Second Qantas emergency landing this year

[khiemtran]

QF30 diverts to Manila after a 2m gash appears in fuselage

As a regular flyer this is disheartening, especially since there have a number of smaller incidents in-between. Qantas is currently involved in an industrial dispute with its flight engineers and the ratio of "allowable" defects per aircraft has been building up and up.

It wouldn't be quite so bad if it was one of the budget carriers, but the one thing Qantas had going for it was its engineering safety culture (it sure as heck wasn't the customer service). They knew how to keep longhaul planes flying because they knew they had to cross oceans or deserts everywhere they flew.

It's going to be interesting to find out what the investigation into this one reveals.

Comments

[julesjones]

I had much the same thought when I heard the news. You fly Qantas basically because Qantas planes don't fall out of the sky. It appears that this is no longer true...

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's a bit like watching the richest man in the village die first of the plague. Or the strongest hunter in the tribe being eaten first by the lion.