Great Tour of the A380 Cockpit

I just watched this great video, in which a Lufthansa A380 pilot explains the cockpit of the super jumbo. If you're interested in cockpits and don't mind German accents, then you should watch this!

Lufthansa Cargo MD-11 Crash-Lands in Riyadh

I was shocked this morning to read that a Lufthansa Cargo MD-11 crash-landed in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, earlier today.

The pilot of Lufthansa Cargo flight LH8460 reported a fire in the cargo bay of the McDonnell Douglas MD-11 as he approached King Khaled International Airport in Riyadh. Witnesses report black smoke coming from the plane prior to touch down. The plane was scheduled to continue to Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates after leaving Riyadh. At the time of the crash it was carrying 80 tons of freight. Both, the pilot and the co-pilot survived and were brought to a hospital. Both are in "good" condition. There have been no deaths caused by the crash.

In the history of Lufthansa Cargo, this is the first accident that totally destroyed a plane. At this point, pilot error can be ruled out as the cause and the cause of the fire will have to be determined. Over the last year and a half, three MD-11s were totally destroyed in accidents, all of them freighters.

To read the Bloomberg piece, please click here.

Lufthansa Receives First A380

Thursday was a very exciting day for Europe's second largest airline Lufthansa: It finally received its first A380, nicknamed "Lady Bee" (I still hate that name) and officially titled "Frankfurt am Main." Lufthansa is only the second European airline to receive the A380, after Air France, which is using the super jumbo on its route from Paris to JFK.

Lufthansa has announced it will be flying the first three A380s being delivered this year on routes to Tokyo, Beijing and Johannesburg. The first flight with passengers will bring Germany's national soccer team to South Africa in early June for the World Cup. Regular A380 flights can already be booked through Lufthansa's Web site. Unfortunately for me, LH does not plan to use the A380 on routes to North America until mid of 2011 earliest.

Compared to other airlines, especially those from the Persian Gulf and Asia (Emirates, Singapore Airlines, etc.), Lufthansa has been reluctant to buy a lot of A380s. Right now, only 15 A380s have been ordered by Germany's biggest airline, compared to 20 Boeing 747-8s. This is contrary to LH's overall strategy to replace fuel-consuming Boeing aircraft with more fuel-efficient Airbuses, especially for short-haul planes. Obviously, Lufthansa does not want to become too dependent on only one manufacturer when it comes to long-haul aircraft and similar approaches can be observed for most other big airlines. Interestingly, Lufthansa has neither placed orders for the 787 nor the A350. But the German airline has always been very picky when it comes to aircraft orders. In contrast to most other airlines, Lufthansa never owned the extremely popular 777. It also refused to order the 757 and the 767, which it only used for its former subsidiary Condor.

To read Lufthansa's press release on the A380 delivery, please click here.

To see more pictures of the new Lufthansa flagship, please click here.

Two Surprises About Lufthansa's A380

The wait is almost over. Lufthansa is scheduled to receive its first Airbus A380 in May. Over the last couple of months people could vote on lufthansa.com which name they want to give this new, gigantic plane. The idea was: The A380 should have a nickname, like "Jumbo Jet" for the 747. I personally suggested "Mega Jet", "Giga Jet" and "Jet 2.0" and a total of more than 10,000 suggestions were submitted. A few days ago Lufthansa announced it had made a decision. And, in my opinion, they mad a horrible decision. The A380 is now called "Lady Bee"! Awful, isn't it? I am very disappointed by this decision. Why bee??? It doesn't look like a bee. Much more like a whale. Oh well, I really doubt people will start calling the A380 "Lady Bee". I will definitely refuse to do so.

Another surprise was Lufthansa's announcement of the A380's destinations. Initially, LH hinted they would use the "Lady Bee" on its busy route from Frankfurt to New York's JFK airport. Today, however, Germany's largest airline announced it would use the first four A380s it is receiving this year on routes to Tokyo, Beijing and Johannesburg. This is really sad for me to hear. I was planning to take LH's A380 back home to Frankfurt sometime this year, which will not happen now.

All in all, two very disappointing announcements, Lufthansa! I am disappointed, but still love you...

Lufthansa to Resume Flights to Iraq in April

German national carrier Lufthansa yesterday announced it would start flying to Iraq again on April 25, 20 years after it stopped service during the first Iraq war. The airline will use an A319 for the Frankfurt - Erbil service and the flight will operate four times a week. Lufthansa also plans to offer service to Iraq's capital Baghdad soon and is currently making the necessary preparations to do so.

To read the press release, please click here.

Lufthansa's Airbus A380 - First Flight

Nice video about Lufthansa's first A380, which will be delivered in the spring of this year. To my knowledge, the first flight will bring Germany's soccer team to South Africa for this year's World Championship. What a lovely plane...

So What Happened in Hamburg in March 2008?

The weather in Hamburg was nasty on March 1, 2008. It was nasty pretty much all over Europe. LH 44, an Airbus A320, was en route from Munich to Hamburg during the storm "Emma" when it tried to land at Hamburg's Fuhlsbüttel airport in strong crosswinds. Seconds before touch down, the Airbus was hit by a strong gust of wind and its left wingtip made contact with the rundway, causing the pilots to go around. The plane landed without any problems a few minutes later and nobody was injured. However, thousands of people who watched the video online or on TV have been asking themselves what happened here? Was it the pilots' fault? Was the wind just too strong and should they have shut down the airport during the storm? Was there a problem with the fly-by-wire system? Last week, the German Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation (BFU) issued its final report on the accident.

But before I summarize the report's key facts, you should watch the video again:



Initially, people praised the pilots for their "heroic" reaction. They pulled the plane back up and, consequently, avoided a crash. Then, experts started to doubt this version and asked why the pilots didn't use a different runway at the airport in the first place, one that was better suited for landing in strong winds? And why was the 24-year old, inexperienced co-pilot flying in such bad conditions and not the captain himself? Finally, Airbus's fly-by-wire system was blamed for causing the accident. By switching to "Ground Mode" when the plane's first pair of tires hit the runway, the system didn't allow the pilots to fully control the plane anymore - it limited the inputs the pilots could give via the sidesticks, which prevented them from leveling the wings again quickly.

The BFU's report offers some interesting insight into what really went wrong on March 1, 2008. First of all, the crew was well trained to land the plane in weather conditions like those present on this day in the spring of 2008. Even the 24-year old co-pilot had adequate training to land the A320 in strong crosswinds and the captain is not to be blamed for letting her land the plane. He took over control as soon as it was clear a go-around was necessary. However, the cockpit crew is is still at least partly to be blamed for this accident. They knew that there were crosswinds with gusts of up to 55 kts and they still decided to land on one particular runway that was not the wisest pick under the given conditions. Also, the A320 is only approved for crosswinds of up to 38 kts. The cockpit crew should have been aware of that. The BFU report states that most pilots are not aware of the crosswinds limits and the BFU blames Airbus and Lufthansa for not communicating those limits clearly enough. I think this is pretty ridiculous, since even I know that there are limits for landing a plane in crosswinds and I am not (yet) a pilot. So this is a pretty lame excuse.

Another factor here was the impact of Airbus's fly-by-wire (FBW) system. As soon as an Airbus plane touches the runway with one of its tires, the FBW automatically switches from "Flare Mode" (which is operating during the approach) to "Ground Mode" (which applies when a plane is on the ground). During Flare Mode the pilots are allowed to give inputs within the entire scope of permissible commands, during Ground Mode this is no longer the case. But why did Airbus design the FBW to switch into Ground Mode before at least all of the tires in the rear of the plane touch the ground? Well, the reason for this is: Airbus wants to prevent pilot-induced oscillation shortly before the plane touches the runway, which is actually pretty smart. This means, the pilots' controls over the ailerons are very limited when the system switches to Ground Mode. Ironically, this was implemented to prevent the plane from hitting the ground with its wingtips. In this specific instance, however, it caused some trouble, since the plane didn't react to the pilots' inputs and the FBW took over control for several seconds, leaving the pilots with very limited control over the plane. The only option for them was: Get the plane to switch into Flare Mode by increasing speed and taking off again. However, the pilots said they were not aware of these Ground Mode limitations either.

To summarize this: In the end, several factors contributed to the accident. I have to say though that this was not as severe as some people and the media made it look like. This was not an "almost crash" at all. There was some minor damage to the plane, but it absolutely didn't render it uncontrollable. The first factor was: The pilots landed in crosswinds that were too high for the A320 and they should have known that. However, they didn't. I blame Lufthansa more than Airbus. Lufthansa should inform all their pilots about crosswind limits for all its planes. Second, the crew didn't choose the best runway for the wind conditions. They should have chosen the runway they used for their second (successful) landing attempt in the first place. Third, pilots have to be aware that Airbuses switch into Ground Mode as soon as one tire hits the runway. It wouldn't have helped in this case, since there was nothing they could have done, but at least it wouldn't have been a surprise.

Should Airbus change their FBW system and make it switch to Ground Mode only after the tires on both sides touch the ground? Absolutely not! This was probably the first time an accident happened because of the FBW during landing in crosswinds. I am sure it has already prevented dozens of accidents in the past.