Airlines warned about oxygen cylinders

AAP says that it’s been revealed that US authorities ordered airlines to check on-board oxygen cylinders just months before a huge hole was torn in a Qantas jumbo jet in mid-air, nearly causing a disaster.

Officials said an oxygen back-up cylinder is missing from the aircraft, and have ordered Qantas to inspect all such bottles on its fleet of Boeing 747s.

The Qantas Boeing 747 was flying from Hong Kong to Melbourne on Friday when an explosive bang led to a sudden loss of air pressure in the cabin.

The plane, which had originated in London and was carrying 365 passengers and crew, plunged 6,000 metres before stabilising, then made an emergency landing in the Philippines capital Manila.

There, stunned passengers saw a three metre hole in the fuselage adjoining the right wing.

An investigator from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, Neville Blyth, told reporters in Manila on Sunday that an oxygen back-up cylinder was missing.

“It is too early to say whether this was the cause of the explosion,” Blyth said. “But one of the cylinders which provides back-up oxygen is missing.”

He said investigators had ruled out terrorism.

Mr Blyth would not be drawn on the oxygen cylinder, which is roughly the size of a diver’s scuba tank, nor say how many were on the aircraft.

He said the initial inquiry would take two to three days and a preliminary report on the findings should be released in two to three months.

Fairfax newspapers said on Sunday the US Federal Aviation Administration ordered airlines carrying all US-registered Boeing 747-400 series aircraft to conduct a thorough review following a report that found many oxygen cylinders had not been properly heat treated and needed to be replaced.

“We are issuing this (directive) to prevent failure of the oxygen cylinder support under the most critical flight load conditions, which would cause the oxygen cylinder to come loose and leak oxygen,” the administration told airlines.

“Leakage of oxygen could result in oxygen being unavailable for the flight crew or could result in a fire hazard in the vicinity of the leakage.”

Qantas said some of the on-board systems could have been damaged in the accident.

“We will have to wait for the results of the investigation to determine what systems were affected including the oxygen masks,” the head of engineering, David Cox, said on Sunday.

“It seems likely that some of the systems would have been damaged as a result of the accident.”

At least four passengers reported failure of their masks to either fall from the aircraft ceiling or supply oxygen.

Meanwhile, Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) has ordered Qantas to inspect every oxygen bottle aboard its fleet of 30 Boeing 747s.

“… we do know there were two oxygen bottles in that area, we do know they’re a main focus of the investigation, and we think it’s prudent to put safety first, to get inspections done now rather than wait any longer,” CASA spokesman Peter Gibson told reporters on Sunday.

“It will be a visual inspection and it is a precautionary step.”

He said the cylinders provided emergency oxygen for the flight deck.

If confirmed, Mr Gibson said, it would have implications for all of Qantas’s 747s and probably for many others around the world.

A report by The Mole from AAP