Some thoughts
Feb. 10th, 2011 04:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bellinghmanIt's horrible to hear of the crash at Cork airport this morning.
One question that has been raised is whether the crew were making a third attempt to land at a strongly fog-bound airport because their fuel level was low enough as to give them little other option. The initial Wikipedia report indicates that it had been in the air for about 2 hours at that point. Now, depending on model, the Fairchild Swearingen Metroliner (also according to Wikipedia) may have a range as little as 1,065 km, and a cruising speed of 515 km/h.
That indicates a duration of about two hours.
If so, there might not have been sufficient fuel to divert somewhere with no fog.
I make the distance from Belfast to Cork to be about 350 km, so flight time should be about 40 minutes. Even with departure time (taxiing and waiting for a runway) tacked on, they should have been nowhere near two hours.
One question that has been raised is whether the crew were making a third attempt to land at a strongly fog-bound airport because their fuel level was low enough as to give them little other option. The initial Wikipedia report indicates that it had been in the air for about 2 hours at that point. Now, depending on model, the Fairchild Swearingen Metroliner (also according to Wikipedia) may have a range as little as 1,065 km, and a cruising speed of 515 km/h.
That indicates a duration of about two hours.
If so, there might not have been sufficient fuel to divert somewhere with no fog.
I make the distance from Belfast to Cork to be about 350 km, so flight time should be about 40 minutes. Even with departure time (taxiing and waiting for a runway) tacked on, they should have been nowhere near two hours.
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no subject
Date: 2011-02-10 04:37 pm (UTC)My new/temp job is up at the airport business park. If I didn't have today off I would have been driving into the chaos to get to work at noon.