Description

On 23 September 2012, a Boeing 737-300 being operated by Thomsonfly on a passenger flight from Faro to Bournemouth UK made a go around in night Instrument Meteorological Conditions (IMC) from its first approach at destination which was subsequently found to have involved a temporary loss of control before recovery was achieved. The approach and landing which followed were successful and without further abnormal occurrence. None of the 137 occupants were injured as a consequence of the extreme manoeuvres which occurred.

Investigation

An Investigation was carried out by the UK AAIB but this was not commenced until the Branch was made aware of the occurrence by the Operator on 5 October 2007, some 12 days after it had occurred. It was noted that “although the commander reported the event to the operator the following morning, his initial Air Safety Report (ASR) contained limited information and the seriousness of the event was not appreciated until the Quick Access Recorder (QAR) data was inspected on 4 October 2007”, At this point, the ASR was submitted to the UK CAA as an MOR and the AAIB then advised the following day. As a consequence of this delay, both the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) and Flight Data Recorder (FDR) from the event had been overwritten and only the QAR data was available.