Hijackers escape

Yesterday, a plane which was flying from London to New-York was hijacked. The two hijackers ordered the pilot to fly the plane to Canada. At the time of the hijack most of the passengers were watching the in-flight film while others were sleeping. The flight attendants got ready to serve dinner when the two hijackers appeared. They carried guns and they threatened the passengers. When the plane finally landed at the airport, the hijackers managed to escape. Luckily, nobody was hurt.

 51 Exercise 10.

Security alert

“There is a bomb aboard your flight”. The airlines are used to such calls. A carefully thought-out is put into action at once.

If the plane has just taken off the pilots are told to return to the airport immediately. The passengers and crew then leave the plane without delay.

Security men take every piece of cargo and baggage off the aircraft. With dogs trained to sniff out explosives, they carry out a thorough search of the plane. Meanwhile the passengers are asked to identify their own baggage. Every item of cargo is searched. If, as usually happens, no bomb is found, the passengers are allowed to board again and the flight leaves once more.

But not all security alarms prove groundless. Over the past few years safety in the air has been severely threatened by hijackers. By smuggling weapons on board, they manage to hold the planes up and force the pilots to fly them to their chosen destination.

Most of hijackings have succeeded, for almost all the pilots have instructions not to resist. Fights inside airliners, with shots being fired or even bombs exploding, could endanger the safety of the passengers.

Precautions against these hijackers cost airports and airlines hundreds of millions of dollars each year. Thanks to anti-terrorist measures, the authorities are managing to keep down the number of hijackings.

Unit 9.Accident prevention

 52 Exercise 1.

Collision course

Aviation history shows that taxiing has always been a dangerous phase of any flight. The worst accident in aviation history was caused by a crew thinking they had take-off clearance when they did not. That was at the old Tenerife airport in 1977, and 583 people were killed. A KLM Boeing 747 was backtracking along runway 12 for a 180° turn at the end ready for take-off. A Pan American World Airways 747 was also cleared to backtrack along runway 12 about 3 min behind KLM, but to leave the runway at the third exit and report clear. Meanwhile, the KLM crew reported ready for take-off and were given their departure clearance. The KLM crew read back the departure clearance and then, in a famously ambiguous message, reported: "We are now at take-off," and released the brakes to roll. Tenerife tower replied: "OK, stand by for take-off, I will call you," but this message was obscured by Pan Am's simultaneous transmis­sion: "No, we're still taxiing down the runway." The KLM 747 began rolling down the foggy runway and collided with the Pan Am aircraft.

This tragic event contained most of the air­port manoeuvring area errors, which are still the most common mistakes pilots and controllers make. The top risk is still pilots taking off without clearance. Second is lining up on the runway for take-off without clearance.

Most other events occur because the pilot is uncertain of his position on the airfield. The classic recent example was the October 2001 runway collision at Milan Linate airport, in which 122 people died. This event occurred in limited visibility, so the tower depended upon position reports from the pilots. The Cessna Citation pilot was cleared to leave the business aircraft apron by a taxiway that did not cross the active runway, but took the wrong taxiway which crossed it, and that was the fatal mistake.

Evidence shows people don’t realize how little they know-or perhaps how much they have forgotten – about this subject. Unless they find out, another Tenerife is just a matter of time.

 53 Exercise 2.