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Southwest Flight 1380 — 21 Comments

  1. Great flying by the pilot. Apparently, half of the woman’s body from the waist up, was outside the aircraft. It’s hard to imagine.

    Reminds me of the Bond film “Goldfinger.” If I remember, the technically weak show “Myth Busters” tested this (w/ a gunshot through the window) and said it (human through window) wasn’t possible.

    I always fasten my seatbelt while in the seat and minimize my time out of the seat. Unexpected clear air turbulence can and has put unfastened people on the ceiling, sometimes with broken necks. I think a seatbelt would have kept the woman out of the window. It’s possible she was killed by the shrapnel though.

    In the picture it looks like the compressor containment ring under the torn leading edge sheet metal, is still intact. So it may have taken most of the lost blade energy. But a broken blade is long and slender and likely to tumble while striking the containment ring.

  2. Sudden explosive decompression. An emergency that all airline pilots train for. I can still remember the immediate action items.
    Oxygen masks on.
    Cabin masks–Deploy
    Turn off the airway and begin high angle descent to MEA (Minimum Enroute Altitude) as soon as possible. Do not exceed speed at time of failure.
    Assess damage and adjust flight path and controls accordingly.
    Declare an emergency with ATC.
    Communicate the situation to the flight attendants.

    Once those items are done and the descent is established, you run the command and response checklist then request vectors to the nearest suitable airport from ATC.

    All routine. Except that there is total chaos occurring. The decompression causes dust, papers, cups, etc. to fly around headed for the spot where the cabin is breached. Wind noise is high.The cabin temperature drops precipitously. The airplane, with one engine out, must be carefully trimmed for balanced flight. The engine damage must be assessed and further actions taken as necessary to limit fire or further damage. The pull out from the dive must be calibrated to not overstress the airplane and arrive at the 10,000 feet (or MEA if it is higher) awaiting further clearance from ATC.

    I’ve done it many times in the simulator. Fortunately, never had to do the real thing. It sounds like the pilots and fight attendants performed as trained to do.

    As to the failure of the damage containment ring. Not every sort of engine failure can be anticipated in advance. The engineers do their best, but they will have to go back to the drawing board on this one and see if it was a one off or if more can be done to contain failing engine parts.

  3. I don’t think there’s any credible way to contain 100% of fan or compressor stage failures of a high-bypass turbofan 100% of the time. Too much spinning mass. To guarantee 100% containment is likely to make the engine too heavy and too big to credibly do the job (the CFM56 is almost too big in diameter for a 737 as it is)

    Initial investigation comments I’ve seen suggest that the failed parts do exhibit signs of fatigue. Why this might have happened within this engine’s service life needs to be known. Perhaps it was a result of some kind of foreign object damage; it will take some lab work to understand the real cause.

    Meanwhile, crew, passengers, ATC, and emergency responders all did an outstanding job here. That’s what’s really amazing.

  4. Ah, John Goglia! I remember after Southwest 812 developed a crack in its fuselage skin on April Fool’s Day 2011, Mr. Goglia didn’t let three days go by before blaming Southwest’s maintenance program for the failure and personally singled out the FAA’s principal maintenance inspector at Southwest as being negligent.

    The root cause turned out to be manufacturing defects by Boeing.

  5. Steve is basically right…

    CFM56 with a thrust range of 18,500 to 34,000 pounds-force (82 to 150 kilonewtons).

    The CFM56 is a high-bypass turbofan engine (most of the air accelerated by the fan bypasses the core of the engine and is exhausted out of the fan case) with several variants having bypass ratios ranging from 5:1 to 6:1, generating 18,500 to 34,000 lbf (80 kN to 150 kN) of thrust. The variants share a common design, but the details differ. The CFM56 is a two-shaft (or two-spool) engine, meaning that there are two rotating shafts, one high-pressure and one low-pressure. Each is powered by its own turbine section (the high-pressure and low-pressure turbines, respectively).

    the way they make the fans for this is incredibly difficult and is very high tech… VERY

    To boost fuel economy and reduce noise, almost all of today’s jet airliners and most military transport aircraft (e.g., the C-17) are powered by low-specific-thrust/high-bypass-ratio turbofans.

    animation here to see how they work
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Turbofan3_Labelled.gif

    the failure was in the larger low pressure to high pressure front fan…

    CF680C2B6F max N1 rotor speed 3854 rpm, N2 speed 11055 rpm
    PW4000 Max N1 rotor speed 4012 rpm, N2 speed 10,450 rpm

    3000 rpm is about what a small cheap motor does…
    however, this is not that…

    Turbofan blade tips on the outside exceed the speed of sound

    The GE-90 has a fan diameter of 3124 mm and a rotational speed of 3475 RPM. Their circumferential velocity is d·Ï€·57.917 = 568 m/s or Mach 1.67 at sea level and ISO atmosphere

    and they get HOT from air friction, which is why they have a lot of tungsten in them.. (brittle metal)

    3124 is ten feet..

    now, lets put a bit of that together..
    you have a fan in the front..

    That ten foot fan is turning about 60 rotations a SECOND
    at the N2 speed, that blade makes 184 turns a SECOND

    and they are tough… more than one person has had the misfortune to step in front, be sucked in, and come out as a spray… burp..

    and think what happens when a 20lb bird hits it at 400 miles per hour (bird at 40, plane at 360)… and they dont fail badly considerign..

    the shroud of a turbofan engine helps a lot to make the noise from supersonic tips manageable. The XF-84H’s noise made people literally sick
    [meaning it was pushing out audio between 5 and 23 hertz… yes, myth busters busted it, but they failed… why? the problem is cause din the inner ear, and they wore ear protection thinking it was the vibrations to the sternum or stomach. no. its the resonance freequency of the three loops, hit them hard enough and the liquid goes all over… (the cuban thing is easy too, i am amazed they have not figured it out… i did. nice piece of work… but its designed to destroy hearing passively using constructive interference and scanning frequencies under transforms… it constructs superwaves in the ear)]

    why all that?

    easy… which came first…

    The fatigue in the blades, or the shroud not right causing the fatigue? both?

  6. I was on a Southwest flight from LAX to Baltimore about ten years ago when I heard the dreaded, “Is there a doctor on board ?” I waited about a minute, and sure enough, a guy in front of me stood up and volunteered. We made an emergency landing in Kansas City and a passenger was taken off.

    We took off again and an hour later, came, “Is there a doctor on board?” The same guy was still on the plane and volunteered again. This time we landed in Atlanta and another passenger was taken off.

    We finally got to Baltimore.

  7. Interesting point. The CFM-56 is a unique piece of equipment. The diameter of the fan cowl of the CFM-56, when it entered service on the B-737, was so great that it had to be flattened on the bottom to clear the ground. That was many years, and untold thousands of hours of flight time ago, and certainly not a factor in this situation. We can rest assured that a lot of people will be searching diligently for an explanation of this failure; there is a lot at stake.

    Anyway, these engines are magnificent pieces of machinery, and built to unbelievably fine tolerances. It is amazing that failures are so rare. The last un-contained failure that I can recall was back in the 90s and involved the United DC-10 in which a turbine wheel failed and severed all of the hydraulic lines.

    Seat belts. I suppose that we will eventually know whether the unfortunate woman had hers fastened. I don’t know if the force would be great enough to pull her free of a fastened seat belt, or not. At any rate, the crew always cautions passengers to keep their belts fastened; and so many ignore the caution.

    One penultimate comment. I have read various stories stating that Captain Shults was one of the first women fly tactical jets in the Navy. That is not true. Rosemary Conatser (later Mariner) and Mary Louise Jorgenson transitioned to jets in 1975, well before Captain Shults, and went on to fly tactical aircraft. Chris Giza was also in the class, but she went to jet transports. I know because I was there when they made the jump. I do not wish to diminish Captain Shults’s career accomplishments, nor slight her obvious professionalism in coping with a serous emergency. But, these other women blazed the trail for her and others, and that should be acknowledged.

    As JJ noted, the hard work of preparing for this kind of event takes place through repetitive training in simulators–often on the back side of the clock. Never had an event quite like this; but, the ones I did experience–engine flame outs, fire warnings– had become routine business by the time they happened in the airplane.

  8. I have not seen a first hand statement about signs of metal fatigue in the fan. While that is certainly possible, maybe probable, I would be surprised if any authority actually speculated on that before extensive tests had been conducted.

    Unfortunately, any time there is an incident, there are plenty of “self proclaimed” experts ready to get in front of the camera and speculate.

  9. Re: Oldflyer @ 7:13pm: I based the fatigue statement on an article posted over at AvWeb.com, where they site a second NTSB briefing Tuesday evening.

    In that briefing, AvWeb cites “a preliminary investigation of the engine showed that a fan blade had separated, and there appeared to be evidence of metal fatigue at the point of failure.”

    That’s what I based my statement on (such publications are cautious with these kinds of statements, because they actually understand this stuff, and get as annoyed with uninformed reporting as we do…).

    Since then, I’ve seen one photograph that shows about 60% of the first stage fan disk (the part you can see) remarkably intact and undamaged. Inspectors blocked the other 40% from view, including the damaged blade. If it indeed was just one blade that separated, the rest of the rotating mass looked as if it came through the event in good shape. That’s even more amazing.

  10. Mike K
    you just reminded me of when i was younger and was by the window. husband in middle and wife from Canada, he petrified of flying.. taking shots and stewardess giving and that’s before take off. distracted him as much as i could and his wife could… even talked about the “new” colorful Canadian currency i hadn’t seen yet…

    Landing did him in, not bad, but not smooth either. everyone goes to get up and leave, and do, and he has a heart attack. 🙁 not a widow maker, but still alive and fluttering, and team was called and all i could do was miss my connection and my best before the team came and as they worked…

    turned out mild, took a while, and weeks later a $5 Canadian bill arrived… i think with a thank you note.. he not only was ok, but they were back home and ok too…

    [there was the time i lost an apartment because of a catastrophic car accident, and a man pretty broken up wandering the gasoline covered road… basically i gave first aid and ended up in ambulance continuing first aid with the team. balled out someone (turned out to be the captain, but i was right, you dont step over patients). it was a mess. boss said next time i let you leave early quietly dont be on the front page of the local paper. 🙂 never contacted the man, no one knew who i was other than the photo of me over the body giving first aid among the wreckage. the other two truck driver and girl friend were mostly ok, truck was big, had the mass… and girl was buckled in]

  11. Steve C., Mea Culpa. I was not aware that the NTSB had briefed publicly. I usually pretty much tune out for the first 48 hours or so because of all of the misinformation. So, since not paying attention, I should refrain from commenting. But, didn’t.

    All very interesting. I will wait for the report; but, that is not the picture I expected to see. Very surprising if a single blade was not contained.

    On another note; speaking of heroes. I cited the UAL DC-10 crash at Sioux City, Iowa. I had the opportunity to hear Denny Fitch, the jump seat rider (Instructor pilot) who tried to land the airplane controlling by engine thrust alone. A remarkable feat. He almost pulled it off. There were many fatalities, but it would have been much worse without his superb performance under great duress. The cockpit was reduced to a small pile of rubble, and it was assumed that none survived, until someone heard some moans from beneath the pile. All four did, in fact survive, and flew again. (An odd point of fact, Fitch had the least experience of anyone in the cockpit; but, essentially took charge with the blessing of Captain Haynes.)

  12. I know nothing about airplanes or what it means to be a highly skilled pilot; my impression from what I’ve read is the pilot was top notch and the crew and passengers were fantastic. Americans at their best.

  13. The amazing thing to me was the window failure. I have done quite a bit of flying as a passenger and don’t recall ever hearing o such an event. At least not since the comets in the 1940s.

    I’ve missed a couple including the 1956 TWA -United crash at the Grand Canyon. I was on the United flight a week earlier and the captain had flown us down the canyon. The bodies are still there.
    I also missed PanAm 103 by a week.

  14. According to Marty Marté­nez, who put his eyewitness account on Facetime and was interviewed afterward, the deceased passenger, Jennifer Riordan, was wearing her seatbelt.

  15. Bottom line:

    We can’t file the sharp edges off the entire world.

    As always I am in awe of the good people, professional and passengers who rise to the occasion (or just default to training as we say in my line of work). That is the best defense against the forces of entropy and the hordes of mediocrity.

    I haven’t read anything definitive yet but my theory is the poor woman as mortally wounded by the high velocity shrapnel from the engine. Whether they got her back in the window or not, I think death was inevitable in this case.

    But still, thy put themselves in mortal danger just to rescue her. Good men. Good pilot and crew.

  16. Shrapnel? What is this, the thousands of satellites orbiting the Earth are falling down and hitting planes now…

    The GPS tracking signal for planes goes away over ocean and the Southern hemisphere.

    Surprisingly, satellite dishes pointed 45 ish degrees to the horizon, doesn’t cut out for internet and tv sources in the middle of the day, but whenever there is a storm up. Given the amount of junk in low earth orbit, that kind of reliability for satellite linkage is pretty good.

    NASA’s own craft is untrackable over certain parts. The thousands upon thousands of satellites orbiting the Earth, can’t track them even though the NASA affiliates control all the telemetry. Europe and China has to feed in their or the DOD’s pipelines.

    Another interesting bit of trivia is that back in Nixon’s day, he had a phone conversation with astronauts near or on the moon, which was 250,000 thousand ish miles away. The reception was quite good. Not HD quality.

    They just can’t track airplanes like Malaysia that goes bye bye over certain oceans.

  17. Mike K, not exactly the same, but there was the UAL 747 out of Hawaii in 1989 that had a cargo door fly open and rip a gaping hole in the fuselage. Several rows of seats vanished, and there were nine fatalities in that one.

    Fifty-nine year old Captain David Cronin was on his penultimate flight prior to mandatory retirement. (The mandatory retirement age has since been raised to 65, with some restrictions.) He performed magnificently to get the airplane back on the ground. As I recall, the incident was modeled several times in the simulator, and the aircraft crashed almost every time; but, I am not certain if my memory is correct.

  18. Tommy, the Mythbusters tested and found that it’s not possible for a bullet fired through an aircraft window to cause explosive decompression, the hole is too small and the window too strong.

    What happened here was a hole was torn in the side of the aircraft large enough to pull a person through by fan blades ripping through it at high speed (as well as pieces of the engine cowling), probably spinning as they went.

    To test that they’d have to have shot spinning circular saw blades at the aircraft at several hundred miles an hour.

  19. I was wrong about the containment ring, the front half of which was largely sheared off. Looks almost like the proverbial hot knife through butter. A stainless steel or Ti alloy blade through Aluminum?

    It would be surprising if the deceased woman was in fact was in fact wearing a seat belt, though the recent report said she was struck in the head, neck, and torso by shrapnel. She might have been killed, or rendered unconscious instantly, then sucked through a loose seat belt.

    The media reports that she was sucked partly through the window, not a hole in the fuselage. In the Mythbusters test, they made a few attempts to bust out the window. The first one is as JTW described. The subsequent ones were more aggressive, and don’t recall exactly how those went, but I thought that they succeeded in destroying the window.

  20. Losing an engine in a 2-engine airplane used to be a lot more common than it is now. We used to say that the second engine was there to get you to the scene of the accident.

    It happened to me 4 times in my 20 year Air Force career (3 times in a T-37, once as a student and twice as an instructor, and once in a C-119 in Vietnam).

    Fortunately we trained constantly for just such emergencies and on our annual check rides we had to demonstrate our abilities to handle all types of emergencies in the actual aircraft because we had no simulators, only Link Trainers.

    Critical action emergency procedures (to keep the emergency from getting worse) had to be committed to memory to such a degree that a misplaced comma would be cause for failing the check ride.

    This does not take away from the pilot because the skill necessary to handle such things successfully takes a great deal of practice, judgement and coolness under pressure. I’m sure her military training helped her a great deal. She is to be congratulated for the good outcome.

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