RAF scrambled 'cause BMI jet lost radio contact.

[skeggysteve]

Does this happen often?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-12...

"RAF jets were scrambled to intercept a passenger flight into Manchester, the Ministry of Defence (MOD) has said.

The BMI Baby flight from Prague sparked a security alert when it lost contact with air traffic control on Sunday.

BMI said the pilot had restored radio contact before the Typhoon fighters from RAF Coningsby arrived."


I live below the flight path for Coningsby, when they are training, sometimes they come over very quick and low.
They are very quick and very loud!

[anonymous-user]

Heard about this last night about 8pm. Someone on UKAR forum was posting as it happened.

[mrloudly]

Weird... If the crew were aware of comms failure, which I'm sure they would have been, they'd "Squawk" 7600 as an identifier thus flagging their problem to ATC.
Don't know what the commercial procedure is for zero comms landing, no doubt I'll find out shortly :-)

[LukeSi]

wonder if the transponder had messed up as well. That would explain the scramble.

[peterperkins]

Looking at state of RAF and cuts it's quite a big ask for a Sopwith Camel to catch up and down an A300 or whatever it was.

[petemurphy]

hope bmi foots the bill

[LeeME3]

Happens a fair bit, routine precautons and all that - if an aircraft wasn't responsing to radio calls because the cockpit had been 'compromised' (i.e. taken over by baddies) there is no guarantee of a 7600 squawk so, in a way, lost comss with no 7600 is more suspicious than lost comms with the squawk.

Generally it just turns out to be a spot of 'finger trouble' on the part of the jet crews or a mis-heard frequency or whatever. It gets more interesting when they start crossing national airspace boundaries without checking in though.

Certain airlines are worse offenders than others and have been known to get a stern letter from the MOD (oooh, scary!) - a sort of ultimate 'wasting police time' caution!

The RAF may be being cut but you may sleep safe with the mighty Typhoon there to watch over you!

It also does no harm to let others who may be wathing us know that we've not dropped our guard!

[Vipers]

petemurphy said:

hope bmi foots the bill

Why? people get stuck on mountains, need FREE mountain rescue.

Ships get in difficulty, FREE coastguard.

Divers get bent, FREE medical treatment in a recompression chamber.

And if your stuck on a cliff, choppers arnt exactly cheap to run.

TBH, all the above should pay something, rather than sucking the taxpayer.

[Jackleman]

petemurphy said:

hope bmi foots the bill

If I read correctly there was no radio contact, i.e BMI did not call the fly boys out!

[LeeME3]

Jackleman said:

petemurphy said:

hope bmi foots the bill

If I read correctly there was no radio contact, i.e BMI did not call the fly boys out!

True they didn't call us - but if they are in contravention of the rules of the air / established procedures then we'll go along anyway! Sort of like if you break the speed limit plod may point a speed gun at you - even if you haven't asked them to!

[knight]

petemurphy said:

hope bmi foots the bill

But it's all good for training

[JonnyFive]

LeeME3 said:

The RAF may be being cut but you may sleep safe with the mighty Typhoon there to watch over you!

I like this

Also, what happens when the jets are up there with the plane? Fly up alongside and wave over at the Pilot?

[LeeME3]

JonnyFive said:

LeeME3 said:

The RAF may be being cut but you may sleep safe with the mighty Typhoon there to watch over you!

I like this

Also, what happens when the jets are up there with the plane? Fly up alongside and wave over at the Pilot?

Well, yes actually! Firstly a copule fighters on the wing tend to attract the attention of the crew (although it's not unheard of for passengers to point them out first). That can result in the comms 'magically' fixing themselves. But there are mandated air to air hand signals just in case they don't hear you on any radio (very very very rare for them to not be monitoring 'guard' - it's hardwired into the aircraft so would require a pretty coincidental series of events to take out ALL radios but nothing else on the jet).

[JonnyFive]

LeeME3 said:

JonnyFive said:

LeeME3 said:

The RAF may be being cut but you may sleep safe with the mighty Typhoon there to watch over you!

I like this

Also, what happens when the jets are up there with the plane? Fly up alongside and wave over at the Pilot?

Well, yes actually! Firstly a copule fighters on the wing tend to attract the attention of the crew (although it's not unheard of for passengers to point them out first). That can result in the comms 'magically' fixing themselves. But there are mandated air to air hand signals just in case they don't hear you on any radio (very very very rare for them to not be monitoring 'guard' - it's hardwired into the aircraft so would require a pretty coincidental series of events to take out ALL radios but nothing else on the jet).

How can you (Pilot) see the jets on your wing, obviously you've no wing mirrors or is it common to have a check around the plane?

Are the hand signals universally known for "What the fk are you doing?"

[john_p]

A tooled up Typhoon pair flying in front of the airliner is going to be quite visible to the pilot!

[JonnyFive]

john_p said:

A tooled up Typhoon pair flying in front of the airliner is going to be quite visible to the pilot!

Obviously

But, Lee said on the wings of the plane, and I just thought its not going to be just like checking your door mirror and notice them there

[LeeME3]

JonnyFive said:

john_p said:

A tooled up Typhoon pair flying in front of the airliner is going to be quite visible to the pilot!

Obviously

But, Lee said on the wings of the plane, and I just thought its not going to be just like checking your door mirror and notice them there

Well obviusly the exact procedures aren't for forum discussion but the general idea is to approach in as non-threatening a way as possible - a Typhoon coming head on supersonic at the cockpit may spook an already probably fairly tense baddie! so, join on the wing is the norm. Also, airliners have surprisingly good rear 3/4 visibility - ideally they're desinged so as the crew can see at least the leading edges of the wings and engine intakes to give you the ability to visually check the state of the wing with regards to leading edge slats etc...plus in the event of an engine fire/malfunction, for example, a visual check is always nice before shutting down an engine...crews have shut down the good engine before now eg in the Kegworth air disaster http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kegworth_air_disaster (the 737 being a jet where you can't see the wings which was a contributory factor)

Edited by LeeME3 on Wednesday 19th January 10:10

[Chuck328]

A lex said:

Came through our sector before it overflew blighty - lost radio contact around the German border. That is a hell of a long way to fly with no radio comms, especially when they are being called constantly on guard as well the ATC frequencies.

Were they Sq'ing 7600? Also, I take it they folowwed standard ICAO lost comms procedure?

A lex said:

The same flight yesterday was also lost for a while, got that one back before the UK though!

Your saying that a second Baby flight on the same routing did they same thing for a while?


Cheers

(I'll listen out for a Yorkshire? accent on Masstrict)

[eharding]

LeeME3 said:

Well obviusly the exact procedures aren't for forum discussion

The exact procedures are well publicised, so that everyone involved should know what to do in the event of an interception, and everybody acts like little Fonzies, and ideally nobody gets blown away.

http://www.caa.co.uk/docs/33/ga_srg_09webSSL11.pdf

What isn't publicised is what happens if someone decides not to do as they are told after being read the riot act....but if you ever hear someone quoting from the book of Ezekiel on 121.5 then you can assume someone else is about to have a very bad day.....

[anonymous-user]

eharding said:

What isn't publicised is what happens if someone decides not to do as they are told

I think that's what Lee meant.