New air safety worries have risen in Britain after revelations of a persistent technical problem in British Airways™ jets similar to the one,that led to an airliner crash in 2009, killing 228 people.
The disclosures show the same glitch that hit the Air France Airbus in its flight over the Atlantic in 2009 has affected three BA Airbus flights last year, forcing two of them to make emergency landings.
The problem has to with pitot tubes that convey vital flight data to the pilots and the airliners™ computers.
The tubes on different Airbus planes tend to freeze due to inappropriate heating, forcing the crew to manually control the aircraft in extreme weather conditions, where autopilot is desperately needed.
The glitch was detected on Airbus airliners after the 2009 crash and the airplane operators had pitot tubes replaced to remove the problem.
However, The Sunday Express now says it has seen documents that show the same glitch hit three BA flights last year.
The incidents occurred on April 20 when an Airbus 321 flying from Stockholm to Heathrow made an emergency landing in Stansted, on June 16 when the same aircraft had to make an emergency landing again at Stansted with 183 aboard and on August 20 when another Airbus 321 had its instruments reset due to freezing air conditions at 26,800ft but managed to continue its flight.
The BA has in response to the revelations only said their pilots are highly-trained so that they can œrespond to these types of events”.
AMR/HE
Copyright: Press TV