Japan Grounds Fleet of Boeing 787s After Emergency Landing

hcs_$reboot writes "The Boeing 787 Dreamliner has already occupied some of Slashdot news space recently: FAA to investigate the 787 (Jan 11) or 787 catches fire in Boston (Jan 08). Today (Jan 16 JST) another incident happened that led to Japan grounding its entire 787 fleet until an internal investigation gives more information about the problem. A 787 from ANA had a battery problem and smoke was detected in the electronics. The plane had to make an emergency landing and passengers were evacuated. "

Comments

This can't be true

[GodfatherofSoul]

Why, just last week Boeing told us the safety concerns were a non-issue!

Re:This can't be true

[jellomizer]

Well someone had to buy those Samsung battery, after the laptop recall.

Re:This can't be true

[icebike]

Second Li-Poly battery total meltdown in as many weeks.

Boeing had to get the FAA to waive its rules regarding Lithium batteries on planes in order to get this plane certified in the first place, and build containment boxes for the batteries into the design.

For the most part the risk of Lithium batteries lies in the requirement for rigid control of recharging, being careful not to over charge and also of draining the battery completely, the annoying habit of catching fire when the rules are not followed, or when the battery is short-circuited make large Li batteries (8-gram equivalent lithium content or more) banned in luggage, and shipments.

I suspect that the FAA will rescind this waiver, and force the replacement of the battery packs with something less prone to burn..

Re:This can't be true

[AmiMoJo]

No other type of battery has the same capacity/weight ratio though, so either they cut down on the functionality or they increase the weight of the aircraft (and thus reduce its fuel efficiency somewhat). To make it worth using Li-Poly over something else they must really need a hell of a lot of energy storage, otherwise the space and weight saving wouldn't be enough to risk it.

Re:This can't be true

[postbigbang]

Seems more like a QA problem. Energy density is important, but reliability and safety trumps implementation waivers. There's an engineering team that's getting an earful, and rightfully so. Cheers to the airlines for having the guts to ground their fleets; ANA and JAL just went up on my list.

Re:This can't be true

[0123456]

Somehow I suspect most airlines consider not catching on fire more important than a slight improvement in fuel efficiency. Someone's going to lose a shedload of money if these planes are out of service for long.

Re:This can't be true

[Rakishi]

This is why pilots don't fuck around with fire warnings:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ValuJet_Flight_592
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Canada_Flight_797
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Airlines_Flight_120
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudia_Flight_163
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_African_Airways_Flight_295
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asiana_Airlines_Flight_991
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UPS_Airlines_Flight_6

Re:This can't be true

[tlhIngan]

For aircraft, the real reason is lithium + aluminum leads to rapid oxidation of the aluminum. Basically a small blob of lithium in contact with aluminum will eat a hole in the aluminum. That's why there's lithium restrictions. The containment vessel has to be made of another metal (steel, normally) so that the lithium will not come into contact with any aluminum structure.

Re:This can't be true

[Dzimas]

A well trained crew does not simply declare an in-flight emergency for fun. They'd much rather proceed to their destination than put the aircraft down at the nearest alternate after an ear-popping emergency descent which is rapidly followed by an emergency evacuation and a transportation board investigation. As for your assertion that their reaction was manic, do you remember this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swissair_Flight_111

Re:This can't be true

[girlintraining]

To make it worth using Li-Poly over something else they must really need a hell of a lot of energy storage, otherwise the space and weight saving wouldn't be enough to risk it.

You're the first person on this entire thread to hit the nail on the head. The Dreamliner uses a sophisticated network of computers and sensors to fly. If all the engines fail, power must be supplied from the APU, basically a UPS for airplanes. Because of the amount of electronics and the fact that due to a lack of power the hydraulics and other critical systems must also remain powered... there is a massive power need. The APU is designed to power the aircraft's systems in the event of an all engine failure from cruising altitude all the way to landing; Although the more common scenario is that an electrical fault causes fuses, etc., to blow, and the APU is switched on (an isolated power source) so the plane can land safely.

Re:This can't be true

[icebike]

No, that's not why.

The reason is that lithium fires happen fairly easily, and the fire extinguishing systems aboard aircraft are not all that effective against such fires.

Several FAA bulletins have reported that "The current fire suppression agent, Halon 1301, found in class C cargo compartments is inefficient in controlling a lithium metal cell fire." Yet halon is just about all they have on board other than water.

See Slide 7: http://www.777cheatsheets.com/resources/Lithium_Battery.pdf

See Page 9: http://www.fire.tc.faa.gov/pdf/04-26.pdf

Tests were conducted using 4, 8, 16, and 32 CR2 batteries, the 10.75 fire pan, and 220 ml of
1-propanol. In each case, the results were identical. Discharging the halon prior to battery
ignition resulted in the extinguishment of the 1-propanol fire and no battery involvement.
However, discharging the halon after only one battery was ignited had no effect on stopping the
propagation of the battery fire to adjacent batteries. The halon extinguished the 1-propanol fire
immediately but had no effect on the lithium fire with the exception of turning the normally
white sparks bright red.
The color change of the lithium sparks indicated that a reaction was occurring between the
lithium and the Halon 1301. This reaction had no effect on the fire progression, neither
hindering nor promoting the spread of the battery fire. The vented electrolyte fires, normally
pale red in color, turned bright red when exposed to Halon 1301.

Re:This can't be true

[Rakishi]

Just because a plane is on the ground doesn't mean a fire can't kill passengers still inside:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Canada_Flight_797
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudia_Flight_163
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolavia_Flight_348

This is not counting other cases where fires destroyed the airplane but didn't kill anyone due to a quick enough evacuation.

Furthermore, some basic web searching show that using emergency evacuation slides isn't unheard of in cases of suspected airplane fires due to no one wanting to repeat the incidents I just listed.

Re:This can't be true

[Rakishi]

This approach has killed hundreds of people in the past as they burned alive or suffocated while pilots and airport personnel dicked around instead of getting them off the damn plane.

Re:This can't be true

[cheesybagel]

The 787 is supposed to use electrical actuators instead of hydraulics powered by engine bleed air. That is where the need for all that power comes from.

Has anybody said

[Joce640k]

"Dreamliner, Screamliner..."

Re:Has anybody said

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

No Oscar. But they will. They will.
-- James Abbot McNeil Whistler

Re:Has anybody said

[kelemvor4]

Actually, the American way is to say that safety concerns are not an issue when I can't imagine they didn't know they are

No, the American way is to say that the market will find an optimal solution, and if customers want safe airlines, they're free to purchase from another carrier.

You know, the whole laissez-faire capitalism thing.

If we implement safety features on the more expensive airliners, the safety features will eventually trickle down to the less expensive ones.

Re:Has anybody said

[Meeni]

Or the contrary, the lower price point will trick people (which are not perfectly informed and rational, and therefore make choices that go against their own interest -all the time- ), and the lack of safety features will become pervasive in the industry because if you do things right, you are not cost effective (and even if you remain profitable, you eventually get bought by some other company that is more profitable and can cash you out).

A Swissair FL111 crash waiting to happen

[JoeyRox]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swissair_Flight_111

Compressed charcoal is sometimes called diamond

[Overzeetop]

How many times have you seen a diamond burn without immersing it in pure oxygen? It's just compressed graphite, after all.

The correct joke should have been: Boeing should reconsider using Sony batteries in their planes.

I survived.

[Anonymous Coward]

I flew the 787 from Haneda to Frankfurt two weeks ago, and am happy to report the flight was excellent and as far as I can tell I wasn't killed in a fire.

Re:I survived.

[TheNinjaroach]

Have any creepy new nine year olds in your life lately?

Re:The downsides of outsourcing

[Richard_at_work]

This has nothing to do with outsourcing - under no circumstances would Boeing have made these batteries, and all f them were installed on the Washington State FAL. Nothing to do with outsourcing, nothing to do with unionism.

Evacuating Passengers

[holophrastic]

I know the TSA has been doing cavity searches for a long time. But exacuating passengers seems both extreme, and dirty. Shouldn't the world health organization have something to say about this?

Maybe next time there's an emergency landing, they should consider evacuating the plane, instead of the passengers. Besides, if it's a rough landing, some of the passengers are likely to self-evacuate.

Re:The downsides of outsourcing

[Pascal Sartoretti]

This has nothing to do with outsourcing - under no circumstances would Boeing have made these batteries, and all f them were installed on the Washington State FAL. Nothing to do with outsourcing, nothing to do with unionism.

Outsourcing in itself is not an issue, as long as you clearly define what you expect, follow up your suppliers, check their processes, their products, etc. All of this takes time, hence money. It can work, but also turn into a nightmare if/when :

• - Your suppliers themselves subcontract to other suppliers, which in turn...
• - A stupid PHB slashes costs by "trusting" and not checking the suppliers
• - Different countries, cultures, languages

We need WiFi in those planes ASAP

[sshir]

With internet connection it is much more handy to short Boeing stock on the first whiff of smoke.

Re:We need WiFi in those planes ASAP

[sunking2]

Would that be considered insider trading?

Engineering has been suplanted by cost accountants

[Anonymous Coward]

I had worked as an engineer for approximately 30 years. What I have witnessed has disturbed me.

In the last 10 to 15 years, design decisions that used to be made by engineers have been replaced by cost accountants restricting most decisions of a technical nature and replacing it with "most cost effective solution".

I did some consulting for a small aero engines company about 15 years ago that had a brilliant concept dreamed up by a non-technical MBA executive to start building aero engines for small aircraft based on race car engines. Reasoning for that is because they are high performance engines. Well d'ohhh that is not what you want in an aero engine, you want reliability & safety as the most important factors. Race car engines need to be rebuilt after every race. Not a desirable attribute for an aero engine.

Needless to say extensive testing which I was involved with proved that this idea was half baked and it failed. Problem was executive management freaked and were cursing the engineers for destroying their "brilliant idea" and acted in a savage manner to the staff by trashing many of them.

In many aerospace companies, I have had been involved with have pushed out most experienced staff in favour of young and cheap staff. If I was to guess, I suspect Boeing has done the same thing. I have heard from many experienced colleagues that old technical problems that were resolved decades ago in the aerospace industry are re-emerging due to in-experienced staff and loss of knowledge.

This shift I suspect contributes in part to many of the issues being experienced in the Dreamliner.

my two cents

Re:A380 787

[segedunum]

Yeah, the DeHaviland Comet airliner was a sterling example of the quality of European aircraft design...

Yes it was considering it was the first jetliner. Someone had to go first and it certainly wasn't the US because they were so far behind.