FOKKER 100 Nose Gear Failure Landing | EP. 1262

Video from the channel Aviões e Músicas about Fokker, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 20:54. Language: Portuguese. Video type: Documentary.

A Brazilian educational video reconstructing the nose-gear-up landing of an Avianca Brasil Fokker 100 in Brasília, broadcast live by the country's television networks, and the subsequent investigation. It includes an advertising break and the announcement of a channel giveaway, unrelated to the topic.

The video places the aircraft within Fokker's history, founded in 1912: the First World War aircraft, the F27 turboprop, the F28 jet of the 1960s and its derivatives, the Fokker 70 and Fokker 100. In Brazil, the Fokker 100 was for years TAM's main aircraft, and TABA and Oceanair, later Avianca Brasil, also flew it. The Congonhas accident and other incidents gave it a bad reputation, to the point that Avianca marketed it as the "MK28", from its official designation F28 Mk 100.

According to the video, on 28 March 2014 the aircraft registered PR-OAF, one of Avianca's 14, mostly ex-American Airlines, was operating flight 6392 from Petrolina to Brasília with 44 passengers, three flight attendants and two experienced pilots. It took off at 14:52 and half an hour later reported low fluid in hydraulic system number 1, which powers, among other things, the landing gear, the flaps, the speedbrakes and the thrust reversers. The crew lowered the gear by gravity using the alternate system, but the nose gear showed no lock indication. The crew declared an emergency, requested fire crews and burned off fuel down to about 700 kg before landing at 17:42.

The aircraft rolled 900 m, 750 of them resting only on the main gear with the nose raised, and stopped within the 3,300 m runway. Firefighters covered the front of the aircraft with foam and there was no fire; the only injury was to the first officer, who suffered a fracture to the thoracic spine.

The investigation found a displaced seal in engine 1's hydraulic pump, which had gone 2,563 hours without leaking, and confirmed the nose gear itself worked: it was its doors that blocked it. A hinge on the right-hand door was bent and had not been recently lubricated, and its holes showed corrosion that narrowed the clearance for the pins. The report recommended removing and inspecting those doors on all Fokker 100s. The aircraft was not repaired, as it was not economically viable; it was used as a source of spare parts and, after Avianca Brasil's bankruptcy, ended up converted into a theme restaurant in Brasília.