Pearson airport in 2001. Then as now, Air Transat was based at Terminal 3.Tibor Kolley\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n
At 00:52 UTC (8:52 local time) on Aug. 24, 2001, an Air Transat Airbus A330 departs from Toronto Pearson International Airport bound for Lisbon. On board are 293 passengers and 13 crew members, including Captain Pich\u00e9 and First Officer Dirk de Jager, 28. The plane is loaded with about 47 tonnes of fuel \u2013 4.5 tonnes more than the regulated amount required for the planned flight. <\/p>\n
How did that day begin?<\/p>\n
I had flown into Toronto and was assigned the flight to Lisbon \u2013 it\u2019s all done by computer. I tried to get someone else to take it because my wife\u2019s friend was getting married and we were invited. But it didn\u2019t work out. We were supposed to stay two days in Lisbon and then fly back. It started like any other flight. It was routine.<\/p>\n
\t\t![](\"https:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/resizer\/v2\/MJA5JQSUXRGWVBUMSTS5D7RDMU.JPG?auth=b4f9696780f43e3c00c9222400418b4e70343bf4350d45670462c0fb4772457b&width=600&height=400&quality=80&smart=true\")
<\/p>\n
When an Air Transat Airbus A330\u2019s engines flamed out over the Atlantic because of a fuel leak on Aug. 24, 2001, its survival partly depended on a set of aviation rules called ETOPS.* Throughout its route, a plane with twin engines must be close enough to emergency diversion airports that it can get to one in a fixed time, even if an engine were disabled. For the Air Transat flight, the limit was 120 minutes. However, for a large portion of the time, they were within one hour of land. Without ETOPS, a plane might choose a more direct route that could still strand them in danger if something went wrong. <\/p>\n
Engines: 2 Rolls-Royce <\/p>\n
Trent 772B-60<\/p>\n
*Extended-range Twin-engine Operational Performance Standards. **Current livery.<\/p>\n
john sopinski\/the globe and mail <\/p>\n
Source: faa; air transat image<\/p>\n
\t\t<\/p>\n
When an Air Transat Airbus A330\u2019s engines flamed out over the Atlantic because of a fuel leak on Aug. 24, 2001, its survival partly depended on a set of aviation rules called ETOPS.* Throughout its route, a plane with twin engines must be close enough to emergency diversion airports that it can get to one in a fixed time, even if an engine were disabled. For the Air Transat flight, the limit was 120 minutes. However, for a large portion of the time, they were within one hour of land. Without ETOPS, a plane might choose a more direct route that could still strand them in danger if something went wrong. <\/p>\n
Engines: 2 Rolls-Royce <\/p>\n
Trent 772B-60<\/p>\n
*Extended-range Twin-engine Operational Performance <\/p>\n
Standards. **Current livery.<\/p>\n
john sopinski\/the globe and mail ,Source: faa; air transat image<\/p>\n
\t\t<\/p>\n
When an Air Transat Airbus A330\u2019s engines flamed out over the Atlantic because of a fuel leak on Aug. 24, 2001, its survival partly depended on a set of aviation rules called ETOPS.* Throughout its route, a plane with twin engines must be close enough to emergency diversion airports that it can get to one in a fixed time, even if an engine were disabled. For the Air Transat flight, the limit was 120 minutes. However, for a large portion of the time, they were within one hour of land. Without ETOPS, a plane might choose a more direct route that could still strand them in danger if something went wrong. <\/p>\n
Engines: 2 Rolls-Royce <\/p>\n
Trent 772B-60<\/p>\n
*Extended-range Twin-engine Operational Performance Standards. **Current livery.<\/p>\n
john sopinski\/the globe and mail ,Source: faa; air transat image<\/p>\n
Nearly four hours after takeoff, at 4:38, a component swapped in at the last minute causes a fuel line on the plane\u2019s borrowed right Rolls-Royce engine to crack. <\/p>\n
The engine begins to leak fuel at a rate of 13 tonnes an hour into the Atlantic Ocean.<\/p>\n
Around 5:00, during a mandatory position check, the crew notices unusual engine oil indications on the right engine.<\/p>\n
What was the initial problem?<\/p>\n
It started with the oil pressure and temperature. The readings didn\u2019t make sense. If I was a mechanic, I might have understood. <\/p>\n
But given that this was something that happens so rarely, even a mechanic might not have figured out the problem right away. The computer system was showing us a fuel imbalance instead of a leak. <\/p>\n
Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n Portuguese officials inspect the A330 a few days after its landing in Lajes. Both engines were starved of fuel over the Atlantic.Humberta Augusto\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n At 05:33, an advisory flashes on screen, and Mr. Pich\u00e9 and Mr. de Jager note a fuel imbalance between the two engines. They transfer fuel from the left engine to the right, a procedure Mr. Pich\u00e9 performs from memory. Twelve minutes later, the plane has 8,500 kilograms less fuel than it should \u2013 not enough to reach Lisbon. The crew radioes local air traffic control that it\u2019s short of fuel and diverting to tiny Lajes. <\/p>\n Mr. Pich\u00e9 has logged 16,800 flight hours, Mr. de Jager 4,800. In all that time, neither of the pilots has ever encountered a fuel leak or unexplained low-fuel reading before, either in training or while in the air.<\/p>\n You were never able to confirm that there was a leak, were you?<\/p>\n No. I was thinking that this couldn\u2019t be happening in the middle of the ocean, on the most sophisticated commercial airliner flying at the time. It didn\u2019t make any sense. We should have understood that there was a leak. But the computer \u2013 that\u2019s not what it was telling us. <\/p>\n When an advisory warning flashes, you don\u2019t want the fuel page to come up. The pressurization page, the heating system, the electrical, the hydraulics, maybe. But not fuel. You\u2019re in the middle of the ocean. You try to process that as the captain, but your human side says, \u201cToday, we\u2019re going to die.\u201d<\/p>\n People sometimes think I wasn\u2019t scared because I landed the plane. But that\u2019s not the case. When the fuel page came up, I was scared right away. <\/p>\n Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n Meleni Tesic, at right with Mr. de Jager and Mr. Pich\u00e9 in 2001, managed the cabin crew on Flight 236.Paul Chiasson\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n Around 5:45, the pilots ask the cabin crew \u2013 led by flight director Meleni Tesic \u2013 to visually check the wings and engines for a possible fuel leak. As the passengers watch the in-flight movie, Chocolat, a member of the crew shines a flashlight toward the wing. But it\u2019s pitch-dark outside. They see nothing. <\/p>\n If it had been a daytime flight, would the flight attendants have seen the leak?<\/p>\n The passenger sitting behind the right engine would have seen the leak and pressed that call button \u2013 ding dong. That kind of observation has saved me in the past, while I was flying on the Lockheed L-1011. We had a double leg, and during one stop, a passenger pointed out to the flight director that something on the wing wasn\u2019t right. One of the airbrakes was detached. If it weren\u2019t for him, we might have flown on. That passenger did us a favour.<\/p>\n So if a passenger on 236 had seen the leak, I would have sent the first officer to check. Then we would have done the procedure for a loss of fuel.<\/p>\n The accident report found that you didn\u2019t follow the fuel-check protocol.<\/p>\n Yes, I was blamed for that.<\/p>\n Did you agree with that conclusion?<\/p>\n Yes and no. I\u2019m an old dinosaur. Young people today would probably react differently, because they rely on computers 100 per cent. I come from an older system. I didn\u2019t come into this world with an iPad in my hands. Like many people in my generation, I had to learn to use computers.<\/p>\n The report also says that if you had accepted the premise that the plane was spilling fuel, then according to the protocol, you would have to descend to 20,000 feet. But at that altitude, you weren\u2019t sure you\u2019d have enough fuel to get much further, since aircraft burn more fuel at lower altitudes. <\/p>\n If I had followed that procedure, we would all be dead. The first officer was telling me the procedure. But I said \u201cno, no, no.\u201d In that situation, altitude becomes my fuel.<\/p>\n Based on the Portuguese island of Terceira, the Lajes air base is still used today by U.S. military aircraft, who find the Azores a convenient place to refuel on transatlantic flights.<\/p>\n AFP\/Getty Images; Evan Vucci\/AP<\/p>\n At 6:13, the plane\u2019s fuel-starved right engine flames out. <\/p>\n Ten minutes later, Mr. de Jager declares \u201cmayday.\u201d At 6:26, with Flight 236 still 120 kilometres away from Lajes, at an altitude of roughly 34,500 feet, the left engine shuts down, too. <\/p>\n Inside the cabin, the lights go out and everything goes silent, except for the sound of air buffeting the fuselage. \u201cWe\u2019re going to die,\u201d one passenger screams.<\/p>\n What was it like in the cockpit?<\/p>\n It was calm, but we were both on edge. The prospect of dying was there. De Jager was more closed off. He was 28 and already a co-pilot on an A330. <\/p>\n Were you aware of what was happening in the cabin?<\/p>\n No. We have a communications protocol \u2013 the flight director is in charge back there. And when we have a problem in the cockpit, it\u2019s them we advise. Then, the flight director advises the other flight attendants and the passengers. At the start, the briefing I gave to the director was that she prepare the cabin for a ditching at sea. That was the worst-case scenario. Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.<\/p>\n Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n ‘It was calm, but we were both on edge. The prospect of dying was there,’ Mr. Pich\u00e9 says of the mood in the cockpit in 2001.Selena Phillips-Boyle\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n Meanwhile, in the cabin, passengers alternately gasp, scream and pray. Oxygen masks drop from the ceiling. Through tears, a Portuguese-speaking flight attendant delivers an announcement telling passengers to prepare for an ocean landing. <\/p>\n Some passengers described a lot of screaming. You didn\u2019t hear that? <\/p>\n No. You\u2019re focused pretty hard in the moment. You know, when you get into, I\u2019ll call it the zone, you\u2019re in a bubble. It\u2019s a high level of concentration. Everything kind of slowed down. It\u2019s adrenaline, survival instinct. <\/p>\n What was going on in your head when the second engine stopped? <\/p>\n I remember lowering my head and saying, \u2018This can\u2019t be happening.\u2019 Through hard work and determination, I had gotten back to being the captain of a big jet, which I should have been long before I went to prison. I\u2019m on the most sophisticated plane you can fly, and it\u2019s now a glider over the Atlantic, at night, with 306 passengers on board. This can\u2019t be happening. \u2018Why me?\u2019 you know?<\/p>\n And when I raised my head, I saw that the plane was reacting well. That\u2019s when I decided to keep my altitude as long as possible. <\/p>\n How do you maintain altitude without engines?<\/p>\n You play with the stall warning. When a plane has no power and you keep it level, it loses speed. And when it loses speed, it will stall. So when there was a warning, I\u2019d drop the nose a little bit to keep one or two knots faster than the warning. It didn\u2019t allow me to keep the plane level, but we didn\u2019t descend fast. Bit by bit, the adrenaline was increasing. Because you tell yourself, \u2018I\u2019m not going to crash in the water. I\u2019m going to get to the island.\u2019 And then it became, \u2018At worst, I\u2019m going to land in a field on the island.\u2019 It was a gradual realization that I\u2019d be able to get to the airstrip. <\/p>\n How do you control a dead stick? <\/p>\n A journalist once asked Tiger Woods how he could win tournaments with one stroke. He said, \u2018On competition weekends, when I\u2019m able to get in the zone, it\u2019s like I become my club.\u2019 Meaning that when he hits the ball, he knows exactly where it\u2019s going to go because his state of concentration is at its maximum. He\u2019s focused on nothing else. So it\u2019s not something you know or you don\u2019t know. I became the plane. Do you understand? <\/p>\n At a certain moment, you saw the runway at Lajes.<\/p>\n The first thing we did was ask the control tower to flash the runway lights. So I could see the island, just a little sliver of light. When I knew I\u2019d get to the airport, it became like one more landing, like the kind I\u2019d been doing for 30 years.<\/p>\n You circled once before landing.<\/p>\n We did a 360. That was to calm my first officer \u2013 I didn\u2019t want him to jump on the controls. He kept telling me, \u2018We\u2019re too high, too fast.\u2019 But he didn\u2019t know what was going on in my head. I wanted to be too high, too fast, so that I could keep some speed and altitude in case I needed it. From his perspective, landing a normal plane in normal conditions, he could see that we were too high. His reaction was normal. <\/p>\n But he did his job, which is to follow orders. That\u2019s what you learn in the simulator. I always give him an honourable mention because he did what he needed to do. I don\u2019t know if I would have done the same thing in his place, flying with a guy I barely knew. I think I would have jumped on the controls.<\/p>\n I thought you circled to get lower for landing.<\/p>\n That\u2019s what we do normally when we arrive at an airport, and we\u2019re too high and too fast. A big plane is like a 28-wheeler on the road. It doesn\u2019t stop like a Volkswagen stops. You\u2019ve got to slow down. You\u2019ve got to be in the slot. <\/p>\n But were you too high and too fast?<\/p>\n For sure \u2013 I had to be. You can\u2019t be too low and too slow. As a captain of a big jet, you\u2019re always 100 miles ahead of your plane. You\u2019ve always got to be planning further ahead. Even if the chances are 90 per cent that you\u2019ll land, you\u2019ve got to prepare for the 10 per cent. You can\u2019t be caught with your pants down at the last minute.<\/p>\n What could you see out the window? <\/p>\n It was still dark. You have to be at the right place at the right time at the right speed. But my speed was too high to keep the nose up and not stall. So I didn\u2019t know when I needed to lose altitude, when I should go down. My concern was lowering the wheels. <\/p>\n The gear doors open, the wheels come down and the door shuts again. But this time, the doors didn\u2019t close, and that would produce drag. So I\u2019d need to come down 2,000 feet per minute to keep my speed and not stall. If I wasn\u2019t high enough, I\u2019d crash 500 feet before the runway. That\u2019s why I wanted to keep my altitude. My worry was the wheels. <\/p>\n Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n Passengers had to hurry down the emergency slides in Lajes, in case the plane exploded on the tarmac.Humberta Augusto\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n At 6:45, the planes hits the Lajes runway hard, at roughly 370 kilometres an hour, and bounces once. <\/p>\n Passengers are pitched forward as the plane scrapes and grinds to a stop. Some of them begin to cheer and applaud, until the crew starts rushing them toward the exit slides \u2013 there\u2019s a fear the aircraft could explode on the ground. But when several small fires ignite near the landing gear, they\u2019re immediately extinguished by crash responders. During the evacuation, 16 passengers and two members of the cabin crew are injured. As for the plane, it shows signs of structural damage to the fuselage and main landing gear.<\/p>\n So when you landed, you bounced, and almost all the tires exploded.<\/p>\n Yes. The wind was coming from the side, and in a big plane like that, when the wind hits from the side, it tends to move. So you\u2019ve got to put it down, touch the wheels, stay in the middle of the runway. All of that is complicated, but it happens fast. And that\u2019s where experience counts. When I bounced once, I said, \u2018I\u2019m going to brake on the rebound so the plane sticks.\u2019 As soon as the plane touched down again, I braked. That prevented another bounce, and the tires exploded.<\/p>\n You\u2019ve said prison helped you in that moment. How?<\/p>\n Day and night, you\u2019re dealing with the possibility of a physical attack, a sexual attack. And you can\u2019t let on that you\u2019re bothered by it, either. You\u2019ve got to stay cool, because if you don\u2019t look cool, you become vulnerable. You\u2019ve always got to be ready. <\/p>\n When you landed, you high-fived your first officer.<\/p>\n Yes, and I said, \u2018I told you we would land it.\u2019 That\u2019s easier to say after the fact than before. <\/p>\n Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n All 293 passengers and 13 crew members survived their glide to Lajes, where they continued the journey to Lisbon via a ferry and another flight.Humberta Augusto\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n The dazed passengers stumble into the tiny Lajes terminal, where they wait for several hours before being offered beds in the nearby U.S. Air Force barracks. Before long, they\u2019re shuttled to the ferry docks, where a five-hour boat ride delivers them to another airport, from where they\u2019re taken to Lisbon. <\/p>\n Mr. Pich\u00e9 is the last person to leave the plane.<\/p>\n You received no training for this type of situation.<\/p>\n Correct. Now, I think they have a protocol for something like that. With my past as an offender, I didn\u2019t follow procedure \u2013 not because I\u2019m better than someone else or smarter. It\u2019s that I had this survival instinct I developed in prison.<\/p>\n Do you think there\u2019s too much trust in technology now and not enough credence given to pilot instinct?<\/p>\n That\u2019s not for me to say. But I will say that the young first officers I flew with at the end of my career were highly trusting of electronics. Today, it\u2019s about minimizing human decision-making to minimize human error. The statistics tell the tale. In the 1950s, when commercial aviation started, crashes were higher. <\/p>\n Flying a plane when everything is going well, any penguin can do that with a bit of experience. But you\u2019re always waiting for what could happen. And that pending problem happened to me. Being captain of a big jet is a big responsibility. And technology is maybe stripping away that side of it.<\/p>\n What do you say to people who ask why Robert Pich\u00e9 pushed the transfer valve that shifted the fuel to the leaking side of the plane?<\/p>\n Because he\u2019s an old dinosaur. I learned how to fly on the job. When I started to work in aviation, there was no formal training. The boss said to me, \u2018Get in, and we\u2019ll show you how it works.\u2019 So you develop reflexes that someone with structured training, good training, who starts flying right away at Air Canada, might never have.<\/p>\n But do you accept the criticism that your decision to hit that switch worsened the situation?<\/p>\n Of course. If I didn\u2019t have that side to me, I should have understood that it was a fuel leak and shut down that engine. <\/p>\n Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n David Collenette, federal transport minister at the time of the fuel leak, would announce a $250,000 fine against the airline for improper maintenance.Kevin Frayer\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n