Government wastes R5 million to fly empty aeroplane to fetch vaccines

[Packer]

30 percenters that cannot differentiate between ounces, pounds and kilograms

Americans then? They've already crashed a Martian satellite because metric confuses them.

 

[Oldfut]

That accident report was from an event several years ago. I quoted it for context on what can go wrong. We have few details on what actually happened.

Point taken although I note from the PWeb article "It is, perhaps, significant to consider that the usual fuel uplift for an A340 flight from Johannesburg to Europe with a load of passengers and cargo is around 120 tons. An empty flight (as this was save for spares taken along in case of technical difficulties in Brussels) would only require in the region of 90 tons – which is the exact figure noted by those reporting the “mis-calculation by the crew”."

 

[Willie Trombone]

You can spin the story a different way... Pilot error or pilot intervention?

SAA pilots hailed for preventing take-off disaster

SAA has responded to a dangerous take off event

www.businesslive.co.za

Not sure how they get that the pilots were the heros but then they are paywalled.

 

[Willie Trombone]

Seems to be a problem on the A340 software interface, and not picked up by pre-flight checks. A notorious previous incident makes for scary reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emirates_Flight_407

Edit: http://avherald.com/h?article=416c9997

Password complexity requirement: 15 characters, at least one upper case, lowercase, special character, number...
Password must be changed every 30 days.

/Fetches post-it notes from stationery cupboard.

 

[krycor]

Damned if you do.. Damned if you don’t.

You literally see this playing out with the successive shipments.

 

[RonSwanson]

You can spin the story a different way... Pilot error or pilot intervention?

SAA pilots hailed for preventing take-off disaster

SAA has responded to a dangerous take off event

www.businesslive.co.za

Not sure how they get that the pilots were the heros but then they are paywalled.

And again, same SAA pilot as the Alpha Floor incident, Captain Vusi Khumalo:

Now information of another very serious incident that was quietly buried suggests that SAA has done it again. Flight SA052 flew from Johannesburg to Accra, Ghana, on 14 April. When the plane was refuelled in Accra, the engines would not start. Investigation revealed water in the fuel.

The flight was delayed until 3.20am the following day, when the Airbus departed from Accra, operating under the callsign SA9053, the prefix indicating that it was now a non-passenger carrying ferry flight.

Nevertheless, SAA has now confirmed that the Airbus was carrying 184 passengers and 25 crew plus cargo, and under the command of the same captain Khumalo. After having taken a large golden parachute as chief pilot from SAA in the wake of the Brussels flight, Khumalo was taken back as the head of training, despite having no training qualifications.

AIR SAFETY ANALYSIS: Flight SA9053: Yet another near-fatal incident uncovered at SAA

Flight SA9053, which was a passenger flight from Accra, Ghana, to Johannesburg, had water in its fuel, which could have caused both engines to flame out and crash.

www.dailymaverick.co.za

This is another reason why I will not fly SAA.

 

[konfab]

And again, same SAA pilot as the Alpha Floor incident, Captain Vusi Khumalo:

AIR SAFETY ANALYSIS: Flight SA9053: Yet another near-fatal incident uncovered at SAA

Flight SA9053, which was a passenger flight from Accra, Ghana, to Johannesburg, had water in its fuel, which could have caused both engines to flame out and crash.

www.dailymaverick.co.za

This is another reason why I will not fly SAA.

He has all the qualifications to fly you racist .

 

[Willie Trombone]

And again, same SAA pilot as the Alpha Floor incident, Captain Vusi Khumalo:

AIR SAFETY ANALYSIS: Flight SA9053: Yet another near-fatal incident uncovered at SAA

Flight SA9053, which was a passenger flight from Accra, Ghana, to Johannesburg, had water in its fuel, which could have caused both engines to flame out and crash.

www.dailymaverick.co.za

This is another reason why I will not fly SAA.

Which part of the alpha floor incident made you not want to fly SAA, the fact that they correctly identified the symptoms and prevented the auto system taking over?

 

[Sledgehammer67]

Brainless people do brainless things, it's been the case for 27+ years now - who is fooling who

 

[The Light Green Hornet]

One year later - SAA is bankrupt and sold for R51 (and a R3bn IOU). Who's laughing now? Will it make a difference to the gangsters running the state? I'm not holding my breath ....

 

[konfab]

Which part of the alpha floor incident made you not want to fly SAA, the fact that they correctly identified the symptoms and prevented the auto system taking over?

R10 has been paid into your VBS account. Thank you for shilling for SAA.


1) The flight crew didn't verify the take off mass.

The delay gave time for additional training. With this done, South Africa’s Civil Aviation Authority CAA gave its permission for the SAA Airbus A340 and its crew, to perform the flight. According to the Aviation Herald, the crew created a manual flight plan for this trip. Then for as-yet-undetermined reasons, there was a discrepancy between the planned and actual take-off mass, of 90 tons.


The mistake in the aircraft’s weight, gave the crew wrong speeds for flap retraction. So as they retracted flaps after departure, SAA’s Airbus A340 went into Alpha Floor Protection. It reduced its rate of climb to just 500fpm, losing about 10 knots of speed, before stabilizing. The aircraft then continued to Belgium, without any further incident.

2) SAA didn't report the incident for a month to the CAA

When the incident happened, the A340 automatically sent ACARS messages to Airbus, the engine manufacturer (Rolls-Royce) and SAA’s dispach. The airline should have reported the incident to South Africa’s CAA within either 48 or 72 hours. The choice of deadline depends on how severe they consider the incident to be. However CAA did not become aware of the incident until the 17th of March. They then started an investigation.

3) The crew's explanation of the incident was that the aircraft lied, and their procedure to "fix" the issue violated the noise abatement.

The SAA aircrew denied that the incident happened, blaming it on a wrong ACARS message from the Airbus A340. Further, the crew refused to participate in a meeting with the airline, on the 16th of March, to discuss the event. The phrase the crew used was “The aircraft lied!” There is also a report regarding the aircraft’s return flight. The crew accelerated the aircraft past 200 knots below 150 feet AGL, as they departed EBBR, at 19:00 local time. This is against noise abatement procedures for Brussels.

https://mentourpilot.com/the-aircraft-lied-saa-airbus-a340-90-ton-miscalculation/

The CAA has rose tinted goggles when it comes to SAA, if any other airline didn't report an incident like this they would be grounded.

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

must be nice to be the ANC, you make the rules, enforce them and punish transgressions all at the same time,

scary boarding a SAA plane when issues like that are allowed to continue unpunished.

 

[RonSwanson]

2) SAA didn't report the incident for a month to the CAA

Yep. And then a repeat:

SAA seems to have attempted a cover-up as it was only on 25 April 2022 that Sacaa came to learn of this incident due to a report from the Ghanaian Civil Aviation Authority.


There were no repercussions to the near-disaster of the alpha floor incident and it is a worrying sign that the airline appears to be trying to duck the latest incident. There are already questions about pilot standards at SAA. Unless the airline gets lucky, the odds are stacking up that a serious crash is imminent.

This is the thing, these are notifiable incidents. In both cases, it was reported by a party other than SAA. Makes one speculate as to what else is being covered up that no-one knows of except them.

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

Yep. And then a repeat:

This is the thing, these are notifiable incidents. In both cases, it was reported by a party other than SAA. Makes one speculate as to what else is being covered up that no-one knows of except them.

just wait for an SAA aircraft to crash and burn and there to be fatalities,
thats the only way big companies learn to follow the rules and not duck and dive the consequences of their actions,

happened with Malaysia airlines and will happen again.

 

[The Light Green Hornet]

R10 has been paid into your VBS account. Thank you for shilling for SAA.


1) The flight crew didn't verify the take off mass.

2) SAA didn't report the incident for a month to the CAA

3) The crew's explanation of the incident was that the aircraft lied, and their procedure to "fix" the issue violated the noise abatement.



https://mentourpilot.com/the-aircraft-lied-saa-airbus-a340-90-ton-miscalculation/

The CAA has rose tinted goggles when it comes to SAA, if any other airline didn't report an incident like this they would be grounded.

Thats very interesting - the planes ACARS is now so clever that it can lie? Really? Must have been built specially for SAA. Did it also vote for the ANC? Seriously, all the more reason to fly with another airline.

 

[konfab]

Thats very interesting - the planes ACARS is now so clever that it can lie? Really? Must have been built specially for SAA. Did it also vote for the ANC? Seriously, all the more reason to fly with another airline.

It was the white supremacy in the programming that caused it to lie to the poor African child in the pilot seat.

 

[neoprema]

On a recent trip I could have flown SAA to Ghana, and Ghana to the US city I was going to for R 14000 return. I instead paid R29 000 to fly on United Airlines.

And you know what? I would do it all over again not to touch an SAA aircraft It was worth every penny.

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

And you know what? I would do it all over again not to touch an SAA aircraft It was worth every penny.

so SAA is a lost cause to you? no matter how many adverts they run, and no matter how much cheaper it is,
you should hear their adverts on the radio, before you can run, you have to crawl,

and before you can fly, you have to vote ANC.

 

[neoprema]

so SAA is a lost cause to you? no matter how many adverts they run, and no matter how much cheaper it is,
you should hear their adverts on the radio, before you can run, you have to crawl,

and before you can fly, you have to vote ANC.

You only fall out of the sky once.