Thread: Aircraft incidents that made me smile !

err ..MONTY PYTHON..

Yes...

The answer is: "I dunno......it's fucking sea bird flavoured...."

Was detached to an Italian airbase with a RAF Squadron many moons ago... 8 nice shiny fast jets parked out on the pan with Italian Air Force guards patrolling. Following morning the Squadron engineers came back to find all the pitot tubes (pointy bit right on the front of the nose that is connected to the aircraft instruments... allows measurement of airspeed I think) all bent about 30 degrees downwards. Seems a bored guard had been fruiting about and bent one while swinging on it. Then realising what he had done he bent all the rest to match so no-one would find out. 8 jets, all f*cked, until replacements could be shipped and fitted. Two extra days on the lash ... Hoorah!

Another one ! This time I just had a minor involvement but made me laugh at the time

King Abdul Azizz airport at Jeddah had a new hangar erected - completed but not fully commissioned and handed over.
I had a claim from Gulf Air - Tristar landed with a cracked windscreen.
No problem - 2 days work to replace and back in service.
They put in the new hangar and I did the checks - they took the busted one out .
Just got into the office and got sa frantic phone call about the plane .
Went back to the airport and just about pissed myself laughing

They had closed the sliding doors and fired up the internal lighting.
There was an electrical fault somewhere in the hangar system and the 'Foam Flood' system started up .
This can fill a hangar to a depth of 8 meters in 5 minutes or so with high density fire supression foam .
Nobody knew how to turn it off!!
With a window missing from the cockpit that was filled up as well !!
When it eventually stopped they started to wash it all away with the fire hoses - yep - they filled the cockpit as well.

Cost a bloody fortune to repair/ replace all the electronic bits - I was only appointed for the window claim - 3,000US$

There was also a knock- on effect
The amount of water they used overwhelmed the grey water drain and was diverted to the sewerage system

Th foam compound in the filterbeds then killed off all the working bacteria as well !

Another one from Saudi Arabia

Was working on a small pilot plant ( Iron ore ) at a place called Wadi Sawawin on the coast 200 miles north of Jiddah
Site ferry aircraft was a Shorts Skyvan
Had to go to site and was asked to bring a gallon of Ammonia for the print room there as their print machine was out of it .
Store only sold it in 5 gallon cans but they decanted a gallon into an unmarked plastic container for me.
No problem with taking it there as the plane followed the coast at about 2000 ft and the container was in the cargo bay .
Before we left Jiddah the Religious Police decide to search the cargo just in case we were taking anything illegal up there .
One dickhead spotted the container with a clear liquid in it and thought it was sidiqui ( illegal booze) and despite our entreatments opened it and took a deep sniff !!!

He went out out like a light and dropped the container .
We evacuated the plane like our arses were on fire .
The fumes did about 5,000 US$ damage to the seats and internal paintwork !!!

Surprisingly , as the plane was leased from Saudia , they did not make a claim and paid for the repairs themselves !!

Not often you get a win in Saudi Arabia

Found another one !

Old Dakota-WW11 ex UK army taildragger - operated by Nile Air as a cargo plane.
It was at Luxor and a strong wind storm blew in .
Ground crew dutifully locked it down with piquet straps .
Storm passed
Lines released and engines cranked up for departure

Full power to get it moving

Big BANG !

They had not released the tailwheel line

Tore the bugger off !

Oops !


Claim rejected as crew had not followed proceedure !

Not aviation but a couple of marine giggles - saves opening a new thread !

In the early 80's I was the approved insurance man for the Port Said dock company at the Med end of the Suez canal .
Their sister company at the red sea end was the Port Suez dock company .
Port Suez bought a large tug boat from China to manoeuvre big vessels into the canal .
As I recall it was powered by a couple of 2000 hp Pielstick ( Copy) engines .
As it was a deepsea tug and they wanted to use it at max power in the confined waters of the canal entrance they started to bugger around with different props .
It was the biggest tug on the canal and they wanted to check its pulling power but had no way of measuring it .
Port Said had a complex electronic and large transducer thing that they leased to Port Suez.
I fixed up the insurance etc for them .
It was duly delivered and everything sorted
At Port Suez they attached the thing to their test bollard and gave the engines full power.
The bollard was torn off the dock and the boat did about 150 meters before it hit a ferry ( thankfully moored up and empty) which promptly sank .
The transducer was consigned to the depths but only after the tow line got mangled by one of the props and bent the shaft. Nice claim !!!



The other one was a patrol boat built in France with 2 x 16 cylinder CAT 399 engines .
Shipped as deck cargo to Nassau and put in the water .
I went over to witness the commissioning .
Got there and the boat had sunk at its moorings !!
It turned out that before they put it in the water they had not removed any of the water inlet blanks for the engines .
Some bright spark decided to crack up one of them .
With no water in the system there was no movement of the gauges, and , while he was wondering why, the engine blew - put a rod through the side ( engine and fibreglass hull) and gently went down !
Took me a couple of weeks sorting that one out -( in between some of the best gamefishing every afternoon,) I have ever had !

I must be one of the few people who didn't want to retire -

YACHT DELIVERY

65' custom-built motor yacht complete with 4 cabins, a state-of-the-art galley, GPS System and radar for navigation, twin supercharged diesel engines, etc.
$3,474,793.00

Champagne, chocolate covered strawberries with cream and music dockside for the
excited 'soon to be owners' and a small group of friends.
$500



Two corporate representatives, crane, and rigging complete with faulty turnbuckle.
$2,500/hour



(Note the owner in the stern) Watching your dreamboat nose dive into the harbour, accompanied by two corporate Representatives just prior to 'inking' the final paperwork...



PRICELESS!

So, how was your day.....

Here we go again !
I was working out of Mwanza in Tanzania when I got an urgent call to get to the wonderfully named International Airport in Bangui - Central African Republic- Bangui M'Poko ! to investigate a theft from a couple of aircraft .
Cotton is one of the countries only export and they had an outbreak of cotton boll weevil infection .
A well meaning US cotton company - through some UN aid organisation donated - on loan - 2 Piper Brave crop dusters.
The Theft ??
They had been in the hangar for a week waiting for the dusting chemicals - and when the doors were opened both aircraft had their tail wheels missing !!
I started doing the paperwork but a couple of days into it was told that the wheels had been found and were being refitted .

They were found by a sharp eyed UN man who noticed that one of the porters in the central market had a new hand truck with sparkling wheels !

Before I packed my things and left town the UN man told me that the porter was the brother of the hangar security man !!!

Originally Posted by keda

YACHT DELIVERY

I like that one !!

Where did it happen ?

not a clue, received it by email

^
Pity that !
I could have logged into the Lloyds data base and got the full story

I'm sure you have the means to track it down, though it's probably a nominal claim against what air mishaps can cost. Otoh not sure it would be covered in case of negligence or faulty equipment.

Will have a go !
I will copy this post to some chums at Lloyds and see what they come up with - OK ?

snopes.com: That's One Way to Launch a Boat!

Don't know if it will show where. (yes it does)

Happyman , I wasn't in Lloyd's I was getting a statement in Nat West

Originally Posted by oldgit

snopes.com: That's One Way to Launch a Boat!

Don't know if it will show where. (yes it does)

Looks like buyer in this thread's boat was charged the farang price.

A non- insurance marine one this time .
Before I went into insurance I was a call-out service manager for Caterpillar .
Had a call out from Sicily ( was living in Cyprus at the time ) to get to the port at Augusta Siracusa.
This was attached to the mafia controlled refinery there where they processed hydrocarbon products that had somehow evaded the sanctions - against Lybia- and shipped it on to the Italian Mainland.
They had a small tanker and the auxiliary generator engine (CAT) was buggered and needed a new fuel pump - like yesterday !
Got there and out onto the vessel - bloody rustbucket- not to Lloyds standard by any means .
Went into the engine room and the old motor was spluttering away firing on 4 of its 6 cylinders .
Shut it down and naturally all the lights went out but a small brilliant shaft of sunlight illuminated the engine. Ships engineer took a lump hammer and went to tap the area - one bang and the hammer went right through, and took a 1 ft sq piece of the hull plating with it !! It was rusted paper thin - just glad it was above waterlevel .
A year later we received a water damaged engine for rebuilding and putting into our service exchange store - was told that it had been recovered from a tanker that had gone down in Brindisi.
Checked the engine number - yep - same one !
I wonder why I was not surprised !