Interesting night at Williamtown

[Mat James]

Had a couple of diversions from Sydney

Qantas A330 (QF582)
Qantas 767 (QF460)
Jetstar A320 (JQ791)

They parked the A330 on the civil side and the 767 on the RAAF side. Was interesting listening to the scanner and how they dealt with it all. They had to do a special turn to park the 767 which involved the use of wing walkers. They had a ambulance on stand by as someone on the Jetstar flight fell ill. They moved one of the overnighting Jetstar A320s right up next to the other overnighting A320 so they could try and fit the other A320 in between it and the A330. Didn't end up happening as the A330 ended up departing at 11:20pm heading to Sydney but I believe it ended up going to Brisbane. The 767 was still parked when I left and I think it's overnighting as they were taking the passengers off.

They never put stairs up to the A330 as I don't believe the airport (I know the RAAF do) has any that reach the height of the door. There's was a Jetstar engineer in the cockpit. How did he access it. There was a ladder just in front of the nose wheel?

[Stephen Brown]

Does anybody know why the diversions happened?

[Noel White]

Thanks for the photo Mat.

Was talking to a pax on QFA582 when waiting for the fuel truck, plenty of sick bags were used.

Their approach to 34L was hairy with some full aileron movement before electing to abort.

Low level holding was too fuel consuming and pilot requested FL220 (via my scanner). Other a/c were holding above but eventually able to climb to FL182 then best to divert to Willy for a top up and try again.

When I last spoke to him at 2230 hoping for last minute dash to SYD. Trust they have curfew dispensation because they will get turned away if not.

Departed Willy at 2314 headed south but turned north when over The Entrance for BNE.

A long day in an A330 for a flight from PER.

[Sarah C]

There was a technical issue with the 767 so they couldn't get it out on time.

But as usual - all flights impacted by weather, couldn't get out in time for the curfew. Being bused from Newie and arriving in SYD at 3am...........welcome to Sydney indeed.

[Nigel C]

Does anybody know why the diversions happened?

There was a period last night when a front pushed through that severe turbulence was being reported. The ATIS at one stage reported aircraft getting moderate to severe turbulence at 300' on finals. On the ground there was a stiff nor-easter blowing, but up top it was apparently quite different!

[Noel White]

Update regarding paxs on QF582 - got to bed 0200, up again at 0400 for 0615 departure and arrived at SYD ITB at 0900.

As they say in the classics, "An interesting flight"

[Jason Mac]

I was on 582. Quite a bumpy approach into Sydney. Lots of sick passengers.

[Grahame Hutchison]

QF582 sounds like a very long day for all on board.

My record is 52hrs on a return trip from Lisbon to Sydney via Heathrow. Had to switch from BA to Air Portugal, then a fog delay departing Lisbon, the crashed BA B777 was still on the runway when I made it to Heathrow, I missed a BA connection to go home via Tokyo, and ended up on a BA B777 operating BA15, instead of QF2.

http://www.16right.com/MessageBoard/D300-2008-01-18_002.jpg

[Jarrad Phillips]

I was wondering why I saw a 767 when i just drove by Newcastle airport!

[Alex Ch]

QF460 was was airborne for 4.29 on the ML-SY

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/QFA460

[Radi K]

More info:
http://avherald.com/h?article=46b376ea&opt=0