If this week is any guide, next week’s rolling stop work meetings by Qantas ground engineers will make flying on the airline hell.
On Tuesday just after midnight a 747, QF2 made an emergency return landing at London Heathrow after smoke filled the cabin, and the pilots, wearing oxygen masks, dumped 77 tonnes of fuel on the way back.
On Wednesday a domestic Qantas 767 docked at Sydney with smoke pouring out of a defective undercarriage. And while delays blamed on overtime bans by ground engineers crippled the timetable, several jets were flown abroad empty, apparently to get the minimum maintenance needed for them to legally re-enter passenger service.
Get used to minimum maintenance. The reason Qantas can’t fly to schedule is that it dare not knowingly break the rules on the legal minimums without being liable for criminal prosecutions potentially far more serious than systematically stealing from its freight clients through illegal price fixing.
A late Qantas jet should be a safe Qantas jet. Assuming the managers who are standing in for engineers know what they are doing.
This coming week is critical to the dispute between Qantas and its licensed engineers and mechanics. If Qantas finds a way to replace them root and branch, which is one of the rumours going around, it will cost way more than giving in to demands for a 5% rather than 3% pay rise for each of the next three years. And if a screw up kills a jetload of passengers it costs them “everything”.
Or maybe not. It is an unpleasant reality that in any airline there is a team that calculates and manages risk. Including the risk of loosing a “hull”, a pseudonym for several hundred people wrapped in aluminium, say once every ten or twenty years versus the terrible inefficiencies of the no-longer fashionable cultures of “excessive” excellence in flight and operational standards that built the world’s leading carriers, including Qantas.
The cost of compliance with regulations is one of the few areas left, other than labor “reforms”, where savings can be made.
CASA is holding the line. An email received this morning from within the safety regulator says:
Were keeping a close eye on all that is going on in Qantas. We are making it clear to them that the standards set down in their manuals and the regulations must be met at all times.
There are no short cuts being granted. It is up to Qantas to manage this situation but we will take appropriate action if standards are not met.
By way of an update most of the stop work meetings were canceled yesterday because of a legal risk that the licensed engineer’s union would have been compelled to identify a management leak.
There is a fear in at least some at CASA that a crash could result from maintenance errors or backlogs in this situation, a fear that exceeds the fear of displeasing Qantas. The last time such fear was apparent in CASA was in April 2001 when it discovered an Ansett 767 had flown multiple sectors with inoperable emergency slides and had not rectified cracks that were apparent in other 767s in a load bearing component in the top of the pylons attaching each engine to the wing.
Leaving for London Friday, tried to cancel Qantas but they will only give a credit, canceling anyway.
Bastards I won’t use them again except to use the credit up.
Too many problems cropping up to take the chance.
From the Age June 9th, imagine what the defects total is now, I’m now on Malaysian, to London , I didn’t feel I had any choice really after reading various reports and hearing of the problems that have occurred so far within the fleet.
“A pay dispute between Qantas and its engineers has led to more aircraft flying with “allowable defects,” minor technical problems with which planes are allowed to fly for a limited time.
The Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association (ALAEA) said before the current round of overtime bans by engineers, there were 750 allowable defects among Qantas’ 130-strong fleet of aircraft.
“Over a three-week period that’s risen to 1,810 which is more than double, which is I guess going to continue heading north unless (Qantas) come to the table next week with something and we can reach a solution,” ALAEA federal secretary Steve Purvinas said on Monday.
Mr Purvinas told ABC Radio some of the defects carried a time limit so some aircraft might have to be grounded.
“If they don’t have enough engineers to repair those defects that are reaching their final days … well then they will have problems and have to remove some aircraft out of service I dare say,” he said “
The operational levels of CASA COULD have a difference of views to those of CASA senior management on this one. Recent events suggest CASA senior management may instruct operations to back off prior to investigating – if a complaint is received from a high level.
The CASA Senate Enquiry Terms of Reference
“to consider ways to strengthen CASA’s relations with industry AND ensure CASA meets community expectations of a firm safety regulator. “
QF story for u
PP