Heavy Check!

Growing up I thought that that an aircraft lasted "forever". As a member of the traveling public, some of us think that a plane is like the family car. Check the oil, the tires and change/add fluid as necessary. On occasion, we do a monthly check on the car and get our inspections done yearly. But with an aircraft, maintenance on these winged beauties are an on going process. Currently, one of our Dash-8-100's, N805WP, is in ourhanger for a "C" Check or a heavy inspection.

N805WP "Holomua"  in the hanger

The check is very extensive. Every portion of the aircraft is scrutinized. From Nose to tail. Nothing is overlooked. Rivets that hold the skin flaps are inspected. Aircraft interiors are taken out. Items needing repair or replacement are addressed. Avionics inspects and test all the instruments

#1 engine removed. Leading edge boots removed. Her seats on the hanger floor, 805's heavy check in progress

In a rarely seen area are the control cables that are linked to the control column in the cockpit. When a pilot turns the the controls one direction or another or pushes or pulls back, these cables respond by moving the control surfaces of the aircraft in relation to the input

 The cables run the length of the aircraft. Most aircraft have this type of configuration. The exception would be those aircraft that are "fly-by-wire" where electronic signals control the movements of the control surfaces

Looking thru the #1 engine mounting

Panels to the aircraft's rudder actuators are open and the elevator boots are missing

Looking thru the open cargo door, we can see the exposed pressure bulkhead and ducts.

The black marks on the wall to the left are from the constant scrapes of bags being placed in the hold

looking forward from the cargo door we see the cabin side panels removed for cleaning and inspection

Overhead cargo bins are still in place with the rest of the cabin covered and taped. Side panel installation is clearly visible as is the ceiling. The large opening is the under wing emergency exit

Here's another view of the cabin looking from the front to the rear cargo door area. Still alot of work to be done

 Main cabin door area with the galley covered. This aircraft is st to come out of the hanger on 01 Nov. Still alot more to be done. I look forward to dispatching this aircraft again when she is done with the check. 805 is one of my favorite aircraft's

BIRD STRIKE!!

Okay, so this kind of stuff happens on occasion. Areas like MKK and JHM are prone to having their fair share, perhaps more, of birds in and around the vicinity of the airport. Flying into these birds does happen. Most of the times when it does, it really a non event. Meaning that the bird takes a glancing blow either off the aircraft body or at times strikes the props and gets turned into a "flash of crimson".
 But today was a little different. During the crew walk around after landing in MKK they discovered this:

The F/O was looking in the intake and found the feathers and a small blood trail leading into the intake.

So they checked the engine intake bypass and found this

(GRAPHIC PHOTOS...LOOK AT YOUR OWN RISK!!)

So, we got a birds carcass in the intake, but did ANY portion of the bird get sucked into the engine? Well, now we in dispatch pretty much ground the aircraft on MKK and get maintenance control to send an mechanic and inspector out to the aircraft on the next available flight to check. FOD or Foreign Object Damage is a serious matter and is treated that way at EVERY AIRLINE!

Two hours later...after a thorough inspection, the aircraft is released by maintenance and we can now re-dispatch the aircraft from MKK back to HNL to finish the remainder of the line, albeit 2 hrs delayed!

As for our feathered friend, well this is all that maintenance found of him...

Not much left. Not even a cat would want this as a snack!

The best thing was that no one was hurt. The plane landed safely and we didn't have to replace an engine. Even after this happened, the station's customer service was already rebooking passengers and trying to minimize the delay they would experience.

Unfortunately these things do occur and the crews are capable of handling it and the maintenance staff is capable of getting the aircraft back flight ready.

Aloha Air Cargo Engine Fire

Early Sunday morning, Aloha Air Cargo's B-737-100 had an engine fire. The crew was returning to HNL when it loss the engine. Here's CFR from station 2 "rolling out" after the plane touched down on 4R in HNL.

A Heavy Heart...

Always Remembered...

The March of the 737's

There are many completed 737's transiting HNL on there way to Asia and Beyond. Here are some that I took but I have not posted on HNL RareBirds.

Here's a Malaysian 800 series taxing out to the reef runway (8R/26L). Many of these 737's have been purchased a while ago from Boeing, but only now are the airlines taking delivery of the aircraft.

Here comes a Lion Air 737-900ER series. Lion AIr, Indonesia's larget private airline is the launch customer for the 900ER series. They will be taking delivery of 30 of this type of aircraft and have the option for 30 more. These are to replace the older 737-300 and 400 series already in service with them.

 

As this monster taxis past my office, its wings actually go over the fence line. Minutes later a second one lands and both are parked next to each other during their one hour tech stop for fuel and food before procceding on to Majuro (MAJ).

 

2 down and 28 more to come for Lion !

Not only are the Indonesians and Malysians purchasing aircraft, the Chinese too are purchasing new aircraft for many startup's around the country. Here a Shandong Airlines 800 series taxi to a hardstand out on the south ramp.

Many more deliveries are coming thru HNL in the coming months. And this dosen't even count those that stop on the neighbor islands, like Virgin Blue that usually stops on LIH on there way down under.

For more info and other pics, visit http://www.hnlrarebirds.blogspot.com/