DHL A300B4>>  Click to open

To those of you who are wondering what happened to the DHL A300B4 coming
out of Baghdad last Saturday, take a look. Aircraft was hit at 8000 FT,
lost ALL hydraulics and therefore had no flight controls, actually did
a missed approach using only engine thrust and eventually (after about
16mins) landed heavily on runway 33L at Baghdad. This was fortunate
because with no steering the aircraft veered of the runway to the
left, had they landed on 33R veering to the left would have taken them
straight into the fire station.  The aircraft then travelled about 600
metres through soft sand taking out a razor wire fence in the process,
see LH engine pic, and came to rest almost at the bottom of the sloping
area between the runway and a taxiway. All three crew evacuated safely
down the second slide, the first one tore on the razor wire. 

I flew in with a team on Tuesday in one of our Metros and some
special equipment we'd had made locally in Bahrain and some provided by
Airbus. Using a USAF D9 Caterpillar pulling a 100 metre cable fitted to
the back end of each bogie and a nice new aircraft pushback tug with a
towbar on the nose gear, we were able to remove the aircraft just on
dusk on Tuesday night and towed it to an Iraqi Airways graveyard on
one side of the terminal. We stayed overnight in the USAF camp on the
airport and went back to the aircraft on Wednesday morning to allow the
insurance survey to be completed and then secure the aircraft.

Basically, LH engine rotates in a fashion, has ingested lots of razor wire
and is knackered. RH engine has seized, probably from ingesting loads
of sand at maximum reverse thrust and inlet cowl has unacceptable lip
damage, probably from hitting the razor wire fence posts. The No 8 axle
appears to be cracked as the wheel sits at an odd angle. The bulk of the
damage is the LH wing. About 3 metres of rear spar is missing in front
of the outboard flap, the wing has bulged upwards and downwards where
the initial explosion appears to have occurred, one O/B flap track is
hanging in the breeze and one has a small piece of flap still attached,
the rest of the flap is nonexistent. The pics show the huge crack that
has occurred to the rear spar inboard of where the spar has burnt away,
possibly from loads on the wing during the landing process.

The front The point of entry pics show where a projectile entered Tank
1A, which was full of fuel, and, after it ignited, proceeded to burn away
at the spar. The fuel tank ribs in the area directly in front of the O/B
flap are burnt almost 50% through. The crew obviously did a fantastic job
in getting the aircraft back on to the ground and one can only assume
that it was most fortunate that they were not aware of the state of
the wing as they could not see it from the cockpit. It also says a lot
for the structure of the aircraft that it withstood the impact of the
(whatever is finally determined to have hit it).

I'm sure there will be lots of other photos and videos flying around
the net, but at least these ones are genuine. The worst part for us
was the airport was shut down on Wednesday and we had to be driven in an
armour-plated Landcruiser Troop Carrier from Baghdad to Balad, 60 miles to
the north, from where we flew back to Bahrain in our Metro again. I trust
you will all appreciate just how lucky these guys were. Regards, Ashley.

Ashley Northcott,

Technical Director,

DHL International Aviation,

Bahrain.
Ph: +XXX XXXXXX Fax: +XXX XXXXXX Mob: +XXX XXXXXXX

QOTD:
	"It's hard to tell whether he has an ace up his sleeve or if
	the ace is missing from his deck altogether."