Description

On 22 June 2009, an Airbus A330-300 being operated by Qantas on a scheduled passenger flight from Hong Kong to Perth encountered an area of severe convective turbulence in night Instrument Meteorological Conditions (IMC) in the cruise at FL380 and 10 of the 209 occupants sustained minor injuries and the aircraft suffered minor internal damage. The injuries were confined to passengers and crew who were not seated at the time of the incident. After consultations with ground medical experts, the aircraft commander determined that the best course of action was to complete the flight as planned, and this was uneventful.

Investigation

An Investigation was carried out by the ATSB. The flight crew stated that when approaching the coast of Borneo, the aircraft was in clear air with no indication of cloud either visually or on the weather radar. The lights of Kota Kinabalu and other coastal cities in the region were visible below the aircraft as it approached the coast of Borneo, which suggested, in conjunction with the absence of distant weather radar returns from the area where the encounter occurred suggested that the cloud did not extend into the lower levels where the radar installed would have detected precipitation. The severe turbulence began as the aircraft entered cloud. The flight crew believed that the cloud was probably composed of ice crystals, due to the noise of particles impacting the aircraft, the outside air temperature of -50 °C, and the high reflectivity of the aircraft strobe lights when within the cloud.