not really GA related, but still a good story worth reading, as in things don’t always go as planned, even for the pros…
VivaColombia A320 landed with just 282kg of fuel remaining @ Monteira
PS
I’ve once landed @Elba following a diversion and some low flying thanks to ATC (…) with 980kg remaining (on blocks fuel really), and was not too happy about it… should not have worried, still had plenty 
Brings to memory the Concorde which once landed at LHR and had to be towed to the gate….
Puts the new EASA Fuel policy into perspective I guess. What’s good for the Goose is good for the pigeon.
Please enlighten me. How much would it consume to do a go around and another approach? Would they have been able to do that?
What’s the fuel burn?
Fly310 wrote:
What’s the fuel burn?
Google says for “A320 fuel burn” in cruise 2500 kg/h. For one “go around” it says 700 kg. The numbers sound reasonable to me, however I have no shares in jet flying. So this is about 8 minutes of cruise fuel.
Sounds like they should get some satellite weather ;-) Flying towards an airport simply based in the METAR/TAF can mean you arrive there just in time with a thunderstorm arriving you could have seen moving on a radar or satellite image.
20 years old but bascially the same problem (with worse outcome):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_International_Air_Lines_Flight_850
Fly310 wrote:
Please enlighten me. How much would it consume to do a go around and another approach? Would they have been able to do that?What’s the fuel burn?
The final reserve for an A320 under the ops I was involved in was 1100 kgs. That translates to one go around, one pattern and landing or alltogether 30 mins to tanks dry.
Therefore clearly no. They landed with 282 kgs of fuel and burnt some 50 kgs to taxi to wherever they shut down (Standard taxi fuel for an A320 is 200kg).
The average fuel burn for an A320 in cruise would be around 2tons/hr to 2.2 tons/hr. That depends however on weight and cruise regime.
In other words, they not only did eat into their final reserve, they pretty much used it up.
Sebastian_G wrote:
20 years old but bascially the same problem (with worse outcome):
That one was an interesting case. The line of thunderstorms forcing them to abort Hamburg was predicted on the SWC as moving West, in fact however it spread massively to the east. When they aborted Hamburg, they were caught in front of the line and could not find a way to cross it. So they tried running from it to Berlin, which proved unsuccessful. At the time of the abort, they were overhead Lübeck and could have landed there as it was still wide open, also from that position several airports nearby such as Rostok were available. By the time they arrived at Berlin, the front had closed their approach.
ATC did not inform the crew about the walls on the runway, only that they should land on the eastern part of the runway, despite being informed about them by the person in charge at Werneuchen. They were erected to prevent kids from racing cars on that runway. The paint of the X’s on the unusable part was faded so the original threshold was seen in the twilight and they landed normally, only to have their gear torn off by those walls.
In retrospect, the flight should have diverted to the West, but that meant crossing the frontal zone which is not an easy feat in a SB20. The alternate should have been chosen to be behind the front, such as Bremen or Amsterdam.
The crew also was given the assignment short notice, so they probably were not as familiar as they should have been with the situation. Finally, the weather that day was later described as one of the worst storms ever in that area, killing several people in Berlin.
Well, in my company a typical FR was around (ain’t a fix value as u know, and the definition is defined and legally binding) 800-900kg.
A typical GA, flown tightly to say 1500’ above threshold (best case scenario), with either a visual circuit or tight vectoring, will eat up a minimum of 600kg, probably 700kg with the kind of load they had.
These figures being based on my own experiences 
Ok, thanks for the clarification. They were in trouble indeed. Glad they made it.
I think airliners get away with this because of CAT3 autoland. One could not do it otherwise.
