On January 17, 2008, British Airways’ flight BA038 bound for London from Beijing was uneventful until the Boeing 777 attempted to land at London’s Heathrow Airport. According to the Air Accidents Investigative Branch’s (AAIB) initial report, the landing approach was normal for the aircraft, with the autopilot and auto throttle engaged properly, until the B-777 was nearly two miles from landing. At that point, the aircraft began a rapid descent and crashed nearly 1,000 feet shy of the intended runway, 27L. There was significant damage to the left and right main landing gears as well as portions of the undercarriage due to the harsh landing. Although the B-777 leaked jet fuel, there was no report of a post-crash fire. Once the aircraft came to a stop, the crew followed the emergency protocol and the majority of the 136 passengers and 18 crew members on board emerged unscathed. Only a handful of the passengers and crew sustained injuries. There were no fatalities. Click here to read a BBC News Report with a diagram of Heathrow Airport.
The Boeing 777 flight control system is designed with a fly-by-wire technology that transmits electronic signals by wires to the pilot control wheel, column, and petals from the aircraft’s primary flight computer. The B-777’s design is unique from other Boeing models because these aircraft rely on a cable, rather than the typical electronic signals, which runs through the aircraft allowing movement of the rudder, aileron and elevator. The B-777 was first put into service on June 7, 1995 and has seen a tremendous increase in sales and notoriety for its design and innovation. Click here to learn more about the B-777.
The B-777 has only recorded a handful of incidents since its inception, however, according to Aviation-Safey.net, Malaysia Airlines had an incident with a B-777 in 2005. In this incident, the captain had to turn off autopilot and fly manually in order to maintain altitude. The probable cause report stated: "An anomaly existed in the component software hierarchy that allowed inputs from a known faulty accelerometer to be processed by the air data inertial reference unit (ADIRU) and used by the primary flight computer, autopilot and other aircraft systems.” The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an Airworthiness Directive (AD) in 2005 that called for a change to avoid using data from failed sensors. This change was necessary because the use of these data could result in anomalies in the fly-by-wire system.
The AAIB has recovered the Flight Data Recorder (FDR) and the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) from British Airways Flight BA038 and both items have been successfully downloaded for analysis. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) from the United States sent a team to represent the design of the aircraft and to assist with the investigation. After initial interviews from the flight crew and preliminary screening of the FDR and CVR, it appears that at the two mile altitude, the engines did not respond when the auto-throttle demanded an increase in thrust to the two engines.
UPDATE:
After preliminary investigations, reports indicate that it appears a build up of ice crystals restricted the flow of fuel causing a simultaneous decrease in thrust of both engines soon before the British Airways jet’s landing attempt. Due to these recent findings, U.S. carriers United Airlines and American Airlines are pushing for safety improvements relating to this crash, including increasing the quality-control systems for testing fuel and fuel stations. The investigation of this incident is ongoing.
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Motley Rice attorneys have many years of experience representing victims of airline disasters and have aircraft pilots and mechanics on staff. We also have French, Portuguese and Spanish translators on staff. If you have any questions, comments or would like to explore your legal rights as a result of this air crash, click here. |
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