Saturday, September 6, 2008

The United Kingdom’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) has released an interim report into the crash of British Airways Flight 38. The Boeing 777-ER crashed early this year as it tried to land at London’s Heathrow Airport.

The report states that the AAIB believes the crash occurred when ice crystals formed within the fuel system. However, it should be noted that the report only serves as an update into the progress of the investigation and that the final report is yet to be published and may yet reach a different conclusion into the cause of the accident.

The flight from Beijing, China had been normal until final approach at Heathrow, at which point the aircraft was coming in for landing with the autopilot and autothrottle engaged. However, engine power became greatly reduced when the autothrottle requested more thrust, and the aircraft made a forced landing 1,000 feet from the runway. The aircraft suffered substantial damage as it slid across the grass to the runway threshold, where it came to rest, and was written off. There was only one serious injury and eight minor ones to the 136 passengers and 16 crew.

As the jet passed over Siberia it encountered significantly reduced temperatures. The AAIB has determined that the fuel was at a temperature below 0°C for an unusually long duration. This is believed to have caused water in the fuel – which met all relevant international standards – to have frozen into crystals. These were able to form undetected as the aircraft cruised with a low fuel requirement, and it was only when extra fuel was pumped in from the tanks for the landing that the crystals became a problem.

The report says that the current explanation being offered for the accident is an “apparently hitherto unknown phenomenon” and warns that other combinations of aircraft models and engines may also be vulnerable. The 777 involved was powered by Rolls-Royce Trent 800s, like 222 of the 736 777s currently operating. Data from 141,000 other flights of such aircraft has not yielded any other set of circumstances similar to the one in the crash flight.

In light of these results, a worldwide alert has been issued to the 11 airlines that between them operate all the aircraft identical to the lost jet. Boeing have instructed airlines to vary altitude regularly when fuel is below 10°C and to run the engines at max power for ten seconds before attempting a landing if the fuel has been at such temperatures for over three hours. The extra power is intended to clear out any buildup of water. To prevent buildup of water during ground operation at freezing temperatures all fuel pumps should be run at full power for one minute.

Air New Zealand have already confirmed they will introduce the new measures, and United States authorities are expected to make them mandatory within days. The affected aircraft are operated by US carriers American Airlines and Delta Air Lines.

Saturday, August 5, 2006

The magnetic tapes of the first moon landing that was beamed to the world via three tracking stations and those of other 5 Apollo missions have gone missing. There will be a search for these tapes in the hope that they may be found before they deteriorate.

The missing tapes contain original recordings of five Apollo Moon Landings. Due to the format incompatibility between the Apollo recordings and the commercial TV, the public transmissions were projected onto a screen from which they were filmed using conventional TV cameras which substantially degraded the quality of the picture. These were digitized and can be seen in the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal website, where all the graphic documentation of the Apollo Moon landings is maintained.

The tapes were originally stored at Goddard Space Flight Center, but, without any explanation, were taken to the US National Archives in 1970. A few years after, in 1984, about 700 hundred boxes of tapes were returned to Goddard along with documents stating that the tapes were withdrawn.

“We have the documents to say they were withdrawn, but no one knows exactly where they went,” said John Sarkissian, a CSIRO scientist.

Mr. Sarkissian who has been working at the Parkes Observatory for more than decade, initiated a study about the participation of Australia in the Apollo Mission. He requested the tapes from NASA and they told him the tapes were missing.

“We are working on the assumption they still exist,” Mr Sarkissian said, “Your guess is a good as mine as to where they are.”

“People may have thought ‘we have tapes of the moon walk, we don’t need these’,”

“We want the public to see the way the moon walk was meant to be seen,”

Mr Sarkissian proposes that if the tapes are found that they be digitised and stored.

The Goddard centre, home to the only known piece of equipment that decodes the analogue tapes, is set to be closed in October raising fears that, even if they are found, it might not be possible to decode and copy them.

Only a few people saw the original high-quality broadcast. One of these people is David Cooke, a Parkes control room engineer in 1969.

“I can still see the screen,” Mr Cook, 74, said. “I was amazed, the quality was fairly good.”

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

Zach Scruggs, a lawyer for United States Senator Trent Lott, says that State Farm Insurance Company is destroying records related to claims for damage from Hurricane Katrina.

The records allegedly contain information saying that State Farm fraudulently denied insurance claims made by its policy holders, including Lott, that had homes there were damaged or destroyed when Hurricane Katrina came ashore on the Gulf Coast.

Scruggs said that Lott has “good faith belief” that many employees of the insurance company in Biloxi, Mississippi are destroying engineer’s reports that were inconclusive as to whether or not water or wind was the main cause of damage to the buildings affected by the hurricane.

Lott is among thousands of home and/or business owners who had their property damaged or destroyed during the hurricane and had their claims denied because State Farm claimed that their policies don’t cover damage caused by floods or water that was driven by the wind.

State Farm has not issued a statement on the matter so far.

Monday, November 2, 2020

The following is the sixth and final edition of a monthly series chronicling the 2020 United States presidential election. It features original material compiled throughout the previous month after an overview of the month’s biggest stories.

This month’s spotlight on the campaign trail: the Free and Equal Elections Foundation holds two presidential debates, three candidates who did not participate in those debates give their final pleas to voters, and three political pundits give their predictions on the outcome of the election.

Sunday, January 21, 2007

Ricky “The Hitman” Hatton regained the IBF light welterweight title belt he relinquished less than 12 months ago when he defeated Juan Urango in Las Vegas, Nevada tonight.

“The Hitman” won by unanimous decision, as the fight went to 12 rounds. Despite early match odds suggesting Hatton would dominate the fight, this was not the case. Each round was close, but most pundits and judges alike agreed that Urango only won 1 of the 12 rounds, with Hatton taking the other 11.

Despite the unfamiliar confines of Las Vegas, Hatton looked touched by the ringing of football fan-like chants, familiar in British boxing, that rang around the arena, as more than half of it was filled by traveling support from across the atlantic.

Many in the UK will hope Hatton has ended the “curse” that has seen names such as Frank Bruno, Naseem Hamed, Barry McGuigan and others fall short while headlining fights on “The Strip”.

From here, it is widely believed “The Hitman” will move on to fight Jose Luis Castillo in June, again likely in Vegas.