QF12 - Bad weather forces A380 to land in Noumea

[Andrew M]

Must have been pretty bad weather....Running low on fuel sounds more likely as indicated in the article. Then the crew timed out... Should have stopped in Hawaii or Fiji me thinks.....

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/bad-weather-forces-qantas-a380-to-make-emergency-landing-in-noumea/story-e6frf7l6-1225903933659


A QANTAS jet carrying 375 passengers has been forced to make an emergency landing at Noumea.

The Sydney-bound QF12 A380 aircraft was forced to divert its flight from LA due to severe weather earlier today.

Passengers, as well as 26 crew members, were stranded on the plane for more than five hours after landing.

It is believed ground crew at the tiny south pacific airport, that has never had an A380 land there, were unable to tow the massive aircraft.

"Safety is first priority, hence the Captain made the decision to divert to Noumea for additional fuel," she said.

[James K]

Hardly an "emergency" landing. :rolleyes:

[Andrew M]

I didn't want to go down that path again..... :p

[Stephen B]

If you're a fan of entertaining heeadlines check this one out!

http://www.smh.com.au/travel/travel-news/weather-warning-forces-qantas-a380-down-in-pacific-20100811-11z9k.html

[Stuart Trevena]

Hi All,

Just out of interest, why wasn't BNE or CNS used, as a diversion airport?

Stuart

[Sarah C]

That would have been the first preference - maybe they didn't have enough fuel to get to those destinations if they were affected by weather too.

BNE did have some big storms yesterday.

[Brandon Giacomin]

DL17 diverted to BNE this morning.

[Brett o]

Hi All

The Article said that Qantas dispatched a 747 to fly the passengers’ home. I was wondering why they did not use the A380 to fly the passenger’s home. I assume all that is needed is a new flight and cabin crew and they could be flown to Noumea on any aircraft available.

Also do you happen to know the rego’s of the planes involved?

[Adam P.]

Blatant speculation of a possible scenario:

Only crew and spare aircraft available at short notice could have been a 400. Send it to rescue the passengers, then wait for the original Airbus crew to finish their min rest period before they ferry their own aircraft back. Not being a 'normal' port for the A380, there's no scheduled services to rely on to get a new crew out there, and certainly no crew on standby anywhere near the place. So a 'rescue' flight becomes the quickest option.

Having no idea of what longhaul min-rest requirements are for crew, perhaps it would have been faster to do this than wait for the first crew to become available again.

End of blatant speculation.

[Laurent Sanhard]

i presume the 747 was sent as the A380 with a full load my not have the required length of runway (or width ) @ Noumea for take off back to Sydney

[Stuart Trevena]

Hi All,

NOU has a rwy length of 10663ft or 3250m.
So maybe just marginal, but still should be able to take off.

I think the problem could be more the Number of cabin crew required for an A380 vs B744.

Stuart

[Laurent Sanhard]

i am thinking that they did'nt want the A380 taking off from an airport like Noumea with a full load , not so much because of the length bust also the width of the runway , A380 at full thrust would probably suck in too much dirt dust from a runway which was not wide enough , just a thought

[Jon B]

As a question (ie i am not assuming this is feasible) would Melbourne with the Cat III ILS be an alternate in bad weather if the aircraft and crew are approriately rated?

In any event i would rather a have a delay than a problem en route so dont see why the media portray these as a "major issue" when in reality qantas and the crew are doing the right thing.

[Grahame Hutchison]

VH-OJA QF6021 11/08/2010 12:31 Qantas B747-438 Sydney-La Tontouta

[Ash W]

Hi All

The Article said that Qantas dispatched a 747 to fly the passengers’ home. I was wondering why they did not use the A380 to fly the passenger’s home. I assume all that is needed is a new flight and cabin crew and they could be flown to Noumea on any aircraft available.

Also do you happen to know the rego’s of the planes involved?

The 2nd (SMH) article says "Qantas has dispatched a Boeing 747 carrying a replacement crew to bring the passengers back to Sydney in the A380"

So what is the truth then? Will admit it sounds odd to send a 747 just to to ferry over a new crew to fly the A380 home, though considering there were 374 passengers on board flying a 747 over would mean, depending upon config that some passengers would be left behind or have to be placed on other flights.

[Laurent Sanhard]

Ash , read my previous post on this subject , and it might explain why they did,nt wan't the A380 taking off from Noumea with a full ,load of pax

[Nigel C]

The runway width at Noumea is 45m, which is the same as Sydney, but I don't know if they have widened the shoulders. For economic reasons, I doubt they would have.

I just hope they have a good street sweeper on hand!

[Lee G]

OQC (QF12) is overhead YSSY at FL070 right now....

[Scotty B]

As a question (ie i am not assuming this is feasible) would Melbourne with the Cat III ILS be an alternate in bad weather if the aircraft and crew are approriately rated?

Jon,

The Alternate Criteria for Melbourne is 700'/2500m.

If the forecast weather is below this they can't fly to YMML to make the approach unless they have an Alternate Airport (or have the fuel to hold until the conditions are forecast to be above the ALTN criteria.) That is despite the fact that with a CAT IIIB minima for the A380 of 0'/75m they would (more than likely) get in. At a guess I'd say the likelihood of the 380 being able to fly to Sydney then divert to YMML and hold is pretty close to zero unless it had a light load. (The -400 definitely couldn't do it, but I don't know the performance of the A380)

I won't mention to NeilP if you don't, that the original SMH headline for this article was- "Weather warning forces Qantas A380 down in Pacific"
:rolleyes: :D

Scotty B

[Tim Bowrey]

VH-OQC cleared to land 34L just now with QF6020 from Noumea not far behind.

[Ash W]

Ash , read my previous post on this subject , and it might explain why they did,nt wan't the A380 taking off from Noumea with a full ,load of pax

So they did use the 747 then? Interesting as the article I mentioned said they were flying in a crew to fly the passengers home in the A380, not the 747 and unless it was a 2 class 747 then there wouldn't have been enough seats to bring home all 374 passengers.

[Sarah C]

They might have used the 747 for 2 reasons - they are more likely to be on the ground at the Jetbase and can be used without impacting scheduled services today, and they might have also used it in case they didn't think they could get the full payload off the ground. Better to take a 747 that can carry about the same load than just a 767.

[Sarah C]

The headline writer at the Herald have updated the front page to a new one which is just as amusing.

"Weather forces A380 to land on island"

Gee, Australia is an island, those A380's just can't cope!!!

[Grahame Hutchison]

VH-OQC QF0012 11/08/2010 19:03 Qantas A380-842 Los Angeles-La Tontouta-Sydney

VH-OJA QF6020 11/08/2010 19:39 Qantas B747-438 La Tontouta-Sydney

2016 Turning onto final 34L Squawk 1214
2018 Established on approach

[Andrew M]

My original link still has the headline of

"Bad weather forces Qantas A380 to make emergency landing in Noumea"

[Peter Agatsiotis]

Brett, the A380 was OQC which arrived in SYD less than an hour ago.

Can't help with the 'rescue' a/c. (Grahame must have posted OJA whilst I was searching my SBS log)

[Sarah C]

My original link still has the headline of

"Bad weather forces Qantas A380 to make emergency landing in Noumea"

Go the Herald home page - 4th story from the top.

[Grahame Hutchison]

Having returned from La Tontouta, OJA is now off to Avalon ...

VH-OJA QF6191 11/08/2010 22:31 Qantas B747-438 Sydney-Avalon
-> 2253 Overhead Canberra at FL400 heading 230 at 473kts (empty)

[Laurent Sanhard]

Vh oqc. Is. Currently doing QF31 tonite. Leaving 5 hours late

[Philip Argy]

I see that OJC arrived before OJA, but did they leave Noumea in that order or did the (presumably empty?) OJC overtake OJA?

[Fred C]

VH-OQC left Noumea before VH-OJA. OJA was the empty plane. It had some staff on board.
It was more important to get the 380 back to do the QF31. OJA was off to AVV for some love and attention.:D

[Michael Cleary]

Nice pics, just needed an A-340 to complete the 'family' photo.

[Jethro H]

Hi All,

NOU has a rwy length of 10663ft or 3250m.
So maybe just marginal, but still should be able to take off.

I think the problem could be more the Number of cabin crew required for an A380 vs B744.
Stuart
Sorry, was there an actual answer to this, as Airbus make it proudly noted their MTOW runway length@ 2750m is less than 744 @ 3018m
I was just curious on sending the 744 over.

[Mick F]

I'm assuming the A330 was gone by the time the 747 turned up? Otherwise, where did it park?

Mick

[Laurent Sanhard]

Even though Noumea airport may have the required length of runway for the A380 , they may not be certified for A380 take offs , emergency landings only , remember how the runways in Sydney had to be increased in width to stop the engines picking up rubbish on takeoff , so Qantas sent the 747 for crew requirements as well as for safety reasons ,

[Jethro H]

Cheers

[Mick.B]

Plenty off room to spare.

[Michael Arentz]

so Qantas sent the 747 for crew requirements as well as for safety reasons ,

Source?

How does that explain the 744 heading back empty? Unless it was sent so it could depart first and ingest all runway debris on behalf of OQC?

[Nigel C]

Runway is 45m wide, so a B747 shouldn't/won't have any problems with ingestion at any time. Sydney ran with a 45m wide runway without widened shoulders and B747's for decades...

[Jethro H]

Apparently no problem for A380s either asI found on FAA notes:
http://www.faa.gov/airports/engineering/engineering_briefs/media/EB_74.pdf
July 2007: the FAA and EASA agreed to let the A380 operate on 45 m runways without restrictions
The issue called for wider runways is generated by 747-800. There are older FAA documents stating runways should be 60m wide. These were overruled.

and Airbus pointed out in their media release how 45m runways are acceptable:
http://www.airbus.com/en/presscentre/pressreleases/pressreleases_items/07_07_31_a380_approved_45m_runways.html

[Nigel C]

I believe one of the reasons Airbus didn't install thrust reversers on the 1 and 4 engines of the A380 was to help enable their use on 45m runways too. They most probably recognised too that some of the older airports (like Sydney) had no way of complying with having 60m wide runways due to geographical restraints.