He was rushed to the hospital and survived, returning to work within five months. But they held strong, fearful that if they let go, he could be sucked into one of the plane's engines. Having survived about 20 minutes exposed to sub-freezing temperatures and hurricane-force winds, Lancaster had lost consciousness. But the shift maintenance manager had taken shortcuts and missed several cues that should have alerted him to the initial problem and his own subsequent errors: There was still one last chance to catch the mistakes. He then re-engaged the autopilot and broadcast a distress call, but he was unable to hear the response from air traffic control because of wind noise; the difficulty in establishing two-way communication led to a delay in initiation of emergency procedures. Years later, Lancaster recounted in a documentary how he had purposefully twisted his torso around to face the inside of the plane so that he would be able to breathe.

First Officer Alastair Atchison joined Jet2, but was flying with the budget airline until he turned 65 in June 2015. Feeling it would take too long to look up the correct parts for the job in the catalogue, he brought one of the bolts hed removed down to the store room. The crew has worked together to not only keep their Captain alive but everyone else on that flight who was at great risk. Ogden rushed to grab Lancaster's belt, while the other two flight attendants secured loose objects, reassured passengers, and instructed them to adopt brace positions in anticipation of an emergency landing. This is perhaps the best known of heroic landings in recent memory, earning a dramatic re-enactment in Sully, a 2016 movie directed by Clint Eastwood. The cabin had descended into a silent panic. Alastair Atchison's last landing before retirement. The NTSB blamed the crash on pilot error.

Despite very limited windscreen vision and facing a host of other landing problems, the crew managed to touch down safely at Jakarta airport. The failed fuel system now became simple and manageable".

March 22, 2023. He was also able to re-engage the autopilot and broadcast a distress call but with the rushing of the wind through the failed windscreen, he was unable clearly to hear the instructions from air-traffic control. We are all doing our damnedest to get them going again. Sources: BBC, New York Times, The Guardian, Daily Mirror. Captain Tim Lancaster had been sucked through a gaping hole where the windscreen should have been. We and our partners share information on your use of this website to help improve your experience. This was also a repeated mistake the same erroneous bolts had been screwed in the previous time the windscreen had been changed. michael wooley shreveport, louisiana; ajax request timeout default As a licensed aircraft engineer with decades of experience, he had regularly serviced the BAC-11, though it had been about two years since he'd last tackled a windscreen change. The landing took place 35 minutes after take-off from Birmingham. It is normal. The battered windscreen was found in a field near Chosley in Oxfordshire, along with the corner post and some of the bolts that had been securing it. Co-pilot Alastair Atchison landed the plane - a BAC 1-11 528FL - at Southampton Airport after 22 minutes, and Captain Lancaster - whose head had banged British Airways 5390 was a popular leisure flight route for British tourists heading to MlagaCosta del Sol Airport (AGP) in Spain. This time, the job was set up for him, with all the parts he needed. A news report about this incident can be viewed here: The incident involving British Airways flight 5390 is not the sole occurrence of an aircraft losing its windshield during a flight. That it chimes with all three of these descriptions simultaneously reveals much about a perilous 22 minutes that could have led to conflagration and recrimination but which, thanks to swift thinking, considerable heroism and survival instinct, has become a story to be recounted with a sigh and a smile. But Atchison instructed them to continue holding on to him to prevent potential damage to the plane. Due to the high speed and low pressure at that altitude, pulling Lancaster back was humanly impossible. It was by holding fast to pilot Tim Lancaster's belt that Mr Ogden prevented the captain from flying out of the Spain-bound plane. In this photo taken from the view of a plane window, smoke billows out from a plane that caught fire at McCarran international airport. The two men tried with all their might to pull Lancaster back through the hole, but the slipstream was immense. Just two were the correct size. Just 11 bolts were still attached to the windscreen, while 18 were found loose nearby. Web5 Communication Poor communication between the cockpit and air traffic control from ME 320 at University of Balamand In 1990, a plane really did land whilst the pilot was hanging out of the window by his ankles.(THREAD. The investigators also criticized the processes themselves, which should have mandated testing or verification by another person for this crucial task. Another flight attendant named Simon Rogers realized that Ogden was not able to hold the Captain for another 15 minutes until the plane landed, so they used extra seatbelts to tie the Captains legs to the chair.Photo of Tim Lancaster hanging out of the plane in 1990 (Source: Air Disasters/ National Geographic). Claim: In 1990, a British Airways flight crew saved dozens of lives by holding on to a pilot who was sucked halfway out of an airplane after explosive depressurization. Meanwhile,Simon Rogers and Sue Gibbins, who made up the rest of the cabin crew, tried to calm the passengers, urging everyone to re-fasten their seatbelts and take the emergency brace positions. Between cancellations, delays, lost luggage and booking errors, travellers arefed up, witha growing number even resorting to private charters to avoid the chaos. On June 10, 1990, British Airways Flight 5390 took off from Birmingham, England and headed towards Malaga, Spain. "It was like something from a disaster movie.
Unfortunately, this flight would not be routine. While he was giving out this advice, he was also trying to make proper contact with air-traffic control. Both pilots subsequently released their shoulder harnesses, while Lancaster loosened his lap belt as well. michael wooley shreveport, louisiana; ajax request timeout default The plane itself was brought into the British Airways fleet in 1988 and had been serviced accordingly. At the controls were Captain Tim Lancaster, 42, and his co-pilot, 39-year-old Alastair Atchison, both Flight attendant Nigel Ogden grabbed his Captains ankles before disappearing out of the window. Departure was perfectly normal and routine. The incident involving BA Flight 5390 remains one of the strangest, most disturbing and most astounding moments in the airlines history. About Us; Staff; Camps; Scuba. WebIl volo, diretto a Malaga, con a bordo 81 passeggeri, era pilotato dal comandante Tim Lancaster e dal primo ufficiale Alastair Atchison. Around 8:30, as the plane neared 17,300 feet altitude, Atchison turned the flight controls over to Captain Tim Lancaster. The gift link for this subscriber-only article has expired. Lancaster survived, suffering a few fractures and frostbite. A few months ago I found that I once had Alastair Atchison as a co-pilot on a BA flight was on. Some were the right diameter, but slightly too short, while most were the right length, but 0.66mm off in diameter. As the air pressure equalised, wind rushed back into the cockpit, creating a mini-tornado of papers and debris. As the co-pilot was talking with flight control over at Southampton, Ogden was starting to lose his grip. The bolts holding the windscreen in place, and the missing window, were found in Cholsey, Oxfordshire, around 5.5 miles (9 km) away from the location where decompression took place. Captain Moody of BA Flight 9, with 263 passengers, told BBC's Good Morning Scotland later: "It was very frightening, all the engines stopped for 14 to 15 minutes.". By registering, you agree to our T&C and Privacy Policy. Footage showed people in Batam holding sheets of metal, some of them even bearing the red and white paint of the Qantas insignia.

Co-pilot Alastair Atchison made an emergency descent and as he was new to the type, he had to land the plane on his own, from memory. WebAlistair Jackson. The aircraft was repaired and returned to service, eventually being sold to Jaro International in 1993. An engine on a Qantas Airbus 380 with more than 450 people on board exploded mid-air after take-off in Singapore, and was forced to spend a further 90 minutes airborne before landing sucessfully in Changi Airport. As the aircraft picked up speed due to its quick descent, plane documents and other small items were sucked out of the cockpit while some debris blew in from the passenger cabin. The bolt heads were too small to carry any markers identifying their part number, but after sifting through the trays to compare, he deduced it was an A211-7D. BA flight 5390 was piloted by 42-year-old Timothy Lancaster, an experienced captain with more than 11,000 flight hours, including 1,075 hours on the BAC One-Eleven type. WebCo-pilot, Alastair Atchison, was forced to make an emergency landing at Southampton Airport United Kingdom, with a flight attendant desperately holding on to the unconscious captain, who was buffeted against the outside of the aircraft suffering from frostbite and hypoxia. You have reached your limit of subscriber-only articles this month. Both pilots released their shoulder harnesses and Lancaster loosened his lap belt. Captain Alexander Akopov (right) had to land the passenger plane - with 127 people on board - "blind" after a freak hailstorm damaged its windscreen. Moody used autopilot to glide the plane into a gentle descent. They could see his head, bleeding profusely and with his eyes wide open, banging against the side windscreen. Late on Friday, June 8, the maintenance manager in charge at Birmingham International Airporthad decided to tackle the job during his overnight shift so that the aircraft would be ready for a wash on the Saturday morning. I whipped around, and saw that the front windscreen had disappeared, and Tim was going out through it, Mr Ogden explained. The explosion killed one passenger who had been nearly sucked out of a shattered window. 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Thankfully, unlike Capt Lancaster, the co-pilot had not got around to unclipping his safety harness and somehow, First OfficerAlastair Atchison was able to maintain his composure. Categories . Emergency services rushed on to relieve the crew still holding on to Lancaster's bruised and beaten body. Webalastair atchison pilot. Published by SPH Media Limited, Co. Regn. Atchison brought the plane safely to the ground in a textbook landing. Just 13 minutes after take-off at 08:20 local time, the flight reached an altitude of 17,300 feet (5,300 m) over Didcot, Oxfordshire, and the cabin crew were preparing for meal service. Saving the flight fell to Atchison, the co-pilot, who tried to get on the radio to declare an emergency, but couldnt hear the response because of the noises surrounding him. The storyof BA Flight 5390 remains one of the strangest, most disturbing and most astounding moments in the airlines history. Despite working alongside the still-in-tact right windscreen, he failed to notice that the bolts he was installing were sitting lower in the countersink. An investigation was promptly launched to determine the cause of the BA Flight 5390 incident. The aircraft was slowly climbing to gain the necessary altitude to cruise to the destination. Ogden had dislocated his shoulder and sustained minor frostbite as well as a few cuts and bruises. Investigators quickly realised the bolts didn't match the manufacturers' guidelines. [4]:55, First Officer Alastair Atchison and cabin crew members Susan Gibbins and Nigel Ogden were awarded the Queen's Commendation for Valuable Service in the Air; Ogden's name was erroneously missed from the published supplement. Working with a crew that was down two engineers, the manager opted to carry out the windscreen change himself. 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