Passengers Stick Airliner Back Together

[peter991]

GERMAN holidaymakers found themselves using adhesive tape to stick together the interior of a plane operated by a Turkish airline with a troubled safety record, a German newspaper has said.

The midair repair job came during an Onur Air flight from Antalya in southern Turkey to the eastern German city of Leipzig, the Bild newspaper said.

"The pilot started the engines. Suddenly a piece of the interior of the plane fell on our heads. Some of the holidaymakers started to scream," one of the passengers, Gunnar Storch, 34, told Bild.

"A female flight attendant immediately ran into the cockpit to ask for the takeoff to be aborted. But the pilot wasn't in the least bit interested. He just carried on.

"Behind the interior casing, we could see the exposed wiring. It wasn't a very reassuring sight."

Bild published passengers' photographs of the exposed wiring inside the Airbus A321.

Mr Storch, who was returning from a holiday with his wife and two children, said he used tape he had in his hand luggage to attempt to stick the panel back into place as the plane reached an altitude of 33,000 feet (10,000 metres).

The plane later landed safely in Leipzig but Mr Storch said "no one was interested" when he tried to report the incident at the airport.

Bild did not say when the flight took place, and there was no immediate reaction to the report from either the Turkish airline or Airbus.

Onur Air was briefly banned from Dutch skies in May for security reasons, with France, Switzerland and Germany following suit.

The four countries decided on a progressive lifting of the ban after the airline put forward a programme of safety improvements.

Another Turkish airline, Fly Air, has been beset by safety concerns in recent weeks. One of its planes was seized by the French civil aviation authority at the weekend.

France and Belgium have published a list of airlines banned from their airspace in the wake of a string of fatal accidents this summer, including a crash on August 16 that killed 160 people in Venezuela, almost all of them French tourists from the Caribbean island of Martinique.

The French authorities said they had banned five passenger carriers, and Belgium nine cargo companies, but neither Onur Air nor Fly Air were among them.

Source: news.com.au 01 September 2005

Note: This is not Thailand related but no doubt some TV members may want to relate their airline horror stories here too.

[meelousee]

GERMAN holidaymakers found themselves using adhesive tape to stick together the interior of a plane operated by a Turkish airline with a troubled safety record, a German newspaper has said.

The midair repair job came during an Onur Air flight from Antalya in southern Turkey to the eastern German city of Leipzig, the Bild newspaper said.

"The pilot started the engines. Suddenly a piece of the interior of the plane fell on our heads. Some of the holidaymakers started to scream," one of the passengers, Gunnar Storch, 34, told Bild.

"A female flight attendant immediately ran into the cockpit to ask for the takeoff to be aborted. But the pilot wasn't in the least bit interested. He just carried on.

"Behind the interior casing, we could see the exposed wiring. It wasn't a very reassuring sight."

Bild published passengers' photographs of the exposed wiring inside the Airbus A321.

Mr Storch, who was returning from a holiday with his wife and two children, said he used tape he had in his hand luggage to attempt to stick the panel back into place as the plane reached an altitude of 33,000 feet (10,000 metres).

The plane later landed safely in Leipzig but Mr Storch said "no one was interested" when he tried to report the incident at the airport.

Bild did not say when the flight took place, and there was no immediate reaction to the report from either the Turkish airline or Airbus.

Onur Air was briefly banned from Dutch skies in May for security reasons, with France, Switzerland and Germany following suit.

The four countries decided on a progressive lifting of the ban after the airline put forward a programme of safety improvements.

Another Turkish airline, Fly Air, has been beset by safety concerns in recent weeks. One of its planes was seized by the French civil aviation authority at the weekend.

France and Belgium have published a list of airlines banned from their airspace in the wake of a string of fatal accidents this summer, including a crash on August 16 that killed 160 people in Venezuela, almost all of them French tourists from the Caribbean island of Martinique.

The French authorities said they had banned five passenger carriers, and Belgium nine cargo companies, but neither Onur Air nor Fly Air were among them.

Source: news.com.au 01 September 2005

Note: This is not Thailand related but no doubt some TV members may want to relate their airline horror stories here too.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I have posted this statement more than one time.

Budget carrier means they dont have a budget to do it right. Its your life do what you want. But just remember these things. This incident was null, but suppose this was an engine problem that MANAGEMENT ignored?

[cdnvic]

I have posted this statement more than one time.

Budget carrier means they dont have a budget to do it right. Its your life do what you want. But just remember these things. This incident was null, but suppose this was an engine problem that MANAGEMENT ignored? 

What about Easyjet, Westjet, Southwest, Frontier, AirTran, etc?

Many budget carriers save their money by using secondary airports, not having unionized staff, eliminating meals, movies, and other in-flight conveniences, as well as fast turn-around times at the gates.

Its important to seperate them from the likes of Phuket Air, and other third rate operations.

All of the worst air disasters in history have been with non-budget carriers.

cv

[Ricardo]

Good low-cost airlines use new/almost-new aircraft, which are lower-maintenance & more-reliable, to achieve faster turn-rounds & higher-utilisation.

Bad low-cost airlines think they can get the same reliability out of clapped-out elderly aircraft, which are much cheaper to lease, but inherently less reliable & safe. The key to keeping them flying, while less reliable than new aircraft, is the (expensive) maintenance you must give them.

As a Thai airline-owner with limited funds, would you spend the extra money, on new aircarft ? Even Nok-Air use their parent-company's cast-offs !

[chownah]

Duct tape!!!! It'll fix anything!!!

[ilyushin]

Budget airlines are not a new thing, Rollin King and Herb Kelleher developed the original concept back in 1971; a ticketless airline (Southwest Airlines) reducing frills and aiming squarely at offering the lowest possible prices. Shares trading today : LUV $13.14.

Many years later ailing carrier, RyanAir through profit warnings and drifting balance sheet, decided it needed a shot in the arm and adopted and modernised the ethos of King and Kelleher's business model. Cutting the frills and focusing on the functionality.

This proved a phenomenal success, shorter range flights cutting out the unnecessary frills. A logical step forward..

Launched at just the right time EasyJet tapped into the Zeitgeist of web based travel, offering a purely web-based operation, flights booked only though the web-site, sidestepping overheads and bringing costs down for the punter.

The factors above contributed to the airlines' relative successes, the most pivotal development was EasyJet's pricing model.

Traditionally, airlines like British Airways profited on those who booked early, reducing prices as the date of travel approached. EasyJet's pricing model effectively turned this on it's head, rewarding those who bought early and raising prices as the date of travel approached.

Following market deregulation in 1997, the practices laid down by these EasyJet and RyanAir were adopted by many other budget operators both in the UK, throughout Europe and the world.

Budget Airline Definition

Budget airlines don't issue tickets.

Budget airlines don't do connections.

Budget airlines have short check in times.

Budget airlines promote and sell journey 'legs' separately.

Budget airlines have one class, budget.

Budget airlines sell direct to the public.

Budget airlines don't have free meals or entertainment.

Asian budget carriers also think reducing maintenance and using aged aircraft is considered a budget carrier. Certainly is a budget airline based on how much they put into the airline and business model.

Fly high or don't fly at all!

Great comment:

chownah Posted Today, 2005-09-02 11:45

Duct tape!!!! It'll fix anything!!!

Have a great weekend fellow members!

[ilyushin]

I have posted this statement more than one time.

Budget carrier means they dont have a budget to do it right. Its your life do what you want. But just remember these things. This incident was null, but suppose this was an engine problem that MANAGEMENT ignored? 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

What about Easyjet, Westjet, Southwest, Frontier, AirTran, etc?

Many budget carriers save their money by using secondary airports, not having unionized staff, eliminating meals, movies, and other in-flight conveniences, as well as fast turn-around times at the gates.

Its important to seperate them from the likes of Phuket Air, and other third rate operations.

All of the worst air disasters in history have been with non-budget carriers.

cv

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Budget carriers can't afford an accident. Not in the budget!

[meelousee]

All of the worst air disasters in history have been with non-budget carriers.

cv

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That is my point exactly. But I lump them together, because of the fact they dont chage full rates and dont pay full rates to employees Some are not fully qualified, and if they can put off a maintence schedule they will do so only to boost profit.

Cut cost, cut corners is no way to do business and in airline business it is dangerous to us all. I feel this is true irrespective of where they are based.

Edited September 2, 2005 by meelousee

[cdnvic]

I'll fly Westjet, Easyjet, Frontier, etc, before I will fly some mainline carriers. As Ilyusin pointed out so well, it is NOT maintenence that gets cut to save funds.

Yes, they don't pay as much as unionized mainline carriers, but unlike those carriers many do profit sharing with their employees who are as qualified as their mainline counterparts.

If you have actual evidence of of airlines padding profits by using inadaquate maintenence, please feel free to post it. Otherwise its only hearsay, and I'm certain a few aircraft engineers out there will take much offense to it.

cv

All of the worst air disasters in history have been with non-budget carriers.

cv

That is my point exactly. But I lump them together, because of the fact they dont chage full rates and dont pay full rates to employees Some are not fully qualified, and if they can put off a maintence schedule they will do so only to boost profit.

Cut cost, cut corners is no way to do business and in airline business it is dangerous to us all. I feel this is true irrespective of where they are based.

[AsiaWolfie]

quote]

I have posted this statement more than one time.

Budget carrier means they dont have a budget to do it right. Its your life do what you want. But just remember these things. This incident was null, but suppose this was an engine problem that MANAGEMENT ignored?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

BIG NONSENSE..... ONUR is not a budget airline... its just one of the many Charter airlines from Turkey...... but I agree that most Turkish airlines cannot be considered safe.... even their national carrier is on the rock-bottom-end of the ranking (rank 50 out of 50 of the biggest airlines in the world, with a huge gap to rank 49) when it comes to accidents....