Tupolev TU-204 crash in Moscow

[Michael_Chang]

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57561227/plane-runs-off-moscow-runway-catches-fire/

 

Just felt like sharing, My condolences to the families involved

[Jordan P.]

Agreed

[Ryan M.]

It looks to have landed on a racetrack, from the twitter pic.

 

There are some pics over on the A.net thread:

http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/general_aviation/read.main/5646389/

[Patrik Hedström]

No it was a higway.

 

http://rt.com/news/plane-vnukovo-airport-moscow-073/

[Michael_Chang]

 

Video of the crash

[niebieski]

[Patrik Hedström]

 

Video of the crash

Seemed like you beat me to posting that video Micheal, I'm temped to writgh LOL but I don't think it would be taken well.

[i<3xplane10]

 

Video of the crash

 

@ 0:12

That guy is extremely lucky to be alive.

[Nicola_M]

Some impressive driving skills there. Could so easily have gone wrong.

[Michael_Chang]

@ 0:12

That guy is extremely lucky to be alive.

yeah but how are you going to explain to insurance that your car was hit by the landing gear of a tupolev?

[Ryan M.]

What hit that first car? It almost looks like a tire!

[Jordan P.]

Yeah it does but the video is pretty sad...

[Michael_Chang]

What hit that first car? It almost looks like a tire!

 

i believe it's a nose gear

[Jordan P.]

Yeah I think so!

[Andyrooc]

Being Russia, they are already saying it's pilot error. I hope not though.

[Nicola_M]

yeah but how are you going to explain to insurance that your car was hit by the landing gear of a tupolev?

Well, the video's pretty darn good proof.

[Nicola_M]

Being Russia, they are already saying it's pilot error. I hope not though.

When you watch that video, the plane came off the runway really bloody fast. Looked to me to be about 80-100mph. Bit more than a skid.

[Michael_Chang]

When you watch that video, the plane came off the runway really bloody fast. Looked to me to be about 80-100mph. Bit more than a skid.

i heard it hit the highway at around 50 knots

[Nicola_M]

It looked a lot more than 50 knots.  Watch that video and see it launch itself off the runway and plunge down just before impact. No way is that 50 knots.

 

Halfway down the runway it should have been having thrust reversers applied and speed significantly reduced from the speed it came off the runway at. For some reason the pilots either didn't, or couldn't, get the speed down. I can't even blame the snow for that - by the video the snow wasn't bad.

 

Interesting point was that it was a second attempt at landing. I wonder what the cause for that was.

Edited December 30, 2012 by Nicola_M

[Michael_Chang]

It looked a lot more than 50 knots.  Watch that video and see it launch itself off the runway and plunge down just before impact. No way is that 50 knots.

 

Halfway down the runway it should have been having thrust reversers applied and speed significantly reduced from the speed it came off the runway at. For some reason the pilots either didn't, or couldn't, get the speed down. I can't even blame the snow for that - by the video the snow wasn't bad.

 

Interesting point was that it was a second attempt at landing. I wonder what the cause for that was.

you can actually hear the gears of the aircraft scraping along the ground just before it comes into view, for the most of the time it left the runway, it was on the ground heading towards the highway

[Nicola_M]

you can actually hear the gears of the aircraft scraping along the ground just before it comes into view, for the most of the time it left the runway, it was on the ground heading towards the highway

That's not apparent to me. You hear the flapping of loose metal similar to the sound you used to get with Mike Wilson's L-1011 if you did a hard landing. But at the point you hear it you see the aircraft launch off the end of the runway.

Doesn't sound like landing gear scraping along to me. Also, had there been anything causing drag, it wouldn't have come off the runway at the speed it did, plus it would probably have come off the runway sideways had anything been digging in.

 

It should have been a lot slower than that by the end of the runway, snow or no snow.

 

The place has two intersecting runways of 9,800 ft and10,040 ft. Should've been plenty of length to bring a plane to a halt, no matter what emergency. I still say for some reason they didn't get the speed down properly, either mechanical failure, distraction of pilots due to mechanical issue or something else. I can't blame the snow, because in the video there is no snow. Could be ice, who knows, but I would've still expected it to have been a lot slower than it was doing by the end of the runway.

 

It wasn't skidding, as it would've gone sideways, and it clearly was travelling forward nose-first. Plenty of reverse thrust would've brought its speed down to a controllable rate.

I still think whatever the cause for the aborted first landing holds the explanation.

Edited December 30, 2012 by Nicola_M

[Andyrooc]

The speed may have been because they were trying to go around, but couldn't get off the ground in time...?

[Patrik Hedström]

From what I have read they where doing a forced landing.

[Nicola_M]

Faulty brakes may be the reason for the crash, investigators believe.

 

Faulty brakes may be to blame for a Russian airliner sliding off the runway and crashing into a motorway, an investigator has said, as the death toll rose to five.
"After landing the pilot uses all the available brake systems on the plane, but for some reason the machine did not stop," a member of the investigation team told Russia's Interfax news agency.
"Most likely it was faulty reverse engines or brakes."

http://news.sky.com/story/1031417/russia-air-crash-faulty-brakes-likely-cause

 

 

Interestingly, this has happened to another Tu-204: (same link)

"But the state news agency RIA Novosti cited an unidentified official at the Russian Aviation Agency as saying another Tu-204 had gone off the runway at the international airport in Novosibirsk, Siberia, on December 20.

The agency said that incident, in which no one was injured, was due to the failure of the plane's engines to go into reverse upon landing and that its brake system malfunctioned."

 

Same scenario, same symptoms, same cause?

Edited December 31, 2012 by Nicola_M

[AgreMeister]

I've never heard of a plane having failure of both the reverse thrust and brakes at the same time, seeing as both are completely seperate systems... That seems like an extremely unfortunate series of events.