Two Screws
Who woulda thought that 2 little screws could down an aircraft? Turns out, 2 little missing screws really can delay a flight for over an hour.
At my airline, we have several outstations in the system that serve as maintence bases. What that means is that crews will fly the planes in to the outstation, then mechanics will take the planes to the hangars to work on them overnight. While the crew is enjoying an excellent reduced rest overnight in style at the local Clarion or Best Western or whatever low level, cheap hotel there is in the area, the mechanics are up all night working on the aircraft. In the morning, the mechanics bring the plane back to the gate is all is well.....sometimes. Mechanics are not perfect, they make mistakes. Its up to the pilots to catch those mistakes before taking an airplane into the air. I just happened to catch an error that the mechanics made.
As I was putting my flight kit in the fishbowl, I hapened to notice 2 little screws were missing on the panel in front of my oxygen mask. Having come out of maintence, I made a comment to the guy I was flying with that the plane wasnt out back together yet. I then showed him the missing screws. We called the mechanics to come take a look and fully expected them to DMI it (DMI means deferred maintence item). DMI's are usually for non-important items such as scratch's and worn paint. But when the mechanic stuck his head in the cockpit, he let out a noticable "ohhh". He knew that the screws would have to be replaced and could not be deferred. We figured since this was a maintence base, replacement screw's would be readily available. Nope. Not even close. The first attempt to fix the problem resulted in a second trip to the hangar because they brought the wrong screws. The second attepmt was more sucessful, but the damage was already done. By the time we got out of there, we were 1:20 late and most of the pax had missed their connections. Doh!!!!!
At my airline, we have several outstations in the system that serve as maintence bases. What that means is that crews will fly the planes in to the outstation, then mechanics will take the planes to the hangars to work on them overnight. While the crew is enjoying an excellent reduced rest overnight in style at the local Clarion or Best Western or whatever low level, cheap hotel there is in the area, the mechanics are up all night working on the aircraft. In the morning, the mechanics bring the plane back to the gate is all is well.....sometimes. Mechanics are not perfect, they make mistakes. Its up to the pilots to catch those mistakes before taking an airplane into the air. I just happened to catch an error that the mechanics made.
As I was putting my flight kit in the fishbowl, I hapened to notice 2 little screws were missing on the panel in front of my oxygen mask. Having come out of maintence, I made a comment to the guy I was flying with that the plane wasnt out back together yet. I then showed him the missing screws. We called the mechanics to come take a look and fully expected them to DMI it (DMI means deferred maintence item). DMI's are usually for non-important items such as scratch's and worn paint. But when the mechanic stuck his head in the cockpit, he let out a noticable "ohhh". He knew that the screws would have to be replaced and could not be deferred. We figured since this was a maintence base, replacement screw's would be readily available. Nope. Not even close. The first attempt to fix the problem resulted in a second trip to the hangar because they brought the wrong screws. The second attepmt was more sucessful, but the damage was already done. By the time we got out of there, we were 1:20 late and most of the pax had missed their connections. Doh!!!!!
posted by Windsor at 2:08 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home