Hi Kelvin,
I think I may have flown yesterday afternoon with the cabin crew who were operating your service back to Sydney. They seemed to think that there may have been a tailwind component that the crew were waiting on to abate.
In addition it was also fairly warm yesterday afternoon in Canberra (25 degrees ish at 7 when we arrived so perhaps a couple of degrees warmer for your departure). This in combnation with the relatively high elevation can quickily limit the 300, especially from runway 35. It's sometimes possible to request rnwy 17 in light wind conditions to allow a higher BRW (traffic permitting of course).
I agree it seems odd that the dash would be limited from such a long runway, but I believe that the limiting factor is in fact the climb performance required departing CB due to the obstacles that exist in the takeoff splay (as opposed to an ASDA, TODA or TORA restriciton).
I can't say I'm all that familiar with the 300 fgures any more but it's quite likely that the ambient termperature, elevation and possibly tailwind all together reduced the Max BRW from the structural limit of 19.5 tonnes down to the 17.5 - 18 tonne range, which with a full load of pax could have required the offloading of a few bags as you describe.
The Q400 that was scheduled to operate your service had a minor technical issue that apparently procluded the use of the autopilot (hence it was in Sydney being repaired). Was fixed by mid afternoon and continued to operate 1493 in the evening.
|