In-Flight Fires Wreak Havoc With Systems Reliability

Air Safety Week, Sept 22, 2003

"Continued flying, donned mask, declared emergency. Landed ... uneventfully."

Issues:

* Crew's actions exemplified the hierarchy of aviate, communicate, navigate.

* Case illustrates virtue of emergency vision assurance system [EVAS] when thick smoke obscures instrument panel (see ASW, Dec. 21, 1998).

'Passengers were becoming very nervous'

Case: MD-80 had smoke, fumes in cabin after takeoff.

Details: "We could not isolate the problem and the haze and smoke appeared to be increasing. Flight attendant said that the pax were becoming very nervous and the sound in a very senior flight attendant's voice indicated to me that the situation was deteriorating. At this point we declared an emergency and returned to JFK.

"Pax already were uptight and anxious due to an earlier security problem during boarding (we departed 1.5 hours late).

"Maintenance found an oil leak in the APU [auxiliary power unit] that was contaminating the pneumatic system with APU turbine oil. This then caused the reported smoke and fumes."

Issues:

* Inability to isolate source of smoke.

* Rising level of anxiety in the cabin.

Fire in the lavatory

Case: B767 lavatory fire.

Details: "In cruise at FL 370, the flight attendant called from the aft cabin and stated there was a fire in the left aft lavatory and another flight attendant was fighting the active flames with the Halon extinguisher. I declared an emergency and requested priority handling to divert ... We lowered the gear and extended flaps to burn fuel and minimize the overweight landing. I determined it prudent to land 1,000 lbs. over the maximum landing weight for the Cat. II autoland rather than delay longer."

Issues:

* Time pressure to land ASAP.

* Flight attendants not required to extinguish a realistic fire in training and often face the real thing for the first time in flight.

'An amber X'

Case: B717 engine malfunction.

Details: "Climbing to FL 330, an amber X appeared on the left oil pressure indication. Shortly thereafter, the indication reappeared, showing 0 psi along with 'L oil pressure low' alert. Then the X reappeared, before switching back to reading 0 psi ... we suspected a bad indication ... Maintenance control concurred with our suspicion of a bad indication and advised us to continue to [Atlanta]. As I, the FO and PF, began to advance the left engine throttle, while carefully monitoring all engine indications, we ... heard several loud bangs, along with puffs of smoke in the cockpit.

"The captain declared an emergency [and] took control of the aircraft."

Issue: Trust your instruments?

'Smoke and sparks'

Case: Entertainment system fire on B757 on climbout.

Details: "We were notified by FA the video unit in the cabin was on fire and smoking ... shortly after the notification, several lights illuminated in the cockpit including landing gear, flaps, pressurization and autopilot lights.

"Power was cut off to the video system at the source and CB's were pulled in the cockpit.

"Autopilot and autothrottles would not work properly. We made an uneventful return ...