VS016 Go Around Today (16/05/08)

Just after reading Slinky09 topic on go arounds last night whilst in the lounge at MCO, you can guess what happened to my flight today.
On short Final to runway 08 at LGW when the engines suddenly roared back to life and we were heading back towards the clouds.
The captain came on and informed us that he had landing clearance, however, the next departing aircraft had misheard ATC instructions and taxied onto the runway for take off [V]

-Steve

Wow that sounds pretty awesome!

I'm surprised the captain was so honest about the reason for the go around. In this day and age of sensationalised stories about anything to do with aviation i'd expect to see some crazy article about a 'near catastrophe' soon!

Our Captains are pretty candid in this respect, when it's not their fault they will gladly blame the other pilot for the other airline! I thought I heard some noise this morning, didn't look out my window to see the go-around!

There was also one last night into JFK on one of our A343s. I've only had a rejected take off, and in all honest think my stomach would be in my throat if the engines roared back to life!

Only ever had one go around which was a good minute or so before touchdown anyway so not really a 'proper' one. Never had a rejected take off so fill me in BoeingCat! What happened and did all the passengers have to get off while the brakes cooled etc?

IT was on the babybus (A343) departing LHR for LOS, and shortly after power was applied, and we realised we should be leaving tarmac, we suddenly started slowing down and exited the runway, there was an indication light playing up, was reset by the Flight Crew and we taxied back to the runway for our departure. A few pax were a bit worried but were ok once we were up and landed early so they were happy! Don't think I've heard an aircraft so quiet on takeoff!

Sounds pretty nerve-wracking if you're a nervous flyer! It's the various vids i've seen of a/c which have almost reached take off speed and then hit the brakes which amaze me - the tyres all deflated and brakes smouldering etc.

I've had an RTO in a Swiss A321. Fortunately, we'd only just started to accelerate, only a couple of seconds into the takeoff roll, so we stopped very quickly, vacated the runway and taxied straight back to depart again.

We hadn't built up too much heat in the brakes, meaning we didn't have to wait for the brakes to cool before attempting another takeoff - waiting for the brakes to cool would be normal if you're well into the takeoff roll and reject.

I think an RTO is actually more surprising than a go-around. The norm with most issues on the takeoff roll, once they occur above a certain point in the roll (usually a certain speed), is to take them into the air and then handle them then, rather than reject the takeoff - stopping the plane in the remaining runway is usually more risky than taking the problem into the air.

Mike

I think it's called 'V1' when the aircraft reaches a certain speed the captain says 'v1' and that means whatever happens next they are going to take off because there's not enough runway left to stop.

[Scrooge]

link to a RTO test

I have never had an RTO, though one day while being an anorak out at LAS I watched a 722 suffer an engine failure during the take off roll.

I had a very turbulent descent on a BA night-flight into Athens some years ago. A friend who was trevelling with us had started expressing concerns about the bumpiness of the descent and I did my best to reassure him all was quite normal...[:I]
Flaps were set, landing gear was down, and we'd crossed the runway threshold when we experienced fairly severe pitching and rolling. At this point I admit to feeling quite terrified and quickly started calculating the wing-span of the 767, and trying to work out just how much roll we'd get away with at such a low altitude! Yes, this all happened very quickly and then the engines roared and off we climbed again into the thundery skies above Athens.[:?]
Very prompt announcement from the flight deck to say we'd experienced windshear and they'd opted (or perhaps no option!?) for a go-around. Very smooth landing on second attempt and all was well...

Feeling a tad shaken, we boarded our little connecting flight on a smallish turboporp down to Santorini, and yes, you guessed it - another late-aborted landing in shockingly wet and windy weather. As we climbed back into the sky, the captain, after making the announcement in Greek, stated 'Sorry, I couldn't see the runway so I'll have one more go but if I still can't see it, then we need to go back to Athens because we don't have enough fuel for a third attempt...'
He managed to land us on the second attempt, although I remember seeing the runway as we did a very, very steep bank-and-dive (he basically did a u-turn onto the runway!) to much grateful applause from all passengers!![^]