WITH the eruption of Mount Ruang in Sulawesi kicking off on April 16 and the subsequent upending of the travel plans of many due to all the airport closures and cancelled flights, it is only natural that many have questioned the need for such measures.
With all that has affected flights in Sabah and Sarawak - including the severing of air links to Peninsular Malaysia - there has also been a revival of talk that a volcanic eruption in Indonesia once caused an airliner to suffer total engine failure.
In fact, it is said that all the damage occurred when the airliner flew through the volcano's ash plume.
Did this really happen?
Verdict:
TRUE
Yes, this happened on June 24, 1982, when British Airways Flight 009 flew through the ash plume of the then-erupting Mount Galunggung in Java while heading from Kuala Lumpur to Perth, Australia.
In the incident, Captain Eric Moody and his crew were flying at an altitude of 37,000 feet (11,277m) when puffs of foul-smelling smoke began appearing in the cabin of the Boeing 747-200.
Moody – who had been walking down the aisle of the airliner – was then summoned to the cockpit where he was greeted with the glow of a static electricity phenomena called St Elmo's Fire lighting up the path ahead of it.
In an interview with the BBC in April 2010, Capt Moody then said that while St Elmo's Fire itself is not unusual, the crew also noted that they could see that the engines of the Jumbo Jet were glowing as if lit up from the inside.
He then recounted that it was at this point that his flight engineer relayed some chilling news.
"Engine failure number four, engine failure number two. Three's gone. They've all gone," said Moody of the news that the Boeing with 247 people on board had been turned into a glider.
So, what happened then?
Capt Moody and the crew turned the aircraft to head for Jakarta while trying to restart the engines, while losing altitude all the way.
"We glided from 37,000ft to 12,000ft (3,657m) before we got (the engines) going again," he said in the interview.
The aircraft ultimately landed in Jakarta on three engines, as one failed shortly after being re-started.
On his website in which he shared another account of what happened on Flight 009 as published in the April 1996 edition of the aviation magazine The Log, Capt Moody also recalled the announcement he gave to passengers and cabin crew once the oxygen masks dropped.
This announcement by Capt Moody is one that has gone down in history as a prime example of British wit and stiff upper lip.
As was recounted, he said; "good evening ladies and gentlemen. This is your captain speaking. We have a small problem. All four engines have stopped. We are all doing our damnedest to get them going again. I trust you are not in too much distress."
In The Log's article, it was also said it took two days to determine that volcanic ash from Mount Galunggung was the cause, something suspected by some of the crew.
"The engines were the worst-affected parts of the aircraft with the turbine blades having the most damage. The tips of the blades were ground away where they were blasted by the ash at high speed," said writer Jack Diamond.
It was added that aside from grinding away at the turbines, the ash melted and fused with its blades.
"The change in blade shape and size had serious effects on the efficiency of the engines," he added.
Ultimately, all four engines of the 747 had to be replaced – a testament to how much damage a volcano's plume can cause to a jet airliner, even at 37,000 feet up in the sky.
References:
1. https://aviation-safety.net/
2. chrome-extension://
3. chrome-extension://
4. chrome-extension://
5. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_
