jamesnixon.com

Qantas A330 descends 20,000 ft
during Perth-Sydney flight, then
declares an emergency and
diverts to Melbourne.



Saturday April 2018 08:30


VHQPF

VH-QPF
[Pic by Yumihiko Ogawa]

Last night QF568, the PER-SYD red-eye A330, was maintaining 37,000 feet over the Nullarbor when FlightRadar24 (FR24) shows it started descending at 260 feet per minute (at 1727 UTC). Over the next 77 minutes it descended to 17,000 feet.

Another flight tracking app shows it did an emergency descent to 10,000 feet and then climbed back up to 17,000 feet.

QF568Other


FR24 showed that it wasn’t until the aircraft reached 17,000 feet (1844 UTC) that it started diverting to Melbourne on their high level view; but upon further examination the actual diversion was outside their radar coverage.

QF568 track


At some stage the crew declared an emergency by selecting 7700 on their transponder. They landed uneventfully just after 6 a.m. and Qantas has the continuation flight leaving to SYD at 0730. It is still on the ground at 07:50.

Crew reports: "We are fine. Bit of excitement for the day."

Qantas attribute the descent to a faulty air-conditioning system

Thanks to Melbourne Aircraft spotter Jarle Dixon for noticing, and for the FR24 screen shot of the approach.


QF568 Jarle Dixon


Qantas responds HERE


QF568 PERTH-SYDNEY

PUBLISHED ON 14TH APRIL 2018 AT 7:12

Comments – to be attributed to a Qantas spokesperson

QF568 travelling from Perth to Sydney experienced an issue with the air conditioning system that affected the ability to maintain pressure in the cabin.

Following standard procedure, the crew descended to 10,000 feet and were able to restart the system and diverted to Melbourne.

The aircraft landed normally in Melbourne and customers are being transferred to the first available services to Sydney.

We thank the crew for their professionalism and passengers for their patience and understanding through this issue.

Background           
                                                                                                                                                                     
Standard procedure when there is an issue with cabin pressurisation is to descend to 10,000 feet where pressurisation is no longer required. If there is a pressurisation issue, oxygen masks are deployed.

The aircraft was operated by an Airbus A330 aircraft, which carries up to 297 passengers.

Engineers will be inspecting the aircraft in Melbourne.