Airliner sitting on it's tail? How does this happen?

Improper loading and/or unloading. Tail stands or in some cases nose gear straps are used to prevent it from happening. If you leave a lot of weight in the back of the plane and not much weight in the front, it can happen.

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I believe that's a known problem with the longer 737s. There's a specific order the plane has to be loaded and unloaded to prevent this. Plus a tail stand is supposed to be installed at the gate just in case.
 
I saw one on its tail at KGFK in 1997 a couple days after the big spring ice storm. I can't remember the type of plane, but probably whatever FedEx or was flying there at the time. The wind lifted the nose and the ice froze the tail to the ground.
 
Get a couple of those football players together in the back of the plane and it's easy to see how that could happen.
 
Teaching moment for weight & balance and CG.
 
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The baggage carts tell the story. The aft cargo hold probably had a similar load in it, and should have been emptied first.
 
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A partner of mine was a boomer on KC-135's. He tells a story where a high ranking hot stick was told they were out of CG limits and needed to transfer some fuel forward before landing. The hot stick said "naah, those limits are no problem, we're landing now". Landing went fine, but as the last crewmember stepped off of the aircraft, the nose wheels slooooowly began to rise. Cue a firedrill for everyone to hurredly climb back up the ladder, into the nose of the airplane, power it up and transfer fuel forward.
 
Not a good week for The University of Spoiled Children.

Lose to a 13 point underdog, fire the head coach, dump a plane on its tail, and plan on losing to the sissy blue shirts:rolleyes:

Cheers
 
It was a big problem for the B-58.
They had to stick a 150 LB (?) weight on the nose to keep it from becoming the "ruptured duck".
 
WWFeldman said:
https://www.espn.com/college-footba...lane-tips-backward-tarmac-coaches-staff-board
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Once upon a time I flew to Europe (Amsterdam, IIRC) on a "Combi" airplane. This arrangement has passengers in the front and cargo in the back. After landing and taxiing to the gate they announced
"everybody stay in your seats; we have a herd of cattle in the back that must be unloaded before passengers can deplane". And so we did - without incident. Never saw the cattle.

Dave
 
murphey said:
Teaching moment for weight & balance and CG.
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The problem is that, as passengers deplane, you reach a point where the entire front-half of the airplane is empty, save for a few passengers walking up the aisle, while the entire back-half of the airplane is still full.

The procedure, when loading is such that there is the potential for a tail-tip, is for the opening of the cabin door to be delayed until the tail stand is removed and the aft cargo area unloaded before the forward one.
 
Does any know of the procedure to get the nose back down to the ground? Is it slowly put in place the tail stand? Does the plane have to be inspected before it can fly again?

"Good luck! We're all counting on you."
 
Pretty common to be told to stay in your seat until the tail stand is placed.
 
cessna182b said:
Once upon a time I flew to Europe (Amsterdam, IIRC) on a "Combi" airplane. This arrangement has passengers in the front and cargo in the back. After landing and taxiing to the gate they announced
"everybody stay in your seats; we have a herd of cattle in the back that must be unloaded before passengers can deplane". And so we did - without incident. Never saw the cattle.

Dave
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Around 2014, the country of Kazakhstan imported 2500 head of cattle from ND to diversify their genetics. The Fargo airport owned a small freight terminal that had been abandoned after Airborne/DHL disappeared into thin air. This terminal was turned into a temporary export facility for the moo-cows. The ranchers who sold into the program pulled up with their trailers and unloaded the cows into holding pens. After a vet inspection, they got loaded into boxes one at a time which were then loaded onto a waiting Kalitta 747 using a forklift. There were about 100 on each load, but they couldn't actually go anywhere beyond the pallet they lived on.
 
They did it on purpose. They're just changing the tire on the nose.
 
They just need a big set of wheelie bars. Somewhere there should be a cargo operation that has done this. My bet is either Russian or Canadian.
 
Stewartb said:
Pretty common to be told to stay in your seat until the tail stand is placed.
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Must be common up North with Alaska Airline's 737 combis, 'cause I've never seen a tail stand in the lower 48.
 
You have to wrap your head around how much weight is involved and how much of an envelope. When we did maintenance on a DC-10 (and same with the 727) if you were gonna take out all of the fuel you had to load the forward cargo bay with weights or hang them off a special mount that was built into the airframe.
So yea, it can definitely happen d;-)
 
3393RP said:
Must be common up North with Alaska Airline's 737 combis, 'cause I've never seen a tail stand in the lower 48.
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Our operation doesn't have any airplanes that use tail stands anymore. Last one was the 727. Our Brown cousins use them on their 747s (and maybe their Airbusses).

We typically get around the tail stand issue buy having "nose tethers" attached to the nose gear. Basically, each of our parking spots has a heavy chain embedded in the concrete and the rampers will fasten this to the nose gear. If there isn't a nose tether available, we have weight carts (basically 10,000 lb weights on wheels) that the nose gear gets tethered to. If neither one of those is available, we can do what they call "sequential loading" where they put weight in the forward most positions while they load the aft of the plane.

Boeing finally got smart with their 777Fs and put the cargo door in the rear so you're constantly pushing weight forward as you load. Still have to have a nose tether, just in case though.

If you search around you'll find a couple pictures of purple tailed aircraft sitting on the tail. Oops. It happens.
 
X3 Skier said:
Not a good week for The University of Spoiled Children.Lose to a 13 point underdog, fire the head coach, dump a plane on its tail, and plan on losing to the sissy blue shirts.
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Just for the record, the "underdogs" were the Washington State Cougars (Wazzu) and they trampled the spoiled brats, 45-14.
 
The interesting thing is how long and skinny that skeg is. Euler's column buckling and all...
 
You folks got it all wrong, this is a visual aid on how far NOT to rotate for take off.... :lol:
 
Matthew Rogers said:
What does that have to do with anything? Please explain your reasoning. Are you talking about the plane looking like a hydraulic low rider car that can pop a wheelie? If so, maybe just state that and not link it to race.
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Sounds like you were offended. I apologize for that. It wasn't my intention.
 
1950's pictures of the ramp at Logan Airport, Boston showed photos of all the parked DC-4s with tail stands.
 
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