That burning plane at Tokyo

[88V8]

Watching video of that plane* burning at Tokyo airport this morning it struck me how much fire load there seemed to be in the cabin.
What's burning? The duty free?
Given that even on earth we're not allowed to buy flammable upholstery nowadays, surely aircraft cabins are not built with flammable materials?

V8 *type unidentified at time of writing.

[DrFfybes]

I did wonder that - amazinfg everyone got out as the doors over the wingd weren't open so perhaps it didn't have an emergency exit there?

The news suggests there was a colllision involved, very scary.

[bungeejumper]

An Airbus A350 (acc to BBC) . I'd assumed it was fuel, which is stored in the wings and also below the fuselage (yikes). But it was the even distribution of the fire along the fuselage that got me wondering too.

Either way, it was an outstanding evacuation to have got all 379 passengers ad staff out safely, especially since (AIUI) there was close to zero visibility in there because of the smoke. God only knows what chance disabled passengers would have had. The onboard staff deserve huge credit.

BJ

[gryffron]

Fuel. Passenger luggage.

No doubt the aircraft is built with "Flame resistant" materials. But most materials ultimately burn. Aluminium burns. Once it gets hot enough. Likely sparks ignite ruptured fuel tanks, spreads to everything else.

Now I'll have my rant. All 379 passengers and crew escaped. "It's a MIRACLE" scream the press. NO IT ISN'T! It's a triumph of superb design, and highly trained aircrew and firefighters.

Gryff

[gryffron]

I did wonder that - amazinfg everyone got out as the doors over the wingd weren't open so perhaps it didn't have an emergency exit there?

https://bloga350.blogspot.com/2014/08/a ... -done.html shows 8 escape doors on an A350. None directly above the wings, but just in front and behind. You deliberately DON'T open doors where the fire is.

Gryff

[XFool]

Now I'll have my rant. All 379 passengers and crew escaped. "It's a MIRACLE" scream the press. NO IT ISN'T! It's a triumph of superb design, and highly trained aircrew and firefighters.

Indeed! The point about "the airframe doing what it was designed to, keep the passengers safe" was at least made by somebody in a video interview on the 1pm BBC TV News.

[swill453]

Worth noting that 2023 was the safest ever year in commercial passenger aircraft in terms of crashes and fatalities.

There were only two fatal crashes with a total of 86 deaths, both involving propeller aircraft on domestic flights.

No fatal accidents involved international flights or jet aircraft.

https://twitter.com/SimonCalder/status/ ... 8881800634

Scott.

[Dod101]

Does anyone know the carrier involved with the Tokyo fire?

Dod

[swill453]

Does anyone know the carrier involved with the Tokyo fire?

You mean the passenger jet? The headline on the BBC right now is "Five dead on coastguard plane after Japan Airlines collision in Tokyo".

Scott.

[Dod101]

Does anyone know the carrier involved with the Tokyo fire?

You mean the passenger jet? The headline on the BBC right now is "Five dead on coastguard plane after Japan Airlines collision in Tokyo".

Scott.

Yes just found that. Seems the other plane was carrying coastguards to do with the recent earthquake. Somebody got it wrong.

Dod

[swill453]

Yes just found that. Seems the other plane was carrying coastguards to do with the recent earthquake. Somebody got it wrong.

Not sure what you mean. Who's wrong?

Scott.

[Dod101]

Yes just found that. Seems the other plane was carrying coastguards to do with the recent earthquake. Somebody got it wrong.

Not sure what you mean. Who's wrong?

Scott.

Well two aircraft are not meant to collide so somebody got it wrong.

Dod

[swill453]

Well two aircraft are not meant to collide so somebody got it wrong.

Ah, I thought you meant it was being reported wrong.

Scott.

[Mike4]

Not sure what you mean. Who's wrong?

Scott.

Well two aircraft are not meant to collide so somebody got it wrong.

Dod

Indeed. And the five people on board lost their lives, which should put a dampener on the success of the evacuation of ghe airliner.

[bungeejumper]

Indeed. And the five people on board lost their lives, which should put a dampener on the success of the evacuation of ghe airliner.

Do we know yet exactly where the collision took place? Like on the ground or in the air?

This from the BBC report:

Japan's coastguard says it is investigating how and when its aircraft collided with the Japan Airlines flight.

But as we piece together a sense of what happened, a London-based professor says airport officials at Tokyo's Haneda Airport would have been slotting earthquake emergency response flights between existing commercial flights - rather than giving them priority.

That sort-of suggests (to me) that they were both on the same area of the runway at the same time, which surely shouldn't have been allowed by air traffic control?

I'd also suppose that, in case of doubt, an incoming plane would have priority over an outgoing plane. But hey, what do I know? Does anybody else?

BJ

[Gerry557]

There is usually carbon in the composites that modern aircraft are made of. Mixed with damage to fuel lines. I suspect that there was enough heat and fuel to keep it going.

From what little I have seen there didn't seem to be a lot of foam early on. Of course there might be reasons for this, passengers evaluating etc.

[NearlyThere]

Do we know yet exactly where the collision took place? Like on the ground or in the air?

Looks like on the ground... short video here:

https://old.reddit.com/r/CatastrophicFailure/comments/18wliuz/japan_airlines_plane_with_367_people_on_board/

[Lootman]

Japan's coastguard says it is investigating how and when its aircraft collided with the Japan Airlines flight.

But as we piece together a sense of what happened, a London-based professor says airport officials at Tokyo's Haneda Airport would have been slotting earthquake emergency response flights between existing commercial flights - rather than giving them priority.

That sort-of suggests (to me) that they were both on the same area of the runway at the same time, which surely shouldn't have been allowed by air traffic control?

I'd also suppose that, in case of doubt, an incoming plane would have priority over an outgoing plane. But hey, what do I know? Does anybody else?

Although ATC is an obvious suspect, pilots sometimes misunderstand ATC instructions, get lost or disoriented etc. There were a couple of near misses on the ground in the US last year, at JFK. One was an American Airlines 777 headed for London that took a wrong turn and a Delta plane had to abort its takeoff at short notice.

I believe this is the first hull loss for an A350.

[airbus330]

Its not unnatural to think that aircraft furnishings would be be non-combustible, but is not the case. The main danger to passengers in a fire is the breakdown and oxydation of the furnishings into particles which will at the correct temperature spontaneously combust into a flameover. This situation is largely non-survivable and was infamously demonstrated by the Saudi MD11 incident at Ryadh in the 80's where a few minutes delay in evacuation cost all 300 passengers their lives.
This recent Japan incident is notable (at this early stage) for two reasons. Firstly for the disciplined and rapid nature of the evacuation. Notice in the videos that no (that I saw) passengers attempted to take their carry on luggage, only coats. Secondly, AFAIK this is the first time that there has been a major crash with fire in a carbon composite airframe. There has been much conjecture on how this material will perform and many worries that it would not. It seems that Boeing have done a good job and the integrity of the hull appears to have withstood impact and ensuing fire very well. It will be interesting to see the outsome of the inevitable analysis in due course.
My condolences will be with the crew members of the aircraft they hit, all bar one, the capt. were killed. Far too early to say what went wrong, but sadly global aviation has had a number a near misses with this type of accident in recent years and the authorities are very worried by it.

[doolally]

Secondly, AFAIK this is the first time that there has been a major crash with fire in a carbon composite airframe. There has been much conjecture on how this material will perform and many worries that it would not. It seems that Boeing have done a good job and the integrity of the hull appears to have withstood impact and ensuing fire very well..

It was an Airbus A350, I think
doolally