JetBlue Flight 292

File:Jetblueemergency.jpg

As the front wheels touched the runway, flames shot along the runway and the tires tore off, leaving the metal gear scraping the runway for the final few yards. Courtesy Andrew Marino

JetBlue Airways Flight 292 was a scheduled flight from Bob Hope Airport (BUR) in Burbank, California, to John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK), in New York City. On September 21 2005, flight 292 executed an emergency landing at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), in the United States, after the nose wheels jammed in an abnormal position.

The September 21, 2005 flight

Carrying 140 passengers and 6 crew, the Airbus A320-232 aircraft departed from Burbank at 3:17pm PDT (UTC-7). The aircraft, which was built in 2002, bore the tail number N536JB and the name "Canyon Blue." It was scheduled to fly 2,465 miles (3967 km) to JFK airport.

After takeoff from Burbank, the pilots realized that they could not retract the landing gear. They then flew low over Long Beach Municipal Airport (LGB) in Long Beach, California (the location of a JetBlue hub) to allow officials in the airport's control tower to take stock of the damage to its landing gear before attempting a landing, and it was found that the tires on the nose gear were rotated ninety degrees to the left, perpendicular to the direction of flight.

Rather than return to Long Beach Airport, it was decided that the airplane would land at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), in order to take advantage of its long, wide runways and modern safety equipment.

The long runway at LAX was needed since the pilot was going to brake late on the runway. The intention was to keep the nose in the air until the aircraft had slowed significantly. This maneuver is called Aerodynamic Braking, and it reduced the speed of the craft when the skewed wheel touched the ground. That in turn minimized damage done to the craft, and the risk that the landing gear itself would fail. Once the nose touched down, full wheel braking was used, but the thrust reversers were not deployed so as to reduce pressure on the front landing gear and to prevent any potential damage to the engines.

The pilots flew the aircraft, which can carry up to 46,860 pounds (21 255 kg) of aviation fuel, in a figure eight pattern between Bob Hope Airport in Burbank and LAX for more than two hours in order to burn fuel and lower the risk of fire upon landing. This also served to lighten the plane, reducing potential stress on the landing gear. [1] [2] Although local news reports reported that the pilots were dumping fuel over the ocean, the Airbus A320 (like many commercial airplanes) does not have the necessary equipment for this, so excess fuel must be burned in flight. Meanwhile, passengers and baggage were moved towards the rear of the plane to further lessen the weight on the nose gear.

Emergency services and fire engines were standing by on the LAX tarmac ahead of the landing. Although foam trucks were available, they were not used. The U.S. FAA has not recommended pre-foaming runways since 1987, chiefly due to concerns that it would deplete firefighting foam supplies in the event they were needed to respond to a fire; it is also difficult to determine exactly where a runway should be foamed, and pre-foaming might also reduce the effectiveness of the aircraft's brakes, potentially causing it to slide off the runway.

Los Angeles Fire Dept. Battalion Chief Lou Roupoli said, "The pilot did an outstanding job. He kept the plane on its rear tires as long as he could before he brought [the nose gear down]."[3] When the nose gear did touch down, there were sparks and flames from the nose gear, but no apparent damage to the rest of the plane. At 6:20pm PDT (UTC-7), the aircraft came to a stop very close to the end of the 11,096-foot (3382 m) runway 25L. In an attempt to keep the nose gear off the ground as long as possible, reverse thrust was not used to slow the airplane. The pilots therefore used a much larger portion of the available runway than in a typical landing, stopping 1,000 feet before the end of the runway [4]. This validates the pilot's decision to divert from Long Beach, whose longest runway is 10,000 feet (3048 m).

Aftermath and evaluation

Aerial view of LAX. The Airbus A320 landed on the southernmost runway, 25L. In runway naming, 25L means the runway points to compass heading 250, and is the leftmost runway. All runways at LAX are actually at a heading of 249.1.

Passengers began to disembark almost seven minutes later. The landing was smooth and no physical injuries were reported. The aircraft was vacated via airstairs, as opposed to Evacuation Slides typically used in an emergency situation.

JetBlue does not operate from LAX, so they have no company officials or maintenance personnel based at that airport. Therefore, the aircraft was towed to a Continental Airlines hangar at LAX for evaluation.[5]

It has been noted by current and former airline pilots and other experts that, despite the drama and live worldwide coverage (not to mention the on-board satellite TV that some passengers were watching as the plane was viewed circling over the Pacific), there was actually little real danger to the passengers or crew of Flight 292 [6]. The A320, like all modern airliners, is massively over-engineered for safety, and if necessary can be landed without the nose gear at all.

MSNBC reported that "The National Transportation Safety Board Web site reported that a similar incident with an A320 occurred on an America West Airlines flight in February 1999 in Columbus, Ohio. The agency found the cause was a failure of the external o-rings in the nose landing gear steering module." [7] That plane also landed safely.

Further media reports state that this is at least the seventh occurrence of an Airbus A320 series aircraft touching down with the landing gear locked ninety degrees out of position, and one of at least sixty-seven "nose wheel failures" on A319, A320 and A321 aircraft worldwide since 1989. Earlier incidents included another Jetblue flight bound for New York, a United Airlines flight into Chicago, and an America West flight into Columbus, Ohio. While some incidents were traced to faulty maintenance, Airbus Industries had issued maintenance advisories to A320 owners which were later mandated as Airworthiness Directives by American and French aviation authorities. [8] Further, Messier-Dowty, a Paris-based firm which manufactures nose gear assemblies for the A320 stated in an NTSB report in 2004 that part of the gear had been redesigned to prevent future problems, but at the time the redesign was awaiting approval. [9] [10]

The preliminary National Transportation Safety Board report indicated "Both nose tires collapsed during the landing roll, and about half of the two wheels were ground off." No cause has yet been determined for the nose gear malfunction. The report does note that "Maintenance records indicated that Jet Blue maintenance technicians replaced a proximity sensor on the nose wheel prior to the previous flight's departure from New York earlier in the day," but the report does not state there is any connection between the repair and the fault.

Trivia

• Since JetBlue planes are equipped with DirecTV satellite television, passengers on flight 292 were able to watch live news coverage of their flight while the plane circled over the Pacific for hours. The in-flight video system was turned off "well before landing." [11] [12] This flight, therefore, may have been the first in history where the passengers watched themselves during an emergency (however see AA191).
• A few minutes after the incident, which was broadcast live in television, JetBlue aired a commercial on some television stations, which it had booked earlier.
• Actors Tuc Watkins, Joanna Going [13], Taryn Manning and DJ Qualls were among the flight's passengers. "The pilot and the crew were amazing," Manning told the media afterwards. "They never once showed fear on their faces." [14] Qualls appeared in an episode of the TV series Lost which aired 11 days after the incident.
• An editor at The New York Observer was another passenger on the flight. Shortly after disembarking, in an interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper, she called the experience of watching the news coverage of the landing from within the plane "post-post-modern."
• Some NBC Universal employees were also among the flight's passengers.
• At least one passenger used a home-video camera to document the events inside the plane.
• Episode 299 of This American Life, "Back from the Dead", features interviews with passengers of the flight.

See also

• Airbus A320
• JetBlue Airways
• Los Angeles International Airport

External links

• Preliminary NTSB Report
• JetBlue Flight 292 Video of the landing
• "Fly With Me" Podcast captured some audio of the pilot reporting his problem to Air Traffic Controllers