A332 MRTT, en-route, south eastern Black Sea, 2014

A332 MRTT, en-route, south eastern Black Sea, 2014

Summary

On 9 February 2014, the Captain of a military variant of the Airbus A330 suddenly lost control during the cruise on a passenger flight. A violent, initially negative 'g', pitch down occurred which reached 15800 fpm as the speed rose to Mach 0.9. In the absence of any effective crew intervention, recovery was achieved entirely by the aircraft Flight Envelope Protection System. The Investigation found that the upset had occurred when the Captain moved his seat forward causing its left arm rest to contact the personal camera he had placed behind the sidestick, forcing the latter fully forward.

Description

On 9 February 2014, a Royal Air Force-operated Voyager (ZZ333), the UK military designation of the Airbus Multi Role Tanker Transport derivative of the Airbus A330-200, was on a passenger flight from RAF Brize Norton, UK to Camp Bastion, Afghanistan and in the cruise in day Visual Meteorological Conditions (VMC) at FL 330 when it suddenly and very violently pitched down very rapidly losing over 4000 feet of altitude before recovery to controlled flight occurred. Almost all of the 198 occupants who were unrestrained at the time were thrown towards the ceiling with a considerable number of minor injuries and damage to cabin fittings resulting. After recovery to controlled flight, a MAYDAY was declared and a diversion to the Turkish airbase at Incirlik, near Adana was completed.

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