Emergency gear-up landing of LOT B767 in WAW

[galaxy]

There is something I personally don't understand ... Is there only one runway in Warsaw Airport ? When looking on different maps or 'google earth', it seems there are two runways ... In that case why does the airport remain closed ???

The belly landing ended exactly on the intersection of the two runways. That was not expected apparently.

[Bralo20]

Engineers where able to extract the gears and the plane was towed to an hangar. WAW should be back open now since about an hour or so.

[galaxy]

Polish pilot felt huge relief after safe landing :

Several Facebook pages sprang up immediately to express admiration for Wrona, with some calling him a "superhero." ''Fly like an eagle and land like a crow," runs a phrase that has appeared on Facebook, playing on the word "wrona," Polish for crow.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501369_162- ... e-landing/

[andorra-airport]

The fact that the pilot could not extend the landing gear seems strange. When the electric motor does not work, it is still possible to unlock the gear and to let it free-fall into its down position, where it is automatically locked.

The landing gear of this 767 has a alternate system, which you are talking about. It relies on electrically releasing the 3 landing gear uplocks and allowing them to fall under gravity. If that electrical system fails... But lets wait and see what the final conclusion is.

[DeltaWiskey]

Capt "Sully" Sullenberger the hero in NY was indeed also a very experient glider pilot. A lot of pilots are starting their flying carreer within the " Aircadets", not all of them though. A glider pilot I knew always said that the best feeling and movements in the air were in a glider but this will be a personal experience I suppose.

Not a lot of pilots, quite the contrary, very few airline pilots started their career with the "air cadets". In Belgium it is only a handfull of people a year (majority goes to the air force or college). From the ±30 air cadets I know (all between 20y and 27y), only 2 are flying now with a civil airline.
In the Netherlands there isn't even an air cadet program (but there is an iFly, a cadet-like program sponsored by an FTO)

My father (TR instructor) trains pilots from time to time, and he directly notices (within 5 minutes) when they do have a gliding background. So, there is something to say to include gliding in a pilot training.

[jan_olieslagers]

So, there is something to say to include gliding in a pilot training.

Yes indeed. When the Belgian Ultralight Federation began to be worried about the rate of serious incidents, a day of glider initiation was one of the laudable initiatives in response. I'm still sorry I missed it, but hope to make up soon.

[galaxy]

Been a glider pilot myself,i don't get the advantage to be a glider pilot in this belly landing. It was a beautiful and smooth executed landing of a 767 without extended wheels but nothing more. The only similar thing with a glider is the smooth landing ,nose up .

[earthman]

What is interesting to discuss is the in my view odd decision to execute this gear up landing at WAW...
Given there was no real urgency to land (the plane had circled for some time, which is quite normal as the cabin needs to be prepared and fuel needs to be burned), it might have been a good idea to divert to another equally suitable airport meanwhile, where it would certainly have caused less disturbances...

WAW has by far the longest runway in the country. Also WAW has plenty of rescue services (note that besides the regular airport fire dept. they also called in something like 10 regular fire engines), and the city has a whole lot of hospitals (including very specialized ones) and ambulances (a lot of which came to the airport), and the airport is very close to some of them. I would like to argue that there is NO equally suitable airport anywhere in the vicinity (or in the country, for that matter).

[earthman]

To everybody wondering why they crossed the atlantic when a hydraulics fault came up 30 minutes after takeoff: the captain said that there was no decision to be made at that point, fault came up, he followed the manual on how to resolve the fault, manual said do X, if Y simply continue, no problem. They only found out the gear didn't work on approach.

[sn26567]

To everybody wondering why they crossed the atlantic when a hydraulics fault came up 30 minutes after takeoff: the captain said that there was no decision to be made at that point, fault came up, he followed the manual on how to resolve the fault, manual said do X, if Y simply continue, no problem. They only found out the gear didn't work on approach.

I'd add that going back to EWR would have compelled him to land at night, whereas continuing to WAW enabled him to land in daylight, with a much better visibility.

[andorra-airport]

Video made inside during the emergency landing:

[sn26567]

LOT Polish Airlines crew decorated by President

The crew of LOT Polish Airlines flight No. LO 016, which made an emergency landing at Warsaw airport last week, were decorated with state honours today by the President of the Republic of Poland, Mr Bronisław Komorowski.

The ceremony, which took place in the Presidential Palace in Warsaw, was attended by the crew members of Flight LO 016 and the airport service staff involved in the emergency landing.

Captain Tadeusz Wrona was awarded the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta, First Officer Jerzy Szwarc and Chief Purser received the Knight’s Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta and every other member of the crew, the Gold Cross of Merit. The Order of Polonia is conferred for outstanding achievement and the Cross of Merit for actions above and beyond the call of normal duty and to the significant benefit of the State or its citizens.

I would like to congratulate the entire crew as they receive the President’s highest accolades, said Marcin Piróg, LOT’s CEO. We are all extraordinarily proud of the superb skills and training our pilots and flight attendants demonstrated during the landing – he added.

Last week, the crew of Flight LO 016 were awarded the company own highest honours, the LOT Polish Airlines Badge of Honour, 1st Class with three diamonds and the Badge of Honour 2nd and 3rd class.

The crew consisted of Captain Tadeusz Wrona, First Officer Jerzy Szwarc, Chief Purser Jerzy Konofalski and Flight Attendants Anna Michalak–Zawadzka, Wojciech Winiarski, Beata Sobczak, Grzegorz Pietrzyk, Magdalena Gortat, Wioletta Bugajska and Magdalena Olędzka.

LOT Polish Airlines press release, Warsaw, 7th November 2011

[sn26567]

Recent video of the aircraft damage:

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=ff4_1320794781

[KriVa]

All in all, she's in a much better shape than I thought she would be.

[sn26567]

LOT is wet-leasing a B767 from Ukrainian airline AeroSvit to compensate for the temporary unavailability of its own B767.

viewtopic.php?p=256501#p256501

[cathay belgium]

All in all, she's in a much better shape than I thought she would be.

Could be, but I guess total-loss in any case

As the VLM ( euh.. cityjet ) F50 was already after a gear retraction during a stand few onths ago..
But a lot of B767 on the market now I guess..


CX-B

[mad_fab]

All in all, she's in a much better shape than I thought she would be.

Always hard to tell... Remember the IB A346 in Quito, it looked great too but was finally scrapped

[earthman]

All in all, she's in a much better shape than I thought she would be.

Always hard to tell... Remember the IB A346 in Quito, it looked great too but was finally scrapped

That was a much worse landing even though it did have its gear down. They smacked the plane onto the runway, which broke a bunch of things, then overran the runway at 90kts which cause a whole lot of additional damage.

This 767 made a really smooth landing.

[mad_fab]

Agreed!

But I'm not trying to compare the landings, I'm just saying "it's not because it looks ok (or better than expected) that the plane will fly again"

[earthman]

Read in a Polish newspaper:

On thursday the preliminary report will be published. A popped circuit breaker that was found after the landing. Resetting it caused the alternate gear extension to function again. It appears that this fuse is NOT the alt gear extension fuse but some larger fuse protecting a bunch of systems, and it actually seems that Boeing itself wasn't aware that this fuse affects the alt gear. This seems to be a significant oops in their checklists then...