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onetrack

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Everything posted by onetrack

  1. onetrack
    I believe this is the crashed aircraft ... https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1403532354035011
  2. onetrack
    This is terrible news. 2025 is going to go down as a dreadful year for light aircraft crashes in Australia. 2024 was a really bad year with 27 fatalities, 2025 must have exceeded that figure already. There were 16 fatalities from 12 crashes up to the end of July, and there have been a serious number of crashes and fatalities, since then.
  3. onetrack
    The ABC News article is most certainly centred around just the effect on Jetstar, and it's not an aviation technical report, and it ignores all the other affected airlines. Jetstar are most affected because they own around 90 A320's - but only 34 of the Jetstar A320's are affected by the recall. Virgin only own 4 A320's affected by the recall, and were able to work around those aircraft being pulled from operations for the software revamp. Qantas are not affected, as none of their aircraft are covered by the recall.
  4. onetrack
    Don't forget! - they use piles of cardboard boxes for the stuntmen to land in, when they make those fabulous leaps, from the tops of big buildings!
  5. onetrack
    Here's an ABC news article regarding the problem. Jetstar has had about 90 flights grounded. The repair involves a software update that takes about 2 hrs - but as always, a shortage of qualified LAMEs is a big part of the problem, that is causing delays. The software "update" actually involves reverting to the previous version of the aircrafts computer programming. It appears the latest software update installed was unable to cope with the solar flares. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-11-29/jetstar-flights-grounded-delayed-due-to-airbus-a320-recall/106081408
  6. onetrack
    As I understand it, the BOM was dead-set on setting up the new site purely due to major security concerns surrounding the old site. The old site apparently runs on Linux and some "bad actors" (in the form of potential enemy countries) had been infiltrating the old site to garner a lot of useful, easily accessible information, about the stats and conditions of many things in Australia, related to water, and even geography. Not a lot of people know that the BOM site contains water reservoir information across all States, with detailed information on locations, reservoir names, reservoir capacities, water level heights and percentages of capacity, as well as other useful information to any "bad actor" planning any kind of enemy assault on our country. Not a lot different to the Japanese who did covert surveillance of Australias geographic features and facilities in the late 1930's. https://www.bom.gov.au/water/dashboards/#/water-storages/summary/state
  7. onetrack
    Nothing that a couple of dampening springs wouldn't fix! I'm surprised, that with Peter Sripol reportedly having engineering qualifications, that he didn't work that little problem out.
  8. onetrack
    I like one of the comments on Peter Sripol's Instagram page - "One time my dad asked about you in the car, and he was surprised to hear that you were still alive!" 😄
  9. onetrack
    Wow, I can see some real potential there! Fill all the open spaces with expanding styrofoam, paint the outside of the cardboard with some Dulux Weathershield, and you're in with the winners! 😄 Crashproofing due to the styrofoam, waterproofing due to the Dulux, all that's needed is to ensure triple-wall cardboard is in the fuselage and wing spars! 😄 Have you seen how strong triple-wall cardboard is, and how durable Dulux Weathershield is?! Fantastic stuff! This thing will outlast the Gooney Birds! 😄
  10. onetrack
    You have to ask - Why? It looks like a throwback to a draggy 1930's design.
  11. onetrack
    John - A 33-year-old Boeing 747-400, registration HL7413, operated by Asiana Airlines Cargo, holds the record for the most hours flown by any Boeing aircraft: 149,645 hours. Converted from passenger service to freighter in 2007, this aircraft continues to fly key transpacific cargo routes. Second on the list is Cargojet’s 767-300ER (C-FCAE) with 147,861 hours, followed by Delta Air Lines N171DN 767-300ER, still flying passengers with over 145,622 hours. The B747 and B767 are amongst the best of the very well built (or perhaps "overbuilt") aircraft ever produced. Of course, the venerable Douglas DC-3 is also up amongst the long-lived list of aircraft, but their piston engines are possibly their weak point for ensuring longevity. A lot of DC-3's crashed simply due to engine failure. Jet engines reliability is one of the reasons why the B747 and B767 airframes can last for so long.
  12. onetrack
    The media are now missing the point that the BOM website is no longer fit for purpose and doesn't provide satisfactory weather information or warnings, because the layout is user-unfriendly and a lot of information is "buried", with no clear indications of how to find it. I want to check weather at two locations regularly, the one I leave from, and the one I'm going to, in the W.A. wheatbelt. To do so, involves a convoluted trail of searching the BOM website.
  13. onetrack
    I can recall the time when you couldn't get CoA for any aircraft that had ever been in combat, or designed for combat. In wartime, they're used and abused, and taken way beyond structural recommendations as they're thrown around the sky. They're shot up, patched, crashed and rebuilt - multiple times. They patched sections of one airframe onto another - and the LAME's worked in dreadful conditions, often with inadequate tools, and certainly using secondhand parts and components. In WW2 they worked in atrocious conditions, sandstorms, new fresh-made (and often, still unfinished) runways, they took off in deep mud, they spent all their life in the open, alongside the oceans, on decks of ships (from new), and the average airframe life in WW2 was probably 3-4 years.
  14. onetrack
    No B-17 would have ever achieved any more than 2,000-3,000 hrs TT. "The Swoose" is the oldest B-17 preserved, and has probably done less than 2000 hrs. It was built in 1941, and started suffering from cracked wing spars and corrosion by 1944. The B17G "Nine-O-Nine" that was recently destroyed in a crash, had done under 1200 hrs. They weren't built to last, just built fast, to fight a war, and to be quickly destroyed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Swoose#:~:text=The Swoose is a Boeing,oldest B-17 still intact.
  15. onetrack
    They still appear to be in business? https://www.atecaircraft.eu/en/news
  16. onetrack
    If you paint the wings and tail a bright purple, you'll have two colours and a pattern that will stand out anywhere. 🙂
  17. onetrack
    How can you be so sure it's drone footage? It could be a screenshot from Google Maps. If I go to Google Maps Street View, and then click on the zoom out ( - ) button, I can get pretty good "drone-type" views of the terrain. I would inquire to the real estate company as to how they acquired that image or images, before making a report to CASA. If they have used a drone, then someone certainly needs reaming out.
  18. onetrack
    Well, that colour is pretty much guaranteed to make sure that no-one ever misses sighting you! 🙂
  19. onetrack
    That's terrible treatment on behalf of your wife! Apple watches aren't designed to take that kind of abuse!
  20. onetrack
    You have to remember that the aircraft was 34 years old, and had done over 92,000 hrs. Despite being fully rebuilt in 2006 when converted to a freighter (MD-11F), it was still a 1991 aircraft build - and it was due to be phased out of service shortly, due to age and hours/cycles. Corrosion in two separate areas of structural members of the hull, was found in the Sept 2025 maintenance check, and along with a crack in a stringer near the centre wing upper fuel tank, these problems resulted in the lengthy repair, when the aircraft was out of service for over a month in Sept and Oct. This was a very old and very tired aircraft, and it should've been retired 10 years ago, especially with its known design faults.
  21. onetrack
    A lot of people learn quickly and easily from images, rather than text. The U.S. military found that cartoon-style instructions were very effective training aids, during WW2, and right up to the video age. Youtube explanatory videos are often very good, although a lot are a bit amateurish.
  22. onetrack
    It's reported the pilot has suffered burns to 80% of his body. That is a dreadful figure, and doesn't augur well for his survival. The docs used to say that if you add your age to the percentage level of burns, and it comes to more than 100, you have little chance of survival. Fortunately burns recovery methods have advanced in a big way in recent years (especially since the Bali Bombing), and the burns victims have a better chance of survival today. Despite all that, the first few days are critical, the body becomes overwhelmed with the repair job it's facing. I've burnt myself badly twice, it sure wasn't fun. Once when I dropped an open 1 gallon can of petrol onto a battery when I was crouching over it (youthful stupidity) - and once when I tipped a full cup of boiling water into my lap at breakfast time, as I was sitting in my jocks. It was made worse by the fact I'd microwaved the cup of water to boiling point, which really makes everything doubly hot. The pain was unbelievable, off the scale, and it took weeks for the burns to heal. I hate to even imagine what it would be like, being caught in burning wreckage. I trust this bloke pulls through O.K., and I wish him all the best for recovery, but he's got a long and painful road in front of him, if he pulls through the first few days.
  23. onetrack
    The news media are reporting a light aircraft crash on landing at Raglan, Qld this morning. The aircraft crashed when trying to land on a private airstrip. The aircraft caught fire during the crash and the pilot, a gent in his 60's suffered serious burns to the face, chest and limbs, from the fire. It appears he managed to free himself from the wreckage, and walked around 2km to a nearby homestead, where the alarm was raised. Paramedics have been treating the victim for "significant" life-threatening burns. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-11-23/man-suffers-life-threatening-burns-light-plane-crash-raglan/106042294
  24. onetrack
    The reason it's in two pieces could be because that style of design sped up the manufacturing process. The bottom line is, no aircraft engine should depart the airframe, ever. There's just no redundancy when that lug fails, and the lug design obviously has minimal reserve strength. American built machines usually have massive reserves of strength in critical areas, it seems the engineers calculations on the forces applied to that lug under all potentially-foreseeable conditions, were just simply wrong. And they could have engineered some other form of redundancy into the design, such as a safety strap, similar to driveshaft safety straps, which prevent driveshafts that fall off, from flailing about.
  25. onetrack
    Moneybox, there's already a global oversupply of grains, and prices have dropped accordingly. Canola is possibly still one of the bright spots in the grain market, because of strong demand, mostly from Europe, as a fuel additive. The canola price peaked during 2022, and has dropped off somewhat since, but it's still a profitable crop. European countries have set targets on biodiesel percentages, and the European farmers alone, can't grow enough oilseed crops to meet the demand. Plus, canola has a wide range of uses, from food use (cooking and salad oils) to industrial uses (lubricants, soaps and cosmetics) - and the meal left over from oil processing can be used as animal feed, fertiliser, and pet food.
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