Air France A-340 crashed landing at Toronto

[EHM-1511 Theodore]

Just saw the news.Air France A-340 crashed(over-run the runway)after landing at fair weather,at Toronto's Pearson Intl.All pax escaped untuched.
God by their side......

[EHM-0948 Bruno]

I saw it too on the news. But they said that the airplane was hit by a lightning bolt....

[EHM-1511 Theodore]

We'll see,let the time pass.
I download real weather from Jeppesen and the weather was:
clouds at 1100ft   visibility 8km   w/speed 8kts
It seems good exept the w/speed

[EHM-1511 Theodore]

Sorry,w/speed was 15 kts  not 8 kts

[EHM-1539 Pierre]

Was waken up at 2 in the morning by Air France who wanted to speak to my mom (who is part of the volunteers for the crisis cell).
Seems like it got a power failure due to the lightning bolt 1 minute before landing.
No deads, just 14 minor wounded it seems. Thank god.

[EHM-1343 Jonathan]

ok....BBC news24 in the UK, was reporting that it may have aquaplaned after landing on a wet runway...initially the weather was so bad the airport was closed for 2 hrs....and this was on of the first movements after the re-opening.

For those of you who don't now aquaplaning in when the aircraft or transport is seperated from the runway by a layer of water....and brakes have no effect.....glad nobody died today.

[EHM-0948 Bruno]

Ok.

So, until now, the conclusions are :

1. The airplane was struck by a lightning bolt 1 min before the landing.
2. The airplane made aquaplaning when it touched the wheels on the ground.

Maybe the airplane got no brakes due to electric power shutdown....

[EHM-0654 Murray]

Also, *if* one or both of the engines had been knocked out (going by the Radio 4 news reports, the left wing was ablaze by the time  it ran down the embankment after the runway ended...) then there would be no way the flight crew would have used the reversers, which would have a huge effect on how much non-mechanical braking they could have brought to bear.

[EHM-0948 Bruno]

Then maybe that could help Airbus company to build a system that even when electricty is offline, the engines still work ... no ? ...

[EHM-1365 Benjamin]

Originally posted by Murray Crane
Also, *if* one or both of the engines had been knocked out...

Thought it was an A340

Bruno, are you thinking some emergency system that activates the brakes (probably have to be permanently) once certain criterea are reached?

[EHM-0654 Murray]

Originally posted by Murray Crane
Also, *if* one or both of the engines had been...

Should have read, "Also, *if* one or both of the left engines had been...". Sorry if any confusion was caused (A340 being 4-engined...)

Anyhow, the crew deserve praise for getting her evacuated in under 5 minutes...

[EHM-1655 Scott]

Well on the pictures and footage the reversers on the engines were deployed and the brakes have nothing to do with the electrical system all hydraullic run of the engine driven hydraulic pumps. I guess we will have to wait for the Canadian Authorities to find the cause!

[EHM-1001 Robert]

I have seen a video animation, where the engines 1-2 (left) was on fire then the airplane run off the runway to the right...maybe because of aquaplanning, maybe because of the right engines operated the reversers.

What I do not understand is the passengers said after touchdown, the plane started bouncing on the runway...this is not a typical aquaplanning affect.

The aquaplanning depends mainly on the width of the waterlayer, and the weight of the object. A nearly 1 ton F1 racecar can go aquaplanning on about 3 milimeters of water. Imagine how much water needed for the 300 tons beast.

Hopefully everybody survived.

[EHM-1655 Scott]

Well I know here were I live the runway has slots all alond it to allow the water to drain off and thus making aquaplaning impossible. I would ahve thought this would be wordwide standard?

[EHM-0654 Murray]

Scott/Robert

If you're correct and they had both right engines reversing, then yes, it would slew to the right under engine braking.

And Robert, everyone survived the landing (crew and passenger), hence my praise for the crew, and I'll add local emergency crews to my praise list as well, if I may.

[EHM-1464 Andrew]

bumping possibly ABS locking and unlocking the wheels under heavy braking?

EHM-1365 -- I believe emergancy braking is a permanant thing as I recall a topic about them needing to be changed every time as they often catch fire?

[EHM-0005 Maarten]

ABS = Automatic Braking System
Anti-skid = To avoid blocking of the wheels (called "ABS" in cars)