ASN Wikibase Occurrence # 323465
| Date: | Tuesday 25 July 2000 |
| Time: | 16:44 |
| Type: |  Aérospatiale / BAC Concorde 101 |
| Owner/operator: | Air France |
| Registration: | F-BTSC |
| MSN: | 203 |
| Year of manufacture: | 1975 |
| Total airframe hrs: | 11989 hours |
| Cycles: | 4873 flights |
| Engine model: | Rolls-Royce Olympus 593/610 |
| Fatalities: | Fatalities: 109 / Occupants: 109 |
| Other fatalities: | 4 |
| Aircraft damage: | Destroyed, written off |
| Category: | Accident |
| Location: | Gonesse -
 France
|
| Phase: | En route |
| Nature: | Passenger - Non-Scheduled/charter/Air Taxi |
| Departure airport: | Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG/LFPG) |
| New York-John F. Kennedy International Airport, NY (JFK/KJFK) | |
| Investigating agency: | BEA |
| Confidence Rating: |  Accident investigation report completed and information captured |
The Air France Concorde, registered F-BTSC, was to depart Paris-Charles de Gaulle for a flight (4590) to New York-JFK. Departure was delayed by about one hour because the crew had requested a replacement of the thrust reverser pneumatic motor of the no. 2 engine. Also, the rear bogie truck of the left hand main undercarriage was replaced. When all 100 passengers had boarded, the plane taxied to runway 26R (4217 m long). Takeoff weight was calculated to be 186,9 tons, including 95 tons of fuel, which was one tone over the maximum takeoff weight. At 14:42:17 the crew were cleared for takeoff.
At 14:42:31, the captain commenced takeoff. At 14:42:54.6, the co-pilot called one hundred knots, then V1 nine seconds later. A few seconds after that, tyre No 2 (right front) on the left main landing gear was destroyed after having run over a strip of metal lost by a Continental Airlines DC-10-30, registered N13067 which departed Paris as flight 055 to Newark five minutes before. The destruction of the tyre in all probability resulted in large pieces of rubber being thrown against the underside of the left wing and the rupture of a part of tank 5. A severe fire broke out under the left wing and around the same time engines 1 and 2 suffered a loss of thrust, severe for engine 2, slight for engine 1. By 14:43:13, as the captain commenced the rotation, the controller informed the crew the presence of flames behind the aircraft. The co-pilot acknowledged this transmission and the flight engineer announced the failure of engine no. 2. Nine seconds later the engine fire alarm sounded and the flight engineer announced "shut down engine 2" then the captain called for the "engine fire" procedure. A few seconds later, the engine 2 fire handle was pulled and the fire alarm stopped. The co-pilot drew the captain's attention to the airspeed, which was 200 kt. At 14:43:30, the captain called for landing gear retraction. The controller confirmed the presence of large flames behind the aircraft. Twelve seconds later the engine fire alarm sounded again for around 12 seconds. It sounded for the third time at about 14:43:58 and continued until the end of the flight. At 14:43:56, the co-pilot commented that the landing gear had not retracted and made several callouts in relation to the airspeed. Three seconds later, the GPWS alarm sounded several times. The co-pilot informed ATC that they were trying for Le Bourget aerodrome. Then the number 1 engine lost power as well. The aircraft entered a left turn until control was lost, crashing into hotel 'Hotellisimo' and bursting into flames.
PROBABLE CAUSE:
- High-speed passage of a tyre over a part lost by an aircraft that had taken off five minutes earlier and the destruction of the tyre.
- The ripping out of a large piece of tank in a complex process of transmission of the energy produced by the impact of a piece of tyre at another point on the tank, this transmission associating deformation of the tank skin and the movement of the fuel, with perhaps the contributory effect of other more minor shocks and /or a hydrodynamic pressure surge.
- Ignition of the leaking fuel by an electric arc in the landing gear bay or through contact with the hot parts of the engine with forward propagation of the flame causing a very large fire under the aircraft's wing and severe loss of thrust on engine 2 then engine 1.
In addition, the impossibility of retracting the landing gear probably contributed to the retention and stabilisation of the flame throughout the flight.
Accident investigation:
 |
|
Sources:
SKYbrary
Bureau Enquêtes-Accidents (BEA)
History of this aircraft
Other occurrences involving this aircraft
| 19 September 1982 | F-BTSC | Air France | 0 |  |
unk | |
| Tire failure | ||||||
| 27 March 1992 | F-BTSC | Air France | 0 | New York-John F. Kennedy International Airport, NY (JFK/KJFK) |  |
unk |
| Tire failure | ||||||
Location
Images:
photo (c) Ralph Kunadt; Basel, Switzerland/Mulhouse-EuroAirport Swiss (BSL); May 1989
photo (c) Dominic Ganz; June 2000
photo (c) Dominic Ganz; June 2000
photo (c) Peter Frei; Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG); 22 December 1979
photo (c) Ralph Kunadt; Basel, Switzerland/Mulhouse-EuroAirport Swiss (BSL); May 1989
photo (c) Dennis Piplow; Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG); April 1995
photo (c) Phil Wherry; Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG); 12 February 2000
Revision history:
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