Passengers stuck on Qantas A380 after aborted take-off

[Joe Frampton]

More great news for Qantas... sigh...

Qantas passengers stuck on board an A380 for more than four hours at Melbourne Airport have been told the flight will not take off due to the crew on-duty time limits, passengers report.
The Airbus superjumbo carrying 450 passengers reportedly aborted take-off earlier today due to a problem with its fuel gauges.
As the plane gathered speed down the runway, about 10 seconds into the dash, the pilots decided to abort the take-off.
A passenger on board the plane told Traveller that the captain made an announcement saying that the fuel readouts were not providing correct information.
It was a recurrence of an earlier problem that delayed the plane and was thought to have been remedied before the plane taxied on to the runway, the passenger said.
The flight, QF93, was scheduled to leave Melbourne at midday for Los Angeles.
After the take-off was aborted, the plane taxied off the runway for mechanical checks.
Passengers were told that could not disembark because of the heightened security procedures for flights going to the US. They were told it was not feasible to disembark 450 passengers and re-screen them for a second time.
The delay has now stretched so long that the flight will no longer be able to take off due to the crew exceeding their permitted on-duty hours, passengers have reported.
One passenger said travellers were "very unhappy" at being stuck in the plane for hours and that onward travel plans were now in disarray.
Qantas has yet to advise passengers when they’ll be allowed to get off the plane.
Traveller is seeking confirmation of the passenger's account from Qantas.
Last month the US Federal Government introduced new regulations that ordered airlines to allow passengers to disembark after three hours if a flight was delayed on the tarmac.

Source: theage.com.au

[Jason H]

Aircraft was VH-OQE......it has only flown 6 commerical flights :S

[Andrew M]

It appears that the crew ran out of hours so the flight is now delayed until 11am tomorrow (Tuesday).

How long were passengers held on the plane for all up I wonder ?

[James Smith]

Wouldn't QANTAS have a back up A380 crew on standby in Melbourne or flown a crew from Sydney? Alternatively, assuming the fuel gauge problem was fixed, couldn't they have flown the plane to Sydney where a standby crew could have operated the flight with less delay than 23 hours?

It will be interesting to hear what QANTAS has to say.

[Sarmad Al-Khozaie]

All A380 Seem the faulty fuel Gauge on all new birds even ones acquired by SQ, EK from airbus.

[Adam.S]

I thought this was the case too, so by now isn't there a 'standard' repair job procedure for the maintenance crews to follow?
Perhaps they did use this 'standard' approach, but maybe this problem was a little more complex then the others of the past as the problem was apparently 'fixed' the first time around, (after take off atempt#1) but reappeared on take off attempt#2.

[Nils Kenny]

QF-012 Today 05 Jan was a No-Show and it was due to be a A380 from Los Angeles. From what I can see it left Los Angeles on time and then returned 2 Hours later and now isn't due into Sydney till tomorrow 6 January 2010. If this is the Case QANTAS might have a problem with A380 later in the week. Only because 2 Aircraft are 2 Days behind schedule.

[Andrew P]

Hi Friends,

Unfortunately our plane from LA was delayed last night and we have been holed up in a hotel all day. Hopefully we will get off the ground tonight.

an email I Just received from a friend booked out of LAX

Banjo

[Andrew M]

Originally Posted by Nils Kenny

QF-012 Today 05 Jan was a No-Show and it was due to be a A380 from Los Angeles. From what I can see it left Los Angeles on time and then returned 2 Hours later and now isn't due into Sydney till tomorrow 6 January 2010. If this is the Case QANTAS might have a problem with A380 later in the week. Only because 2 Aircraft are 2 Days behind schedule.

Yes the Wednesday MEL-LAX departure is going to be a problem.

744 time for those expecting the A380..

Fun times

[Philip Argy]

If I were QF and other carriers I'd be starting to get a bit weary of the A380 teething troubles. It's such a beautiful aircraft to fly and be flown in, these niggling issues are really infuriating and lose a lot of goodwill for the airlines which is hard to get back