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Jesus what a horrible way to start your year. And that's just the fear of it maybe happening. Atleast the warnings seem to have come reasonably early this time.
Oh bugger!
On a slightly ghoulish note, the BBC's Fukushima podcast series on Sounds is A1. It's in a dramatised documentary style detailing the effects/fallout of the last major tsunami (obv).
https://twitter.com/rie894/status/1741727910913040434?t=2O9AeTkLCoKDZx9f0pyyvA&s=19
See the water rocking in the canal!
Daughter is in Kyoto didn't feel anything but are advised not to travel to coast, purple are is being evacuated.
Seems like the tsunami's are being downgraded, which is good news
Let's hope that Japan's incredible building resilience has worked too.
Christ, now a couple of planes have collided at Haneda airport. Apparently no deaths, hope that's correct.
https://twitter.com/FlightEmergency/status/1742112892684480644
did well to get everyone off ! (though 5 of the crew of the coastguard plane no so lucky) passanger aircraft interiors do burn well don't they !
Airline says everyone accounted for, 5/6 Coastguard in other plane missing. Grim.
I'm going to hazard a guess here based on the video, it looks to me like the coastguard plane took out the undercarriage and ruptured the fuel tank on the Airbus, but it skidded far enough that most of the fuel had escaped by the time it stopped so the fire was small enough for everyone to escape. Could easily have been so much worse.
Looks that way to me as well. There seems to be a tail light flash very close to the airliner just before the explosion.
passanger aircraft interiors do burn well don’t they !
Having blown up a passenger airliner..... aircraft interiors don't burn at all. The lockers, lining, upholstery etc were all fine - we subjected the plane parts to all sorts of flavours of exxplosive and nothing was even smouldering after each blast. We blew it up in sections and for one section we packed a section fuselage - hold and lockers - with luggage. What's surprisingly flammable is peoples's belongings - Nylon and plastic suitcases and polyester clothing, perfume, aftershave (and nowadays a little lithium battery in every phone, laptop, watch, vape, torch, earphone etc) burned like fury - immediately ablaze and not at all keen on being put out. The initial report I read seem to suggest there was already a fire on board when the plane was landing.
I'm not a tower controller but from what I can see one of 2 things has happened.
ATC has cleared the coastguard on to the runway.
Or
The coastguard aircraft has made an unauthorised runway incursion.
The video of the plane urning is horrifying. Flames coming from every window, and at the front end it seems like the skin of the fuselage itself is burning (or melting?). If the upholstery etc is fire retardant, is all that really just from luggage?
I was in Kanazawa (near the epicentre) in November. The Japanese do seem well prepared for earthquakes. Although it still looks like there were some fatalities. What a horrible start to the year.
There is an awful lot of cabling and I'd imagine even the fire retardant bits burn when they get hot enough.
is all that really just from luggage?
Don't forget theres cargo other than the passengers belongings on board - so more than the passengers themselves have brought on board - winter time means there'll just be a greater volume of stuff in peoples luggage too. But yes - clothes really, really burn quite enthusiastically - stuff like fleeces turn into a tenacious sticky, running, burning glue (having had my own fleece catch fire once then having the burning goo stuck to my hands trying to put myself out - the molten polyester ran onto my jeans and burnt through those in seconds too - it was an interesting bus ride home after that incident 🙂 ).
fire retardant bits burn when they get hot enough.
Fire retardants prevent something being the source of ignition - make it difficult to ignite, but dosen't make it impossible to burn. Once stuff like clothing is alight it'll overcome the retardant qualities of the stuff around it
Aluminium will burn when it gets hot enough too (CF HMS Sheffield). Plus there will be hydraulic lines running the length of the aircraft.
Here's the video of the plane burning.
https://twitter.com/wmanzione/status/1742122592503255502
Aluminium will burn when it gets hot enough too<br /><br />
I think the A350 is carbon fibre / composite? Which I guess also burns.
I think the A350 is carbon fibre / composite? Which I guess also burns.
53% composite according to wiki.
There's also a fuel tank right under the fuselage and a fuel line back to the APU in the tail. Even if the collision ruptured two tanks, it's hard to see how it could have ruptured all three so there will have still be a lot of fuel on board.
Footage from inside the plane. Amazing they all got off that
https://twitter.com/hsnain901/status/1742124007560818850?s=46&t=e_-0N9OefibJwaXIxCsLGg
From the link above, "People can be heard screaming."
> https://twitter.com/hsnain901/status/1742124007560818850?s=46&t=e_-0N9OefibJwaXIxCsLGg <
fire retardant bits burn when they get hot enough.
Same happened at Grenfell, the individual items are fire retardant, but that prevents things like a spark landing on fabric, a wiring fault, or a bulb blowing in a lamp from turning into a fire. It doesn't prevent it eventually burning given sufficient heat/oxygen. For that you need an inert material.
Can done in a few ways, some materials self-extinguish by releasing lots of inert gas (water, CO2, etc), some reduce the surface area making it hard for a flame to propagate e.g. if you light the end of a piece of fibrous synthetic material the fibers will mostly melt together into a solid lump which is harder to keep burning than the original fluff/wool.
There’s also a fuel tank right under the fuselage and a fuel line back to the APU in the tail. Even if the collision ruptured two tanks, it’s hard to see how it could have ruptured all three so there will have still be a lot of fuel on board.
There won’t be fuel in the centre tank at landing other than a few litres sloshing around.
Very sad for those on the coastguard plane, but an incredible testament to modern aircraft design and the crew that everyone got off the A350 safely.
Same happened at Grenfell, the individual items are fire retardant, but that prevents things like a spark landing on fabric, a wiring fault, or a bulb blowing in a lamp from turning into a fire. It doesn’t prevent it eventually burning given sufficient heat/oxygen. For that you need an inert material.
the principle problem at Grenfell was retrospectively applying the cladding to the structure in such a way that it effectively wrapped the the building in combustable chimneys
the principle problem at Grenfell was retrospectively applying the cladding to the structure in such a way that it effectively wrapped the the building in combustable chimneys
Yep, but it was allowed because in isolation each material was fire retardant. Whereas what they should* have been was inert.
*correctly, morally, etc just unfortunately not what the regulations called for.