Air Force SSgt. warns oceanic airliner crew of fuel leak!

mikea

mikea

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A fuel leak on a civilian aircraft caught the attention of Staff Sgt. Bartek Bachleda, 909th Air Refueling Squadron boom operator, during a flight from Chicago to Narita airport, Japan. After alerting the pilots and aircrew, the ranking pilot made the decision to divert the flight to San Francisco.

"I noticed the leak on the left side of the aircraft right behind the wing earlier during take-off," said Sergeant Bachleda.

Sergeant Bachleda continued analyzing the outflow of fuel to be 100 percent sure it was a leak while the plane was reaching cruising altitude. Almost an hour into the flight, he told a stewardess of the possible leak, but was given an unconcerned response.

Sergeant Bachleda then began to capture the possible leak on video. He then got the stewardess' attention by saying, "Ma'am it's an emergency." He identified himself to her and showed her the leak on video.

"She was completely serious and was no longer handing out drinks," he said. "I told her you need to inform your captain before we go oceanic."

The captain came from the cockpit to where Sergeant Bachleda was sitting to see the leak and view the video footage. Sergeant Bachleda said the captain and the crew were trying to figure out how the aircraft was losing 6,000 pounds of fuel an hour and then they knew exactly what was going on.

....

http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123149266
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:yikes:

We gotta hope the cockpit crew would have made the divert decision due to the unusual fuel use...right?

Could have been another miracle glide to landing like the Azores one! If there was a place they could reach!
 

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I thought Greg might chime in! Chicago to Narita is probably a United flight. I bet he knows all kinds of details he's not at liberty to share.... gonna have to buy my buddy a few "beverages" at Gastons! ;-)

Once the flight arrived in San Francisco, Sergeant Bachleda and a coworker were asked to stay back while the aircraft was deplaned. They waited for the arrival of investigators, the fire chief, and the owner of the airport to explain what went wrong.
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Hmmm... me thinks the conversation might have included the need to confiscate the video... "for evidence and review"? Wonder if he gets it back intact; I have a feeling they wouldn't want it on YouTube.

Regardless, good on him for being willing to speak up. It'd be easy for most to "dismiss it" as "something I probably just don't understand".
 
TangoWhiskey said:
I thought Greg might chime in! Chicago to Narita is probably a United flight.
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Definitely was. 747-400. Notice the wingtip? UAL paint.

I bet he knows all kinds of details he's not at liberty to share.... gonna have to buy my buddy a few "beverages" at Gastons! ;-)
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Sorry. Can't help you, no matter how much adult beverages you "force" on me. :D
 
dparter said:
Don't tell him that now... wait until after he's bought the beverages! :rofl:
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:rofl::rofl: I suppose, but I am only good for a couple, anyway.

On second thought, Gaston's is the one place where I push the limits a tad more. :D
 
Years ago I was flying commercial somewhere when I notived an oil leak. I told the stewardess and she went on got the engineer or co-pilot. He came back and looked and said; "Yep, that's and oil leak, at least we have some oil left to leak (with a smile) and went back to the cabin. I felt pretty good about saying something and calling attention to it rather than saying nothing. We continued to our destination and he thanked me on the way out.
 
6000# / hr sounds like a lot, til you realize they were probably tankering 300,000# or more.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
6000# / hr sounds like a lot, til you realize they were probably tankering 300,000# or more.
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It LEAKED that much. In normal cruise, a 777 burns about 16,000 pounds an hour. The 747 would burn more. And the point about the 66,000 pounds on an 11 hour flight? Given the flight would want to land with about 30,000 pounds or a bit less on a 747, if unnoticed, (that would not happen), They would have run out of fuel roughly 1.5 hours short.
 
mikea said:
What's KIX?
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Kid-tested, mother-approved.

kix-cereal-box-web.jpg
 
So why the "unconcerned" response from the stewardess?

Its a good thing the pilots at least listened. I am a bit conerned with the "They finally figured out how they were losing 6000 lbs an hour" thing. Seems that's not something you go "Hmmm, how did that happen?" when flying over the ocean, but maybe that's just me.
 
So, by looking at the picture, the leak appears to be close to the wingtip. Where are the fuel dump chutes/vents located on a 747? Perhaps a faulty fuel dump valve or switch actuator? There, I started the guessing game. As far as the crew not acting concerned, I'd maybe chalk that up to yet another "well written" aviation news story. Plus they hadn't gone oceanic yet and were working the issue. I've had fuel discrepancies in flight before, and they do take a bit of time to figure out. I was showing a 3k difference between what was burned and what was showing on the gauges every hour. Turned out to be a faulty fuel flow transmitter. Things are not always as they seem..
 
SkyHog said:
So why the "unconcerned" response from the stewardess?
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Could be a lot of things. Passengers tend to mention a lot of things they don't understand that are not issues.

I am a bit conerned with the "They finally figured out how they were losing 6000 lbs an hour" thing.
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Chalk it up to "You really don't know exactly what was going on when." All you really know is what was reported and we ALL know how that goes.
 
mikea said:
Oh. :redface:

I got the wrong airport from a scummy search site.

12 hours 47 minutes.

What's funny is you knew which airport goes through KIX. What's KIX?
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KIX is Osaka airport and it is much nicer than NRT aka Narita. KIX is built out on an island and is much newer. Since I like the Kansai area (Osaka, Nara, Kyoto, Kobi) much better than Tokyo maybe I am a bit jaded. But I have spent far too much time in Narita. It is so well travelled by road warrios that I use dto hold my staff meetings in the AA Admirals club. It was one of the few places on the planet that we all seemed to be at together. Everytime I fly through NRT I run into someone I know.
 
smigaldi said:
KIX is Osaka airport and it is much nicer than NRT aka Narita. KIX is built out on an island and is much newer. Since I like the Kansai area (Osaka, Nara, Kyoto, Kobi) much better than Tokyo maybe I am a bit jaded. But I have spent far too much time in Narita. It is so well travelled by road warrios that I use dto hold my staff meetings in the AA Admirals club. It was one of the few places on the planet that we all seemed to be at together. Everytime I fly through NRT I run into someone I know.
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And I've certainly spent my share of "quality time" in the UA RCC at NRT. Not so much (none) this year, however.
 
Isn't Osaka the one that keeps on sinking?
 
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