JAL crash marks first airframe loss of composite airliner

A feminine passenger stated it had been darkish on board as the hearth intensified after touchdown.

“It was getting scorching contained in the airplane, and I believed, to be trustworthy, I would not survive,” she advised the Japanese broadcaster NHK.

“This was the very first crash or burn-up ever of a brand new carbon fibre plane sort,” Spaeth defined.

“There’s the Boeing 787 and there’s the A350 being constructed of carbon fibre as an alternative of aluminium. The within additionally has the most recent supplies for seat covers, for wall covers, for carpets, all these items.”

“We have now very stringent requirements nowadays and, after all, usually you’d by no means see in actual life how these supplies truly behave in a giant hearth, so this was very a lot a affirmation that the requirements truly do what they’re purported to do, delaying the unfold of fireside.”

“We noticed many circumstances within the Nineteen Eighties and the ’90s the place as soon as an plane was affected by hearth, it virtually at all times unfold in a short time.”

“However when you watch right now, it took a surprisingly very long time earlier than the entire airplane was on hearth.”

However there may be one factor, that mainstream media has missed on this story — the emergency hearth crews, couldn’t put out the hearth.

Regardless of two huge pumpers, the airframe melted away, leaving solely the supporting body.

A considerably terrifying takeaway, if you consider it. Composites apparently burn otherwise.

Consultants have additionally credited the JAL cabin crew — thought to be among the many greatest educated on the planet — for getting passengers out rapidly, with out taking luggage.

Earlier than this incident, the one all-composite, massive airplane hearth had been that of a B-2 Spirit Stealth bomber.

On February 23 2008, Spirit of Kansas, a USAF B-2 crashed on the runway moments after takeoff from Andersen Air Drive Base in Guam.

The plane was destroyed, however each crew members efficiently ejected.

The accident marked the primary operational lack of a B‑2 bomber and as of 2023, stays the one one.

With an estimated lack of US$1.4 billion, contemplating solely the price of the plane, it was additionally the costliest plane crash in historical past.

— with recordsdata from BBC, MSN & CNN