MK Cargo Jumbo in Halifax verunglückt

[Flugplan]

Cargo plane crashes at Halifax airport

 

A Boeing 747 cargo plane with seven crew members has crashed off the end of a runway at Halifax Airport, RCMP said on Thursday.

 

The MK Airlines jet, which had been loaded with tractors and seafood, crashed as it was taking off, ending up in a rock quarry.

 

The airport is closed as fire departments and emergency crews rush to the scene.

 

Taxi drivers taking passengers to the airport had reported being turned back, saying all they had been told was that there was some sort of incident.

 

The airport is about 35 kilometres from the city's downtown.

 

No other details are available.

[Zulu]

hier noch ein bischen mehr zu dem Unglück:

 

Survivors unlikely in plane crash: spokesperson

 

 

Canadian Press

 

 

Thursday, October 14, 2004

 

 

HALIFAX (CP) -- A Boeing 747cargo jet bound for Spain with seven crew members aboard crashed into a quarry at the end of a runway at Halifax International Airport early Thursday.

 

The fate of the crew was not known, but a spokesman for MK Airlines of Britain said the situation looked grim.

 

"I understand from our people on the ground in Halifax that there may be no survivors," said Steve Anderson.

 

Initial reports from the scene suggest the jet's tail hit Runway 06 during takeoff before crashing into a wooded area near an industrial park. Pictures from the scene show a orange glow in the sky not far from a rural road.

 

The weather at the time was good with clear, pre-dawn skys.

 

The aircraft, which stopped in Halifax to refuel, was loaded with tractors, lobsters and fish.

 

"There was a fire at the aircraft," said RCMP Const. Joe Taplin. "Emergency crews are done there right now and their fighting a fire at the aircraft."

 

Witness Peter Lewis was dropping off his wife at the airport and saw two explosions that resembled heat lightning.

 

"As we were approaching we saw what I thought was heat lighting 'cause I told everyone in the car that we've got heat lightning in the sky," he told radio station CJCH.

 

"That was only a quick one followed by a second one that was bigger. And then we seen a very bright orange light and I mean bright. It took up the whole sky."

 

"RCMP and emergency firefighters are on site," said airport spokesman Pat Chapman. "The airport is closed."

 

Chapman and Taplin said seven crew members were on the aircraft but it was not known whether they survived.

 

An official at the Queen Elizabeth II Health Science Centre said they were put on Code Orange, meaning they had to prepare for mass casualties. However, the Code Orange was later called off and no casualties were brought to the hospital.

 

The airport is located in a remote area outside city limits.

 

Cab drivers taking passengers to the airport reported that they had been turned back.

 

"All the information that we can get is the airport is closed for the day," said cab company owner Angus McGillivary. "We got a cargo plane down that's taken down the power at the airport."

 

He said his drivers could not see anything except for a darkened airport.

 

"It's completely black," said McGillivary. "There's no runway lights. There's no tower lights."

 

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is assembling a team of investigators in Ottawa, said spokesman John Cottreau. The board is an independent agency that investigates transportation accidents and prepares incident reports.

 

The MK Airlines spokesman said the company had never had problems with this particular aircraft.

 

Meanwhile, the airport was re-opened and flights were resuming on a limited basis.

 

© Canadian Press 2004

[Hias]

Na ja, ich will ja jetzt nix behaupten, aber ein unbeschriebenes Blatt ist MK ja nicht:

 

http://aviation-safety.net/database/2001/011127-0.htm

http://aviation-safety.net/database/1996/961217-2.htm

http://aviation-safety.net/database/1992/920215-0.htm

 

4 Totalverluste in 12 Jahren spricht nicht gerade für sich, obwohl die Crews sicher auch nicht lebensmüde sind und wahrscheinlich unter zum Teil schwierigen Umständen in Afrika operieren...

 

Gruss

 

Mathias

-----------------------------------------

http://www.spotter.de.vu <--- Aviation Photography

[Jörg]

Habe gerade Bilder bei n-tv gesehen. Sieht verdammt übel aus - 7 Tote...

[ATmstein]

Der Jumbo kam aus Windsor/Bradley International und sollte nach Zaragossa gehen, es soll sich um 9G-MKJ handeln, ist aber noch nicht 100%ig sicher.

[Zulu]

Der Crash von der 9G-MKI im Nov. 2001 hatte eigentlich nichts mit MK als solches zu tun. Vielmehr war zur Zeit des Unfalles das ILS am Flughafen in PHC ausser betrieb. Die Maschine ist bei sehr schlechtem Wetter beim zweiten Anflug auf die Piste in ein Palmenhain runter. Dabei brach sie auseinander. 1 Crewmitglied kam dabei ums Leben.

 

Wie man sieht sind sämtliche Unfälle in Nigeria passiert! Das spricht für sich!

 

Siehe auch das Unglück von Hydro Air in Lagos.

http://aviation-safety.net/database/2003/031129-3.htm

 

 

Wenn es bei der MK in Halifax um die 9G-MKJ handeln sollte, dann ist es ein ehemaliger Flieger von SAA. Wurde vom Combi zum Frachter umgebaut.

Als es noch bei SAA flog mit dem Taufnamen "Waterberg" bin ich in 1987 damit von JNB nach FRA geflogen. Schade

 

Jetzt sollten wir erst mal abwarten, was die Ursache war.

 

[ Diese Nachricht wurde geändert von: Zulu am 2004-10-14 19:29 ]

[Jörg]

Ja, es war die 9G-MKJ !

Siehe Bild: http://www.flugzeugbilder.de/show.php?id=247002

 

Nicht gerade vertrauenserweckend!

[Zulu]

noch ein Bericht dazu aus Kanada:

 

Thursday, October 14, 2004 Back The Halifax Herald Limited

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

...

Len Wagg / Staff

Firefighters work to put out fires at the site of the crash of MK Airlines flight 1602 at the Halifax Airport on Thursday morning.

747 cargo plane crashes at Halifax Airport

By Mike Tutton / The Canadian Press

HALIFAX (CP) - A loaded cargo jet bound for Spain crashed into woods at the end of a runway at Halifax International Airport early Thursday, killing all seven crew members on board.

 

"Our thoughts and our prayers go to the families of those killed in this tragedy," said Pat Chapman, a spokesman for the airport authority.

 

The tail of the Boeing 747, owned by MK Airlines Ltd. of Britain, snapped off during takeoff and lay in a field at the end of the runway.

 

"The aircraft basically didn't take off," said Steve Anderson, an airline spokesman in Sussex, England.

 

"She continued her rotation and ran off the runway and ran into woods."

 

There didn't appear to be casualities on the ground as there are no homes in the area.

 

The tail of the jet lay inside the fence surrounding the large airport property. The rest of the plane cut a wide, V-shaped swath through woods and brush and came to rest in pieces about a kilometre away.

 

"We've recovered some remains at the scene," said RCMP Const. Joe Taplin.

 

He said the RCMP were treating the crash as a potential criminal investigation after reports of an explosion. He didn't elaborate.

 

The tops of several trees and power poles were sheered off. The jet's severed wings lay in the brush, which was still burning in places several hours later.

 

A mangled engine and a charred portion of fuselage lay nearby.

 

"It's very devastating," said Mike LeRue, a spokesman for Halifax firefighters, as he stood about 300 metres from the smouldering fuselage.

 

"It's surreal, is what it is. It's reality, but it's surreal for sure."

 

The Boeing 747-200 crashed shortly before 4 a.m. local time near an industrial park and quarry about 30 kilometres north of Halifax.

 

Pictures from the scene showed an orange glow in the sky. It took about 60 firefighters and 20 trucks about three hours to control a fire caused by burning jet fuel on the ground.

 

Meanwhile, the crash forced the airport to close for several hours, delaying or cancelling 17 flights. Power was temporarily knocked out, but flights resumed on one runway later in the morning.

 

The plane's crew are either from the United Kingdom, South Africa or Zimbabwe, Anderson said.

 

Aside from the usual three-person crew in the cockpit, the plane was also carrying a loadmaster and a spare crew.

 

The weather at the time of the crash was good with a partly cloudy sky and light winds.

 

The huge aircraft, which stopped in Halifax to refuel, was loaded with lawn tractors and 53,000 kilograms of lobster and fish bound for Zaragosa, Spain.

 

Witness Peter Lewis was dropping off his wife at the airport and saw two explosions.

 

"As we were approaching we saw what I thought was heat lightning," he told radio station CJCH. "That was only a quick one followed by a second one that was bigger. And then we saw a very bright orange light - and I mean bright. It took up the whole sky."

 

The MK Airlines spokesman said the company had never had problems with this particular aircraft.

 

"She's been an absolute gem," Anderson said, noting the aircraft had been in service for about six years. He also said the company has been flying out of Halifax for the past 18 months.

 

The crash was the fourth for the cargo company in 12 years and the second involving fatalities. All three previous crashes were in Nigeria.

 

In 2001, one crew member was killed when a 747 went down about 700 metres short of the runway.

 

In 1996, a McDonnell Douglas DC-8F-55 struck trees during approach. There were no fatalities.

 

In 1992, a McDonnell Douglas DC-8 crashed and caught fire, also during final approach.

 

The information on the previous crashes is listed on a website for the Aviation Safety Network, an independent aviation safety watchdog.

 

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada has assembled a team of investigators in Ottawa. The board is an independent agency that investigates transportation accidents and prepares incident reports.

 

A TSB spokesman said the jet's flight date recorders had yet to be recovered.

 

The flight originated near Hartford, Conn., and the flight to Halifax was uneventful, Anderson said.

 

A pilot familiar with large planes said the tails of jets such as the 747 occasionally strike the ground during rotation - the point in the takeoff sequence when the pilot pulls back on the control stick, lifting the nose off the ground.

 

Large aircraft have so-called strike bars that protect the tail section when the pilot over-rotates and tail strikes the runway.

 

"It doesn't happen that often," said a pilot who didn't want his name used. "You can encounter turbulence right at rotation."

 

While tail strikes are uncommon, pilots can recover from them, he said.

 

In Ottawa, federal Transport Minister Jean Lapierre said "my thoughts are with the families of the people involved in this tragic accident."

 

Bill Fowler, a TSB spokesman, said the downed jet was likely equipped with depleted uranium, a radioactive material often used as ballast in the rudders and wings of wide-body aircraft.

 

Depleted uranium is the dense, heavy waste produced during the making of nuclear fuel and weapons.

 

A 747 may contain as much as 1,500 kilograms of the material, which is denser than lead and 60 per cent as radioactive as natural uranium.

 

Fowler said "there is no threat or concern" about exposure to those working on the wreckage.

 

 

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Zulu]

nach diesem Bild zu urteilen http://www.airliners.net/open.file/680325/L/

wurde die Mühle in der zwischenzeit frisch lackiert.

[BobbyFan]

@ Jörg und Zulu

Man kann nicht zwangsweise von dem Zustand des Lacks

auf den Zustand des Fliegers schließen.

 

Schlechter Lackzustand heißt nicht zwingend "schlechter" Flieger.

Guter Lackzustand heißt nun wirklich nicht immer "guter" Flieger.

 

Ein Blick hinter die (gut lackierten) Klappen offenbart meist erst das

wahre Gesicht des Fliegers.

 

Ingo

[Chris99]

Gibt es denn inzwischen genauere Angaben zum Unfallhergang? Nichts genaues hab ich bisher gelesen, auch in der div. Presse.

Es ist die Rede von einem tail strike und einem abgerissenen Heck.

Kann es sein, dass aufgrund eines tail strike das komplette Heck abreist??

[D-ABZI]

warum denn nicht ?

 

jeder Cargo Jumbo hat einen "Metallknopf" am Heck, wo die Heckstütze montiert wird. Die steht etwa 10 cm vom Rumpf hevor. Wenn der Rumpf blöd auf die Startbahn knallt, die Struktur vielleicht schon durch irgendetwas anderes geschwächt ist. Ich weiss nicht warum dies nicht möglich sein sollte.

[Blue-Sky]

Aber mit was für einer Wucht muss das Heck aufgeschlagen sein, dass es komplett abreißt bzw. Stück abbrechen?

Kann es sein, dass sich vielleicht durch einen Tailstrike Teile der Ladung gelöst haben und das Flugzeug so viel zu Schwanzlastig war u.a. und so das Tail aufschlug bzw. am Boden blieb?

 

Gruß,

Blue-Sky

 

http://www.vain-try.de.vu

[EDLB]

Hallo,

 

lässt sich trefflich spekulieren. Die Untersuchung wirds schon rausbringen was passiert ist.

Ich halte es für wahrscheinlich, das aus irgendeinem Grund die notwendige rotation speed nicht erreicht wurde. Tailstrike ist dann die Folge, wenn trotzdem versucht wird abzuheben.

 

Mit freundlichem Gruß

Christian

[BobbyFan]

@ EDLB

Zu dieser Aussage würde das Gerücht passen, das der Flieger an einer falschen Stelle

auf die Startbahn ist (über Taxiway D anstatt E [2300ft weniger]).

 

Ingo

[Zulu]

Hier nochmal ein Artikel aus der lokalen Presse :

 

'Utter destruction'

Impact sequence key in probe of fiery jet crash

By SHERRI BORDEN COLLEY and PATRICIA BROOKS / Staff Reporters

 

Seven crew members aboard a loaded cargo jet bound for Spain died in a fiery crash early Thursday morning during takeoff from Halifax International Airport. It was the airport's first fatal crash since it opened in 1960.

 

RCMP were called to the airport at 3:52 a.m. after an MK Airlines Boeing 747-200 crashed into a quarry in woods at the end of a runway off Old Guysborough Road.

 

Four of the dead crew members were British nationals, two living in South Africa and two in Zimbabwe. Two others were from Zimbabwe and the seventh was a German living in South Africa.

 

Some remains have been recovered.

 

The tail of the aircraft snapped off and lay in a field at the end of the runway while the rest of the huge jet was in pieces hundreds of metres away.

 

"The critical element is to determine the sequence of events of pre-impact versus post-impact," said Bill Fowler, an investigator with the Transportation Safety Board.

 

Officials must figure out whether the tail section broke off before or after impact, he said.

 

None of the flight data recorders had been recovered as of a 7:30 p.m. news briefing.

 

Paul Sharpe, a Jetsgo worker at the airport, lent support to unconfirmed reports that the 747 didn't have enough runway to take off safely.

 

He said the plane was supposed to leave from the end of a 2,700-metre runway but entered through a taxiway at the 2,000-metre mark.

 

"From where she left, they only had about 6,000 feet and it just wasn't enough runway," he said.

 

Mr. Fowler declined comment when asked if the plane took off from the wrong spot.

 

"I don't have any information to that effect," he said.

 

The crash forced the airport to close for several hours and power was temporarily knocked out. Both runways were immediately shut down but one was reopened a couple of hours later. Seventeen flights were delayed or cancelled.

 

The cargo plane, which made regular stops in Halifax, was said to have been carrying 89,000 kilograms of fuel when it crashed and burst into flames.

 

"Utter destruction" is how Michael Tutton, a Canadian Press reporter permitted to get within 50 metres of the crash site, described the scene.

 

"There's no sign of cargo, it's just blackened wreckage," he said later. "It smells like burnt fuel."

 

No homes are within a kilometre of the site.

 

The most striking sight, Mr. Tutton said, was the condition of the wreckage.

 

"It's nothing but a blackened centre of an aircraft torn into pieces, and pieces of the engine lying on the ground - wings torn off either side completely."

 

Major crime units from the RCMP and Halifax Regional Police were brought in and were treating the crash as a criminal investigation because of the deaths and reports that an explosion may have occurred.

 

Part of the investigation will be to check into any possible links to terrorism.

 

"Until we can determine it otherwise, we'll be looking into that," said Const. Joe Taplin of Halifax RCMP.

 

Early on, Const. Taplin was saying the plane did get off the runway. But an MK Airlines official in Hartwell, England, said the aircraft hadn't left the ground when it crashed.

 

"There's been press speculation that it took off and then crashed but it's our understanding that it did not take off," said Steve Anderson, the company's risk and legal manager.

 

"Which leads us to believe - and it's pure speculation - that there may have been something like a bird strike into the engine, and invariably an aircraft can't take off when that happens."

 

The aircraft has a capacity of 110 tonnes and there were 103 on board, Mr. Anderson said.

 

"She wasn't quite full to capacity, so she was well within her limits," he said. The jet had earlier loaded 50 tonnes of fish and lobster and refuelled after arriving from Hartford, Conn. It was already about half-full with John Deere lawn tractors and general freight, including computer equipment.

 

"I do know that the plane had an awful load of fish on it, I can tell you that," said Leo Negus, who works for Canadian Gold Worldwide Perishables.

 

"We put four tractor-trailer loads on it yesterday."

 

Andy Lyall, the Halifax International Airport Authority's cargo specialist, said the facility does not have the ability to independently measure the weight of cargo planes before they lift off.

 

That's the responsibility of the airline, he said. Under normal procedures, the loadmaster weighs the cargo before it is put onto the aircraft. Then the loadmaster sends a fax to the airline stipulating the weight.

 

In this case, the loadmaster, an MK employee, died in the crash.

 

Mr. Lyall said he did not have a copy of the fax but investigators might.

 

Mr. Fowler, the safety board official, said at the Thursday evening news briefing that he has a report detailing the safety history of the aircraft.

 

"There is nothing that I have seen" that indicates similar previous problems, he said. "But it's very preliminary."

 

He was asked if he was aware of an incident in which either ballast or cargo broke loose on the same plane in 2000.

 

"I recall something like that," he said. "But I don't have enough specifics."

 

MK Airlines, which employs 400 people at offices in England and the African country of Ghana, contacted some family members but some are travelling and could not be reached.

 

The company is not releasing the names of any of the victims but Mr. Anderson said some had been with the company since it began in 1990.

 

"A lot of the people are quite close or are family friends," he said. "It's hit the company quite hard."

 

MK pilot John Power was summoned from England and arrived just an hour before the evening news briefing.

 

"The families and all of MK are grieving the loss of friends and fellow airmen," he said.

 

Asked to defend his company's safety record, Mr. Power said: "I'm not here to defend, I'm here to try and support the investigation.

 

"I don't want to be sidetracked from the primary focus. However, there will be a time when all of your questions will be answered."

 

A major fire was underway when 60 Halifax regional firefighters arrived in the dark, along with police, search and rescue crews and paramedics.

 

Transportation Safety Board and Transport Canada officials also responded, as did a military helicopter.

 

MK Airlines later sent a team of four people to join investigators from the safety board, Boeing, U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and U.S. Federal Aviation Administration. Representatives of the U.K. Aircraft Investigation Bureau will also assist.

 

"We want to find out as soon as we can what has actually happened," Mr. Anderson said.

 

At about 6 a.m. - two hours after the crash - airport workers were watching the blaze.

 

"Everything is shut down," said a man, identified only as Mike, who works for Provincial Airlines. "We're in the black.

 

"We just saw a flash of light. And then everything went black."

 

Soon afterward, he said, a stream of emergency crews passed with lights flashing and sirens blaring.

 

"All we can see is flames and smoke, that's it," he said.

 

No one came around to tell them what had happened, he said.

 

No one needed to.

[Jörg]

@BobbyFan,

 

da magst du recht haben. Sieh es aber bitte mal von einem anderen Standpunkt. Wenn die airline schon kein Geld in das Äußere des Vogels steckt, welches ja auch die ganze Gesellschaft vertritt, dann könnte man schon davon ausgehen, dass es in der Technik nicht VIEL anders aussieht.Dies sind natürlich reine Spekulationen!!

[EDLB]

@Jörg,

 

da ist IMHO offensichtlich irgendwas völlig schiefgelaufen. Durch Wartungsmängel fällt vieleicht ein Triebwerk aus, aber es passiert in der Regel nichts, was nichts durch "normale" Emergencyprocedures (z.B. Startabbruch) in den Griff bekommen werden kann. Eine allgemeine "Un"sicherheitsdiskussion von LCC etc. finde ich hier bei dem jetzigen Kenntnisstand für Fehl am Platze.

 

Mit freundlichem Gruß

Christian

[karstenf]

Das ist doch ein Frachter. Viele Frachter sind von der Lackierung her nicht perfekt. Das ist auch bei weitem nicht so wichtig, wie bei Pax-Airlinern, wo schlechtes Aussehen bei den Paxen für Unruhe sorgen würde. Denke nicht, dass man daraus sofort auf technische Mängel schließen kann.

 

Sieht doch verdammt nach zu kurzer Rollstrecke aus.