Aviation Safety 

wreckage found in Alaska

JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, Alaska (AP) --The wreckage of an Air Force F-22 fighter jet has been found near a national park in Alaska.

Military officials confirm search and rescue aircraft discovered the wreckage of the single-seat plane Wednesday south of Denali National Park. A rescue team is still looking for the pilot.

The jet had been missing since the pilot lost contact with air traffic control at 7:40 p.m. Tuesday while on a nighttime training run.

The Alaska Air National Guard, which is leading the search effort, used three helicopters and a cargo plane to look for the stealth aircraft. It searched from Tuesday evening until early Wednesday, resuming efforts at daylight

Qantas jet had series of system failures

(AP) Pilots struggled against a rapidly cascading series of system failures after a Qantas jet's engine blew out, severing electrical and hydraulic lines and puncturing fuel tanks.

The description of the pilots' ordeal on the Nov. 4 flight came as the airline's chief executive said Thursday the engine failure might lead to the replacement of as many as half of the 80 Rolls-Royce engines that power some of the world's largest jets, the Airbus 380.

After the Qantas engine disintegrated, blasting metal shards into the left wing, the pilots were inundated with 54 computer messages alerting them of systems that had failed or were close to giving out, said Richard Woodward, vice-president of the Australian and International Pilots Association. Woodward has talked with all five pilots who were in the cockpit. 

"I don't think any crew in the world would have been trained to deal with the amount of different issues this crew faced," Woodward said.

"The amount of failures is unprecedented," he said. "There is probably a one-in-100-million chance to have all that go wrong."

Among the pilots' troubles, the wing's two fuel tanks were punctured. Fuel leaked out, causing a growing imbalance between the left and right sides of the plane.

At the same time, the plane was becoming tail heavy. The electrical power problems prevented pilots from pumping fuel from tanks in the tail to tanks farther forward, Woodward said.

Gradually, the plane's centre of gravity began to change, Woodward said.

That might have posed the greatest risk, safety experts say. If a plane gets too far out of balance, it will lose lift, stall and crash.

The pilots managed to return the crippled plane to Singapore and land safely with 450 passengers aboard.

Qantas has since grounded its fleet of six A380s, each powered by four of the giant Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines. Qantas CEO Alan Joyce told reporters that Qantas might have to replace 14 engines, each worth about $10 million.

Rolls-Royce has indicated that the number of engines that need to be replaced is "40 engines worldwide," he said.

Rolls-Royce has remained virtually silent since Nov. 4 as its stock price has dropped.

FAA plans to require photos on pilot certificates

WASHINGTON - The government is finally moving to require photos on pilot certificates to guard against terrorists getting through airport security.

The Federal Aviation Administration proposed the requirement on Thursday.

Photos would add to other safeguards on the certificates, which now must be made of plastic and contain a hologram or ultraviolet-sensitive layer to deter altering or forgery.

The FAA would give commercial pilots and flight instructors three to four years to comply with the photo requirement, and five years for recreational pilots. New certificates cost $22 and must be renewed every eight years -- with a new photo.

Congress directed the FAA to add photos and other security safeguards back in 2004. Last month, Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., said government officials were guilty of "an incredible level of incompetence" for failing to comply with the law that he helped draft.

The law was intended to plug security holes exposed by the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks by verifying the identity of people trying to get on planes.

The FAA is taking comments on the proposed photo requirement until Feb. 17.
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9JIP1M00.htm

LAX-Bound Jet Lost Navigation System

Union Rep: LAX-Bound Jet Lost Navigation System

Union rep: LAX-bound jetliner lost navigation system, had to be talked down through clouds

(AP) A Southwest Airlines jet lost its navigation system as it approached Los Angeles International Airport last week, forcing air traffic controllers to redirect several flights to clear the airspace as they guided the aircraft to a safe landing, a union representative said Tuesday.

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a statement saying only that it was investigating the flight and that controllers handled the situation professionally.

The Boeing 737 carrying 92 passengers and crew members was coming from San Jose when the navigation system failed around noon on Oct. 20, causing the jet to lose its positioning amid the clouds, said Ron Geyer, union representative for air traffic controllers at the facility that handles planes approaching and leaving Southern California airports.

"The weather was bad. The pilot had no visuals until he was below the clouds," Geyer said.

Geyer said controllers scrambled to redirect several flights so they could clear airspace for the Southwest pilot to get through the clouds until he could see the airport. He said controllers almost never encounter such a scenario.

"It was such a rare occasion, yet there was no impact to the system except we had to turn some planes around to make sure nobody was in jeopardy in case the plane got off course," Geyer said.

A Southwest spokeswoman said the captain's instruments failed but the copilot's remained intact, and emphasized that the plane landed safely and nearly on time.

"An aircraft like this is set up with redundant systems," Ashley Dillon said. "There are backups to backups to backups."

She said the outage occurred because a circuit breaker was flipped on the aircraft. She could not say how common the problem is.

Najmedin Meshkati, a professor who studies aviation safety at the University of Southern California, said he has read few reports of such failures on airliners compared with more frequent incidents like runway incursions. But he said that simply could be because instrument problems are not made public.

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