Pilots praised for crash landing

Plane's wheels failed to open properly

An airline crew who had to crash land a Virgin Airbus at Heathrow Airport after part of the landing gear jammed have been praised in an official report.

The crew realised there was a problem when one of the jet's sets of wheels failed to open properly shortly before they were due to land the flight from Los Angeles in November 1997.

It's all in a day's work

Captain Tim Barnby

Apart from the technical problems, the crew had to contend with cross wind, inadequate information from an emergency reference book and the fact that the plane was fast running out of fuel.

But despite the problems the aircraft was landed amid sparks and flame and all 114 passengers and crew were safely evacuated, with just seven suffering minor injuries.

The report from the Air Accidents Investigation Branch said the pilot and his two co-pilots made a valuable contribution to the team and "displayed a high degree of initiative and motivation".

"After the successful evacuation, a number of passengers expressed their gratitude to the crew for their handling of the situation," it added.

Flames

After the landing, the plane's captain, Tim Barnby, a former British aerobatic flying champion, said: "I don't think what I did was heroic. It's all in a day's work."

The flight was only eight miles from its final approach to Heathrow when the landing gear problem became apparent to the flight deck crew of Captain Barnby, 40, and co-pilots Andrew Morley and Craig Matheson.

The left landing gear had been jammed by a part of the brake system which had come loose after a torque rod pin had fallen out, said the report.

The pin was later found on the runway at Los Angeles airport.

Unable to view the damage themselves, the crew did a "flypast" of the Heathrow control tower so that officials on the ground could assess the state of the aircraft.

Quick thinking

They consulted the manufacturers' quick reference handbook but this did not give "the best information" about a landing in such circumstances, the report said.

Thinking quickly under pressure, Captain Barnby decided to amend the suggested handbook procedures.

Flying the plane manually himself, he arranged a sequence of engine shutdowns and kept the left wing of the aircraft raised for as long as possible.

Part of the number four engine on the right side scraped the runway as the aircraft banked to the right and there was a brief fire as the aircraft slowed down.

During the landing all four tyres on the right-hand landing gear burst and the wheels broke up.

Fire crews sprayed the fuselage with foam as passengers used emergency chutes to get onto the tarmac.