Airbus A320 family Archives

A baggage handler told the The Sun he is “mortified” after a simple error caused more than $6 million in damage to a British Airways plane.

The news outlet is reporting things went horribly wrong as an Airbus A320 plane taxied on the runway at London Heathrow Airport. Having just finished loading the plane with luggage, the baggage handler accidentally left his scanning gun – a device used to scan the barcodes of suitcases to make sure the correct luggage is put on the plane – on the aircraft’s engine cover. Within moments, the gun was sucked into the engine, and the results were apparently disastrous. After hearing a loud bang, the pilot aborted takeoff and evacuated the 150 passengers on board.

According to The Sun, nobody has been suspended over the blunder – not even the baggage handler who made the six million dollar mistake. The airline, however, is investigating the incident, which could have been much worse if it had happened after takeoff. The plane has already been repaired, and the passengers made it to their destination of Bucharest, Romania, about three hours late.

[via news.com.au]

They were on their final approach to Scotland’s Glasgow airport when an unidentified object passed within 300 feet of the Airbus A320 passenger jet. “Er yeah we just had something pass underneath us quite close [1255:30] and nothing on TCAS have you got anything on in our area” said the pilot to Glasgow tower, reports the BBC.

The TCAS’ of which the pilot mentions is the A320’s Traffic Collision Avoidance System, which communicates with other aircraft, several times per second, alerting two aircraft that are dangerously close to each other. The system was silent as the A320 was preparing to land, in clear conditions, at an altitude of about 4,000 feet. It was then that the pilot and non-flying pilot saw an object about 300 feet (100 meters) ahead.

Described as “blue and yellow or silver in color with a small frontal area, but ‘bigger than a balloon,’ the object moved quickly and came so close to the A320 that the pilot filed a near-miss report with authorities.Glasgow air traffic control said that while there were no other objects in the area of the A320 at the time, they did have an “unidentified track history” 1.3 nautical miles east of the A320’s position 28 seconds earlier.

Not likely another aircraft, glider, hang-glider, para-motor, para-glider, hot-air balloon or helicopter – all of which would have shown up on radar. The object is still unidentified.

Here is animation of the event, as it unfolded: