Archive for the ‘Travel News’ Category
Wednesday, August 10th, 2011
A man has appeared in a Los Angeles court after stowing away on board a Virgin America flight from New York. According to the prosecution, 24-year-old Olajide Oluwaseun Noibi managed to get past security using an out of date ticket and boarding pass issued in the name of another traveller. The Nigerian-American man entered a guilty plea and could face a fine of $250,000 and a maximum of five years behind bars.
The incident occurred on 24-25 June and Noibi was arrested on 29 June as he attempted to stow away on a Delta Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Atlanta. According to the FBI, 10 boarding passes in other peoples’ names were discovered in Noibi’s luggage when it was searched by the authorities.
Although the exact motive for Noibi’s activity is yet to be established, he claimed that he was travelling around the country trying to recruit people to join his software company. The prosecution has not mentioned terrorism.
According to a spokeswoman for the FBI, crew on board the Virgin America flight out of JFK became suspicious because Noibi was sitting in a seat which should not have been occupied. Other passengers were also apparently complaining about his body odour.
Because the crew could not find his name on the passenger manifest they radioed ahead to Los Angeles to say they had a suspected stowaway on the plane. Noibi was taken for questioning after the aircraft landed but was released by the FBI pending further investigation because he posed no physical threat.
Tags: delta airlines, fbi, JFK, terrorism, Virgin America
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Tuesday, August 9th, 2011
The final words of the pilots in charge of an Air France jet which went down in the Atlantic have been revealed. The crash occurred in 2009 as the flight was carrying 228 passengers and crew to Paris from Rio de Janeiro. All on board were killed.
The conversation has been recovered from the flight’s voice recorder. It reveals that having flown into a high-altitude electrical storm the pilots lost all control of the Airbus A330. At the controls were 32-year-old Pierre-Cedric Bonin and 37-year-old David Robert. The captain of the flight, Marc Dubois, 58, was taking a scheduled rest when the situation started to deteriorate.
After entering the storm Robert is heard to ask Bonin what they should do. Bonin answers that he no longer has control of the plane and Dubois is recalled to the cockpit. After returning, Dubois is informed by Bonin that he has no idea what is happening. Several stall warnings have already gone off and the pilots attempt to rectify the situation by pulling the nose up. Bonin then says he has no vertical speed and no indications. Dubois says the plane is descending.
Air France is claiming that its pilots did nothing wrong and that they were confused by the various readings being given in the cockpit. Airbus maintains that everything was working as it should.
In the last moments one of the pilots is heard to ask if the plane is still descending. A warning for the pilots to pull up sounds as Captain Dubois repeats the order. Bonin says he is trying just before the aircraft hits the sea.
Tags: air france, airbus, cockpit, pilots, stall warnings, voice recorder
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Thursday, August 4th, 2011
A French pilots’ union has removed itself from the investigation into what caused an Air France passenger jet to plunge into the Atlantic in 2009 claiming that the authorities are unfairly defending planemaker Airbus. An official interim report issued at the end of last week by the BEA claimed that the tragedy was due to pilot error.
However, it has been shown that investigators removed, at the last minute, a recommendation that the stall warnings on the A330 be either modified or replaced. Allegedly, it has been known for some time that the warnings tended to go off when there was in fact no problem.
Flight AF447 crashed into the ocean on 1 June 2009 killing all on board. The plane was travelling to Paris from Rio de Janeiro when it encountered an electrical storm. The BEA has said that it removed information pertaining to the Airbus stall warnings because it felt further investigation was required.
An association representing the interests of the families of the deceased passengers has protested what it sees as the French authorities’ determination to place the entire blame for the accident on the dead pilots. Robert Soulas, president of Entraide et Solidarité AF447, said the omission of the information regarding the stall warnings meant the investigation had been discredited.
Both Airbus and Air France are currently being investigated on charges of manslaughter by a French court. The criminal investigation is likely to last for some time to come although the BEA is due to issue a final report into the matter later this year.
Tags: AF447, air france, airbus, BEA
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Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011
When Virgin Galactic flies its first commercial service into space it will have a Wiltshire man at the controls. David Mackay from Salisbury is the project’s chief pilot and is hoping that his lifelong dream to become an astronaut may be no more than a couple of years away.
The 53-year-old described how as a boy he had seen the Apollo moon landings and was determined that he too would, one day, go into space. He said he had found out that many astronauts were chosen because they had first been test pilots, so he signed up with the RAF.
It was while a captain with Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic that he was chosen, along with three others, to become test pilots on the Virgin Galactic project. Mr Mackay has been based in the Mojave Desert in California at Virgin’s Spaceport where he has been testing WhiteKnightTwo, the jet-powered aircraft designed to carry SpaceShipTwo to its launch altitude.
Mr Mackay said that there was still a great deal of test flying to go before the first fee paying passengers can be taken into sub-orbit, but that by the time the project is given the green-light he will be the most experienced pilot and therefore the obvious choice to take charge of the first mission.
He described how the rocket ship transporting passengers will accelerate to 2,500mph to leave the earth’s atmosphere and that, for around a minute, passengers will certainly feel the g-force. They will then be able to leave their seats and literally float around the cabin.
Tags: Apollo, RAF, Sir Richard Branson, SpaceShipTwo, virgin atlantic, Virgin Galactic, WhiteKnightTwo
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Monday, August 1st, 2011
French aviation safety investigators looking into the cause of the 2009 Air France crash have concluded that a lack of pilot training was responsible. The incident happened on 1 June after Flight AF447 encountered an electrical storm around four hours into the journey. It was en route to Paris from Rio de Janeiro when it plunged into the Atlantic killing all those on board.
The BEA has been examining black-box data recorders recovered from the floor of the ocean earlier this year. Jean-Paul Troadec, head of the safety authority, said that crew had failed to react properly to repeated stall warnings. Although Air France denies the findings, the BEA said the situation could have been rectified and that the pilots had not been adequately trained to cope with the aircraft’s loss of altitude.
Troadec has called for all pilots to be trained in how to manage similar situations. He explained that the aircraft’s speed indicators had malfunctioned, probably due to ice. The autopilot then disengaged. An appropriate response would then have been for the pilot to execute an unreliable indicated airspeed manoeuvre which involves raising the nose by just five degrees.
However, the angle was far too severe and meant the aircraft went into rapid ascent. This caused the plane to stall after which it began to descend at 10,000 feet per minute. The co-pilot is finally recorded as saying that he has no indications, the stall warning sounds for the last time and all communications go dead.
Air France has issued a statement saying that there is no proof that the crew did anything but deal with the situation in a professional manner.
Tags: AF447, air france, airbus, BEA, crew, Paris, pilots
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Thursday, July 28th, 2011
Concerns over the safety of the Rolls-Royce manufactured Trent 900 jet engines used to power some Airbus A380 superjumbos are likely to be reignited after a Singapore Airlines jet was forced to return to base after experiencing engine failure. The airliner was 20 minutes into its flight to Hong Kong when the pilot was forced to shut down one of the engines because of vibrations, according to a Singapore Airlines spokesman.
The aircraft had 21 crew and 368 passengers on-board, but no injuries have been reported. The incident occurred just eight months after a Trent 900 exploded on a Qantas flight out of Singapore.
The dramatic failure sent debris ripping into the aircraft wing and forced the pilot to request an emergency landing. Qantas made the decision to ground all six of its A380s until the cause of the problem was discovered. Accident investigators found that a leak in an oil pipe led to a fire and an explosion.
Since then Rolls-Royce has replaced all of the faulty engines and, according to Nick Cunningham from London-based Agency Partners, the problem with the Singapore Airlines engine is unlikely to be related to the problem experienced by Qantas.
Rolls-Royce spokeswoman, Erin Atan, confirmed that the engine manufacturer was aware of the issue and that it would be providing all the necessary technical assistance and support to Singapore Airlines. Sean Lee, a representative of Airbus based in Singapore, said that the European manufacturer would also be supplying all the support needed to discover the cause of the problem.
Tags: A380, airbus, Qantas, Rolls Royce, Singapore Airlines, Trent 900
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Wednesday, July 27th, 2011
The aviation authority in France is due to formally report on the circumstances which led to an Air France passenger jet crashing into the Atlantic Ocean in 2009. The BEA will deliver the report in Paris on Friday. A spokeswoman said the contents would explain the lead up to the crash, but that a later report would deal with exact causes.
The tragedy occurred on 1 June 2009 as the Air France jet was carrying passengers to Paris from Rio de Janeiro. After entering an electrical storm readings sent from the cockpit show that the pilots were having problems with their air speed indicators. They then lost control of the aircraft after it stalled and it fell out of the sky and into the sea. All of the 228 crew and passengers were killed.
Rescue teams at the scene of the crash managed to recover some debris and 50 bodies. A number of seabed searches then took place to locate the rest of the wreckage and nearly two years after the plane went down its remains were discovered.
Accident investigators were able to retrieve the aircraft’s voice and data recorders which were sent to Paris for analysis. They also managed to pull a further 104 bodies to the surface which have also been sent to the French capital for forensic identification.
The BEA has been subject to some criticism by groups representing the victims’ families for not giving out enough information on what caused the tragedy and not allowing families to fully come to terms as to why it happened.
Tags: air france, air speed indicators, aviation authority, BEA, crash, data recorders, pilots
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Monday, July 25th, 2011
The authorities in the Philippines are hoping to attract more foreign disabled visitors to the country by offering discounts on transport and services. The government said that disabled tourism was currently an under-served section of the travel market and has called upon tourism businesses to apply the 20 per cent discount scheme to all visitors.
The discount already applies to all Filipinos under the law. In a statement, Alberto Lim, the country’s Tourism Secretary, said the discount would apply across a range of services including transportation, medical services, amusement centres and accommodation. Lim added that the aim was not to provide separate services for those with disabilities, but to make sure that people with certain needs were able to travel on equal terms with everyone else.
According to President Benigno Aquino, tourism is extremely important to the future economic growth of the Philippines. However, the country still lags behind many of its Asian neighbours in this respect.
Lim blamed poor transport systems as well as a lack of hotel beds. Although last year there were 3.52 million visitors which is a record number of people and a hike of 16.68 per cent on the year before.
Maria Victoria Jasmin, Tourism Undersecretary, said the government was offering tourism establishments incentives to improve their facilities and make more disabled friendly renovations to their properties. These include making access to toilets and bathrooms easier, introducing handrails and better floors and building more ramps for wheelchairs to provide better access. Jasmin said it was now the right time to take action.
Tags: disabled visitors, Philippines, President Benigno Aquino, tourism, transport, travel
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Monday, July 18th, 2011
Flying cars could soon be seen on the roads and in the skies of the UK as American safety authorities give permission for the Terrafugia Transition to be driven on US highways. The Transition is both a two-seater car and a propeller-powered airplane capable of flying at speeds of 115mph for a distance of around 500 miles.
The machine is powered by petrol from a normal pump and can be driven on the road at up to 65mph once the wings are folded away and power has been transferred from the prop-shaft to the rear axel. The Transition can be turned from plane to car in around 15 seconds and will even fit into a standard garage.
The project was started in 2006 and recently ran into a financial hurdle after the US authorities demanded changes in the design which included the addition of tyres, which were appropriate for both road and runway, and a new stability system.
Because the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has approved the Transition on the other side of the Atlantic, aviation experts predict that it will be relatively easy for approval to be gained from the European Safety Agency. If so, flying cars could be a feature of British roads within five years.
The Transition already has 100 orders in the US and is generating significant interest in the UK. Sir Richard Branson is said to be keen and the first flying cars are set to come off the production line at some point next year.
Tags: European Safety Agency, flying car, Richard Branson, runway, Terrafugia Transition
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Thursday, July 14th, 2011
Pile-ups and accidents on the road could soon be greatly reduced as new software is being tested which allows vehicles to talk to each other. A team of scientists in Italy have developed a system whereby any car involved in an incident will be able to let all other cars approaching the location know before they got there.
Professor Marco Roccetti, head of the University of Bologna team working on the project, said that unlike telematics systems currently being used the new system does not need to use radar to detect an obstruction on the road. He explained that a car experiencing abnormal conditions, such as rapid deceleration, would send out a warning signal which would be relayed to all following vehicles.
The system has been developed to cope with roads such as motorways which have multiple lanes. The software can be installed into a car’s dashboard, into a sat-nav device and even into a smartphone, according to Professor Gustavo Marfia, a fellow member of the team.
Professor Roccetti said that the app meant all cars which had been enabled would constantly swap information with one another. This means that they would know the speed and direction of every other vehicle travelling on the road. Other systems pass information to the limit of cars broadcast range, whereas the new software allows it to be communicated for miles, according to Roccetti.
The system has been proven to reduce pile-ups by 40 per cent in simulation and next month the software will be tested live on the roads of Los Angeles.
Tags: accidents, motorways, sat nav, simulation, smartphone, talking cars, University of Bologna
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