Delta 121 control issue

[MikeD]

Here's my mayday and I will call you back.

Here’s the mayday and what I need to do right now, then I will call you back.

That way ATC can be of help, versus wondering where you’ll be barreling around to, course and altitude-wise. The extra info they need can be sent to them when able, which many ATC will preface with “…when able, fuel, souls and nature of emergency.”

Too many pilots forget the bolded part, which is understandable as emergencies are an unusual situation that is rarely experienced.

 

[Soul Brotha']

Plane landed safely, good job. Very few pilots(thankfully) will never experience an event like this. We practice emergencies in the sim, under a controlled environment, every year. I have no clue how sharp I would be if it was a real life emergency. I would like to think that I would handle it like a “Boss”
But if I safely get the plane to the ground and maybe make a decision or two that some will Monday morning quarterback, I’ll take it.

 

[thevideographer]

Plane landed safely, good job. Very few pilots(thankfully) will never experience an event like this. We practice emergencies in the sim, under a controlled environment, every year. I have no clue how sharp I would be if it was a real life emergency. I would like to think that I would handle it like a “Boss”
But if I safely get the plane to the ground and maybe make a decision or two that some will Monday morning quarterback, I’ll take it.

Is it rare? Maybe CRJ-200 threw off my perspective.

 

[MikeD]

Plane landed safely, good job. Very few pilots(thankfully) will never experience an event like this. We practice emergencies in the sim, under a controlled environment, every year. I have no clue how sharp I would be if it was a real life emergency. I would like to think that I would handle it like a “Boss”
But if I safely get the plane to the ground and maybe make a decision or two that some will Monday morning quarterback, I’ll take it.

Just an uncommon occurrence. Whereas in mil, especially fighters, it’s almost routine, emergency declarations. From aircraft issues, fuel emergencies during ops, structural damage, hung secure/unsecure ordnance, all kinds of crap that somewhat routinely would occur that mandated a declaration.

 

[DPApilot]

All of our -200s can. Our prior POI had a fear of overweight landings so all of the 330s came configured to dump gas. Pretty quick checklist to run once you get a few minutes on a long divert and makes for one less thing to think about during a landing.

Learning has just occurred.

 

[Autothrust Blue]

Our union used to send out emails about maintenance hogs, where they highlighted aircraft with recurring issues. It’s pretty surprising how much stuff gets pushed down the road after pulling a couple of breakers on the Bus.

Airbus be all:

System Reset: Use With Caution | Safety First

A system reset is not always the quick fix that it may seem. Performing an inappropriate manual system reset in flight can seriously impair the safety of the flight. Multiple system resets on the ground without performing the necessary troubleshooting actions can also have serious...

safetyfirst.airbus.com

 

[phill1174]

In fairness, part of a reporting, just and learning culture is that something happens when you do bother to report whatever, not "Oh thanks for the report, it'll be used to 'enhance safety', teehee, bye."

This is true! You should see the response for our informational fatigue reports. Do we work at the same place?

 

[Autothrust Blue]

This is true! You should see the response for our informational fatigue reports. Do we work at the same place?

I've been saying that • since I wore one hat, hung it up for a hatless place and now wear a hat again, so potentially, but this is an "SSE" topic.

 

[tcco94]

let’s not forget it’s pretty easy declaring an emergency on your keyboard in a forum from the comfort of your coach

 

[Wardogg]

Sure. However If I’m asking for special handling I’m declaring. If you’re getting really randy with your requests they’re going to declare for you anyway.

 

[MikeD]

let’s not forget it’s pretty easy declaring an emergency on your keyboard in a forum from the comfort of your coach

The thing is, it shouldn’t be this way. It should be trained to be easy to do. Was simple enough for us on the mil side, whether dealing with mil or civil ATC. There were no wives tales of excess paperwork, or being in trouble in some way, or some large response bill to pay or anything like that. Why that has seeped into the general consensus of civil aviation, I’m not sure.

 

[MikeD]

Sure. However If I’m asking for special handling I’m declaring. If you’re getting really randy with your requests they’re going to declare for you anyway.

And this is what irks me. We as pilots always ramble on about never letting ATC fly your plane for you. And yet, we tend to allow ATC to essentially declare an emergency for us rather than doing it ourselves.

 

[///AMG]

Never have I ever needed to explain myself to anyone for declaring. Not to my boss, not to ATC, not to anyone. Like mike said, have done it plenty. One recent one was an engine failure. Only explaining I had to do was give the rest of our staff and students a "there I was" overview of what happened, during our monthly all aircrew meeting. I began telling it, and the guy who had been in my backseat had to remind me "it was actually the right engine, not the left"......me: "oh yeah, you're right, I forgot we had to emergency extend the gear and take a trap because we didn't have brakes" (effects of losing that associated hyd system). Suffice to say, though that was the first completely uncommanded engine failure I've had, it was about the millionth precautionary shutdown and single engine approach/landing I've done, especially in the old ass Hornets I used to fly.

 

[MikeD]

Never have I ever needed to explain myself to anyone for declaring. Not to my boss, not to ATC, not to anyone. Like mike said, have done it plenty. One recent one was an engine failure. Only explaining I had to do was give the rest of our staff and students a "there I was" overview of what happened, during our monthly all aircrew meeting. I began telling it, and the guy who had been in my backseat had to remind me "it was actually the right engine, not the left"......me: "oh yeah, you're right, I forgot we had to emergency extend the gear and take a trap because we didn't have brakes" (effects of losing that associated hyd system). Suffice to say, though that was the first completely uncommanded engine failure I've had, it was about the millionth precautionary shutdown and single engine approach/landing I've done, especially in the old ass Hornets I used to fly.

A few engine fires and associated shutdown here. A few HYD failures. One landing gear issue. A good few low fuel EPs due to problems during mass recoveries of aircraft and/or Wx diverts. Numerous hung ordnance recoveries.

The best was declaring an emergency for what was a significant emergency potential system loss in the aircraft, only to be assigned to proceed to a fix and hold as published with an EFC/push time for the HI-PAR. Querying the ROKAF RAPCON controller that I’m an EP, am told that I’m the number 6 emergency declaration in the stack right now for the field that is varying between ILS and PAR mins now, with the other 5 EP aircraft they are working, two sections of RF Phantoms needing short-field arrestments and an F-5, being more critical than me EP-wise, per the SOF.

Oh. Well, ok. In that case, guess I’ll go to the assigned fix and hold then…..

 

[Minuteman]

All of our -200s can. Our prior POI had a fear of overweight landings so all of the 330s came configured to dump gas. Pretty quick checklist to run once you get a few minutes on a long divert and makes for one less thing to think about during a landing.

Not like this, right?

“A Hawaiian Airlines Airbus A330-200, registration N375HA performing flight HA-22 from Honolulu,HI to Seattle,WA (USA) with 278 people on board, was in the initial climb out of Honolulu's runway 08R when the crew requested to level off at 3000 feet and return to the airfield advising, they had a continuous trail coming out of the #1 engine (Trent 772, left hand) and requested the emergency services on arrival. The aircraft returned to Honolulu for a safe landing on runway 08L about 15 minutes after departure. The crew shut both engines down and did not activate the APU due to the leak concerns, emergency services confirmed a fuel leak from the left hand engine.”

The Aviation Herald

Aviation Herald - News, Incidents and Accidents in Aviation

avherald.com

View: https://youtu.be/M64hgkqg8sk

 

[NovemberEcho]

A few engine fires and associated shutdown here. A few HYD failures. One landing gear issue. A good few low fuel EPs due to problems during mass recoveries of aircraft and/or Wx diverts. Numerous hung ordnance recoveries.

The best was declaring an emergency for what was a significant emergency potential system loss in the aircraft, only to be assigned to proceed to a fix and hold as published with an EFC/push time for the HI-PAR. Querying the ROKAF RAPCON controller that I’m an EP, am told that I’m the number 6 emergency declaration in the stack right now for the field that is varying between ILS and PAR mins now, with the other 5 EP aircraft they are working, two sections of RF Phantoms needing short-field arrestments and an F-5, being more critical than me EP-wise, per the SOF.

Oh. Well, ok. In that case, guess I’ll go to the assigned fix and hold then…..

I had a similar situation with an F-15 RTB emergency fuel. Gave him a vector, he got mad, I was like yes sir your #5 in the emergency fuel pattern. Seriously though why was it SO common for fighters to come back emergency fuel from training flights in the warning areas? Seriously I feel like in a peer shooting war we’d lose half the USAF to fuel starvation on the first sortie.

 

[MikeD]

I had a similar situation with an F-15 RTB emergency fuel. Gave him a vector, he got mad, I was like yes sir your #5 in the emergency fuel pattern. Seriously though why was it SO common for fighters to come back emergency fuel from training flights in the warning areas? Seriously I feel like in a peer shooting war we’d lose half the USAF to fuel starvation on the first sortie.

For us, mass recoveries would usually happen during unforeseen serious Wx, when the SOF would issue a Wing recall. Otherwise the genera launch/recovery flow works out fine with flights properly staggered.

The one time I was SOF, NEACP was a hundred some miles away and had some engine issue and was headed to us. They can go wherever they want and with no PPRs. ZAB was on the phone to our tower cab relaying that he was headed our way, and I had fighters out still that are going to start getting bingo fuel. Being single runway, I had the controller query if ZAB could send them to LUF, as we at DMA are single runway and I’ve got fighters airborne. Seems STRATCOM didn’t care about my problems, only about their bird. And LUF, an AETC base, its tower had just closed for the night (though its RAPCON remains open). So I had nowhere for my fighters to go besides GXF or TUS. And they were already coming back halfway between the two. Finally convinced them, or maybe they figured better, to just go to IKR and it’s 4 runways and the AFB there, that would really affect no one.

 

[Autothrust Blue]

Seriously I feel like in a peer shooting war we’d lose half the USAF to fuel starvation on the first sortie.

Don’t tell the Air Force but their real priority and reason to exist is the airborne refueling of Navy strike aircraft.

 

[BobDDuck]

Not like this, right?

“A Hawaiian Airlines Airbus A330-200, registration N375HA performing flight HA-22 from Honolulu,HI to Seattle,WA (USA) with 278 people on board, was in the initial climb out of Honolulu's runway 08R when the crew requested to level off at 3000 feet and return to the airfield advising, they had a continuous trail coming out of the #1 engine (Trent 772, left hand) and requested the emergency services on arrival. The aircraft returned to Honolulu for a safe landing on runway 08L about 15 minutes after departure. The crew shut both engines down and did not activate the APU due to the leak concerns, emergency services confirmed a fuel leak from the left hand engine.”

The Aviation Herald

Aviation Herald - News, Incidents and Accidents in Aviation

avherald.com

View: https://youtu.be/M64hgkqg8sk

Ideally not. It's supposed to discharge out of mid wing nozzles... not the engine.

 

[arkavgal]

Not like this, right?

“A Hawaiian Airlines Airbus A330-200, registration N375HA performing flight HA-22 from Honolulu,HI to Seattle,WA (USA) with 278 people on board, was in the initial climb out of Honolulu's runway 08R when the crew requested to level off at 3000 feet and return to the airfield advising, they had a continuous trail coming out of the #1 engine (Trent 772, left hand) and requested the emergency services on arrival. The aircraft returned to Honolulu for a safe landing on runway 08L about 15 minutes after departure. The crew shut both engines down and did not activate the APU due to the leak concerns, emergency services confirmed a fuel leak from the left hand engine.”

The Aviation Herald

Aviation Herald - News, Incidents and Accidents in Aviation

avherald.com

View: https://youtu.be/M64hgkqg8sk

Damn. What's the plan for a fuel leak on a commercial aircraft hours away from a suitable airport?