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On Mar. 27, 1977, a KLM Boeing 747 and a Pan Am Boeing 747 collided on the tarmac at the Tenerife Airport, resulting in the deaths of 583 people.

On Mar. 27, 1977, a KLM Boeing 747 and a Pan Am Boeing 747 collided on the tarmac at the Tenerife Airport, resulting in the deaths of 583 people.

The accident happened when KLM flight 4805, carrying 248 passengers and crew, attempted to take off from the same runway where Pan Am flight 1736, which had 396 people on board, was taxiing.

Due to bad weather, the pilots on the two planes were unable to see each other from a distance and were relying on air traffic control to guide them.

The error was only spotted when the KLM flight was just 2,000ft away from the Pam Am plane – but it was already too late.

Seconds before crashing, Pan Am pilot Victor Grubbs was recorded saying: “Look at him! Goddamn, that son of a bitch is coming!”

Despite both aircraft attempting to avoid each other, with the Pan Am plane veering sharply onto the grass and the KLM Boeing 747 pulling up, they were unable to avoid the collision.

As explained in an extensive piece published by The Sun, the KLM aircraft’s undercarriage and engines hit the top of the Pan Am plane at speed, resulting in a catastrophic crash.

Pan Am co-captain Robert Bragg, who died in 2017, told BBC’s Witness in 2016: “When he hit us, it was a very soft boom.

“I then looked up for the fire control handles and that’s when I noticed the top of the aeroplane was gone.”

Robert managed to escape along with 61 lucky passengers.

He explained: “I jumped to the ground, 40 feet from the cockpit, and thanked the lord I landed on the grass.

“One poor lady jumped first and everyone else jumped on her, broke her back and both legs and both arms.”

After five minutes, the fuel tank blew up, sending flames “250 feet in the air,” as the aircraft fell apart.

The collision of the two planes was attributed to a number of issues.

Earlier that day, a bomb explosion at Gran Canaria Airport that injured eight people, followed by a second bomb threat by the Canary Islands Independence Movement, led to extra planes being diverted to the airport in Tenerife.

With a large number of aircraft landing, the entrance to the main runway was blocked.

It meant that planes were forced to taxi on the runway itself, before making a 180 degree turn to take off.

It was also a foggy day, meaning much lower visibility for pilots.

Because of this, Pan Am missed their assigned turn-off at exit three and taxied to exit four instead, keeping them on the runway for much longer than expected.

However, what was also factored in the final incident report were the key phrases used by pilots and air traffic control which caused confusion and misunderstanding.

The incident report filed in 1977 explained that there was a breakdown in communication due to the ambiguous use of the words “okay” and “take off”, as well as the different accents and languages involved.

The report gives an example of the problem this caused during the incident: “The controller then said, “Okay (pause) stand by for takeoff, I will call you.”

“On the KLM CVR, the portion of this transmission following the word ‘okay’ is overlayed by a high pitched squeal, and the tone of the controller’s voice is somewhat distorted, though understandable.”

The report said: “We believe that nothing after the word ‘okay’ passed the filters of the Dutch crew, thus they believed the controller’s transmission approved their announced action in taking off.”

Pilots are now required to learn “radiotelephony”, also known as Aviation English, which features roughly 300 words and instructions on when and how to use them.

Roger, for example, means message received – but it doesn’t mean the receiver understands the instruction, or that they are planning to comply.

Instead, a pilot might say Roger and then repeat the instruction back to the ATC to make sure both sides are clear on the situation – or they could say Roger and explain why they can’t follow the instruction or if they don’t understand. Pilots only confirm that they will follow the instructions given when they say Wilco (for will comply).

Words that have ambiguous meanings such as “okay”, which could be misinterpreted, are not part of Aviation English.

Another issue that was highlighted was the authority in the cabin – the co-pilot on the KLM flight was relatively junior and didn’t have the authority to challenge the captain’s decisions in the cabin.

So when he highlighted a possible miscommunication, he was ignored by the captain.

Since then, the co-pilots, and even the crew, have been given greater power to challenge the captain’s decisions.

The accident (which was also known as the Tenerife Airport Disaster), the worst of its kind in history, now forms an essential part of a pilot’s training.

The following video is an FAA animation of the Tenerife accident.

Photo by SafetyCard Own work and Anynobody via Wikipedia

“Can you please explain how can my morning flight taking off from LCY to Düsseldorf land in Edinburgh? While an interesting concept, I don’t think anyone on board has signed up for this mystery travel lottery,” Son Tran, BA3271 passenger.

As the Flight Radar screenshot in this post shows, a British Airways flight with number BA3271 from London to Germany accidentally took off in the wrong direction, landing 525 miles away in Scotland.

The flight from London City Airport was supposed to head to Düsseldorf, Germany, but ended up in Edinburgh, Scotland, instead – the total opposite direction.

The airline said Monday the problem started when an incorrect flight plan was filed by WDL Aviation, which operated the flight on behalf of British Airways (BA).

Officials told the Associated Press that the pilot of the BAe 146 aircraft followed the flight plan for Edinburgh and that air traffic control officials also were following the same flight plan and saw nothing amiss.

“We are working with WDL Aviation, who operated this flight on behalf of British Airways, to establish why the incorrect flight plan was filed,” British Airways spokesperson Chip Garnernsaid in a statement to USA TODAY. “We have apologized to customers for this interruption to their journey and will deal with them all individually. Customers are on route to Dusseldorf currently.”

WDL Aviation also is investigating what went wrong. 

“We are working closely with the authorities to investigate how the obviously unfortunate mix-up of flight schedules could occur,” said WDL spokesperson Joachim Schöttes. At no time has the safety of passengers been compromised. We flew the passengers on thenflight with number BA3271 to Düsseldorf afternthe involuntary stopover in Edinburgh.”

One passenger, Son Tran, tweeted about his experience on the flight.

“Can you please explain how can my morning flight take off from LCY to Düsseldorf land in Edinburgh? While an interesting concept, I don’t think anyone on board has signed up for this mystery travel lottery,” Tran tweeted.

British Airways responded with a tweet, writing: “The flight has been diverted to Edinburgh, we don’t have any information as to why at the moment. There is an estimated departure time of 10:30 from Edinburgh to make way to Dusseldorf.”

“This feels like an honest mistake rather than a diversion,” Tran responded. “The crew was convinced of the Edinburgh flight path from the get-go.”

Photo by Lars Steffens via Wikipedia

The aircraft is the sole Boeing 747 carrying weapons for Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to Syria.

Taken on Mar. 17, 2019, the interesting photos in this post show the only Boeing 747-281B of Fars Air Qeshm (EP-FAB) damaged at Hamad airport, Doha, Qatar after the loadmaster mistakenly unloaded the cargo from the nose of the airplane first last night. According to world-famous aviation journalist Babak Taghvaee’s Twitter Profile, the aircraft is the sole 747 carrying weapons for Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to Syria.

Fars Air Qeshm was established in 2003 with the aim of creating efficient passenger and cargo services serving Qeshm Island. The airline was created with the aid of private sector investment. It temporarily ceased operations in 2013 due to bad management and financial problems. Operations were restarted with the new management team in March 2017.

NASA Captures First Air-to-Air Images of Supersonic Shockwave Interaction in Flight.

NASA has successfully tested an advanced air-to-air photographic technology in flight, capturing the first-ever images of the interaction of shockwaves from two supersonic aircraft in flight.

Physical Scientist J.T. Heineck of NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley gets his first glimpse at a set of long-awaited images and takes a moment to reflect on more than 10 years of technique development – an effort that has led to a milestone for NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate.

“I am ecstatic about how these images turned out,” said Heineck. “With this upgraded system, we have, by an order of magnitude, improved both the speed and quality of our imagery from previous research.”

As explained by Matt Kamlet, NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center, in the article NASA Captures First Air-to-Air Images of Supersonic Shockwave Interaction in Flight, the images were captured during the fourth phase of Air-to-Air Background Oriented Schlieren flights, or AirBOS, which took place at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California. The flight series saw successful testing of an upgraded imaging system capable of capturing high-quality images of shockwaves, rapid pressure changes which are produced when an aircraft flies faster than the speed of sound, or supersonic. Shockwaves produced by aircraft merge together as they travel through the atmosphere and are responsible for what is heard on the ground as a sonic boom.

The system will be used to capture data crucial to confirming the design of the agency’s X-59 Quiet SuperSonic Technology X-plane, or X-59 QueSST, which will fly supersonic but will produce shockwaves in such a way that, instead of a loud sonic boom, only a quiet rumble may be heard. The ability to fly supersonically without a sonic boom may one day result in lifting current restrictions on supersonic flight over land.

The images feature a pair of T-38s from the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base (AFB), flying in formation at supersonic speeds. The T-38s are flying approximately 30 feet away from each other, with the trailing aircraft flying about 10 feet lower than the leading T-38. With exceptional clarity, the flow of the shock waves from both aircraft is seen, and for the first time, the interaction of the shocks can be seen in flight.

“We’re looking at a supersonic flow, which is why we’re getting these shockwaves,” said Neal Smith, a research engineer with AerospaceComputing Inc. at NASA Ames’ fluid mechanics laboratory.

“What’s interesting is, if you look at the rear T-38, you see these shocks kind of interact in a curve,” he said. “This is because the trailing T-38 is flying in the wake of the leading aircraft, so the shocks are going to be shaped differently. This data is really going to help us advance our understanding of how these shocks interact.”

The study of how shockwaves interact with each other, as well as with the exhaust plume of an aircraft, has been a topic of interest among researchers. Previous, subscale schlieren research in Ames’ wind tunnel, revealed distortion of the shocks, leading to further efforts to expand this research to full-scale flight testing.

While the acquisition of these images for research marked one of the goals of AirBOS, one of the primary objectives was to flight-test advanced equipment capable of high-quality air-to-air schlieren imagery, to have ready for X-59’s Low-Boom Flight Demonstration, a mission that will use the X-59 to provide regulators with statistically valid data needed for potential regulation changes to enable quiet commercial supersonic flight over land.

While NASA has previously used the schlieren photography technique to study shockwaves, the AirBOS 4 flights featured an upgraded version of the previous airborne schlieren systems, allowing researchers to capture three times the amount of data in the same amount of time.

“We’re seeing a level of physical detail here that I don’t think anybody has ever seen before,” said Dan Banks, senior research engineer at NASA Armstrong. “Just looking at the data for the first time, I think things worked out better than we’d imagined. This is a very big step.”

Additional images included a “knife-edge” shot of a single T-38 in supersonic flight, as well as a slow-speed T-34 aircraft, to test the feasibility of visualizing an aircraft’s wing and flap vortices using the AirBOS system.

The images were captured from a NASA B-200 King Air, using an upgraded camera system to increase image quality. The upgraded system included the addition of a camera able to capture data with a wider field of view. This improved spatial awareness allowed for more accurate positioning of the aircraft. The system also included a memory upgrade for the cameras, permitting researchers to increase the frame rate to 1400 frames per second, making it easier to capture a larger number of samples. Finally, the system received an upgraded connection to data storage computers, which allowed for a much higher rate of data download. This also contributed to the team being able to capture more data per pass, boosting the quality of the images.

In addition to a recent avionics upgrade for the King Air, which improved the ability of the aircraft to be in the exact right place at the exact right time, the team also developed a new installation system for the cameras, drastically reducing the time it took to integrate them with the aircraft.

“With previous iterations of AirBOS, it took up to a week or more to integrate the camera system onto the aircraft and get it working. This time we were able to get it in and functioning within a day,” said Tiffany Titus, flight operations engineer. “That’s time the research team can use to go out and fly, and get that data.”

While the updated camera system and avionics upgrade on the B-200 greatly improved the ability to conduct these flights more efficiently than in the previous series, obtaining the images still required a great deal of skill and coordination from engineers, mission controllers, and pilots from both NASA and Edwards’ U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School.

In order to capture these images, the King Air, flying a pattern around 30,000 feet, had to arrive in a precise position as the pair of T-38s passed at supersonic speeds approximately 2,000 feet below. Meanwhile, the cameras, able to record for a total of three seconds, had to begin recording at the exact moment the supersonic T-38s came into frame.

“The biggest challenge was trying to get the timing correct to make sure we could get these images,” said Heather Maliska, AirBOS sub-project manager. “I’m absolutely happy with how the team was able to pull this off. Our operations team has done this type of maneuver before. They know how to get the maneuver lined up, and our NASA pilots and the Air Force pilots did a great job being where they needed to be.”

“They were rock stars.”

The data from the AirBOS flights will continue to undergo analysis, helping NASA refine the techniques for these tests to improve data further, with future flights potentially taking place at higher altitudes. These efforts will help advance knowledge of the characteristics of shockwaves as NASA progresses toward quiet supersonic research flights with the X-59, and closer toward a major milestone in aviation.

AirBOS was flown as a sub-project under NASA’s Commercial Supersonic Technology project.

Photo by NASA and Lockheed Martin

“This flight is requesting to come back…a passenger forgot her baby in the waiting area, the poor thing,” ATC operative.

Kuala Lumpur-bound Saudi Arabian Airlines flight SV832 set off from Jeddah, but the pilot requested to turn back after a passenger told the crew she had forgotten her baby in the boarding area of the terminal.

A video in which the Boeing 787-9 (B789) pilot can be heard relaying the story to air traffic control was uploaded to YouTube and has since gone viral, with more than 50,000 views.

(Click here to watch the video).

“May God be with us. Can we come back or what?” the pilot says over the radio.

“This flight is requesting to come back…a passenger forgot her baby in the waiting area, the poor thing,” an ATC operative can be heard saying.

The pilot is asked to repeat the request, to which he replies: “We told you, a passenger left her baby in the terminal and refuses to continue the flight.”

“Ok, head back to the gate,” says ATC. “This is totally a new one for us!”

No further information on how the mother managed to forget her child has been released.

It’s not the first controversial air travel-related parenting decision.

As reported by The Independent, In 2017, a photo of a woman who’d left her baby on the airport floor while she used her phone, with the caption “idiot”, quickly went viral.

However, the Illinois mother, Molly Lensing, was quick to defend her actions, explaining that a technical glitch with Delta had left her stranded in Colorado airport for more than 20 hours with her than a two-month-old daughter.

“Anastasia had been held or in her carrier for many hours,” Lensing said.

“My arms were tired. She needed to stretch. And I had to communicate with all the family members wondering where the heck we were.”

Lensing has said that her shaming experience should be a lesson to those who deem it acceptable to publicly judge a stranger’s parenting techniques online.

Photo by Aero Pixels from England via Wikipedia