The lighter side of Flight International.
Diversionary tactics
“We departed Lagos about an hour ago… to Abuja and, upon arrival, the cabin crew confidently announced that we’ve arrived [in] Abuja,” stated a passenger on social media while travelling with United Nigeria Airlines on 26 November, “only for us to realise that we landed in Asaba”.
The passenger in question, a former Kano political candidate, suggested the pilot had been given the wrong flightplan.
But the airline insisted that there had been no such operational cock-up – the aircraft, apparently a wet-leased Airbus A320, had been diverted owing to “poor destination weather”.
“The pilot of the aircraft was aware of the temporary diversion and was properly briefed,” the carrier states.
It admits, however, that its flying customers were not as well briefed. “A wrong announcement was made by cabin crew upon landing safely in Asaba, creating confusion among the passengers,” it says.
Mystery solved. Well, maybe. Because Abuja lies northeast of Lagos, yet the aircraft’s flightpath shows it only flew due east to Asaba, with no indication of a course change. And a quick check of Abuja airport’s METAR suggests it was being hammered by, er, light winds, excellent visibility, and no significant weather conditions.
Self-loading cargo
Congratulations to eHang for achieving Chinese certification for its electric vertical take-off and landing air taxi, but surely its press release description of its EH216-S as a “passenger-carrying unmanned aerial vehicle” is a bit of a contradiction?
Part fiction
Ever since the scandal broke surrounding UK-based AOG Technics’ alleged distribution of unapproved engine parts, online reviews for the company have not been kind.
AOG Technics supposedly had a business address in the futuristic Nova building around the corner from Buckingham Palace – in reality, a rented mailbox – and Google Maps still marks it as the company’s offices.
But the accompanying user reviews are not encouraging. “I ordered a GE90 for a Boeing 777,” says one, above a photo of a huge rusting cargo ship propulsion screw. “I received what seems to be a used one… I installed it anyway, and it works, although the aircraft seems a bit wobbly in the air. Wouldn’t recommend.”
Another one-star rating states: “I asked for a flux capacitor but received a food-processor instead. But it does make good guacamole.”
AOG’s plush London base may have been made up. So too, it seems, were many of its staff. An investigation by the Daily Mail found that employees listed by AOG Technics on LinkedIn appear to be stock images found on the internet.
A woman purporting to be one Martina Spencer, a London-based account manager, pops up in an Amazon advert for women’s reading glasses. Meanwhile, chief commercial officer Ray Kwong is the spitting image of “factory owner Mr Wang” discovered elsewhere online enthusiastically providing a customer testimonial.
Flagging fortunes
Until recently, Boeing used flag emojis for each of its country or regional pages on its web site. In the light of recent events, it seems to have revised its choice of the Palestinian colours for its Middle East section, choosing to remove all flags from the pages.
Yuckspeak
SpaceX spokesperson, quoted in another aerospace journal: “We had a rapid, unscheduled disassembly of both the super heavy booster and the ship…”
= Both stages blew up.
Thanks to spotter RP Czachor.
