Looks like a fine job by the crew. They flew the plane. Not only did everyone walk away with no apparent injuries, the plane will fly again without a heck of a lot of work. Wish there was a video.
Airports don't foam the runway anymore. First, it wasts tons of foam. Second, in this case, the pilots need to be focused on a smooth lowering of the nose and staying on the center line. Trying to land in the foam would only hamper them. I've been told by a large airport fire department that they need the foam after the aircraft is stopped to prevent a fire. We only have to look back at Jet Blue and another ERJ-170 at IAD. Foam was saved for after the stop. Interesting to note that without a nose gear, the ERJ's tail is quite a bit higher than normal. Passengers going out the rear exits have a very steep slide.
I was on UAL86 B777 inbound from Shanghai...4 mins behind. We sidesteped 22L and landed 22R. I am sure we did not have much fuel left after 14 hours from ZSPD.
Route: From (ATL) Atlanta, GA, US to (EWR) Newark, NJ, US Duration: 2h 28m Equipment: Embraer 170 (Scheduled) Codeshares: This flight marketed as a codeshare flight by the following airlines: (CO) Continental Airlines 5125 (UA) United Airlines 5125
anything flying into EWR should always have enough fuel for incidents like this. Besides this accident, EWR is the "Go-Around" capital of the world...even on pristine vfr days!!!!
anybody remember when that FedEx MD-11 crashed at EWR, with no-loss-of-life, year's ago ? the thing burned for 24 HOURS, the foam would NOT smother the burning titanium/aluminum. i watched-this play-out, i was a baggage-handler for 15 years at EWR, the Port Authority Crash Rescue and City of Elizabeth firefighters did a great job containing the fire, preventing a potential disaster, as the big Douglas came pretty close to Terminal B's pods.
Looks like a picture perfect successful landing with nose landing problem. The pilots did a great job as well as EWR in foaming part of the runway for it to slide on. Looks like minimum damage to the Embraer so it should fly again.
I work at EWR and saw this very plane land with no nose gear. The crew, emergency personnel, controllers, and port authority did a great job in ensuring this emergency landing was done with the minimalist amount of damage done.
I can confirm airports do not foam runways. My son is an airport firefighter and they do not foam a runway in advance of an aircraft landing. The AFR trucks come at the plane from both ends of the runway and can be at the site within seconds to put foam on the ground and plane if required. As we have seen in several of these incidents very little foam is used and is put down more for safety then need.
That's the second (that I know of) Shuttle America,AKA UAL 5124, 170 to land with the nose gear up. Both crews did a great job. Fortunately, they had time to prepare. Notice the height of the rear door and the steep angle of the slide. I've been down the slide in the normal position and it's fast. It's REALLY fast with the tail so high. This aircraft will probably re-enter service in a couple of weeks.
Well, the article says foamed around the plane & gear. The video link that Tom sent above say runway foamed and it looked like it, so??? At any rate, great job getting it down.
I agree with it being a waste. This one is weird though as the article says they foamed around the nose and plane and general but the video link that Tom sent in definitely shows more than that. Oh Well, they got down fine.
The photo and video from the NY CBS station appear consistent with foaming once the aircraft stopped. They would not and could not have foamed such a small area anticipating the aircraft would stop there. That is the trouble with foaming the runway. You obviously don't have enough foam for a whole runway, so where do you foam? Better to save the spray until the plane is down and stopped.
UAL5124 declared an emergency after nose gear doesn't extend, confirmed by EWR tower that their nose had not extended... UAL5124 lands without an injury.
