Royal Brunei Airlines receives its first Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner

Boeing (NYSE: BA) delivered to Royal Brunei Airlines, the flag carrier of the Sultanate of Brunei, the airline's and South-East Asia's first 787 Dreamliner. The carrier has ordered a total of five aircraft.

The 787 is scheduled to begin flying regionally to Singapore on October 18, with long-haul service to London, via Dubai, set to begin on December 1. Royal Brunei anticipates delivering on its promise of all Dreamliner long-haul service in the second quarter of 2014 when it will introduce the 787 on flights to Melbourne, Australia.

The airplane flew 6,540 nautical miles (12,112 km) non-stop from Paine Field, Everett, Washington state, home to Bandar Seri Begawan international airport in Brunei.

Dermot Mannion, chairman of Royal Brunei Airlines said

"This exciting addition keeps passenger comfort and high quality service at the heart of our airline and is yet another effort to ensure our fleet remains modern and offers peaceful and tranquil travel," "As a small airline we offer truly personal service, delighting our passengers with an authentic Bruneian grace to enrich their journeys."

Dinesh Keskar, senior vice president of Asia Pacific and India Sales, Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said

"We are delighted that Royal Brunei Airlines has chosen to expand its fleet with five 787s," "The choice is a testament to the airline's commitment to offer the best possible service to its passengers and to operate the most efficient airplane flying today."

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Jetstar receives Australia's first Boeing 787 Dreamliner

by BA Staff

Boeing (NYSE: BA) delivered to Jetstar Airways of Australia the carrier's first 787 today, which is also the first Dreamliner for the nation of Australia.

Jetstar Australia Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner VH-VKA

Jetstar, is the Qantas Group's low-cost brand. Like every other airline which has taken delivery of this new type of aircraft, Jetstar too will introduce the 787 Dreamliner first on domestic routes, to ensure its pilots achieve the required number of landings, its cabin and ground crews get familiar with the aircraft, and then move the Dreamliners to its international network. The airline has a total of 14 787 Dreamliners on order and expects to fly an all-787 long-haul fleet by 2015.

Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce said

"Today is a historic milestone for the Qantas Group and Jetstar as we welcome the most advanced passenger aircraft ever constructed to the fleet," "In just 10 short years, Jetstar has grown to be the largest low fares carrier in the Asia Pacific, carrying more than 100 million passengers. The 787 will set up the airline for another decade of growth."

The aircraft departed Monday morning local time from Boeing's Everett, Washington state delivery centre for Melbourne, Australia where it will be greeted by airline employees and special guests.

Boeing Commercial Airplanes President and CEO Ray Conner said "

We're proud to deliver the revolutionary 787 Dreamliner to our partners at Jetstar," "The 787s unmatched fuel efficiency will give Jetstar an advantage in the marketplace and its passengers will travel with the world's most advanced in-flight experience."

"Jetstar customers will have the chance to fly in a larger and more spacious cabin, enjoy gate to gate in-flight entertainment and arrive at their destination more refreshed thanks to a lower cabin altitude to reduce the impact of jet lag," said Jetstar Group CEO Jayne Hrdlicka. "The entire Jetstar team is very excited to have the 787 take to Australia skies."

Boeing Aerostructures Australia manufactures the movable trailing edge on the wing of every Dreamliner.

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Malaysia Airlines grows capacity across its network;

by BA Staff

Malaysia Airlines A330 in oneworld livery.

Kuala Lampur based flag carrier Malaysia Airlines, a member of the oneworld alliance, has announced a major capacity expansion plan as the carrier tries to fight its way back to profitability. The following is a summary of the expansion

• Re-launch of services to Dubai in August
• New route to Kochi in September
• Launch of new service to Darwin, Australia in November
• An 11% increase in capacity into and out of Bandar Seri Begawan by up-gauging from the 144 seat 737-400 (16J / 128Y) to the 160 seat 737-800 (16J / 144Y).
• Added a third daily frequency between Kuala Lumpur and Medan, Indonesia effective 15 September 2013 using the 737-800
• New daily flights MH623 Kuala Lumpur - Singapore and MH624 Singapore - Kuala Lumpur 
• Current 2x daily operations into Sydney will increase to 18x weekly from 21st November, 2013 and further to 3x daily on 5th February, 2014
• Current 2x daily operations into Melbourne will increase to 3x daily from 21st November, 2013

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Air India to commence Australia service with 787 Dreamliner in late August

by Devesh Agarwal

After many a false start, it appears national carrier Air India is scheduled to commence its Australia service at the end of August. The airline will use its Boeing 787-8 Dreamliners to operate the route.

A schedule for a triangular service between Delhi, Sydney and Melbourne has been loaded in to global distribution systems, but inexplicably, the airline has not loaded the schedule in to its own website reservation system.

It also appears the airline will not offer a London to Sydney "Kangaroo Route" service. While there is a connection from the London to Delhi 777-300ER flight which arrives around 10:40 in the morning, on the return the last flight from Delhi to London departs at 14:05 about four hours before the Australia flights arrive. The next flight to London is only at 05:00 the next morning.

The flight duration to Sydney will be about 12h15m while Melbourne will be about 12 hours. The return flights would be about 30 minutes longer.

Effective 29 August 2013

• AI312 departs Delhi 13:45 on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday Saturday, arrives Sydney 06:30 next morning.
• AI311 departs Sydney 08:00 on Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Sunday, arrives Melbourne 09:35. Departs Melbourne 10:50 arrives Delhi 18:35

• AI312 departs Delhi 13:00 on Wednesday, Friday, Sunday, arrives Melbourne 05:30 next morning.
• AI311 departs Melbourne 07:00 on Monday, Thursday, Saturday, arrives Sydney 08:30. Departs Sydney 10:00 arrives Delhi 18:10

These schedules are subject to government approvals.

As per website Airlineroute.net

Air India last operated service to Sydney in January 1991 with 1 weekly Delhi – Singapore – Sydney on board Boeing 747; Melbourne last served in April 1981. Perth was served until June 1997.

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Emirates and Qantas begin their partnership

by Devesh Agarwal

Qantas A380 welcomed with a water cannon salute

Dubai based Emirates and Australian carrier Qantas have officially started their partnership.

The first Qantas flights departed from Sydney and Melbourne to London via Dubai on March 31.

In the partnership the two carriers will collaborate to deliver network, lounges, frequent flyer benefits and travel experiences over 98 flights a week between Australia and Dubai.

A white-paper providing an overview of the Emirates-Qantas partnership at a glance can be download here.

As part of the Qantas-Emirates partnership, there is a synchronisation in the services of the two airlines. The start also marks an enhancement in Qantas services to match those offered by Emirates.

• A return to a Middle East stopover for the Kangaroo route (Sydney-Dubai-London and Melbourne-Dubai-London) following a 30 year absence while it operated via Asia.
• Lounge access for eligible Qantas and Emirates passengers into either airline’s network in Australia, Asia, the Middle East, North Africa and the UK and Europe.
• Chauffeur Drive for Qantas Business and First Class passengers on flights (matching Emirates’ existing service).
• The ability to redeem existing Qantas Frequent Flyer or Emirates Skywards points for flights to 175 destinations worldwide, on both airlines.
• Reciprocal status recognition for frequent flyers across both networks (e.g. priority check-in for Qantas Gold Frequent Flyers when flying Emirates).
• Harmonised baggage policies, including an increase in Qantas’ Economy checked baggage allowance from 23kg to 30kg.

More details about premium class customer service enhancements are at the end of the story.

Tim Clark, President Emirates Airline. said

“The strength of this partnership stems from the fact the Emirates and Qantas brands are an excellent match. Emirates customers using a Qantas lounge or taking a Qantas flight will experience a level of service that is on par with what they expect from Emirates,”

Chief Executive Officer of Qantas, Alan Joyce said

Emirates-Qantas partnership flights map

“From today, our customers from Adelaide, Brisbane, Perth, Melbourne and Sydney have one-stop access to 65 destinations in the Middle East, North Africa, the UK and Europe via the joint Qantas and Emirates network.

“By travelling through Dubai, Qantas customers can connect to the extensive Emirates network into Europe and the UK and fly directly to their destination,”

“Before today, the Qantas network offered five one-stop code-share destinations into Europe and the UK with our partners. From today, we offer access to 32 destinations in Europe on the combined Qantas and Emirates network.

“The new network will cut average journey times by more than two hours from Melbourne and Sydney to the top 10 destinations in Europe,”

Emirates and Qantas A380s parked at Concourse A, Dubai International Airport

Qantas Premium Class Enhancements

You can also download this document here.

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AirAsia X to increase services from Kuala Lumpur to Melbourne, Taipei and Chengdu

AirAsiaX the long distance arm of Malaysian low cost carrier AirAsia will increase its frequencies from its Kuala Lumpur hub to Melbourne, Australia, Taipei, Taiwan, and Chengdu, China from next year.

Melbourne services will see frequencies increase from the current daily flights to nine flights weekly by May 1, 2013 and to twelve flights weekly by July 1.

Taipei will go from daily flights to ten weekly flights from May 1, and double daily from July 1.

Chengdu will go from the current five flights weekly to six flights weekly by May 1, and daily flights by July 1.

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After London, Qatar Airways beats Air India again, with first 787 Dreamliner service to Australia

Qatar Airways will be the first airline in the world to operate the Boeing 787 Dreamliner to Australia when it commences flights from Doha to Perth in Western Australia from February 1, 2013. Coupled with its Doha London Heathrow 787 service, Qatar Airways will be the first airline to offer a UK to Australia 'all Dreamliner' service.

Despite being the second airline, globally, to order the aircraft, India's national carrier Air India has waffled on its introduction of the Dreamliner, and is progressively losing ground to competitors like Qatar, who are aggressively introducing the new aircraft on their routes.

Air India received its Dreamliners months ahead of Qatar Airways, and yet chose not to operate the aircraft to one of its best destinations -- London, meekly handing over the prize to Qatar. Air India instead operates the Dreamliner, internationally, on routes like Dubai, which is essentially filled with low cost labour traffic, and to Frankfurt, where the airline loses to competitors like Lufthansa who offer global connections, instead of London Heathrow which offers a good balance of premium and leisure traffic, and where Air India has significant Origin and Destination demand thanks to a large Indian origin population.

The airline has been 'planning' a Delhi to Sydney/Melbourne operation for over two years now. The management of Air India has a dynamic minister of Civil Aviation in Ajit Singh now. It time for Rohit Nandan and his team to take the bull by its horns. Even airline staffers are confused as to why the airline is not commencing its Australia operations, loosing hundreds of thousands of passengers to the ASEAN carriers, every year.

The 787 Dreamliner is made up of composite materials making it a lighter and more fuel efficient than any comparable aircraft of its size and range. Key features include larger windows, lower cabin pressure at higher altitude ensuring less fatigue, mood lighting throughout the aircraft and more passenger space and comfort.

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Air India takes delivery of its first Boeing 787 Dreamliner VT-ANH

VT-ANH under a Boeing test regn. N1015B at India Aviation 2012

After much delay, national carrier Air India has taken delivery of its very first Boeing 787 Dreamliner at the airframer's facility in Charleston, South Carolina, USA.

The aircraft LN 35, registered VT-ANH, was received by Captains A.S. Soman and Amitabh Singh on behalf of the airline.

The aircraft is expected to leave Charleston on Friday September 7th, and touch down at the capital New Delhi's Indira Gandhi International airport around 17:00 local on Saturday 8th September. The delivery flight is expected to make a technical halt at Frankfurt.

Air India's 787s are powered by GEnx-1B engines, and are configured in a two-class configuration with 256 seats, including 18 lie flat business class seats. Detailed photographs and video of the Air India 787 cabin can be seen in this article.

This is the first of an order of 27 Dreamliners from the carrier. Four aircraft are lying ready at the Charleston facility and are expected to be rapidly delivered at the rate of one a week.

Despite being the second airline scheduled to receive the aircraft, political wrangling within various ministries and departments of the Indian government delayed Air India to the fifth airline to receive this new generation aircraft, behind launch customer All Nippon Airways, Japan Airlines, Ethiopian, and LAN Chile.

Air India will initially deploy their Dreamliners on domestic routes in India to help impart accelerated training to cockpit, cabin, and ground crews. The flight crews will also need to notch up the numbers of landings, facilitated by these shorter domestic routes.

Air India expects to commence non-stop services from Delhi to Sydney and Melbourne, Australia, in this Winter schedule starting on October 28, 2012. Tokyo and Paris are some of the other destinations being considered.

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Can Air India beat Qatar Airways with the first 787 service to London Heathrow? An all 787 Kangaroo service?

National carrier Air India can expect to take delivery of up to three or four Boeing 787-8 Dreamliners as early as next week, as a Group of Ministers (GoM) headed by home minister P. Chidambaram, approved a compensation demand for an almost four year delay in delivery, made by the carrier on the airframer.

After the GoM meeting, India's civil aviation minister Ajit Singh indicated the proposal will now examined by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) which is meeting today. The exact amount of the compensation has not been publicly disclosed on the grounds of confidentiality. A few years ago former Air India Chairman and Managing Director Mr. Arvind Jadhav, deposing before a parliamentary committee, had indicated a claim amount of $710 million which the airframer strongly opposed.

At present four Dreamliners are sitting on the flight line at Charleston. VT-AND and VT-ANH built at Boeing's Everett, Washington plant, and VT-ANI and VT-ANJ built at the new Charleston, South Carolina facility. VT-ANJ may not be ready for delivery since it appears to be partially painted, but that was a couple of weeks ago.

Air India 787 first to London Heathrow?

Doha based Qatar Airways has announced its intention to be the first airline to operate a 787 service in to London Heathrow, but has still to take final delivery of its first aircraft.

Air India has a definite plan for operating a Dreamliner on the Delhi London Heathrow route, and has been training and certifying pilots for the 787 for some time. Depending on the CCEA decision and its time-frame, the carrier can take delivery of at least three aircraft as early as this week.

The issue will be overall preparedness. Both airlines need to achieve a certain minimum number of landings in order to build up experience of the crews, cockpit, cabin, ground, etc., and will utilise their first 787s on short haul routes to achieve this goal. Qatar Airways on intra-gulf routes, while Air India on domestic routes.

If Air India girds up, is it possible for them to beat Qatar Airways and be the first airline to offer a 787 service to London Heathrow? Share your thoughts via a comment.

A Dreamliner Kangaroo route

Air India is expected to commence a 787 based service from Delhi to Sydney and Melbourne. Air India sources confirmed this service is expected to operate from the September or October time frame. By this time, Air India will have at least four Dreamliner in its fleet, and by synchronising their New Delhi London service to the Delhi Sydney-Melbourne service, can be the first airline to offer a complete 787 service on the Kangaroo Route, London to Australia.

It will be a tremendous PR coup, one that can reap the carrier significant commercial benefits.

Share your thoughts via a comment.

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Qatar Airways commences Doha Melbourne flights; quickest from London

Qatar Airways launched its first flight to the Australian continent with its non-stop Doha Melbourne service using its latest Boeing 777-200LR delivered just a few days ago.

Two flight crews are needed for the long 14 hour flight. Click on image for high res version.

The 42 2–2–2 configured Business Class seats convert into 180 degree horizontal flat beds with a 78-inch pitch. In Economy Class, the 217 passenger seating is nine abreast in a 3–3–3 configuration and a seat pitch of up to 34 inches.

The flight is initially three-times-a-week on Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

QR030 departs Doha at 00:45hrs and arrives Melbourne at 22:25
QR031 departs Melbourne at 23:55 and arrives Doha at 06:25 the following day

The Doha-based airline will take delivery of another Boeing 777-200LR late this month and immediately use the aircraft on the Melbourne route, stepping up frequency to daily from January 1, 2010.

The launch of flights to Melbourne ahead of the busy holiday season ends a year of further growth for the airline, which also launched services to Houston and both Amritsar and Goa in India during 2009.

Qatar Airways has an aggressive expansion plan with orders for over 220 aircraft worth more than US$ 40 billion over the next few years. A brand new airport under construction in the airline’s home city of Doha, Qatar, indicates the emirates commitment to expand and strengthen its national carrier.

At 21 hours and 40 minutes, Qatar Airways offers the quickest scheduled flight times between Melbourne and London.

Qatar Airways plans to launch daily non-stop flights between Doha and Sydney in 2010, also using the same Boeing 777-200 Long Range aircraft as on the Melbourne route.

Last month at the World Travel Awards in London, Qatar Airways once again won the World’s Best Business Class title. Earlier this year, Qatar Airways won several awards at the annual Skytrax passenger survey awards, including Best Economy Class in the world, Best Cabin Crew in the Middle East for the seventh year running and Best Airline in the Middle East for the fourth consecutive year. In addition, Qatar Airways’ overall Skytrax global ranking for 2009 rose to fourth in the world.

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Singapore Airlines to commence Airbus A380 service to Melbourne

Singapore Airlines is commencing an Airbus A380 superjumbo service to Melbourne, Australia from September 29 2009.

The daily A380 flights will replace an existing daily Boeing 747-400 service (part of a triple daily) to Melbourne and will help the airline increase capacity by 10%. SQ227 will depart Singapore Changi Airport at 2100hrs and arrive in Melbourne at 0610hrs (0710hrs from 4 October 2009 due to daylight savings) the next day. On the return leg, SQ228 will depart Melbourne at 1550hrs (1650hrs from 4 October 2009) and arrive in Singapore at 2140hrs.

Melbourne will be the second city in Australia and sixth city in the Singapore Airline network to receive the A380. Sydney was the first to receive the superjumbo when Singapore Airlines began operating the A380 in October 2007. The Airline subsequently added London, Tokyo, Paris and Hong Kong to its list of A380 destinations.

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Cathay Pacific and Finnair extend their oneworld code share flights to Brisbane

Finnair and its oneworld alliance partner Cathay Pacific Airways are extending their code-share flights partnership between Hong Kong Australia and offering flights to Brisbane.

Finnair will operate daily flights from Helsinki to Hong Kong using an Airbus A340 aircraft.

Finnair and Cathay Pacific have cooperated earlier on routes between Hong Kong and Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. Now Finnair can also sell Cathay Pacific operated flights with Finnair flight numbers to Brisbane. Cathay Pacific can sell tickets with its own flight number to Finnair flights from Paris, Rome, Frankfurt, Amsterdam and London as a connection to its own flights to Australia.

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ATSB report and images of Emirates A340 tail-strike incident in Melbourne

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) released it's preliminary report along with detailed images and simulations in the tail strike incident of the Emirates Airlines A340-500 A6-ERG at Melbourne on March 20, 2009.

The jet with 257 passengers, 14 cabin crew and 4 flight crew on-board narrowly avoided disaster as its pilots struggled to take off from the end of Melbourne runway after wrongly entering a crucial number in a computer. As per the report, the pilots wrongly under-estimated weight data by 100 tonnes, which caused all their take-off performance settings to be computed wrong. As per the report

"While reviewing the aircraft's performance documentation in preparation for landing, the crew noticed that an incorrect weight had been inadvertently entered into the laptop when completing the take-off performance calculation prior to departure. The performance calculations were based on a take-off weight that was 100 tonnes below the actual take-off weight of the aircraft. The result of that incorrect take-off weight was to produce a thrust setting and take-off reference speeds that were lower than those required for the aircraft's actual weight."

Airlines routinely use less than full thrust take off throttle settings as a means to save engine wear and should not be taken as a contributing factor. ATSB aviation safety investigations director Julian Walsh says

"The reduced power take-off is standard international practice and almost all airlines doing these type of long-haul operations use these reduced power take-offs,"

"They've procedures developed by aircraft manufacturers and they're procedures that are not unique to Emirates and they're not unique to Airbus."

The Airbus A340-541 (MSN0608) aircraft which joined Emirate's fleet in November 2004, underwent an "A Check" only nine days prior to the accident on March 11, 2009.

The following photos are contained in the ATSB Transport Safety Report which can be downloaded here.

This image shows the aircraft attaining computed airspeed of 143 knots, ground speed 149 knots, corresponding to the 'V1' computed by the crew during take-off at 1,118 meters before the end of the runway. Observe the throttle position on the far right of the graphic at less than full.



The crew did not realise the error until they tried to lift the plane off the runway and it failed to respond because it was travelling too slowly. The captain calls "rotate" a second time and the first officer raises the pitch even more. The aircraft makes initial tail contact with runway. Pitch angle 9.8°, computer airspeed 156 knots ground speed 167 knots, 229 meters to end of runway. Captain then commands TOGA (Take-off and go-around thrust setting, the maximum the engines will supply).

Engines at TOGA, despite the plane's geometrical shape allowing a maximum pitch of 9.5°, desperate to take-off crew increased pitch to 13.7°. Computer air speed 161 knots, ground speed 172 knots, plane finally establishes positive rate of climb 292 meters AFTER end of runway 16. The report released shows the plane's tail hit the runway three times and the landing gear hit the localiser antenna array 300 meters beyond the end of runway 16.

Damage to the airplane extensive and is estimated in the millions of dollars. Due to the significant damage to the rear pressure bulkhead the aircraft cannot be pressurised and therefore cannot be flown out. One can safely assume repairs to be done at site in Melbourne where the aircraft is parked.

The two pilots have since resigned from the airline, and the ATSB is still continuing the investigation and will focus on

• human performance and organisational risk controls
• computer-based flight performance planning, including the effectiveness of the human
• interface of computer based planning tools.
• reduced power takeoffs, including the associated risks and how they are managed.

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Emirates Airbus A340 runs off, damages, and disables runway at Melbourne

An Emirates Airlines Airbus A340-500, Emirates Airlines Airbus A340-500, registration A6-ERG performing flight EK407 from Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, with 225 people on board, damaged and decommissioned the main runway at Melbourne airport while taking-off.

The aircraft ran off the runway 16 (length 3657 meters / 12,000 feet) around 22:30 local (12:30GMT) March 20, during its take-off run, struck its tail on the runway, and hit the runway end lights and the localizer antenna past the end of the runway 16.

The airplane climbed out safely, and tried to dump fuel over the ocean at Port Philip Bay but was forced to return to Melbourne for an immediate emergency landing when smoke started to fill the cabin.

The airplane was fully fuelled for the long non-stop flight to Dubai, and the heavily loaded aircraft landed hard on Melbourne's runway 34. She was able to taxi to the apron after being inspected by airport's emergency services.

Severe abrasions occurred to the tail skin and several access panels have been ripped off during the tail strike at take-off. The hard landing, un-avoidable due to the full fuel weight, has reportedly caused damage to the landing gear.

Melbourne airport authorities have confirmed that ILS runway 16 will need repairs and will not be available until Monday, March 23rd.

For full technical details of the accident including NOTAMs and METARs please visit Aviation Herald. Hat tip to Simon Hradecky who runs a great site keeping track of all the aviation incidents around the world.

Update
The ATSB has released its preliminary report. Read about it here.

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Qatar Airways to commence services to Goa Amritsar Sydney Melbourne in aggressive expansion

Qatar Airways unveiled an aggressive expansion plan today, with plans to expand operations to India and Europe, and launch new flights into Australia from the start of the Northern Winter 2009 schedules.

Over the next nine months Qatar Airways will commence flights from Doha to Goa and Amritsar, taking their count to 11 destinations in India, Sydney and Melbourne in Australia, and two European cities which have not yet been announced.



Qatar Airways has a fleet of 68 aircraft out of which there are eight Boeing 777's; six Boeing 777-300ERs (extended range) and two February delivered Boeing 777-200LRs (long range). Qatar Airways is deploying the latter aircraft on its Doha-Houston service due to commence on March 30th. At close to 17 hours, it will be one of the longest non-stop flights in the world.

Qatar Airways Business Class seats

The Australian services will require the same Boeing 777-200LRs which will be joining the fleet during this year.

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Qantas Airbus A330 grounded after dog in cargo chews up wiring

Qantas' problems on their Airbus A330 fleet just don't seem to end. This time a Qantas A330 aircraft from Auckland to Melbourne was grounded. The reason -- a distressed pet dog escaped from his kennel in the cargo hold, and chewed up the wiring. Must have been a big dog, and extremely distressed to chew through the panel covers to get to the wiring.

As a dog lover, I read this story from the Courier Mail with amusement and a little apprehension. I just hope Qantas does not take punitive actions in transporting pets.

I wonder if the dog owner will or should be made to pay the repair bill ?

As usual your comments are always welcome.

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Qantas jumbo makes emergency landing

Qantas jumbo makes emergency landing after mid-air drama

Image from BBC News

MANILA (AFP) — A Qantas Boeing 747 flying to Melbourne made an emergency landing in Manila on Friday after a dramatic mid-air rupture that left a "gaping hole" in its fuselage, officials and passengers said.

Stunned passengers reported how the jumbo, which originated in London and made a stop in Hong Kong, plunged 20,000 feet (6,000) metres in an "absolutely terrifying" ordeal.

A Qantas spokeswoman said the plane, carrying 346 passengers and 19 crew, diverted to Manila where it was now undergoing inspection on the ground.

"There was a terrific boom, and bits of wood and debris just flew forward into first (class) and the oxygen masks dropped down," June Kane, a passenger from Melbourne, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

"We were told that one of the rear doors, a hole had blown into it, but I've since looked at the plane and there's a gigantic gaping hole in the plane. "It was absolutely terrifying, but I have to say everyone was very calm," she added, speaking from the Philippine capital.

Qantas chief executive officer Geoff Dixon said initial inspections showed the aircraft had sustained a hole in its fuselage, and it was currently being inspected by engineers. He said the flight crew performed emergency procedures after oxygen masks were deployed and there were no reports of any injuries. Dixon said the Australian Transportation Safety Bureau and Civil Aviation Safety Authority had been notified.

Manila airport operations officer Ding Lima said the aircraft lost cabin pressure shortly after leaving Hong Kong bound for Melbourne. "The captain of the aircraft immediately called the (Manila) control tower for an immediate landing," Lima told local radio. "There is a big hole in the belly of the aircraft near the right wing about three metres in diameter," he added.

Flight QF30, which took off from Hong Kong at 9:00am (0100 GMT), had been due to arrive in Melbourne at 1145 GMT, according to the Qantas website. Lorena Dimaya, a Qantas assistant supervisor in Manila, said the aircraft had landed safely just after 11:00am local time and the incident had not been "life threatening." She said the plane had taken off from Hong Kong when it "encountered some technical problems and requested to be diverted to Manila, where it made an emergency landing."

Passenger June Kane said the problem seemed to centre on the baggage compartment of the plane. "I'm looking at the plane now and on the left-hand side, just forward of the wing, there's a gaping hole from the wing to the underbody," she said. "It's about two metres by four metres and there's baggage hanging out so you assume that there's a few bags that may have gone missing.

Passengers praised the crew for landing the plane safely. "We heard a very large bang, the oxygen masks came out. But the crew was very calm and everything was fine," said Phil Rescall, a 40-year-old man from England travelling to Australia for work. "I think we were all very lucky."

"The crew were terrific, they did a great job," another passenger, Brendan McClements, said. "Everyone gave them a round of applause as we landed."

Source : AFP

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