Ryanair flight landed with only 220KG of fuel
Ryanair flight landed with only 220KG of fuel
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butchstewie

Original Poster:

60,687 posts

228 months

smallpaul

1,982 posts

154 months

Yesterday (19:04)
quotequote all
Not sure of the story. It must have landed with more. I'm not sure landing with 220kg of fuel would taxi you to the gate at Manchester.

Countdown

45,416 posts

214 months

Yesterday (19:09)
quotequote all
butchstewie said:
I’ get the impression it’s a regular occurrence for Ryanair (not the Mayday calls, more the judicious loading of fuel)

Mr_J

481 posts

65 months

Yesterday (19:31)
quotequote all
Countdown said:
I get the impression it s a regular occurrence for Ryanair (not the Mayday calls, more the judicious loading of fuel)
Two go arounds at GLA, one go around at EDI before finally landing at MAN in a storm. That's not a regular occurrence and has nothing to do with judicious loading of fuel.

anyoldcardave

1,025 posts

85 months

Yesterday (19:33)
quotequote all
It landed, the passengers got off none the wiser and can we believe everything we read ? a lot of Ryanair bashing out there lol.

They have a very good safety record and sounds like a good plan for queue jumping to me, circle again and we will run out of fuel lol.

Non story really.

alangla

5,853 posts

199 months

Yesterday (20:09)
quotequote all
Mr_J said:
Two go arounds at GLA, one go around at EDI before finally landing at MAN in a storm. That's not a regular occurrence and has nothing to do with judicious loading of fuel.
PIK rather than GLA. Normally Prestwick is more reliable in bad weather as well. Think there were a few Ryanair diversions from there that day.

Crumpet

4,658 posts

198 months

Yesterday (20:32)
quotequote all
anyoldcardave said:
It landed, the passengers got off none the wiser and can we believe everything we read ? a lot of Ryanair bashing out there lol.

They have a very good safety record and sounds like a good plan for queue jumping to me, circle again and we will run out of fuel lol.

Non story really.
They landed with significantly less than ‘Final Reserve’. That’s not a good place to find yourself and very much a rare and potentially catastrophic event. It won’t have been helped by Ryanair’s fuel policies. I’d hate to fly for someone who monitors how much fuel I’m using and whether my descent profile isn’t optimal - or whatever they do.

It also isn’t helped by the EU anti-tankering policy where carrying extra fuel is prohibited. It wouldn’t surprise me if someone runs out of fuel mid-flight in the not too distant future.

Ryanair are up there with the best for safety, but I’m not surprised a fuel related issue involves them.

48k

15,577 posts

166 months

Yesterday (20:41)
quotequote all
anyoldcardave said:
It landed, the passengers got off none the wiser and can we believe everything we read ? a lot of Ryanair bashing out there lol.

They have a very good safety record and sounds like a good plan for queue jumping to me, circle again and we will run out of fuel lol.

Non story really.
Not sure if serious.

ChocolateFrog

32,842 posts

191 months

Yesterday (20:52)
quotequote all
Must have been bold call to divert to Manchester then.

It makes it sound like a change in wind direction would have been enough for them not to make it.

Mabbs9

1,450 posts

236 months

Yesterday (20:59)
quotequote all
butchstewie said:
Not normal and very serious.

Countdown

45,416 posts

214 months

Yesterday (21:37)
quotequote all
Mr_J said:
Countdown said:
I get the impression it s a regular occurrence for Ryanair (not the Mayday calls, more the judicious loading of fuel)
Two go arounds at GLA, one go around at EDI before finally landing at MAN in a storm. That's not a regular occurrence and has nothing to do with judicious loading of fuel.
https://www.eurocockpit.eu/news/mayday-mayday-wins-over-ryanair-defamation-allegations

This is what was vaguely recalling (although I thought it was more recent than that).

Also this

https://www.thetimes.com/travel/advice/pilot-fury-...

Rough101

2,782 posts

93 months

Yesterday (21:44)
quotequote all
No real story, couldn’t land at the original, nor alternate airport.

Crew made it work

Hugo Stiglitz

39,831 posts

229 months

Yesterday (21:47)
quotequote all
Thats not Ryanairs fault.

Hub

6,814 posts

216 months

Yesterday (21:55)
quotequote all
ChocolateFrog said:
Must have been bold call to divert to Manchester then.

It makes it sound like a change in wind direction would have been enough for them not to make it.
It was chaos during the storm that afternoon, many flights for Dublin, Belfast, Glasgow, Edinburgh etc were all diverting to Manchester, to the extent I think Manchester could not take any more by the evening. It must have been a safer option than multiple failed landing attempts - it is the Edinburgh attempt that seems foolish. They should have gone straight to Manchester.

I posted on the FR24 thread about a Man to Dublin flight that was meant to be under an hour but they were in the air for over 3 hours to end up back where they started, I wonder how low they got on fuel!

Sheepshanks

38,048 posts

137 months

Yesterday (22:14)
quotequote all
Hub said:
- it is the Edinburgh attempt that seems foolish. They should have gone straight to Manchester.
Apparently they asked for that but were refused.

48k

15,577 posts

166 months

Rough101 said:
No real story, couldn t land at the original, nor alternate airport.

Crew made it work
Some might say crew should have chosen more appropriate fuel levels and alternates given storm Amy in the first place. If they felt pressured in to their choices there should be questions to the culture at Ryan Air.

anyoldcardave

1,025 posts

85 months

Crumpet said:
anyoldcardave said:
It landed, the passengers got off none the wiser and can we believe everything we read ? a lot of Ryanair bashing out there lol.

They have a very good safety record and sounds like a good plan for queue jumping to me, circle again and we will run out of fuel lol.

Non story really.
They landed with significantly less than Final Reserve . That s not a good place to find yourself and very much a rare and potentially catastrophic event. It won t have been helped by Ryanair s fuel policies. I d hate to fly for someone who monitors how much fuel I m using and whether my descent profile isn t optimal - or whatever they do.

It also isn t helped by the EU anti-tankering policy where carrying extra fuel is prohibited. It wouldn t surprise me if someone runs out of fuel mid-flight in the not too distant future.

Ryanair are up there with the best for safety, but I m not surprised a fuel related issue involves them.
It probably happens far more often than this time, just someone got wind it was Ryanair and not another carrier this time.

While in the EU planes coming into London City have been dumping fuel forever , seen it with my own eyes from my mates penthouse very close to the flight path.
Not sure if they are still flying to New York from LCY but BA could only take off with enough fuel to get them to Shannon in Ireland, where they used clearing US customs as the excuse for refueling, bad weather and diverts would cause the same issue?

All sorts of reasons a plane stays in the air longer than planned, any carrier could have the same issue, not heard of any crashing because they ran out of fuel, have you ? Unless there have been cover ups ?

The fuel got low because of issues, it was put on the ground , non story.

48k

15,577 posts

166 months

anyoldcardave said:
Crumpet said:
anyoldcardave said:
It landed, the passengers got off none the wiser and can we believe everything we read ? a lot of Ryanair bashing out there lol.

They have a very good safety record and sounds like a good plan for queue jumping to me, circle again and we will run out of fuel lol.

Non story really.
They landed with significantly less than Final Reserve . That s not a good place to find yourself and very much a rare and potentially catastrophic event. It won t have been helped by Ryanair s fuel policies. I d hate to fly for someone who monitors how much fuel I m using and whether my descent profile isn t optimal - or whatever they do.

It also isn t helped by the EU anti-tankering policy where carrying extra fuel is prohibited. It wouldn t surprise me if someone runs out of fuel mid-flight in the not too distant future.

Ryanair are up there with the best for safety, but I m not surprised a fuel related issue involves them.
It probably happens far more often than this time, just someone got wind it was Ryanair and not another carrier this time.

While in the EU planes coming into London City have been dumping fuel forever , seen it with my own eyes from my mates penthouse very close to the flight path.
Not sure if they are still flying to New York from LCY but BA could only take off with enough fuel to get them to Shannon in Ireland, where they used clearing US customs as the excuse for refueling, bad weather and diverts would cause the same issue?

All sorts of reasons a plane stays in the air longer than planned, any carrier could have the same issue, not heard of any crashing because they ran out of fuel, have you ? Unless there have been cover ups ?

The fuel got low because of issues, it was put on the ground , non story.
None of the Airbus narrow body types or Embraer E-Jet types which are certified to land at London City have a fuel dumping capability. So I don't think you saw what you think you saw. Besides which an aircraft wouldn't dump fuel on final approach if it was overweight to land, these calcs are done ahead of time it's not a sudden thing, the aircraft would be vectored to circle in a hold and dump fuel there (if it had the capability) or just keep flying to burn off the excess fuel.

The Club World London City service on the A318 to which you are referring hasn't operated for about ten years but not sure what point you are making about diverts. They never made any secret of the fact that when flying westbound the aircraft couldn't take off with enough fuel to make JFK so the refuelling stop was necessary and clearing customs at Shannon was a genius idea IMHO if you have ever seen the international arrivals queues at JFK.

There have been plenty of instances of commercial aircraft running out of fuel and crashing, no cover ups. All the information is in the public domain accident reports. Infact modern CRM (Crew Resource Management) was born out of the recommendations in the accident report of one such crash where the crew were busy dealing with a landing gear problem and didn't notice they were running out of fuel.

In this instance with Ryan Air the crew appear to have made poor choices on fuel, poor choices on alternate airports during storm Amy and poor choices on the number of attempts to try and land before switching to an alternate. They have saved themselves and their passengers from their own mistakes. The questions that need to be asked are why they made those choices, are there issues with the training and/or culture at the airline which lead to poor decision making. It's an opportunity to reflect and learn something which I hope is taken before something even more serious happens.

DJC76

13,274 posts

143 months

ChocolateFrog said:
Must have been bold call to divert to Manchester then.

It makes it sound like a change in wind direction would have been enough for them not to make it.
What normally happens is the airports fill up and the airport authorities start rejecting diversion requests that are made by airlines or pilots for anything other than a splash and dash. There’s often a bit of a disconnect between how pilots think their diversion requests will/should be handled and how they actually are. Some airport authorities are better than others.