Do airliners 'land' on water

On the occassion of my 1000th post I thought I'd satisfy my curiosity about something.

As part of the safety demonstration airlines say something to the effect of 'In the event of the plane landing on water...'. To the best of my knowledge no regular (non-amphibious plane) has ever successfully 'landed' on water. Some have crashed into water, some have broken up over water and a few have slid off runways into water but I cannot think of an occassion when a plane has ever actually landed in reasonable deep water and offloaded passengers into rafts.

This is prompted in part by watching a programme last night about Ethiopian Flight 961 that ditched in the sea off the Comoros islands in the Indian Ocean after being hijacked and running out of fuel. Reading up on this reveals that this is only the third time survivors have walked away from a plane ditching in the sea. One of the facts that came out of this is that the design of most aircraft nowadays - with engines hung from the wings - makes a water landing virtually impossible as the drag on the engines - which enter the water first - pulls the aircraft apart.

If the plane did remain intact - would it actually float as shown in the safety cards?

Has anyone else any opinions or can think of an occassion when a successful landing (e.g. plane did not break up) occurred?

Phil

I think I know of the Ethopian flight, is that the one where they have a video of it from the nearby beach?

I know nothing about physics, or the strength of the fuselage but
I've never belived that picture in safety guides of a plane resting gently on the water while everyone row row rows their boat away safely.

Just presumed it landing on water at those speeds would be like landing on concrete.

Dean

Originally posted by BuffyTVS65
This is prompted in part by watching a programme last night about Ethiopian Flight 961 that ditched in the sea off the Comoros islands in the Indian Ocean after being hijacked and running out of fuel. Reading up on this reveals that this is only the third time survivors have walked away from a plane ditching in the sea. One of the facts that came out of this is that the design of most aircraft nowadays - with engines hung from the wings - makes a water landing virtually impossible as the drag on the engines - which enter the water first - pulls the aircraft apart.

I've often wondered about this too. I remember trying to do some research and completely failing to turn up any documented instance of a plain successfully ditching in water. What are the previous two that you mention? Do you have a reference for them?

I came to the conclusion that this is one of those stupid cases where the safety culture requires that planes carry a whole load of essentially completely useless and unecessary safety equipment which will probably never work anyway.

I believe it is true that planes still have to carry lifejackets even when the routes they fly are completely over land.

Chris

I saw the programme being referred to, an episode of "Air Crash Investigation". I think there is no way a plane could stay afloat for long on water and in fact it may be better for them to break up into pieces. I really don't fancy the idea of being stuck inside the fuselage - I would want to be out immediately and inflating my life jacket as soon as I hit the surface!

I learned from that programme that you should not inflate a life jacket before being afloat independently in the water... lots of people got stuck in the plane wreckage because they could not swim out.

Paul

[Scrooge]

Well if you take the engines of you may stand a chance of a good belly landing,but as soon as one of them catches the water you are going to have drag and it just goes downhill from there as you said.

The MD-80 type of airliner,the ones with the engines on the rear fuselage may have the best hope.

As long as the fuselage remains intact it should stay afloat for a while,but no it will not act like a ship.

BTW,congrats on making it to 1k

Aircraft engines are designed to "naturally" break apart from an aircraft if there is too much drag on it so that it basically sacrifices itself instead of taking the whole wing and part of the cabin with it when it breaks off.

Very few attempts and successes of water landings have occured. I know one flight, a JAL(?) DC-8 incoming to SFO, fell short of the runway and landed in the bay, but it was practically at the shoreline so it didn't really sink, no one died in that accident. Some airliners have overrun runways into the water as well and due to the slow speeds very few injuries result from those accidents as well.

According to some pilots it can be done if the plane is set to a nearly 0#730; approach, but it's never really been tried on purpose so it's hard to say. Under pressure, it can be difficult to land it on the water perfectly, so you can't really use those as examples.

I think given the right set of circumstances it would be possible, however unlikely. The speed needs to be slow, but then why is the plane ditching? Likely as it is in trouble, so speed control is probably not too likely. Again a last minute flare scrapping the the tail in the water first seems appropriate, but again given the aircraft is in difficulty control may not be possible.

I am sure if enough people planned it and test ditched a perfect working aircraft if would be possible to make a safe 'landing' and for it to float.

I has often wondered why aircraft aren;t built with 2 or 3 large parachute. I have seen this tested and in the event of difficulty the parachutes deploy and the aircraft sails gently to the ground.

I believe this was dismissed due to cost vs lives it would save. Amazing to know that life has a value.

Paul

[Scrooge]

Parachutes can be fitted to ultra light type aircraft and even small single engine aircraft,but when you start to talk about the weight of a 737 or above you are going to need a big chute,on top of that finding a place to secure it on the aircarft isn't easy and then you have the fact that while an ultralight may be going at 50-60 mph a pax aircraft is traveling over 400mph,if the chute was released then it would just rip away from the aircraft.

Nick I know what you are saying,but once that engine and pod hits the water you have drag,that will un balance the aircraft and cause it to yaw.

If you watch the film of the Eithopian airliner I think this is pretty much what happened,once the wing touches it's all over.

[mcmbenjamin]

Congrats Phil. Cessna 152 drop like a rock but have no clue about airliners.

[Scrooge]

link for a picture and article on small plane parachutes

and another forum discussingthis.

I don't think that this thread is helping the "Advice to a nervous flyer" topic![:?]

Cheers,
VS045

[Scrooge]

Originally posted by VS045
I don't think that this thread is helping the "Advice to a nervous flyer" topic![:?]

Cheers,
VS045

Agreed,but if they are nervous they shouldn't be reading this anyhows,just the thread title should be enough to put them off.

Unless its designed to land on water I dont think there has ever been a successful ditching without some fatalities. The etheopian flight mentioned above is one of the few with survivors..

If my recollection of the ethiopian flight 961 is correct, the hijackers also tried to sabotage the landing at the last minute by forcing the stick to one side. (They did not believe that the aircraft was out of fuel). Possibly the outcome, in terms of numbers of passengers surviving, would have improved if the pilot had retained control.

Planes like the 727, MD80, DC9 etc with rear mounted engines have a much better chance becasue the bottom of the plane is flat.

Probably impossible, but couldn't they create a feature where: if the pilot knew they were going to attempt a water landing, that they could eject the engines somehow?

just a thought

Planes like the 727, MD80, DC9 etc with rear mounted engines have a much better chance becasue the bottom of the plane is flat.

I don't think that helped that flight that "landed" in the potomac. Although, I think that one of the main problems was the temperature.

800th Post!!!!!!!!:D[:p][8D]:)

Cheers,
VS045

Well according to aircrach investigation- the plane turned at the last minute due to the captain (who still flys for Ethopian) trying to get the plane to not land aganist the waves.

As far as I have worked out a ditch in the sea is the last thing any pilot wants- as it will normally mean that your dead! The only reason the Ethopian flight suffered less deaths was due to the clever pilot and its closeness to nearby islands!

Originally posted by Jonathan
Unless its designed to land on water I dont think there has ever been a successful ditching without some fatalities. The etheopian flight mentioned above is one of the few with survivors..

No, like I said in my post, there have been some.

http://www.airliners.net/articles/read.main?id=1

I know this is slightly cheating because there was only 9ft of water and the landing gear prevented the aircraft from sinking, but hey, this fits the guidelines.

This is a wild shot but maybe inflatable floating devices on the bottom of the plane:D[:I]

Originally posted by willd
Well according to aircrach investigation- the plane turned at the last minute due to the captain (who still flys for Ethopian) trying to get the plane to not land aganist the waves.

As far as I have worked out a ditch in the sea is the last thing any pilot wants- as it will normally mean that your dead! The only reason the Ethopian flight suffered less deaths was due to the clever pilot and its closeness to nearby islands!

Hi willd

Not trying to be right - just checking my own sanity, I found the following link which seems to back-up my recollection that the hijackers forced the captain's hand.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethiopian_ ... Flight_961

Its not unusual to find conflicting reports when it comes to these matters however.

[Scrooge]

Originally posted by VS-EWR

Originally posted by Jonathan
Unless its designed to land on water I dont think there has ever been a successful ditching without some fatalities. The etheopian flight mentioned above is one of the few with survivors..

No, like I said in my post, there have been some.

http://www.airliners.net/articles/read.main?id=1

I know this is slightly cheating because there was only 9ft of water and the landing gear prevented the aircraft from sinking, but hey, this fits the guidelines.

Nick

Thanks for that link,what aninteresting read [oo]

[Scrooge]

Originally posted by p17blo

I am sure if enough people planned it and test ditched a perfect working aircraft if would be possible to make a safe 'landing' and for it to float.

Paul

Ok so it took a few hour's,but there was an airliner designed to withstand water landings,it wasn't a Boeing or Airbus,but Ilyushin,the Il 62 to be exact.It was pretty much a rip off of the VC10,but during the design process it was decided that because it was to be the main international aircraft for aeroflot it should be capable of withstanding a water landing.Test were concucted using models,from 1/25 to full size.

In training we are told that Boeing tell us a 747 will float on water (no mention of how it hits water with 4 engines?) but I dont think the landing would be a problem but getting out into cold water in the middle of the Atlantic or Pacific would concern me.... then If you survive the landing, dont get frozen to death ... then what about Sharks?

I guess thats why airlines try to fly near land where possible

If one were to get down O.K. and excluding the injured, you probably stand a good chance in a liferaft. Your position would be known so it would only be a few days maybe hours before pick- up

Originally posted by BuffyTVS65
This is prompted in part by watching a programme last night about Ethiopian Flight 961 that ditched in the sea off the Comoros islands in the Indian Ocean after being hijacked and running out of fuel. Reading up on this reveals that this is only the third time survivors have walked away from a plane ditching in the sea.

I can recommend the book "Hijack: Our Story of Survival" by two survivors of the Ethiopian flight, Lizzie Anders and Katie Hayes, is a good read. Perhaps not just before you take to the air, though.

It's been several years since I read it, but ISTR that they talk about the kerosene stinging their eyes and the flames above the water as the fuel floated. Luckily the water was shallow enough for them to make it ashore.

Cheers, Howard