Volcano stops flights

[Jeremy]

What a tremendous night. I doubt we will see anything like this again (well, I hope not!).
It is interesting that non of the TV media following the first flights in to LHR mention the 'smell of burning' between 5K and 6K ft. Has he media been suppressed?
J.

[eggplant]

I personally heard 2 flights report that on my scanner. Doubtless it will get into the media reports. Maybe the nervous passengers decided to have a fag !

[Jeremy]

The fact that it was reported on this forum puts it in the public domain. There must have been a reporter on site with a scanner, surely, so why no mention on the national media?
J.

[woodpecker]

Thomas Cook TCX952P registration G-JMCF (Boeing 757-28A) just made a u-turn to Manchester, it was out over the North Sea off Nofolk/Suffolk, it reported to London and Manchester Control it had an engine bleed problem after an 'intense smell of volcanic ash in the cabin during the climb between FL160 and FL200.

[Southwest]

Thomas Cook TCX952P registration G-JMCF (Boeing 757-28A) just made a u-turn to Manchester, it was out over the North Sea off Nofolk/Suffolk, it reported to London and Manchester Control it had an engine bleed problem after an 'intense smell of volcanic ash in the cabin during the climb between FL160 and FL200.

Here we go, sensationalism!  How did they know the smell was volcanic ash?  The Sun is gonna love this one.

[woodpecker]

Here we go, sensationalism!  How did they know the smell was volcanic ash?  The Sun is gonna love this one.

The smell must have been either ash or burning from within the aircraft, if The Sun got hold of it they might sensationalise it but the crew report was not made in this way, although they hot footed it back to Manchester and said they didn't want to hang around in a hold. I've got the radio transmissions if anyone wants to listen.

What exactly is an 'engine bleed problem', would this have been an unfortunate coincidence or ash related?

[glideslope]

Still a lot of inbound flights cancelled for LHR:

http://www.heathrowairport.com/portal/page/Heathrow%5EGeneral%5EFlight+information%5EHeathrow+arrivals/

Steve.

[DaveReid]

What exactly is an 'engine bleed problem', would this have been an unfortunate coincidence or ash related?

The air you breathe in any pressurised airliner (except the 787) is tapped off the engines downstream of the compressor and fed, via the air conditioning/environmental control system, into the cabin.  It's not unknown for an engine oil seal to fail, which results in an intense smell (of burnt oil) and sometimes mist/smoke in the cabin.

The BAe 146 and Boeing 757 are, allegedly, more prone than most types to this kind of incident, in fact an Australian flight attendant on 146s has recently been awarded substantial damages against East-West Airlines for respiratory illness attributed to toxic fumes in cabin.

[Southwest]

What exactly is an 'engine bleed problem', would this have been an unfortunate coincidence or ash related?

The air you breathe in any pressurised airliner (except the 787) is tapped off the engines downstream of the compressor and fed, via the air conditioning/environmental control system, into the cabin.  It's not unknown for an engine oil seal to fail, which results in an intense smell (of burnt oil) and sometimes mist/smoke in the cabin.

The BAe 146 and Boeing 757 are, allegedly, more prone than most types to this kind of incident, in fact an Australian flight attendant on 146s has recently been awarded substantial damages against East-West Airlines for respiratory illness attributed to toxic fumes in cabin.

The 146 was indeed a little 'bleeder' in this respect.  I was helping to build the things at Hatfield in a previous life and experienced it myself on a route proving flight to Southend and back.  I wasn't well for days.

[radarspotter10]

   
hi
Volcanic Ash: Flight of Terror,  just watch this on channel 5 very good show,
maybe on catch up, tomorrow,  might freak a few people out watching it.
http://demand.five.tv/watchnow.aspx
from pat

[DaveReid]

Look out for "The Volcano That Stopped Britain" (working title) on Channel 4 next week.

[Runway 31]

Yes thing are getting back to normal, over 1000 flights on the network for me for the first time since the beginning of last week.

[DaveReid]

Thomas Cook TCX952P registration G-JMCF (Boeing 757-28A) just made a u-turn to Manchester, it was out over the North Sea off Nofolk/Suffolk, it reported to London and Manchester Control it had an engine bleed problem after an 'intense smell of volcanic ash in the cabin during the climb between FL160 and FL200.

Here we go, sensationalism!  How did they know the smell was volcanic ash?  The Sun is gonna love this one.

The Sun did indeed love it:

www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2942884/UK-flight-is-aborted-after-pilot-smells-volcanic-ash.html

Thomas Cook are now back-pedalling furiously and saying that the incident was simply an air-conditioning fault, not related to the ash.

There's definitely a smell of something here ...

[tarbat]

The mainstream media seem to think that the volcanic dust problem is over, but it's not.  Looking at the latest VAAC charts, we're still under the volcanic ash, and several UK airports are still closed, including my own local airport Inverness.

It's having a significant impact, particularly on the UK oil industry, with workers unable to get to and from the platforms.  And vital links between the Highlands and Islands are still severly disrupted, and we're not just talking about holidaymakers unable to get home, but people unable to get to hospital for vital operations.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/highlands_and_islands/8639066.stm

[Runway 31]

Icelandic airports now closed due to wind change.  Icelandair are using Glasgow as temporary hub.