French investigators have disclosed that an Air France Airbus A319 was forced to make a single-engine landing at Paris Charles de Gaulle after an undetected indicator fault resulted in partial fuel exhaustion. Investigation authority BEA – which analysed the 12 March 2014 event – says pilots operating a series of Marseille-Nantes services performed a routine discrepancy check on the theoretical and actual fuel usage, and found the difference to be just 20kg. BEA says the aircraft had been experiencing intermittent failure of its fuel quantity indicator, and the actual difference was 880kg. Analysis of refuelling documents and technical log entries for the aircraft (F-GRHT) revealed several calculation errors by crews – sometimes as much as 1t – which, says BEA, suggests verifications of the calculations by the first officer was “not systematically carried out”. This could explain, it says, why the indicator failure was not previously identified and resolved. When a subsequent crew prepared the A319 for a Marseille-Paris flight, the jet indicated 3,780kg of fuel on board, and the pilots opted to uplift 1,200kg of fuel to bring the total to about 5,000kg. BEA found, however, that the actual fuel on board when the engines were started was about 3,800kg and that the fuel indicator was overestimating the quantity by 1,270kg. Just 15 minutes after take-off an automated alert warned of a low fuel level in the left wing tank. After a check, the crew believed this was a nuisance alarm linked to a known probe failure in the outer left tank. During the descent to 8,000ft, nearly one hour into the flight, the crew was alerted to a pressure drop in two fuel pumps on the left-hand CFM International CFM56 engine. An engine failure occurred a few minutes later. The crew declared an emergency and landed with only the right-hand powerplant running. Maintenance personnel found that the left tank was empty and only 1,100kg of fuel – equating to 150kg above final reserve – remained in the right tank. Inspection showed that the left and right engines had respectively burned 1,272kg and 1,525kg of fuel, confirming that the fuel-quantity indication of 5,080kg after the uplift at Marseille was a substantial overestimation.

Source: Cirium

Three people are believed to have died when a plane operated by the South African Civil Aviation Authority crashed on Thursday. Aviation sources told TimesLIVE the Cessna Citation, which was used for calibration of airport systems, went down in the mountainous Eight Bells area near Mossel Bay. The CAA confirmed that it had not been able to make contact with its flight inspection unit aircraft which took off from George Airport earlier. "The crew, two males and one female, took off at 10.40 (local time) from the George Airport on a flight calibration mission of navigational aids of the same airport," said a statement. "The air traffic control tower could not make contact with the aircraft 10 minutes after take-off. "The Air Traffic and Navigation Services immediately activated search and rescue. The regulator is in contact with the search and rescue team for further updates. "The SACAA will issue further update later today." This is a developing story.

Source: DispatchLIVE

Boeing has scheduled the 777X’s maiden sortie for 23 January, an event that will finally kick off the revamped widebody’s delayed flight-test programme and potentially keep the airframer on track to begin deliveries in early 2021. Under the manufacturer’s current schedule, the 777-9 test aircraft should depart at around 10:00 Seattle time on the 23rd, although Boeing cautions that the timing “could change due to weather and other factors”. Getting the flight-test programme underway will mark a major milestone for Boeing, which has been hammered by a series of major issues, the most prominent being the 737 Max’s grounding. But the 777X programme has been beset by delays, and analysts have raised concerns about how quickly the US Federal Aviation Administration, under extreme pressure to prevent a repeat of the 737 Max’s certification issues, will approve the new big twin. Boeing launched development of the 777X, which has new GE Aviation GE9X powerplants, composite wings and folding wing-tips, at the Dubai air show in 2013. The two-aircraft family comprises the 426-seat 777-9 and the longer-range, 384-seat 777-8. Boeing initially planned to complete first flight of the 777-9 in 2019 and to begin deliveries in 2020. But an issue with the 105,000lb-thrust (467kN) GE9X powerplants stymied Boeing’s plan. GE disclosed the issue, which involved stator vanes at the front of the engine’s high-pressure compressor, at the Paris air show last year. A “durability issue” with those vanes, which pivot on a bearing to keep the engine running at peak performance, was causing hotter-than-expected exhaust gas temperatures, resulting in unexpected component degradation, according to GE. The engine maker recalled four GE9X powerplants from Boeing in 2019, forcing the airframer to delay first flight. GE says it has now fixed the issue. Also in 2019, Boeing announced it had shelved 777-8 development until a later, undisclosed date. The company has struggled to land significant numbers of 777X sales, with firm orders standing at 309 aircraft, according to Boeing data. Industry analysts attribute the modest sales partly to the current phase of airlines’ fleet replacement cycles, noting that many airlines have recently completed widebody purchases. However, the consensus view is that 777X orders will increase by the middle of the decade.

Source: Cirium