Flight to N.Y. diverted over terror scare

B744skipper · Post by **B744skipper** » 03 Jun 2005, 16:43

A Virgin Atlantic flight from London to New York has been diverted to an airport in Halifax, Canada.

It seems that the pilot made an error when transmitting the "highjack signal", but the aircraft has been escorted by Canadian fighter planes anyway.

SN30952 · Post by **SN30952** » 03 Jun 2005, 20:38

False alarm diverts Virgin flight to Halifax video link

ArthurQ · Post by **ArthurQ** » 03 Jun 2005, 21:07

Why do they always send them here to Canada when there is a chance of a hijacker? We don't want them!

A380-800 · Post by **A380-800** » 03 Jun 2005, 21:29

ArthurQ wrote:Why do they always send them here to Canada when there is a chance of a hijacker? We don't want them!

I do also not understand why they diverted the plane to Halifax...
If it was the nearest okay, but if not there is something wrong.
Interesting that the transponder sent wrong signals out. Maybe
the pilots made something wrong ???

rgds,

A380-800

SN30952 · Post by **SN30952** » 03 Jun 2005, 21:29

ArthurQ wrote:Why do they always send them here to Canada when there is a chance of a hijacker? We don't want them!

The landfall for Westbound North Atlantic flights is somewhere in ... Canada, dear ArthurQ

The Atlantic Ocean extends in an S shape from the arctic to the antarctic regions between North and South America on the West and Europe and Africa on the East. And the Atlantic has relatively few islands, with the greatest concentration found in the Caribbean region.

Although, the shortest distance across the Atlantic Ocean (c.1,600 mi/2,575 km) is between SW Senegal, W Africa, and NE Brazil, E South America, most crossing are flown over the North part of the Ocean.

ETOPS has also its role in the routeplanning: Without an ETOPS rating, an aircraft with only two engines must be able to get to an airport where it can safely land within 60 minutes if an engine fails in-flight. ETOPS extends this "rule time" to 90 minutes or more, up to a maximum of 180 minutes. Then the aircraft with engine trouble(s) has to reach the nearest runway, and that is in these crossings more than often on the East coast of your Canada... Few captains will make a 180 to Iceland...

As you know ETOPS means "Engines Turned Off, Passengers Swim" and is not is an acronym for "Extended-Range Twin-Engine Operations".

You could also Ask Captain Lim

ryanvsnow · Post by **ryanvsnow** » 04 Jun 2005, 18:44

SN30952 wrote:The landfall for Westbound North Atlantic flights is somewhere in ... Canada

The average person, who doesn't know about aviation, is amazed to learn that its a shorter distance to fly north across and then go down instead of straight across.

ArthurQ · Post by **ArthurQ** » 05 Jun 2005, 01:38

My dear SN30952 I am quite aware of North Atlantic Region(NAT) and the NAT Organized Track System(OTS). I have written and passed my ETOPS and West Atlantic Route System (WATRS) RVSM study packages a while back. Having flown the routes for a while now I am quite aware of routings, training and equipment requirements.

Since the aircraft in question was not suffering from engine or structure failure I do not see the need to land it at Halifax. Since it was proceeding to New York it could have landed at NAS or AFB in Maine, New Hampshire
or Massachusett.