Is Tg In Trouble?

[sibeymai]

It's a bit late to speculate on TG's first crash.

[sorensen]

It's a bit late to speculate on TG's first crash.

OK then, first in 2009....many more to come after that!

[sibeymai]

it's a bit morbid to speculate on this subject. But from a statistical viewpoint it would be interesting to track the accident rate per miles flown during the current economic slowdown compared to periods when the airlines are flush with cash.

Anybody have numbers on this ?

[neverdie]

it's a bit morbid to speculate on this subject. But from a statistical viewpoint it would be interesting to track the accident rate per miles flown during the current economic slowdown compared to periods when the airlines are flush with cash.

Anybody have numbers on this ?

I don't know about that, but it will be interesting to see what is going to be the cause of the next few years worth of Aircraft accidents.....having said that, it has proven itself time and time again, a safe way to travel....a true credit to those in the design & operation of aircraft generally.

I recently had a delayed flight because a TG aircraft went offline because of a repair needed. I was at the checkin when some fellow went off his brain about it to the check-in staff....I later made a comment within ear shot of him that it was good that the fault was picked up while the plane was on the ground & not at 35,000ft >>> apparently SKY HOOKS are not available for aircrafts that break in mid sky! Some people ...geeze

[sibeymai]

if it weren't for idiots the rest of us wouldn't look so smart.

[Rinrada]

In a couple or LESS years time various outfits..Etti-Emmi-Omani-Quatari....and maybe some others will be flying A380s with better all round facilities, incl. seating comfort,in flight ents and milage programes superior to / than the likes of TG-BA-QA-(maybe not SG) but with the only real hangup of a mid flight stop which is definately a pit Derrier ....but at up to HALF of the price of the OLD Nationals.....so wheres the competation....or is it a case of MPRAI

[Briggsy]

MPRAI???

I'll take a stab in the dark. My Painful Ringpiece Aches Incessantly. No pun intended.

Go on, spill the beans, man.

[junkofdavid2]

TG reported a loss of $300 million in Q2, more than $3,000,000 a day in losses. I haven't followed TG's revenue since then, but I am sure they are still in the red.

That said, I doubt they will file for Chapter 11 anytime soon, so our miles should be save.

They sure the hel_l won't be filling for Chapter 11 because they are not a US company!

I would think if they were to go bankrupt the government of the day would come to their rescue. In countries like Thailand having a flag carrier is just too important to let one go bankrupt.

They are not a US company but even so if they where there wont be able to use chapter 11 because very soon the whole of the usa would be on chapter 11,thanks to Bush.

Why blame Bush it is the peoples fault for borrowing too much and buying foreign products.NOBAMA will destroy the country.

It's always easiest and most convenient to blame the sitting president on whose lap the crisis exploded... even if a crisis was started by a predecessor's policies.

Don't we all know that?

[neverdie]

MPRAI???

I'll take a stab in the dark. My Painful Ringpiece Aches Incessantly. No pun intended.

Go on, spill the beans, man.

MPRAI = Mai Pben Rai, sure you have heard that plenty of times.

[ozfarang81]

countdown to thai's first crash>? you mean countback? or are we forgetting the couple of hundred people they killed in a couple of crashes in the 90s? Due to incompetent pilots!

Those commenting on Ansett shouldnt necessarily believe everything that the media and CASA had to say about the 767 grounding.

Most airlines have things go wrong, look at Qantas of late, the australian media have had a field day on them, everytime a flight is delayed 5 mins its a headline. Media asking the public to sms with every incident they encounter on Qantas to egt paid! Once the media pounce on an airline they dont stop for months, it happened to Ansett, its happened to Qantas this year and it will happen again to other carriers. 99% of journalists have zero idea how to tell the difference between a 737 and a 767 and are clueless twits.

as for the original point of this post, Thai Airways will continue on for years, its had a bad year in 2008 but its previous performance has turned profits in years before that. financial info is avail at their web site... briefly

net profit (millions of baht) 2007 - 6342 2006 - 8991 2005 - 6777 2003 - 10077

so things arent THAT BAD! and the govt can't afford for the airline to go.

[ozfarang81]

In a couple or LESS years time various outfits..Etti-Emmi-Omani-Quatari....and maybe some others will be flying A380s with better all round facilities, incl. seating comfort,in flight ents and milage programes superior to / than the likes of TG-BA-QA-(maybe not SG) but with the only real hangup of a mid flight stop which is definately a pit Derrier ....but at up to HALF of the price of the OLD Nationals.....so wheres the competation....or is it a case of MPRAI

Thai have A380 on order. The Thai economy product on 777-200ER is very good and almost equivalent to SQ new conomy on A380 and777-300ER. And Qantas (QF) have 3 A380 already, and many more on the way with great economy product

[The Philosopher]

The scarey thing is that when an airline starts to suffer financially, the first thing to suffer is normally the safety maintenance schedules.

I recall when Ansett went broke a few years ago, things started disappearing from inside the aircraft....nothing too serious, just life vests, safety slides, fire extinguishers etc ....only the stuff you need in an emergency situation .

As history has shown with aircraft accidents, when human error isnt involved, its normally so abscure little part somewhere that wasnt replaced or serviced when it should of been that downs the aircraft. I wonder what maintance schedules have been adjusted at thai recently?

What rubbish the system and process of maintenance could not be completed in part or reduced. There would have to ba a considerable conspiricy involving both ground and air crew if discovered could lead to prison.

[neverdie]

The scarey thing is that when an airline starts to suffer financially, the first thing to suffer is normally the safety maintenance schedules.

I recall when Ansett went broke a few years ago, things started disappearing from inside the aircraft....nothing too serious, just life vests, safety slides, fire extinguishers etc ....only the stuff you need in an emergency situation .

As history has shown with aircraft accidents, when human error isnt involved, its normally so abscure little part somewhere that wasnt replaced or serviced when it should of been that downs the aircraft. I wonder what maintance schedules have been adjusted at thai recently?

What rubbish the system and process of maintenance could not be completed in part or reduced. There would have to ba a considerable conspiricy involving both ground and air crew if discovered could lead to prison.

If you were to read what I said, I used the word suffer, I didnt suggest that the maintance stops all together, crikey!

You need to realise how the industry is regulated, this information is fact, not rubbish, there is also plenty of information on line about this. There is also some excellent reading material in the various books that have been published on this topic.

I am simply saying that with many of the maintance schedules (that are released with an aircraft when it is built) have 'guidelines' for the owners of the aircraft (or in acutal fact, as many aircrafts are leased - for the owners of the lease) regarding maintance. These guidelines give the airline information on what should be looked at & how often something should be looked at. The airlines develop there own maintance schedules from there.

There is DATA that has shown in past crashes that certain parts of maintance schedules were either NOT carried out or the maintance schedule had been adjusted to increase the amount of time between the checking or frequency of a certain part or inspection.

Its fact & airlines in the past have been prosecuted for it.

But anyway since you have spoken with such great authority and wisdom & just dismissed what I have said with one almighty sentence, I can rest assured you have everything in hand. Thanks for that

[Ricardo]

The scarey thing is that when an airline starts to suffer financially, the first thing to suffer is normally the safety maintenance schedules.

I recall when Ansett went broke a few years ago, things started disappearing from inside the aircraft....nothing too serious, just life vests, safety slides, fire extinguishers etc ....only the stuff you need in an emergency situation .

As history has shown with aircraft accidents, when human error isnt involved, its normally so abscure little part somewhere that wasnt replaced or serviced when it should of been that downs the aircraft. I wonder what maintance schedules have been adjusted at thai recently?

What rubbish the system and process of maintenance could not be completed in part or reduced. There would have to ba a considerable conspiricy involving both ground and air crew if discovered could lead to prison.

Unless perhaps the Thai owner plays golf regularly with the director of the thai D.C.A. ? Never mind the poor maintenance, they can always blame the foreign pilots or farang management, when things go wrong.

What happens when the airline carries on flying, even after its farang pilots all quit or are fired, for refusing to fly over-the-legal-limits, they are just replaced with dodgy indonesian pilots !

When I worked at a reputable farang airline, on the admin side of things, in the '80s, safety was never allowed or encouraged to be compromised, even though we were a lower-cost holiday-charter airline. Quite right too !

Unfortunately this is not true of the 3rd-world, the FAA are rumoured to be unhappy with the thai D.C.A. and the standards it maintains, which is perhaps why 1-2-Avoid recently had its licenses pulled for some months. Poo-Air are also still flying, in other countries, not here. It might be a mistake to assume that normal high standards of crewing or maintenance apply here.

[neverdie]

The scarey thing is that when an airline starts to suffer financially, the first thing to suffer is normally the safety maintenance schedules.

I recall when Ansett went broke a few years ago, things started disappearing from inside the aircraft....nothing too serious, just life vests, safety slides, fire extinguishers etc ....only the stuff you need in an emergency situation .

As history has shown with aircraft accidents, when human error isnt involved, its normally so abscure little part somewhere that wasnt replaced or serviced when it should of been that downs the aircraft. I wonder what maintance schedules have been adjusted at thai recently?

What rubbish the system and process of maintenance could not be completed in part or reduced. There would have to ba a considerable conspiricy involving both ground and air crew if discovered could lead to prison.

Unless perhaps the Thai owner plays golf regularly with the director of the thai D.C.A. ? Never mind the poor maintenance, they can always blame the foreign pilots or farang management, when things go wrong.

What happens when the airline carries on flying, even after its farang pilots all quit or are fired, for refusing to fly over-the-legal-limits, they are just replaced with dodgy indonesian pilots !

When I worked at a reputable farang airline, on the admin side of things, in the '80s, safety was never allowed or encouraged to be compromised, even though we were a lower-cost holiday-charter airline. Quite right too !

Unfortunately this is not true of the 3rd-world, the FAA are rumoured to be unhappy with the thai D.C.A. and the standards it maintains, which is perhaps why 1-2-Avoid recently had its licenses pulled for some months. Poo-Air are also still flying, in other countries, not here. It might be a mistake to assume that normal high standards of crewing or maintenance apply here.

Good Post Ricardo & very good point about some airlines chosing to shift maintance work offshore to places where it can be done @ cheaper rates.....I believe this has been done recently with Qantas & at the time it caused a fair bit of industrial stink in Australia.

Some people would actually be surprised if they got off their high horse & actually looked into something before they posted.

Everything aside, air travel is still very safe compared to other modes of transport.

[tw25rw]

One would hope that a big advantage of being run by ex air force people was that they were strict about maintenance.

The fleet does need a refresh, but not necessarily for safety reasons.

[neverdie]

I posted previously about cases of Airlines increasing or extending the intervals between certain services during periods of tight economic times.

I recall a number of posters were critical of what I said, some stating that it was absolute RUBBISH!

At the time I couldnt recall which fatal aircraft crashes related to service intervals being stretched.I now recall that one case where this type of thing was a direct cause of an Airline crash where 88 people were killed, it was Alaskan Airlines flight crashed in January, 2000, all people on the plane were killed and subsequent investigations revealed that Alaskan Airlines were suffering financial hardship & had adjusted their service schedules in relation to a number of their aircraft.

The following is part of a summary from that investigation:-

While preparing to make an emergency landing at Los Angeles International Airport control was lost by Alaskan Airlines plane MD-83 with 88 Passengers and crew onboard. The Aircraft was seen by other aircrafts pilots in a nose-down attitude, spinning and tumbling in a continuous roll, inverted, before it impacted the sea. Loss of airplane pitch control resulting from in-flight failure of the horizontal stabilizer trim system jackscrew assembly's nut thread. The component failed because of excessive wear resulting from Alaska Airlines' insufficient lubrication of the jackscrew assembly. Subsequent Investigations revealed that one of the main contributing factors to the accident were Alaska Airlines' extended lubrication intervals. At the time of the accident Alaska Airlines were suffering from financial downturn.

Theres an episode on you tube of Aircraft Accident Investigation that outlines the full case.

Interesting stuff & I wonder during in the current economic times how long it will be before we start seeing more cases like this??

Edited February 4, 2009 by neverdie