Airport.

[x-in-man]

10 hours ago, Non-Believer said:

Who?

[Zarley]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/air-traffic-control-strike-will-hit-up-to-1-in-3-summer-flights-cd0mjb2cr 

As if we didn't have enough problems already. 

[The Phantom]

26 minutes ago, madmanxpilot said:

Aircraft maintenance is a strange thing. Quite often it is permitted to continue a flight without restriction provided you’ve already started to move, whereas if the fault was detected before that point you’d have to get whatever the issue was fixed before you set off.

It obviously depends on the nature of the fault, so, for example if you were to have a pressurisation system caution during taxi out, you’d want to go back to stand and have it investigated, but if someone pointed out that your port navigation light was not working as you lined up for take off, you could still go. If, however, you noticed this light was out on your walkaround, you’d have to get it fixed before you departed.

Similar to a car engine warning light?  Yellow just means you need to go to a garage at some point soon, probably just a sensor or something, but you should be fine.  Red or flashing, stop immediately. 

[IOM]

28 minutes ago, madmanxpilot said:

Agree with all of that. There is a lot of discontent out there at the moment and people are, perhaps rightly, suspicious about some of the things that they are being told.

Aircraft maintenance is a strange thing. Quite often it is permitted to continue a flight without restriction provided you’ve already started to move, whereas if the fault was detected before that point you’d have to get whatever the issue was fixed before you set off.

It obviously depends on the nature of the fault, so, for example if you were to have a pressurisation system caution during taxi out, you’d want to go back to stand and have it investigated, but if someone pointed out that your port navigation light was not working as you lined up for take off, you could still go. If, however, you noticed this light was out on your walkaround, you’d have to get it fixed before you departed.

It comes down to the minimum equipment list, the MEL, which all aircraft will have, only applying up to the point of dispatch.

It may well have been that last night’s flight had something that the MEL said would need to be fixed prior to the next dispatch, yet was perfectly safe to keep operating with.

Whatever it was it was clearly not a big deal as the aircraft was in the air again at 7.49am this morning on its way to Edinburgh. 

[swoopy2110]

3 minutes ago, IOM said:

Whatever it was it was clearly not a big deal as the aircraft was in the air again at 7.49am this morning on its way to Edinburgh. 

They do have maintenance that will be working all night in London too of course ..

[madmanxpilot]

Just now, The Phantom said:

Similar to a car engine warning light?  Yellow just means you need to go to a garage at some point soon, probably just a sensor or something, but you should be fine.  Red or flashing, stop immediately. 

Funnily enough, it is a bit like that yes.

On all of the aircraft I’ve flown you have cautions that illuminate yellow, and warnings that illuminate red. 

Although as with your car, you’d need to consider where you were, where you were going and what you’d be likely to encounter on the way before making a decision on when you should pop into the garage.

In your car you could call the AA for some advice. Airlines will have a maintenance control (MAINTROL) officer on duty who will be able to give you advice too. On the ground you can just put the brakes on and call them on the phone. In the air you can use the radio or other means to exchange messages, often using an agreed code from the MEL so every airband radio geek doesn’t get to know what’s going in!

[madmanxpilot]

9 minutes ago, IOM said:

Whatever it was it was clearly not a big deal as the aircraft was in the air again at 7.49am this morning on its way to Edinburgh. 

Sounds like it was that navigation light after all 😂

[Nellie]

39 minutes ago, IOM said:

Whatever it was it was clearly not a big deal as the aircraft was in the air again at 7.49am this morning on its way to Edinburgh. 

I noticed that too.

Most likely scenario seems that it was a fairly low level warning light (or whatever) which didn't preclude completing the flight but which would have prevented them departing on the next one, until an engineer had attended to it.

They could have chosen to deliver the 180 odd pax safely to the IOM, and bring an enginerr from LPL this morning, but that would have meant the Captain (and crew) would not get home. He/she chose to go home.

Dumping those unfortunate pax back at LGW could cost easyJet anything up to £75k. 

Edited July 7, 2023 by Nellie

[madmanxpilot]

Purely as an aside and FYI here is the section of the A320 MEL relating to navigation lights:

 

And for the real geeks, the whole document is here. This one is endorsed by the FAA, but CAA version will be almost identical.

A320 MEL

[bonatti]

29 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

Similar to a car engine warning light?  Yellow just means you need to go to a garage at some point soon, probably just a sensor or something, but you should be fine.  Red or flashing, stop immediately. 

Exactly like that, but with an aircraft, it would have to be investigated by an engineer before the next flight, hence the reason Easyjet wanted aircraft back at a base that have engineering coverage. The pilot, if it was a engine maintenance message, wouldn’t know the nature of the fault, only that it needs investigating before next departure. 

[The Phantom]

9 minutes ago, bonatti said:

Exactly like that, but with an aircraft, it would have to be investigated by an engineer before the next flight, hence the reason Easyjet wanted aircraft back at a base that have engineering coverage. The pilot, if it was a engine maintenance message, wouldn’t know the nature of the fault, only that it needs investigating before next departure. 

 

28 minutes ago, madmanxpilot said:

Funnily enough, it is a bit like that yes.

On all of the aircraft I’ve flown you have cautions that illuminate yellow, and warnings that illuminate red. 

Although as with your car, you’d need to consider where you were, where you were going and what you’d be likely to encounter on the way before making a decision on when you should pop into the garage.

In your car you could call the AA for some advice. Airlines will have a maintenance control (MAINTROL) officer on duty who will be able to give you advice too. On the ground you can just put the brakes on and call them on the phone. In the air you can use the radio or other means to exchange messages, often using an agreed code from the MEL so every airband radio geek doesn’t get to know what’s going in!

So like the car, they'd need to go to the garage (or have a mate) with a diagnostic plug-in to decode the fault?

The pilots don't get told what the fault is, merely that there is a fault? 

Can MAINTROL access it remotely whilst inflight, or do they literally need to plug-in? 

[GreyWolf]

This may be a stupid idea as I know nowt about aviation but what if the gov encouraged easyjet (or others) to have an engineering base here with a hanger big enough to do plane maintenance/overhauls.
would that not create highly skilled employment and have some sort of tax/vat breaks that would incentivize say Easyjet to locate some of there land based crew here. I may be talking broken biscuits so any aviation experts I’d be interested to hear your views.

[madmanxpilot]

10 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

 

So like the car, they'd need to go to the garage (or have a mate) with a diagnostic plug-in to decode the fault?

The pilots don't get told what the fault is, merely that there is a fault? 

Can MAINTROL access it remotely whilst inflight, or do they literally need to plug-in? 

There may be some airlines that can access data inflight, in fact I’m almost certain there that is the case. Think back to that missing Malaysian 777 - Rolls Royce were getting data pings from the engines for a while after it disappeared off radar. 

There will be a data port that the engineers plug a laptop into for diagnostic purposes if required.

The pilots will almost always be told what the fault is. If they are not told for whatever reason, the details of the fault and rectification will be written up in the aircraft technical log which the captain must accept and sign before every flight.

As well as the engineers, there will be a prescribed list of common defects that the captain can write up and defer rectification of too. They are, funnily enough known as acceptable deferred defects, ADDs, which can be carried for a number of days or prescribed number of flights. It is not always necessary, therefore, to have an engineer attend for every defect that needs to be recorded.

[bonatti]

14 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

So like the car, they'd need to go to the garage (or have a mate) with a diagnostic plug-in to decode the fault?

Engineer would access fault through built in maintenance computer

 

14 minutes ago, The Phantom said:

Can MAINTROL access it remotely whilst inflight, or do they literally need to plug-in? 

Very much dependent on aircraft type, but yes,  aircraft can transmit faults to ground stations during flight to give ground staff a heads up. 

Edited July 7, 2023 by bonatti

[madmanxpilot]

12 minutes ago, GreyWolf said:

This may be a stupid idea as I know nowt about aviation but what if the gov encouraged easyjet (or others) to have an engineering base here with a hanger big enough to do plane maintenance/overhauls.
would that not create highly skilled employment and have some sort of tax/vat breaks that would incentivize say Easyjet to locate some of there land based crew here. I may be talking broken biscuits so any aviation experts I’d be interested to hear your views.

Of course would make perfect sense.