MD-87 Down KTME 10/19

NTSB recovers black boxes from plane that burned in Texas
Federal investigators are interviewing people who were on a jet that ran off a Texas runway during takeoff and burst into flames
 
An accident where it was good that everyone was able to get themselves out, that there were no injuries, and that there were only 21 aboard versus 100+ or more. Lots of good luck came their way in that regard.

Unfortunately, even with the corporate traffic that TME gets, there is no crash rescue, not even a small A-index truck, on field. Nor is there any legal requirement for one, even though it’s a good idea.

The area is covered by the volunteer emergency services district of Waller County. In the same way most rural areas are in Texas. That means response time is going to be extended, both by the need to get personnel gathered as well as the accident location and access to it. The volunteer department is well intentioned, but unfortunately ill-equipped and normally lacks the training and tactical knowledge to be doing ARFF work, unless a random department member happens to hold the qualification.

You can tell the extended response time, as the jet is not only fully involved by the time the FD is seen making their fire attack here in the video, but also nearly burnt completely through. The FD has one brush truck on scene, and are running an attack line from a distant engine or pumper-tender that can’t make it all the way to the scene due to terrain, truck weight or access. With the heavy class B fuel fire that is left over now, it’s not even worth fighting. The firefighters can’t get very close to it, as they’re in structural gear vs proximity silvers, and the severe radiant heat is more than the structurals can protect them from. For some reason, the chief officer is on the fire nozzle….seems common of volunteer departments. And they’re pushing a straight stream of water/foam into the fire, which is doing absolutely nothing except wasting water/foam. These guys are going to run through thousands of gallons of water and accomplish nothing….which is what occurs.

With no persons onboard anymore, and no one in need of rescue (say, if there was someone trapped back next to the tailcone still alive), then it’s a waste of resources attempting to extinguish the fuel fire. There are no critical extensions or anything the fire can spread to that can’t be easily controlled such as light grasses…..best to let the thing burn itself nearly out rather than waste extreme amounts of water and extinguishing agent on it, for no reasonable gain of anything. Unless they’re wanting to use the situation as it is currently, as a live fire training opportunity, which wouldn’t be a stretch of logic.

Good intentions, but ill-equipped unfortunately.

Lots of good luck happened in this one.

 
MikeD said:
An accident where it was good that everyone was able to get themselves out, that there were no injuries, and that there were only 21 aboard versus 100+ or more. Lots of good luck came their way in that regard.

Unfortunately, even with the corporate traffic that TME gets, there is no crash rescue, not even a small A-index truck, on field. Nor is there any legal requirement for one, even though it’s a good idea.

The area is covered by the volunteer emergency services district of Waller County. In the same way most rural areas are in Texas. That means response time is going to be extended, both by the need to get personnel gathered as well as the accident location and access to it. The volunteer department is well intentioned, but unfortunately ill-equipped and normally lacks the training and tactical knowledge to be doing ARFF work, unless a random department member happens to hold the qualification.

You can tell the extended response time, as the jet is not only fully involved by the time the FD is seen making their fire attack here in the video, but also nearly burnt completely through. The FD has one brush truck on scene, and are running an attack line from a distant engine or pumper-tender that can’t make it all the way to the scene due to terrain, truck weight or access. With the heavy class B fuel fire that is left over now, it’s not even worth fighting. The firefighters can’t get very close to it, as they’re in structural gear vs proximity silvers, and the severe radiant heat is more than the structurals can protect them from. For some reason, the chief officer is on the fire nozzle….seems common of volunteer departments. And they’re pushing a straight stream of water/foam into the fire, which is doing absolutely nothing except wasting water/foam. These guys are going to run through thousands of gallons of water and accomplish nothing….which is what occurs.

With no persons onboard anymore, and no one in need of rescue (say, if there was someone trapped back next to the tailcone still alive), then it’s a waste of resources attempting to extinguish the fuel fire. There are no critical extensions or anything the fire can spread to that can’t be easily controlled such as light grasses…..best to let the thing burn itself nearly out rather than waste extreme amounts of water and extinguishing agent on it, for no reasonable gain of anything. Unless they’re wanting to use the situation as it is currently, as a live fire training opportunity, which wouldn’t be a stretch of logic.

Good intentions, but ill-equipped unfortunately.

Lots of good luck happened in this one.

Click to expand...


The short of it is that it takes tax dollars to have emergency services. You will always have a reactionary approach things don't go perfectly when you attempt to run a tight budget with non additional revenue. This is just a distant observation of mine.
 
KLB said:
The short of it is that it takes tax dollars to have emergency services. You will always have a reactionary approach things don't go perfectly when you attempt to run a tight budget with non additional revenue. This is just a distant observation of mine.
Click to expand...

you’re not wrong at all. Like you say, no bucks, no Buck Rogers. In many rural areas where there is no tax base and may or may not be a fire district for revenue, nor even a contractor fire service, volunteer services are all they have. And the qualification of personnel, equipment at hand, numbers of people and vehicles available, and response times; all can very widely vary in this kind of makeup. It’s better than nothing, but a spin of the roulette wheel in terms of what it will be.
 
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fholbert said:
I think the FA deserves some credit for getting everyone out.
Click to expand...

Indeed. The successful evacuation is under appreciated. I heard one comment the other day "Someone must've said a strong prayer before that flight." Yeah, that's exactly what happened - it had nothing to do with the actions of professionals that go through routine training for this exact situation.
 
CFI A&P said:
Indeed. The successful evacuation is under appreciated. I heard one comment the other day "Someone must've said a strong prayer before that flight." Yeah, that's exactly what happened - it had nothing to do with the actions of professionals that go through routine training for this exact situation.
Click to expand...


People always say that. Even survivors. "God must have wanted me to live."

Yeah, God sure wanted the other 100+ dead and burned to a crisp?
 
MikeD said:
An accident where it was good that everyone was able to get themselves out, that there were no injuries, and that there were only 21 aboard versus 100+ or more. Lots of good luck came their way in that regard.

Unfortunately, even with the corporate traffic that TME gets, there is no crash rescue, not even a small A-index truck, on field. Nor is there any legal requirement for one, even though it’s a good idea.

The area is covered by the volunteer emergency services district of Waller County. In the same way most rural areas are in Texas. That means response time is going to be extended, both by the need to get personnel gathered as well as the accident location and access to it. The volunteer department is well intentioned, but unfortunately ill-equipped and normally lacks the training and tactical knowledge to be doing ARFF work, unless a random department member happens to hold the qualification.

You can tell the extended response time, as the jet is not only fully involved by the time the FD is seen making their fire attack here in the video, but also nearly burnt completely through. The FD has one brush truck on scene, and are running an attack line from a distant engine or pumper-tender that can’t make it all the way to the scene due to terrain, truck weight or access. With the heavy class B fuel fire that is left over now, it’s not even worth fighting. The firefighters can’t get very close to it, as they’re in structural gear vs proximity silvers, and the severe radiant heat is more than the structurals can protect them from. For some reason, the chief officer is on the fire nozzle….seems common of volunteer departments. And they’re pushing a straight stream of water/foam into the fire, which is doing absolutely nothing except wasting water/foam. These guys are going to run through thousands of gallons of water and accomplish nothing….which is what occurs.

With no persons onboard anymore, and no one in need of rescue (say, if there was someone trapped back next to the tailcone still alive), then it’s a waste of resources attempting to extinguish the fuel fire. There are no critical extensions or anything the fire can spread to that can’t be easily controlled such as light grasses…..best to let the thing burn itself nearly out rather than waste extreme amounts of water and extinguishing agent on it, for no reasonable gain of anything. Unless they’re wanting to use the situation as it is currently, as a live fire training opportunity, which wouldn’t be a stretch of logic.

Good intentions, but ill-equipped unfortunately.

Lots of good luck happened in this one.

Click to expand...


Yeah, what I said.

:p
 
An exemination of the tail section revelased that the left and right elevators were jammed in a trailing edge down position; neither elevator could be moved when manipulated by hand.
Both inboard actuating cranks for both elevator’s geared tabs were bent outboard, and their respective links were bent. Both actuating cranks and links were found locked in an overcenter position beyond their normal range of travel.
The damage observed to the left and right elevator geared tab input rod links is similar to the damage found on an MD-83 which crashed after a rejected takeoff on March 8, 2017.

E2A08280-ACA0-4C26-A426-A8F9E3DCB47A.jpeg
 

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GypsyPilot said:
Blancorlio did a really nice update regarding this on his channel:

Click to expand...

Thanks for the video. Looking at some of the pictures above I was having trouble figuring out what that damage meant, the video cleared it up nicely. I don't think I'll be flying on a DC-9/MD80,83,87/717 ever again if at all possible.

Side note: The only non pilot I know that was ever involved in an 121 incident was on an MD-80 that landed with the nose gear up, he said it made a "god-awful noise" as it slid to a stop.
 
I will bet money that if they look at the elevator gust dampers they will find that they have failed. One of the functions of the dampers is to keep the elevators from banging around in wind gusts and if those fail you can over stress the geared tab links as shown in the picture above. This was one of those things that was drilled into me when I went to gen fam on the 80.
 
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