More bad news for Airbus: Yemeni plane crashes with 154 aboard
 

CNN Story

Lots of Airbus planes having problems lately...

Man . . . I'm flyig Airbus this weekend.

::raises hand:: Me, on USAir next Thursday. :(

a 5 year old was rescued

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31638822...ica/?GT1=43001

I think American Airlines occasionally has an airbus in the mix. I know I've been on at least 1 in the last 4 yrs. but they mainly fly Boeing & MD-80s

I think that's so miraculous that they've found the toddler survivor.

There was a crash in Detroit back in the 80s where a little girl toddler was the sole survivor. It's really amazing when you think about it.

Continental and Jet Blue. Maybe American and Northwest/Delta, but not sure. You can look it up on their Web sites.

All flight schedules/itineraries should state the plane for your flight, btw.

Honestly, maintanance plays the biggest role when it comes to planes. The A330 has issues; I don't know much about the A310. Some engineers are speculating that now that the Airbus planes are starting to get old, we're going to see more and more of them crashing due to what they classify as bad engineering/assembly. But that's just what I read on the Web, what I hear from a couple pilots I know, and what I hear from various people I know who work at Boeing.

Airbus, btw, is known in the aerospace field for basically taking Boeing's old designs and tweaking them to make them their own. The A380 super jumbo jet was actually a Boeing design from decades ago that Boeing passed over.

Some advice, based on conversations I've had with the folks mentioned above: look for airlines that have streamlined fleets. It is much easier to maintain a fleet full of only a few models of aircraft than a fleet of 10 different craft. The maintanance crews will be more knowledgable about every plane they touch if they only have to learn about (and work on) a few rather than a dozen.

ETA: Yes, American, Northwest, US Air fly Airbus, along with some Boeing planes too. US Air has a ton of Airbus planes...its Boeing planes are old models. It appears I was wrong about Delta, though...I only see Boeing planes on its Web site.

All-Boeing fleets: Southwest, Alaska Airlines (my favorite), and it appears Delta as well...of course, since they're merging with Northwest that will change.

okay so the question is was it plane failure or pilot error?
from what i understand is that airbus uses a stick ala the old days, sopwith camels, while boeing uses a yoke for steering more like a car steering wheel.

any flyers out here?

From what I'm told: Of course both use autopilot, but Airbuses rely waaaaay too much on autopilot and the flight computer, and in fact will not allow a pilot to override it in many cases; Boeing takes a different philosophy and allows pilot judgment to override flight computer or fly the plane without the computer. I've been told that if the flight computer goes out on an Airbus, the plane is toast as the pilot can't fly the plane without it. It's called "Fly by wire," though I don't know what that means exactly.

I swear I almost woke up screaming b/c I thought my flight was gonna be on an Airbus.....I guess all the hype has gotten to me (which isn't hard is i'm still scared of flying). I had to wake up early and check to see whether my flight on Southwest was on an Airbus. I am breathing a sigh of relief now...lol.

Essentially it means that there is no physical connection between the cockpit and the control surfaces. Old fashion systems have cables that run to the control surfaces from the cockpit. In Fly By Wire, you pull on the stick and it goes into a computer. The computer decides what you want to do and manipulates the proper control surfaces. I know alot of pilots hate it. They feel that it takes the pilot out of the decision loop.

Nope. They are all Boeing, aside from the CO Express, who is Bombardier and Embraer. I am CO's bitch. Living near a hub, I've never flown anything but them domestically. Internationally, well, thats another Boeing story.
This thread kinds reminds me of what The Boy (who used to work for an airline) and a friend's Boy (who is a airline mechanic) like to say, "If it ain't Boeing, I ain't goin!"

This proves why you should only fly American aircraft.

</flag waving>

Sorry, my bad, I was thinking that the Continental flight I took recently was on an Airbus, but I was getting it mixed up with JetBlue. Folks in Seattle are the same way about Alaska Airlines - we fly it whenever we can since they're Seattle-based.

Anyway, yes, "If it isn't Boeing, I'm not going!" is an ooooooooold phrase that I hear all the time in this town.

The girl who survived is actually 14, not a toddler as originally reported. So we may find out at least what the final moments were like on that plane...if she can remember it. I understand she's very traumatized.

fly by wire is hands on. but you have a great point. with the size of the aircraft today techo is super important as compared to the old stick and rudder peddels. so basically it ain't going to happen and crash is the only option. if the auto pilot goes out, they can still fly the aircraft. if the hydralics are lost, then there is a major situation and crash. glide paths on planes this size anymore are like stones. i some times wonder if we have not gone to far to build bigger which is not always better. one of the best planes is the boeing 737. one of the best was the lockheed-L1011 that i flew to europe/california and was told this by a pilot so there must be some truth there.

Well that certainly goes without saying, I think most of us would be in this instance.

A lot of the French news sites are reporting that a lot of passengers actually complained and have been complaining about this airline because they(Yemenia) in general suck i.e. cattle call type airline with instances of actually not having seats for people.

This doesn't surprise me. If we're talking Middle East carriers, if it isn't Eithad, Emirates, or Qatar, you're talking ultra low cost carrier that doesn't given a crap about service. In any negative situation, (oversold situation, misconncets, etc) even on a good carrier it becomes the person that yells the loudest and/or the woman who cries first. Thats how I got my carry-on luggage(which when we were moving had ALL of my jewelry, medical records, birth certificates, etc- hell if I was letting that get checked to my final destination) carried on the plane.

I heard on the news that the girl was traveling with her mother. She didn't say much but that she couldn't swim well and was holding onto a piece of wreckage to keep her afloat and rescuers saw her thin arm waving for help.

They said she was (or will be ?) put back on a plane to go back to her father, and though she has been asking about her mom, she hasn't been told that she was the only survivor found. :(

CNN article

If she heard voices, is it possible others were still alive when the initial impact happened, but didn't make it until the time she was rescued? Do you think maybe the voices were actually there or maybe something "made up" by her imagination to help her cope with all of the trauma?!