Small plane nearly crashes as it flies below Emirates A380

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 Small plane nearly crashes as it flies below Emirates A380
The engines of the German aircraft were shut, making it fall freely.

Dubai - Emirates noted that an investigation into the incident is currently taking place

By Bernd Debusmann Jr

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Published: Thu 23 Mar 2017, 9:26 AM

Last updated: Thu 23 Mar 2017, 9:58 PM

Germany's Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation is investigating a January incident in which an Abu Dhabi-bound private plane went into an uncontrolled descent after passing underneath an Emirates Airline A380 bound for Sydney.
The incident - which was first reported by The Aviation Herald - took place on January 7th when a Canadaair Challenger 604 with nine people on board passed approximately 1,000 feet underneath the Emirates 380 while over the Arabian Sea, causing the crew to lose control of the plane due to 'wake turbulence', sending it into an uncontrolled 10,000 ft. descent. Once the aircraft was brought under control, the pilots diverted to Muscat. According to the report, a number of passengers were taken to the hospital, including one with serious injuries.
In a statement sent to Khaleej Times, Emirates noted that an investigation into the incident is currently taking place.
"Safety is our number one priority and all of Emirates' flight operations are carefully managed within all applicable regulations and protocols," the statement said. "The incident you mentioned is under investigation by the relevant authorities, and we refer you to them for any comment on this matter."
A German news outlet, Deutsche Welle, reported that the findings of the German authority's investigation "will be published in an upcoming report". The firm that operates the aircraft - MHS - declined to comment because of the ongoing investigation.
A draft issue of a European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) safety information bulletin (SIB) obtained by The Aviation Herald notes that wake turbulence encounters "have progressively become more frequent in recent years."
The bulletin notes that aircraft operators and controllers should ensure that passengers are invited to keep their seat belts fastened unless moving around the cabin, and that large aircraft should include the words "heavy" or "super" immediately following their call-sign during in-flights communications.
Additionally, contrails "should be used to visualize wakes and estimate if their flight path brings them across or in close proximity." The bulletin also notes that "initial piloting action" in the event of an incident can result "in a final bank angle greater than if the pilot would not have moved the controls" and that intentional disconnection of engaged autopilot systems "can complicate the scenario."
A number of other wake turbulence incidents have occurred in recent years in places in the skies near Bali, Germany, Australia and Georgia.
Bernd@khaleejtimes.com
What is wake turbulence, and what can it do?
Wake turbulence is the turbulence that forms behind an aircraft as it passes through the sky. The effects of wake turbulence can include an induced roll, vertical forward or negative acceleration, and the loss of gain of altitude. According to the EASA SIB, the vortices are most hazardous to following aircraft during take-off, initial climb, final approach and landing.
While en-route, vortices can lead to "rates of decay" of typically between two and three minutes, with a sink rate of two or three metres per second. Most significant encounters take place at within distances of 15 nautical miles. Most encounters are reported by pilots as sudden, unexpected events. 
 


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