A jolt, a bang, silence

mimo2005 · 10-03-2006, 10:04 AM

SAO JOSE DOS CAMPOS, BRAZIL - It had been an uneventful, comfortable flight.

With the window shade drawn, I was relaxing in my leather seat aboard a $25 million corporate jet that was flying 37,000 feet above the vast Amazon rain forest. The seven of us on board the 13-passenger jet were keeping to ourselves.

Without warning, I felt a terrific jolt and heard a loud bang, followed by an eerie silence, save for the hum of the engines.

And then the three words I will never forget. "We've been hit," said Henry Yandle, a fellow passenger standing in the aisle near the cockpit of the Embraer Legacy 600 jet.

"Hit? By what?" I wondered. I lifted the shade. The sky was clear; the sun low in the sky. But there, at the end of the wing, was a jagged ridge, perhaps a foot high, where the 5-foot-tall winglet was supposed to be.

And so began the most harrowing 30 minutes of my life. I would be told time and again in the next few days that nobody survives a midair collision. I was lucky to be alive — and only later would I learn that the 155 people aboard the Boeing 737 on a domestic flight that seems to have clipped us were not.

Investigators are still trying to sort out what happened, and how — by some miracle — our smaller jet managed to stay aloft while a 737 that is longer, wider and more than three times heavier fell from the sky.

But at 3:59 last Friday afternoon, all I could see, all I knew, was that part of the wing was gone. And it was clear that the situation was worsening in a hurry. The leading edge of the wing was losing rivets, and starting to peel back.

Amazingly, no one panicked. The pilots calmly starting scanning their controls and maps for a nearby airport, or, out their window, a place to come down.

But as the minutes passed, the plane kept losing speed. By now we all knew how bad this was. I wondered how badly ditching was going to hurt.

I thought of my family. There was no point reaching for my cell phone to try a call — there was no signal. And as our hopes sank, some of us jotted notes to spouses and loved ones and placed them in our wallets, hoping they would be found.

I was focused on a different set of notes when the flight began. I've written the weekly "On the Road" column for the New York Times' business-travel section every Tuesday for the last seven years. But I was on the Embraer 600 for a freelance assignment for Business Jet Travel magazine.

For the next 25 minutes, the pilots, Joe Lepore and Jan Paladino, were scanning their instruments, looking for an airport. Nothing turned up.

They sent out a Mayday, which had been acknowledged by a cargo plane somewhere in the region. There had been no contact with any other plane, and certainly not with a 737 in the same airspace.

Lepore, 42, of Bay Shore, N.Y., then spotted a runway through the darkening canopy of trees. "I can see an airport," he said.

It turned out to be a military base deep in the Amazon.

"We didn't know how much runway we had or what was on it," Paladino, 34, of Westhampton, N.Y., would say later that night at the base in the jungle at Cachimbo.

We came down hard and fast. I watched the pilots wrestle the aircraft because so many of their automatic controls were blown. They brought us to a halt with plenty of runway left. We staggered to the exit.

"Nice flying," I told the two pilots as I passed them.

"Any time," Paladino said with an anxious smile.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/world/4231358.html

ebackhus · 10-03-2006, 11:45 AM

Wow. Just, wow.

**gamerman0203** · 10-03-2006, 02:50 PM

......I can't imagine how horrifying that must have been!

**Joefireline** · 10-03-2006, 02:59 PM

Wow..

**DJ-Zep** · 10-03-2006, 03:23 PM

That is a VERY lucky flight. That must have been thescariest thing the passengers ever witnessed.

Comtrad · 10-04-2006, 07:33 AM

CNN Story

Quote:

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) -- Two American executive jet pilots were ordered by a judge to stay in Brazil while authorities investigate whether they caused a midair collision with an airliner that crashed into the Amazon, killing all 155 people aboard.

A Brazilian newspaper reported that the pilots' Legacy jet, which was carrying seven Americans, disobeyed an order by the control tower to descend to a lower altitude just before coming into contact with Gol airlines Flight 1907.

A judge in Mato Grosso state ordered federal police to seize the passports of pilot Joseph Lepore and co-pilot Jan Palladino "as a result of the doubts surrounding the case and the emergence of indications that the accident was caused by the Legacy," Mato Grosso Justice Department press spokeswoman Maria Barbant said by telephone Tuesday.

She said the two were not arrested but "just prevented from leaving the country, at least until we know exactly what happened" in Brazil's deadliest air disaster.

The daily O Globo paper said the Legacy flew at 37,000 feet to the capital, Brasilia, but then ignored an order to descend to 36,000 feet to continue its flight to the Amazon city of Manaus. The Gol jetliner was flying at 37,000 feet from Manaus to Brasilia en route to Rio de Janeiro.

The damaged executive jet safely landed at a nearby air force base after the incident.

The pilots, who have been questioned by Mato Grosso investigators, were brought to Rio de Janeiro on Tuesday for routine physical tests. They were not injured in the incident.

The Legacy had been making its inaugural flight to the United States, where it had been purchased by an American company, said its manufacturer, Embraer.

Air force commander Gen. Luis Carlos Bueno also said the Gol flight, a brand-new Boeing 737-800, had a flight plan for 37,000 feet and the Legacy jet was authorized to fly at 36,000 feet, according to an interview Tuesday with Brazil's government news service Agencia Brasil.

He said neither plane was authorized to deviate from the plans. He said only an investigation of the planes' flight and voice data recorders could clarify the cause of the accident.

Neither the air force nor the National Civil Aviation Agency would comment on the reports.

Christine Negroni, an investigator for the aviation law firm Kreindler & Kreindler of New York, said in an e-mail that under international guidelines the Legacy should not have been at an odd-numbered altitude because it was heading northwest.

"All westbound flights fly at even numbers with 1,000 feet separation. Eastbound flights fly at odd numbers, same 1,000 separation," she said. "Since the American pilots were flying northwest, they should not have been at 37,000 since that's odd."

Investigators began examining voice and data recorders recovered from the jetliner Tuesday, but the National Civil Aviation Agency said one of the voice recorders was missing data.

"This unit is essential for analysis," the agency said on its Web site. It said military units were searching for missing parts.

Investigators will also look at why the pilots weren't alerted by special on-board equipment designed to avoid collisions. The air force said both jets were equipped with a Traffic Collision Avoidance System, or TCAS, which monitors other planes and sets off an alarm if they get too close.

The Gol plane crashed deep in the Amazon jungle in Mato Grosso state, some 1,100 miles northwest of Rio de Janeiro, killing all 149 passengers and six crew members.

There was apparently only one American on the flight -- Douglas Hancock, 35, of Missouri. He was in Mato Grosso for business and was returning to Rio de Janeiro, where he lived, his father told the Southeast Missourian newspaper.

Bueno said about 100 bodies were found within a half-mile of the wreckage and were flown to the coroner's office in Brasilia for identification. He said rescue workers would have to open more clearings in the dense jungle to try to recover the rest.

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said it was sending a team of investigators, who would be joined by representatives from the Federal Aviation Administration and The Boeing Company.

The U.S. agencies were involved because the Gol plane was manufactured in the United States and the smaller jet was registered there.

**Fr4665** · 10-04-2006, 07:41 AM

wow and when did this exactly occure ? just yesterday ?

Comtrad · 10-04-2006, 08:08 AM

Last Friday

mimo2005 · 10-04-2006, 12:37 PM

A jolt

a bang

silence

Jail ?

10-03-2006, 10:04 AM	#1 (permalink)
mimo2005 Manager, Emeritus Join Date: Oct 2004 Posts: 11,142 OS: xp	A jolt, a bang, silence SAO JOSE DOS CAMPOS, BRAZIL - It had been an uneventful, comfortable flight. With the window shade drawn, I was relaxing in my leather seat aboard a $25 million corporate jet that was flying 37,000 feet above the vast Amazon rain forest. The seven of us on board the 13-passenger jet were keeping to ourselves. Without warning, I felt a terrific jolt and heard a loud bang, followed by an eerie silence, save for the hum of the engines. And then the three words I will never forget. "We've been hit," said Henry Yandle, a fellow passenger standing in the aisle near the cockpit of the Embraer Legacy 600 jet. "Hit? By what?" I wondered. I lifted the shade. The sky was clear; the sun low in the sky. But there, at the end of the wing, was a jagged ridge, perhaps a foot high, where the 5-foot-tall winglet was supposed to be. And so began the most harrowing 30 minutes of my life. I would be told time and again in the next few days that nobody survives a midair collision. I was lucky to be alive — and only later would I learn that the 155 people aboard the Boeing 737 on a domestic flight that seems to have clipped us were not. Investigators are still trying to sort out what happened, and how — by some miracle — our smaller jet managed to stay aloft while a 737 that is longer, wider and more than three times heavier fell from the sky. But at 3:59 last Friday afternoon, all I could see, all I knew, was that part of the wing was gone. And it was clear that the situation was worsening in a hurry. The leading edge of the wing was losing rivets, and starting to peel back. Amazingly, no one panicked. The pilots calmly starting scanning their controls and maps for a nearby airport, or, out their window, a place to come down. But as the minutes passed, the plane kept losing speed. By now we all knew how bad this was. I wondered how badly ditching was going to hurt. I thought of my family. There was no point reaching for my cell phone to try a call — there was no signal. And as our hopes sank, some of us jotted notes to spouses and loved ones and placed them in our wallets, hoping they would be found. I was focused on a different set of notes when the flight began. I've written the weekly "On the Road" column for the New York Times' business-travel section every Tuesday for the last seven years. But I was on the Embraer 600 for a freelance assignment for Business Jet Travel magazine. For the next 25 minutes, the pilots, Joe Lepore and Jan Paladino, were scanning their instruments, looking for an airport. Nothing turned up. They sent out a Mayday, which had been acknowledged by a cargo plane somewhere in the region. There had been no contact with any other plane, and certainly not with a 737 in the same airspace. Lepore, 42, of Bay Shore, N.Y., then spotted a runway through the darkening canopy of trees. "I can see an airport," he said. It turned out to be a military base deep in the Amazon. "We didn't know how much runway we had or what was on it," Paladino, 34, of Westhampton, N.Y., would say later that night at the base in the jungle at Cachimbo. We came down hard and fast. I watched the pilots wrestle the aircraft because so many of their automatic controls were blown. They brought us to a halt with plenty of runway left. We staggered to the exit. "Nice flying," I told the two pilots as I passed them. "Any time," Paladino said with an anxious smile. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/world/4231358.html __________________ TSF has outgrown its server, again. Please help "Gutta cavat lapidem, non vi sed saepe cadendo"

10-03-2006, 11:45 AM	#2 (permalink)
ebackhus Manager, Design Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: SATX Posts: 14,294 OS: WinXP Pro SP3/Windows 7 RTM My System Blog Entries: 28	Wow. Just, wow. __________________ ----------------------------- There are no dumb questions, unless a customer is asking them. Help in the fight against cancer and other serious illnesses.

10-03-2006, 02:50 PM	#3 (permalink)
gamerman0203 Retired Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Grand Rapids, MI Posts: 2,144 OS: XP MCE, Ubuntu Gutsy My System	......I can't imagine how horrifying that must have been! __________________ Follow These Steps First! CPU-Z \| SensorView \| WinXP Clean Boot \| Latest DirectX \| ATI Catalyst \| Nvidia ForceWare Posting System Specifications

10-03-2006, 03:23 PM	#5 (permalink)
DJ-Zep Design Team Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Philadelphia Posts: 1,541 OS: Windows Vista Home Premium (x64) My System	That is a VERY lucky flight. That must have been thescariest thing the passengers ever witnessed. __________________ Nice music blog Nvu \|\| Notepad++ \|\| Apache \|\| PHP \|\| Keep TSF Alive "The great thing about a computer notebook is that no matter how much you stuff into it, it doesn't get bigger or heavier."

10-04-2006, 07:41 AM	#7 (permalink)
Fr4665 aka mr.fraggs Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: USA or Germany Posts: 2,965 OS: Win XP,Vista,Android My System	wow and when did this exactly occure ? just yesterday ? __________________ I don't subscribe to threads please PM me if i miss a reply. ------- Everest SensorView Pro DriverCleaner how to fix your game

10-03-2006, 02:59 PM	#4 (permalink)
Joefireline Enthusiastic TSFer~Joseph Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Portishead (Bristol) England Posts: 5,319 OS: Windows 7 64bit(Desktop) / XP Home SP2(laptop) My System	Wow..

10-04-2006, 08:08 AM	#8 (permalink)
Comtrad Registered User Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Somewhere in Illinois Posts: 279 OS: Windows XP	Last Friday

10-04-2006, 12:37 PM	#9 (permalink)
mimo2005 Manager, Emeritus Join Date: Oct 2004 Posts: 11,142 OS: xp	A jolt a bang silence Jail ? __________________ TSF has outgrown its server, again. Please help "Gutta cavat lapidem, non vi sed saepe cadendo"