The written article cites a radar site as indicating that they dropped 13,000 ft (but no indication about the amount of time it took). I can easily believe that they dropped that much altitude while going for the restart, but it happened over a few minutes (two to four, probably), not a few seconds.

A few minutes instead of seconds would've probably made it worse for the passengers... unless they didn't notice it because of the storm, as you said. But I doubt that. Aircraft engines impart it a very noticeable vibration and characteristic sound.

 

Ben Sandilands' blog is pretty good with down-under aviation stories.
On this one, you'd lose pressurization when both turbines spun down so would have to get down to breathable air pronto. Plus, I don't think you can air-start the engines at FL390, you need to get down to denser air.

For those of you considering a checkout in the SR-71, better bone up on the POH.

FWIW, In his book, Ben Rich related a story of how a blackbird, with low oil pressure on one engine, descended and took a short-cut through French airspace. They were joined by a French Mirage that demanded to know what their 'authorization number' was. After a few minutes of fumbling through his books, the RIO told his pilot that he sent it, shot the finger to the Mirage and told his pilot to hit it. Bye!

 

"Any story beginning with "holy sh*t", and one of those from google did, was a worth while read." - JoeJester

http://www.damninteresting.com/the-gimli-glider/

 

I'll copy response from the other thread (it is more apropos here, anyway).

And this is one of the truly classic cases of a cultural failure regarding the proper use of units, though not of the engineering educational system this time.

The conversion factor they were looking for was how many kilograms a liter of jet fuel weighed (massed). Instead of just writing 1.77 on the charts, had they noted that it was 1.77 lb/L it would have been a really big warning flag right from the start. If the culture was that you always track your units, the natural tendency would have been to question what the units are on that naked number of 1.77 on the chart. Had they bothered to ask if the result made sense they had several opportunities to catch the mistake. First, virtually all pilots that fly with the U.S. system know that a gallon of aviation fuel weighs six pounds as a close approximation. A liter is roughly a quarter gallon, so that means that a liter of fuel weighs about 1.5 pounds. That right there should have told them that something was way off because a pound is only about half a kilogram, so the actual conversion factor should be close to 0.75 kg/L.

Then, at the stopover, the fuel usage as a fraction of the initial fuel on board should have set off mental alarms. Even as a private pilot, whenever I make a stopover and don't refuel I ALWAYS ask whether or not the fractional fuel usage makes sense. What if the engine is, for some reason, burning a lot more fuel (or, more likely, I have a leak in the fuel system somewhere)?

There was plenty of blame to go around and the pilot should definitely be credited with the decisive actions taken once the engines flamed out. But you can't get away from the fact that the Pilot In Command (PIC) is ultimately responsible for the Safety of Flight. In the U.S. (and this is mirrored by most countries), not only is the PIC held ultimately accountable for the Safety of Flight, but they are explicitly authorized to take any action, including deviating from any flight regulation, they believe necessary to ensure the Safety of Flight. To be sure, they may have to answer for their actions, but the basis for judgment is not whether they adhered to the regulations, but whether their deviation from the regs was reasonable given the situation and knowledge at the time of the incident. If they meet that bar, then it will be held that they did, in fact, not deviate from the regs at all because they were, in fact, in compliance with one of the highest priority regs in the book -- namely the one that gives them the ultimate authority to act as pilot in command.

As an example, 14 CFR Part 91 (which governs non-commercial operations in the United States):

§91.3 – Responsibility and authority of the pilot in command.

(a) The pilot in command of an aircraft is directly responsible for, and is the final authority as to, the operation of that aircraft.

(b) In an in-flight emergency requiring immediate action, the pilot in command may deviate from any rule of this part to the extent required to meet that emergency.

(c) Each pilot in command who deviates from a rule under paragraph (b) of this section shall, upon the request of the Administrator, send a written report of that deviation to the Administrator.

Getting back to the Gimli Glider, one thing that always makes me shake my head -- and I've seen it several times, including in regards to the Hudson River crash -- is the claim that only because the pilot was an experienced glider pilot were they aware that they needed to fly at a certain airspeed in order to maximize their range. This is Airmanship 101. The first order of business when you lose power is to establish best glide speed and it is a number that your instructor expects you to know off the top of your head (or have written down somewhere immediately visible). In many aircraft it is on a placard on the instrument panel. In the Cessna line of light aircraft (at least historically), rotating the elevator trim to full nose up will establish a hands-off airspeed very close to the optimal glide speed. In aircraft that normally cruise well above their best glide speed, including airliners and jet fighters, the normal procedure is to "zoom" to the optimal glide speed by initiating an aggressive climb to trade airspeed for altitude until you reach a speed just above the optimal glide speed at which point you nose over and establish that speed. You make the climb aggressive because you want to shed the excess airspeed, and the consequent drag, as quickly as possible.

 

@WBahn, several years ago I saw a chart comparing the gliding ratio of different aircraft, all the way from high performance gliders, to hang gliders, to small planes, jet planes and jumbos...
I've tried googling it already but I can't find it anywhere. Would you have something similar that you could post here?

 

@WBahn, several years ago I saw a chart comparing the gliding ratio of different aircraft, all the way from high performance gliders, to hang gliders, to small planes, jet planes and jumbos...
I've tried googling it already but I can't find it anywhere. Would you have something similar that you could post here?

I've seen similar charts, but I don't know where it might be found. You can usually find the nominal ratios for specific planes pretty easily. Sailplanes range from 25:1 to pretty commonly 40:1 and some can exceed 50:1. A 747 has a glide ratio of about 15:1 and many of the jumbo jets are in the 12+:1 arena, which is pretty remarkable when you consider that a little 4-seat Cessna 172 is 9:1. The "secret" is that the wing loading on many large jets is considerably less than on light aircraft and so they create more lift and less drag on a pound for pound basis. Their motive is economics -- the higher the glide ratio the lower the fuel burn (it's that whole 'less drag' thing). So they pay a lot more per airframe in order to save a whole lot more in fuel over the service life of that airframe. The Space Shuttle had a glide ratio of about 1:1 at high speed and about 4:1 at approach speed. I've heard claims that the F-4 had a glide ratio of 1:7, but I'm very skeptical, though I know it isn't very good given its high wing loading. I think fighters like the F-15 and F-16 are in the 6:1 range.

Take all of this with a grain of salt because I'm dredging them up from memory.

 

Talk about a Beesruptive passenger!

Also, I didn't know about the 96 tragedy caused by a wasp nest.

 

Hi Ho Silver.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...eparing-Paris-Airshow-2015.html#ixzz3cnM1e3yM

 

The glide ratio of my Cessna 182 is 11:1. It will glide ~2mi for every 1000ft of altitude (no wind).
The Piper Pacer (my wife's) pictured in my avatar glides ~7000ft for every 1000ft of altitude.

Any prudent pilot has a mental sight picture of the circle you can land in if the engine quits... The higher you fly, the bigger the circle.

I just got back from flying from AZ to Alberta, CAN. Lots of hostile territory on that route... Airports are few and far between. I generally fly cross-country at about 11000 ft. Ground elevations in the West are about 5oooft.

In 40years and 4000hours of flying, I have made an unexpected engine-out landing only one time. Landed on a dirt road only 2ft wider than the main landing gear. Not a scratch on the airplane or occupants.

 

Hi Ho Silver.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...eparing-Paris-Airshow-2015.html#ixzz3cnM1e3yM

Thanks, had already seen it, but it still keeps impressing me. I wonder what the actual climbing angle after takeoff really was. From that perspective it looks spectacular.

 

Thanks, had already seen it, but it still keeps impressing me. I wonder what the actual climbing angle after takeoff really was. From that perspective it looks spectacular.

It looks like it might have gone completely vertical. The thing to keep in mind is not the angle, but the duration. What it basically did was a pop-up maneuver to exchange airspeed for altitude. So it got to a very high speed prior to rotation and then popped up to a higher altitude at the loss of a considerable amount of airspeed. Any aircraft can do that, provided you don't exceed the G limits in the pitch up. Look at how quickly the aircraft pitched back over. Even in slow motion it was only a few seconds.

 

I wonder if the law is going to make this guy pay for expenses and lost revenue due to his misconduct. Or would they just hand him a short sentence and a fine?

 

If he had deep pockets maybe, otherwise what is the use?

 

I wonder if the law is going to make this guy pay for expenses and lost revenue due to his misconduct. Or would they just hand him a short sentence and a fine?

That article doesn't even say what kind of, "unruly" he was. We can't tell whether he was dancing in the aisles or simply said, "Oh shut up" when offered a pillow. Why should we be able to predict how some court is going to respond?

 

They mentioned him kicking people.

 

They mentioned him kicking people.

I only wonder if that happened after the crew escalated some lesser offense into an international incident.
Seriously, babies have been kicked off airplanes for crying.
I'm just saying, the whole story is not in that one page.

 

I only wonder if that happened after the crew escalated some lesser offense into an international incident.
Seriously, babies have been kicked off airplanes for crying.
I'm just saying, the whole story is not in that one page.

Right... the media is the worst way to draw conclusions from an incident.

 

Right... the media is the worst way to draw conclusions from an incident.

What sucks is that there doesn't seem to be any true good place to draw conclusions from nowadays. Can't trust the media, and the internet isn't always reliable.

 

What sucks is that there doesn't seem to be any true good place to draw conclusions from nowadays. Can't trust the media, and the internet isn't always reliable.

nowadays? I'd seriously like to know if there ever was one in yesteryears

 

nowadays? I'd seriously like to know if there ever was one in yesteryears

Well that is true, I say nowadays due to the fact that I was but a child in yesteryears. As I get older now I see more and more of the problems the "older" generations see and am starting to have an understanding of them and it really upsets me to think what the future will hold. It could improve or it could steadily decline forever.