Alt. airport question
 

Let,s say that your flying from ATH -JFK and 1 hour into the flight you have an engine problem would you return to ATH or would you use FCO as your alternate ?




Fred

I'd say Frankfurt because on today's tracks you're going north of a great circle route but first I'd ask:

1. What sort of engine problem?
2. How many engines do I have? (If I'm BA I'd just keep going to JFK.)
3. How much dump time do I need?
4. What's the weather at ATH?
5. What's the weather in FRA?
6. What's the weather in AMS? If you're going to be dumping for 30 minutes, you may as well be going somewhere.

Where do I have a friendly gate to offload pax? Where does the company have maintenance? As stated above, WX? Friendly to your country? (maybe don't do a stop in North Korea, for instance).

Heck, even Shannon, Ireland, before jumping over the pond. But, I'm assuming a 3 or 4 engine transport. For a twin, it would ETOPS, but the land at nearest suitable seems appropriate.

Engine overheat problem on a twin with a full pax load .
Finally was able to convince the party involved in this minor occurance that the crew did the right thing and that I would have probably done the same by returning to ATH .