Ottopilot

Three Qantas A380 superjumbos grounded in recent days

March 03, 2009 11:57am
QANTAS has been hit by a string of problems which have grounded all three of their flagship A380s in the past few days.

One of the planes was back in service this morning, but the other two were declared unserviceable with a fuel tank indication system problem.

``Qantas is an early customer of the A380 and naturally, as with any new aircraft type and like other operators of the A380, we expect the occasional issue to arise,'' the airline said in a statement.

``We are working very closely with Airbus to resolve these but we remain committed to the A380 as the cornerstone of our new generation product offering.''

The airline's first superjumbo, the Nancy-Bird Walton, was initially delayed for 19 hours in Sydney on Saturday because of a fuel leak.

After repair work the much-heralded plane was cleared to fly the ``kangaroo route'' to Singapore then London.

In London, it was again found to be leaking fuel and experienced a nose wheel ground steering issue. The plane was declared ``unserviceable'' and had to be grounded.

The episode comes after Qantas grounded the same plane due to a ``minor technical fault'' at Los Angeles airport five weeks ago.

In the latest incident, the Nancy-Bird Walton was scheduled to fly from London to Melbourne as a one-off because of the initial delay in Sydney.

Passengers travelling to Melbourne on flight QF10 were delayed for more than 16 hours as a result of the dramas.

One passenger stranded in London told News Ltd: ``Lots of people were really excited to be going on the new plane.

``Now basically they've cancelled the flight because there's a fuel leak.

``It's a worry because it's brand new and a fuel problem is pretty serious.''

They eventually left London on a Boeing 747 at 2.24pm Monday, instead of the original departure time of 10pm Sunday.

A Qantas spokeswoman yesterday said repairs had been completed and the Nancy-Bird Walton departed London for Melbourne on flight QF10 at 11.25pm Monday local time (10.25am Tuesday Melbourne).

The other two A380s were grounded in Sydney and engineers were ``currently working to resolve this and we hope to have both aircraft returned to service very soon'', the airline said.

Of the two ``unserviceable'' A380s in Sydney, one was scheduled to be ready to operate QF31 Sydney-Singapore-London at 5.40pm today.

The other A380 was scheduled to be back in operation tomorrow.

acl65pilot

At least they did not ground it for a water heater in the showers. Emirates did that last year.

Kubota

RepairBus... "they float better then they fly."

forumname

My brother works for a foreign airline that has had airbus products for a while. And they experienced the same problems with the aircraft that just about every other operator does.

They gave it the nickname of the "Skoda", a Czech built car that wasn't know for it's reliability.

The 380 is called the "super Skoda".

Bond

You guys have a habit of mistaken patriotism with global economics. The 380 just as the 787 are global products. I guarantee you when the 787 comes out it will have it's problems, just as the E190 did, just as the 320 did, just as the 777 did, it's awful ignorant for some of you folks to think that one manufacturer is better than the other.

Here's a thought for you "if it's not a boeing I'm not going" types, competition is a great thing. If it wasn't for the 330, there probably wouldn't be a 787; conversely if it wasn't for the 787 there would not be a 350, and so on. Both companies continue to push each other to develop better more competitive products, and we the pilots, the passengers, and the airlines continue to benefit from these advances.

I am a big fan of both companies, as both have brought great things to this industry, but if it wasn't for competition, boeing would be serving us the same 737 or airbus the 310 with a different name for the next 30 years.

alvrb211

It's funny how you never see the same consumer ethnocentrism when it comes to Automobiles.

I think it's cos most Americans know we can't teach the Europeans anything about building cars!

American cars are considered a joke in Europe. I'm sorry to say I doubt we'll ever produce anything close to the performance or build quality of European cars.

Shame I have to keep buying German cars cos the crap that comes out of Detroit is for old ladies.


As for the Airbus A380, it's been in service for over a year. I'm still waiting to see the much delayed first flight test of the B787.

The B787 will be a great aircraft. It hasn't been free of problems and more will follow. That's the nature of the beast. No point in taking pot shots at the competition.

One of the first rules of competition is; don't underestimate the competition. Unfortunately, Boeing did just that with Airbus.

AL

alvrb211

The US engines quit but the Euro airframe stayed afloat!

AL

alvrb211

Skoda's are pretty good. That's why VW now owns the company.

AL

Airhoss

Yeah but we should really blame the Canadians for the whole incident. They need to learn to keep those Canada Geese up in Canada where they belong. I say we should invade!

forumname

Not really sure what quoting my post does in relation to engines failing. I was merely relaying a joke of what guys at a particular foreign operator call the Airbus. Glad to see you have a sense of humor concerning such things .

Guess those guys just can't compete with some of the nicknames it has in the states, like "scud", etc.

Have they ALWAYS been "pretty good"? Also, have you ever owned a VW product that was made in the 80's? Yep, they've (VW) made leaps in the quality department since then, but building quality automobiles wasn't always their strong suit. Especially in the 80's when they captured so much market share in Europe, then quality suffered.