COMMENT: A few minutes after taking off from Singapore on November 4, 2010, the crew of Qantas flight QF32 heard two loud bangs. They looked out the window to find smoke billowing from one of the engines. Holes larger than an adult man had been blown completely through the left wing. The crew, under captain Richard de Crespigny, had spent months talking through potential disaster scenarios and planning how to handle them. With fuel leaking from the engine, warnings lighting up the dashboard, and the entire plane starting to shake and pitch violently this was beyond any situation they had discussed. In fact, it would later be determined that this was the most severely damaged passenger plane ever to be landed safely. The men have said that the repeated pre-flight planning their pilot subjected them to significantly bolstered their ability to focus on what was important and bring the plane down in one piece.
Andy's Quote of the Day 