Boeing 777 crashes at San Francisco International Airport

[txradioguy]

BREAKING NEWS: An Asiana Airlines flight crashed while landing at San Francisco International Airport, Fox News confirms.

It was not immediately known whether there were any injuries.

Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Laura Brown says Flight 214 was coming from Seoul, South Korea and was supposed to land on runway 28 left at San Francisco International Airport at 11:26 PDT.

She said the sequence of events was still unclear, but it appeared the plane landed and then crashed.

A video clip posted to Youtube shows smoke coming from the silver-colored Boeing 777 jet on the tarmac. Passengers could be seen jumping down the inflatable emergency slides.

Fire trucks could be seen spraying white fire retardant on the wreckage.

A call to the airline seeking comment wasn't immediately returned.

It was not immediately known how many passengers the plane was carrying. A Boeing 777-200 can carry between 246 to 300 passengers. The twin-engine aircraft is one of Boeing's best selling airplane models. It is often used for flights of 12 hours or more, from one continent to another.

The National Transportation Safety Board says it's sending a team of investigators to San Francisco to probe the crash of an Asiana airliner.

NTSB spokeswoman Kelly Nantel said Saturday that NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman would head the team.

All flights out of San Francisco International Airport have been canceled, the FAA said.

A tweet from Boeing said the company's thoughts are with those affected by the crash, and that the will assist the NTSB in the investigation.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/07/06/boeing-777-crashes-at-san-francisco-international-airport/

[beefeater]

It appears everybody made it off safely.

Samsung executive David Eun in Boeing 777 crash at SFO: 'Most everyone seems fine'



http://www.theverge.com/2013/7/6/4499044/samsung-executive-david-eun-in-boeing-777-crash-most-everyone-seems-fine

But what's interesting to note is that neither malinger(the lazy Jamaican) nor Nads and all of her scanners and apps have rushed to post the nooze.

They have both been scooped by ordinary mortals.

[obumazombie]

Not casting aspersions, but in my experience orientals don't make great pilots. They can be adequate and somewhat competent, but rarely any better. I would guess that the flight crew was oriental, but I don't know.

[Chris_]

Two dead in San Francisco plane crash

Two people died, dozens were injured and as many as 60 remained unaccounted for after a Boeing 777 coming in from South Korea crash landed at San Francisco International Airport.

Fox News

Damn

[Skul]

Not casting aspersions, but in my experience orientals don't make great pilots. They can be adequate and somewhat competent, but rarely any better. I would guess that the flight crew was oriental, but I don't know.

Saburo Sakai, may dispute that.

[Chris_]

I was watching Fox News earlier today and an eyewitness on the plane that landed before this one reported severe turbulence within minutes of landing.

[Skul]

I was watching Fox News earlier today and an eyewitness on the plane that landed before this one reported severe turbulence within minutes of landing.

Saw the same. Severe turbulence wasn't really mentioned. It was kind of inferred.
I seem to recall it was said that the wings were rocking back and forth (or something similar).
That was followed by a slightly bumping touchdown.
I highly discount any eyewitness reports of aircraft accidents. They are often very wrong.

[obumazombie]

In a large city close to me, some years ago, an American Airlines jet attempted a downwind landing. The conditions also included windshear from thunderstorms in close vicinity. That aircraft ran off the end of the runway, and had a similar post crash disposition as this one. One of the last comments made by the captain on the voice recorder was, "there goes my career". The implication being that willfully accepting the downwind landing was the proximate cause of the crash. I could easily see similar circumstances in play prior to this aircraft's landing. Just conjecture on my part, but formed by a long career in the industry.

[Evil_Conservative]

Not casting aspersions, but in my experience orientals don't make great pilots. They can be adequate and somewhat competent, but rarely any better. I would guess that the flight crew was oriental, but I don't know.

That's an ignorant statement.

RIP to the two young girls who died.

How awful.  I just couldn't imagine. 

[obumazombie]

That's an ignorant statement.

RIP to the two young girls who died.

How awful.  I just couldn't imagine. 

I would agree with you if you based that on your experience. But based on my 35 years in the industry, it is my experience. I wish it wasn't so, then I wouldn't be tempted to make excuses.

[Evil_Conservative]

I would agree with you if you based that on your experience. But based on my 35 years in the industry, it is my experience. I wish it wasn't so, then I wouldn't be tempted to make excuses.

Umm... right. 

[Zathras]

I would agree with you if you based that on your experience. But based on my 35 years in the industry, it is my experience. I wish it wasn't so, then I wouldn't be tempted to make excuses.

I don't know the nationality of the flight crew but Asiana has stated that 3 of the 4 flight crew have over 10,000 hours flight time each. No mention of what aircraft type(s) however.

And just now KTVU news is showing video someone shot of the crash itself. You can see where the jet exhaust threw up water from the bay just before the impact and the aircraft may have actually been in the water itself....hard to tell thought so that's just a guess on my part.

Edit: Here's the video I was talking about....

[youtube=425,350]/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TirXdAecipw[/youtube]

[DLR Pyro]

And just now KTVU news is showing video someone shot of the crash itself. You can see where the jet exhaust threw up water from the bay just before the impact and the aircraft may have actually been in the water itself....hard to tell thought so that's just a guess on my part.

I saw an interview with a passenger who said the plane seemed high on the initial approach and descended more rapidly than normal, then as it approached the runway the engines spooled up and the plane went into a nose high attitude before he felt the tail hit hard.  

My guess is the pilots corrected from being above the glideslope causing the plane to settle too far below the glideslope until it was too late when they firewalled the throttles and tried to stop their descent right before hitting the seawall before the runway.  The black boxes should tell the story pretty of what happened, once they are recovered.

[obumazombie]

The flight crew was reported as South Koreans.

[here]

Despite having 9,793 hours of flying experience, the pilot was in training for this plane and had only 43 hours with the Boeing 777 -  It was Lee Kang-kook's maiden flight.  Poor man; this will be a burden for the rest of his life

http://www.newsdaily.com/world/d3309d797aa224cd0aacb10ae6f65e34/asiana-says-pilot-of-crashed-plane-was-in-training
 

[Chris_]

Asiana Plane Crash: Coroner Probes Whether Victim Was Run Over, Killed By Rescue Vehicle

Huffington Post

Holy shit.

[Chris_]

Asiana says pilot of crashed plane was in training

The plane was travelling "significantly below" its intended speed and its crew tried to abort the landing just seconds before it hit the seawall in front of the runway, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said on Sunday.

Co-pilot Lee Jeong-min, who has 3,220 hours of flying experience with the Boeing 777 and a total of 12,387 hours of flying experience, was helping Lee Kang-kook in the landing, the spokeswoman said.

News Daily

Doesn't look good for the airline. 

[here]

Holy shit.

I saw that too and I hope that the poor man or woman can live with the tragedy of it

[BlueStateSaint]

News Daily

Doesn't look good for the airline. 

Definitely.  Hate to be glib, but the airline should take what happened as "he failed his check flight."  The liability issues are going to be enormous.

[JohnnyReb]

Asiana Plane Crash: Coroner Probes Whether Victim Was Run Over, Killed By Rescue Vehicle

Huffington Post

Holy shit.

Are they sure the victim wasn't run over by an ambulance chaser? You know, the early worm gets the bird.

I shouldn't have said that but I'm going to leave it.

[DefiantSix]

Definitely.  Hate to be glib, but the airline should take what happened as "he failed his check flight."  The liability issues are going to be enormous.

The right-seater (co-pilot) should have taken over a lot sooner. Training a new PIC or not, you don't endanger the passengers when a pilot demonstrates he doesn't know what the frack he's doing - and when this guy made his approach below target speed, he'd demonstrated he didn't know what the frack he was doing.

Interested in seeing how the NTSB investigation works out.

[CG6468]

My wife just heard that all the injured people have spinal injuries. A doctor said it's because of the inadequate seat belts in all aircraft; there's no shoulder belt to prevent rapid bending at the waist and the subsequent rearward snap of the back.

[DefiantSix]

My wife just heard that all the injured people have spinal injuries. A doctor said it's because of the inadequate seat belts in all aircraft; there's no shoulder belt to prevent rapid bending at the waist and the subsequent rearward snap of the back.

Up until the last 10-20 years or so, airliner crashes were assumed to be largely unsurvivable. The passenger seatbelts are what they are because, if a plane crash isn't survivable anyway, spending the extra money to install effective restraints in the passenger compartment isn't justifiable.

Now that aircraft like the 777 are becoming the mainstay of the airline fleet, that may be a calculus which will need to be reviewed.  This incident may likely be a trigger for just such a review.

[NHSparky]

Memo to passengers in aircraft crashes:

LEAVE YOUR BAGS ON THE PLANE.  GRAB KIDS.  LEAVE AIRPLANE. 

Do not pass GO, do not collect $200.