MD-11.

  Japan's Ministry of Transport said it was the first fatal crash at Narita, which opened in 1978.

  Strong winds may have played a role in the crash, said Masaru Fujisaki, an airport official.

  FedEx Express Flight 80 took off from Guangzhou, China, and crashed at Narita about 6 a.m. Monday (5 p.m. Sunday ET), said FedEx spokesman Matt Ceniceros.

  According to observations at the airport, wind gusts were reported to be between 30 to 50 mph around the time if the crash.

  Japan's Kyodo news agency reported that Narita firefighters had worked through the flaming wreckage to try to rescue two people believed to be the crew.

  The news agency said the cargo plane was landing on Runway A, the longer of the two runways at Narita, a major international airport.

  The National Transportation Safety Board in Washington said Sunday night it was sending a team to Japan to assist in the investigation of the crash.

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  http://news.tbs.co.jp/newseye/tbs_newseye4089946.html  with video

  Reports still coming in...

• TIB1224Y

  23 Mar 09, 13:41

  Aircraft seems to be N526FE of the fleet in FedEx. C/n 48600/560.

  http://www.airliners.net/open.file/1362091/M/

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 13:48

  RIP to those involved...

   

  I guess the link should be this.

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 13:50

  Originally posted by TIB1224Y:

  23rd March morning at 6 50 am JST. Reports as follows.

  Reports still coming in...

  The video is shocking... Looks like it came out from a movie...

  This one is worse...

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 13:56

  Originally posted by Fryderyk HPH:

  The video is shocking... Looks like it came out from a movie...

  This one is worse...

  Video shows the MD11 lands nose wheel first. Nose gear failed and plane bounced due to strong winds... Then kenna tail strike skid on the runway, igniting fuel tanks and fire spread to the rear of the aircraft...

   

  The MD11 isn't an easy plane to control... The strong winds sure made it worse.

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 13:58

  SQ638 Singapore to Tokyo Narita has been diverted to Nagoya.

• wonderamazement

  23 Mar 09, 14:04

  bouncing sia... maybe a lot of ground effect involved...

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 14:07

  Originally posted by wonderamazement:

  bouncing sia... maybe a lot of ground effect involved...

  No... Strong wind... Front landing gear collapsed due to downdraft... Damn sad siah... Loss of another tri-holer(3 engine) plane...

• tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R

  23 Mar 09, 15:13

  From de vid. it's most slightly due to cross wind, causing the plane to swift to the left.. also, if i'm not wrong, the plane's speed is also too fast, causing it to made unstable landing.

   

  Anyway... Seriously speaking, i hate MD and DC's products. it has so many disaster and really a very unreliable plane... ...

  Oso, if i'm not wrong, dis is not the first few planes Fedex lost... ...

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 16:01

  Originally posted by tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R:

  From de vid. it's most slightly due to cross wind, causing the plane to swift to the left.. also, if i'm not wrong, the plane's speed is also too fast, causing it to made unstable landing.

   

  Anyway... Seriously speaking, i hate MD and DC's products. it has so many disaster and really a very unreliable plane... ...

  Oso, if i'm not wrong, dis is not the first few planes Fedex lost... ...

  Correct. But the plane's speed is not really that fast. I have seen and experienced faster landings. Typically smaller aircraft have faster landing speeds. Actually if the plane had been slower, the situation would have had been worse. Slower speed = More air movement to buffet the plane(crosswind). I guess plane was over loaded or inbalanced when packing in cargo from Guangzhou Baiyun. Thus the tail strike.

   

   

  BTW is it possible if we move all civil aviation stuff to my forum... Coz the forum name is quite misleading... Singapore Aviation makes one think that aviation issues are with Singapore only.

• tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R

  23 Mar 09, 16:04

  Originally posted by Fryderyk HPH:

  Correct. But the plane's speed is not really that fast. I have seen and experienced faster landings. Typically smaller aircraft have faster landing speeds. Actually if the plane had been slower, the situation would have had been worse. Slower speed = More air movement to buffet the plane(crosswind). I guess plane was over loaded or inbalanced when packing in cargo from Guangzhou Baiyun. Thus the tail strike.

   

   

  BTW is it possible if we move all civil aviation stuff to my forum... Coz the forum name is quite misleading... Singapore Aviation makes one think that aviation issues are with Singapore only.

  
  Seriously... i didn't saw the tail struck first, instead it's the wing that i see struck first...

  anyone can confirm me>!

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 16:08

  Originally posted by tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R:

  
  Seriously... i didn't saw the tail struck first, instead it's the wing that i see struck first...

  anyone can confirm me>!

  Tail scrap ground like free... FO and Captain were pulling the plane up hard and the wind didn't help... Scrap ground then sparks lit the fuel tank. Then cross wind pulled the plane starboard, then scrap wing. By that time plane was already tilted at 60 degree angle. Hit engine 1 and 3 then buffeted. The moment the fuel mix ignited the plane already passed the point of no return...

• tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R

  23 Mar 09, 16:13

  Originally posted by Fryderyk HPH:

  Tail scrap ground like free... FO and Captain were pulling the plane up hard and the wind didn't help... Scrap ground then sparks lit the fuel tank. Then cross wind pulled the plane starboard, then scrap wing. By that time plane was already tilted at 60 degree angle. Hit engine 1 and 3 then buffeted. The moment the fuel mix ignited the plane already passed the point of no return...

  
  So is the Engines that cause de fire... and oso, 4get to add just now's pt, i must agree that the speed u were saying.

  Too bad it's a landing... else... dere might be a turning pt...

   

  Man... we can be NTSB ... =.=

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 16:18

  Originally posted by tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R:

  
  So is the Engines that cause de spark... and oso, 4get to add just now's pt, i must agree that the speed u were saying.

  Too bad it's a landing... else... dere might be a turning pt...

   

  Man... we can be NTSB ... =.=

  Not engines that caused the spark. The tailstrike on the emergency go-around caused the spark... Scrapping the tarmac all the way till it ignited the fuel mix.

   

  And it is lucky it was a landing, not a take-off... Imagine a fully-fuelled plane and this happens... Narita would be closed for a week!

• tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R

  23 Mar 09, 16:21

  Originally posted by Fryderyk HPH:

  Not engines that caused the spark. The tailstrike on the emergency go-around caused the spark... Scrapping the tarmac all the way till it ignited the fuel mix.

   

  And it is lucky it was a landing, not a take-off... Imagine a fully-fuelled plane and this happens... Narita would be closed for a week!

  
  ps... wrong...

  btw.. u r really positive,,, 

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 16:44

  Originally posted by tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R:

  
  ps... wrong...

  btw.. u r really positive,,, 

  I am quite sure... Saw the video. Tailstrike first then *kaboom* ignition of fuel tank then plane tilts, engine 1 and left wing hits ground. More sparks. Centre fuel tank then ignites.

   

  Planes taking off are more fuelled then ones landing. The carnage would be worse. It is lucky that it was a cargo plane so loss of only two lives(RIP)... But imagine it happen to a commercial plane... Lets say another pax version MD11... �果真的会���

• wonderamazement

  23 Mar 09, 19:25

  new report left wing hit the ground first... Fryderyk is a pilot?

• TIB1224Y

  23 Mar 09, 19:29

  The accident looks like a combination of a few factors, of course, strong winds is one of them, and likely the main one. The hard landing, then bouncing back into the air, and then hitting hard on the nose gear are tell-tale signs of strong winds, likely in an opposing direction (headwind). The wind speed at Chiba city near Tokyo Narita had a maximum wind speed record of 27.6 m/s during the accident time.

  Looking at the aircraft's nose going down rapidly, this may be due to two possible factors, one natural and one human. Natural wise there might have been a microburst occurring that pushed the aircraft's nose downwards. Most of the time this happens in thunderstorms. There is a sudden, updraft, then a downdraft/loss of lift, then another updraft.

  Second scenario would be that the pilots counter the updraft encountered during what seems to be an aborted landing attempt, and as the speed of the aircraft is low, the updraft might cause a low altitude stall, hence the pilots push the column forward, not knowing that there is combination downdraft, perhaps that manifested, although there was not any thunderstorm in the vicinity, that pushed the aircraft's nose hard over, causing the front gear to hit the ground.

  Cartwheeling occurred when there is loss of lift on a wing or severe wind shear, however at the time the nose gear hit the ground, there is perhaps little chance that the aircraft would remain in control, and cartwheeling off the runway would very likely be a natural incident.

  Do note that the aircraft however, did not seem to encounter tail strike that caused the fire, but a cartwheeling effect resulting in the contact of the left wing with the ground and caused the initial blaze.

  We wait for the official reports to see more about it. Personally as a aviation student presently I do love the DC-10 series a lot.

• tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R

  23 Mar 09, 19:39

  Originally posted by Fryderyk HPH:

  I am quite sure... Saw the video. Tailstrike first then *kaboom* ignition of fuel tank then plane tilts, engine 1 and left wing hits ground. More sparks. Centre fuel tank then ignites.

   

  Planes taking off are more fuelled then ones landing. The carnage would be worse. It is lucky that it was a cargo plane so loss of only two lives(RIP)... But imagine it happen to a commercial plane... Lets say another pax version MD11... �果真的会���

  
  actually... dis commercial plane... Lets say another pax version MD11 alrdy happen alot of times le... i dun even wanna count....

• TIB1224Y

  23 Mar 09, 20:05

  Originally posted by tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R:

  
  actually... dis commercial plane... Lets say another pax version MD11 alrdy happen alot of times le... i dun even wanna count....

  Till date there are 6 hull-loss accidents involving MD-11 aircraft, including all variants. China Airlines accident in 22 August 1999 bears similarity to this case, including wind-shear as a probable main cause, cartwheeling and inverted aircraft. That accident occurred in typhoon conditions, and this in clear skies/weather.

• tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R

  23 Mar 09, 20:06

  Originally posted by TIB1224Y:

  Till date there are 6 hull-loss accidents involving MD-11 aircraft, including all variants. China Airlines accident in 22 August 1999 bears similarity to this case, including wind-shear as a probable main cause, cartwheeling and inverted aircraft. That accident occurred in typhoon conditions, and this in clear skies/weather.

  
  o.0

  kk...

  thx for info ^_^

• SBS7484P

  23 Mar 09, 20:10

  tail hits floor, pilot tries to pull up, fails, plane hits ground on left side, ignites, and rolls over.

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 23:56

  Originally posted by wonderamazement:

  new report left wing hit the ground first... Fryderyk is a pilot?

  Not really... Am a student... But lets just say I have insider info from veteran pilots round the world and connections with higher personnel in SQ.

• Fryderyk HPH

  23 Mar 09, 23:56

  Originally posted by TIB1224Y:

  The accident looks like a combination of a few factors, of course, strong winds is one of them, and likely the main one. The hard landing, then bouncing back into the air, and then hitting hard on the nose gear are tell-tale signs of strong winds, likely in an opposing direction (headwind). The wind speed at Chiba city near Tokyo Narita had a maximum wind speed record of 27.6 m/s during the accident time.

  Looking at the aircraft's nose going down rapidly, this may be due to two possible factors, one natural and one human. Natural wise there might have been a microburst occurring that pushed the aircraft's nose downwards. Most of the time this happens in thunderstorms. There is a sudden, updraft, then a downdraft/loss of lift, then another updraft.

  Second scenario would be that the pilots counter the updraft encountered during what seems to be an aborted landing attempt, and as the speed of the aircraft is low, the updraft might cause a low altitude stall, hence the pilots push the column forward, not knowing that there is combination downdraft, perhaps that manifested, although there was not any thunderstorm in the vicinity, that pushed the aircraft's nose hard over, causing the front gear to hit the ground.

  Cartwheeling occurred when there is loss of lift on a wing or severe wind shear, however at the time the nose gear hit the ground, there is perhaps little chance that the aircraft would remain in control, and cartwheeling off the runway would very likely be a natural incident.

  Do note that the aircraft however, did not seem to encounter tail strike that caused the fire, but a cartwheeling effect resulting in the contact of the left wing with the ground and caused the initial blaze.

  We wait for the official reports to see more about it. Personally as a aviation student presently I do love the DC-10 series a lot.

  Exactly...

• Fryderyk HPH

  24 Mar 09, 00:06

  Originally posted by tr@nsp0rt_F3V3R:

  
  actually... dis commercial plane... Lets say another pax version MD11 alrdy happen alot of times le... i dun even wanna count....

  IMHO the design of the DC10, MD10~11 and MD 80~90 jets are fatally flawed...

   

  Nice planes to photograph, real pain in the ass for pilots. I personally like the wing flex during rotation in winter(Finnair at Helsinki Vantaa during winter comes to mind)...