JohnBurke

Misfueling typically isn't a matter of putting the wrong fuel directly into the airplane (ie, hooking up the avgas truck to the jet aircraft), but of mixing in the tank.

Avgas doesn't do the damage to a turbine engine that jet fuel does to a piston engine. In fact, turbine engines, with a fuel controller adjustment, can run any number of fuels. I've run turbojets that were designed to run on avgas, and did. J34's on the P2V neptune and the C-119, for example.

If fuel contamination occurred from pressure refueling, it would have to be a tank mix. Given that Jet B and other cut fuels use gasoline/kerosine combinations and are common around the world, the introduction of avgas into jet fuel isn't going to cause engine failures. Mixing kerosine with avgas will cause detonation damage in piston engines, however.

It's not uncommon during fuel deliveries to have small quantities of mix result from using the same hoses from a truck that's carrying multiple fuels or split loads, even after hoses are flushed. More rare, over the years there have been a few incidents of the wrong fuel pumped aboard an airport fuel truck or fuel storage, from the delivery vehicle. In a large operation where the delivery vehicle is working off a fuel farm, it would take a lot of contamination to make a noticeable difference, and then in a turbine aircraft, would likely not be noticed.

Fuel will be tested as part of the investigation, confirming or ruling out this issue.

rickair7777

The Army once did a demo of different fuels with an M1 Abrams tank (it's turbine powered, like Navy surface combatants). This included running the tank on peanut butter (presumably the creamy kind).

Turbines can run on almost anything that burns, with minor tweaks.

Merlin1343

file:///var/mobile/Library/SMS/Attachments/52/02/1AC0DC76-0C93-4FB8-8C72-9A080FE2AA8A/IMG_2883.jpg

AirBear

Local newscast in HNL talking about the company's "troubled compliance history" with the FAA:

https://youtu.be/ijgcdexD3SE

rickair7777

There have been dual engine failures due to incorrect mx procedures being performed at the same time on both engines... I recall one years ago where IIRC an oring was left out on an oil change or something like that and they lost oil on both motors. So that kind of thing can explain why both could fail at the same time.

galaxy flyer

All three engines on an EA L-1011; made it back to MIA with seconds to spare.

ugleeual

They recover the major parts of plane yet?

rickair7777

They found it, at about 400'. The article says it's too deep for divers to recover the boxes, which is not true. It is deep enough to require sat diving and the NTSB probably doesn't want to pay for that. ADS would probably be too cumbersome to access and remove the boxes.

They're looking at raising the plane, might be able to do that with ROVs.

They also sampled the fuel from another plane that was fueled that night, it was OK.

https://www.reuters.com/business/aer...ii-2021-07-10/

Hopscotch

Some video of the submerged aircraft....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ki_VDILYRE

Jamo

GO!/Mesa almost had this same scenario about 10 years ago. Problem…a mechanic incorrectly installed a part of the fuel system. It blew when they were in cruise. Barely made it to HNL. I believe the picture I saw said 124# of fuel by the time they landed and got out.

Also had a United flight cancel many years ago because a random fuel test found sand in a Maui fuel truck.

Many possibilities and I’m definitely curious what the report finds.