I remember reading about a heavy landing by an ANA Boeing 767 in Japan last year, but I hadn't seen images of it until I came across this video clip this morning.
Just looking at that creased fuselage makes my head hurt! I'm very glad I wasn't on board at the time . . .
I was surprised to hear that the aircraft has since been repaired, and returned to service in late December last year. I'd love to know how much work went into fixing it! I suspect the front fuselage would have had to be virtually rebuilt from scratch.
Peter
8 comments:
Dang. They say any landing you walk away from is a success, but... yeesh.
Boeing has a special crew who fly anywhere to repair their airplanes after such an occurrence. Air&Space Magazine had an article about them a couple of years ago. A 767 is $160M and up new so replacing the front fuselage 'plug' by separating it from the cockpit and front spar frame is more economical than scrapping the airframe.
Al_in_Ottawa
*blink* *blink*
Yeah, THAT left a mark, literally... and Al is correct, and those folks stay BUSY!!!
Rumor has it that Airbus makes less of an effort to repair aircraft that have suffered major damage. As a result, an Airbus aircraft might be scrapped even though a Boeing with equivalent damage would be repaired.
Peter
OW!
80 years since the B-17, still built Boeing Tough(tm)!
I worked at Tramco for a little while (on 727s). That would most likely have been a major rebuild of nearly the entire fuselage. The skin around the windows is milled with the reinforcements in place, single piece most of the length of the fuselage. I don't want to know how much force you'd need to put a wrinkle in 1/8" thick skin with 4" tall reinforcements.
Boeing sure makes a hell of an airplane! Some of which have survived my abuse and mishandling! :-)
We still see a lot of 707, 727 and DC-8s faithfully serving the 3rd world. I wonder how long the oldest Airbus may last?
Captain Ross Aimer
(UAL Ret.)
CEO
Aero Consulting Experts,
Los Angeles
I think I would have walked home from wherever that was...
w/v: "jolting" I kid you not...
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