3 aircraft survive incidents in Irish air

A FLIGHT instructor and a student pilot walked away uninjured after the nose wheel on their aircraft collapsed on landing at Cork Airport yesterday.

The two were on a training flight on board a Piper PA 34 twin-engined turbo-powered aircraft operated by the Atlantic Flight Centre.

The aircraft made circuits of the airfield, had landed safely at the airport’s shorter runway 07/25, and was turning off the runway when the incident occurred just before 3pm.

Its nose-wheel collapsed, causing damage to the aircraft’s nose and propellers.

The Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) was informed and both runways were shut down.

The damaged aircraft was photographed at the scene before the IAA gave permission to bring it to a hangar.

The runways were cleared of debris and were inspected before the IAA gave permission to resume flights.

The disruption lasted about 40 minutes, forcing the diversion of an inbound Ryanair flight from London to Shannon, and the delay of an outbound Aer Lingus flight to Tenerife.

A spokesperson for the IAA described the incident as “minor” but said the IAA air accident investigation team will inspect the aircraft this morning as part of a routine investigation into such incidents.

Meanwhile, an Aer Lingus flight to Milan was forced to make a U-turn over the Irish Sea and return to Dublin yesterday morning after the pilot reported a crack had appeared on the jet’s windscreen.

Flight EI-432 departed Dublin at 7.24am bound for Milan’s Linate Airport. The Airbus A320 was about 15 minutes into its flight and climbing through 24,000 feet to its cruising altitude when the pilot contacted controllers.

He reported a crack could be seen in the No 1 windscreen. The crew levelled off at 27,000 feet before descending again to 5,000 feet and turning back to Dublin.

A short time later, the crew reported that the crack had spread.

While emergency crews were being mobilised to meet the Aer Lingus flight, the crew of an inbound Ryanair flight reported a problem with their aircraft’s flaps.

Flight 771 from Prestwick in Scotland was due to land at 7.50am, but the aircraft abandoned its approach at 3,000 feet while it was just 20km east of Dublin. The crew advised controllers that they had a problem with the aircraft’s flaps and that they would be unable to continue their approach.

The flight routed north again and entered a holding a pattern off the Dublin coast.

When the crew was unable to resolve the issue, the pilot issued a minor distress call and requested emergency services be available when the flight landed.

The crew confirmed they had no control issues and expected to make a normal landing. The inbound Aer Lingus flight with the cracked windshield was placed in a holding pattern for a few minutes to allow the Ryanair flight to land.

The Ryanair Boeing 737-800 jet landed safely at 8.26pm, while Aer Lingus flight 432 landed about five minutes later.