APRIL 2013 GROUND HANDLING INTERNATIONAL


closer examination. Whilst a cautious approach was required to this subject, Peter stressed that the most important element was the establishment of a “no blame” culture and the necessity for the reporting of any impact whatsoever. His colleague, Frederick Gaible, underscored these comments, adding that further tests were envisaged by Airbus with a measurement tool to address these very real concerns. Airbus’s first speaker also divulged the interesting information that special attention has been paid to the doorframes of the A350 and that these will benefit from reinforcement. Mindful of the most sensitive areas on the fuselage when it comes to damage, here the manufacturer is merely anticipating the anticipated. Strengthened door frames are not, of course, a licence to kill in themselves: they are sensible precautions, but nothing more. However, we are on something


of a circular tour here: no airframe manufacturer has made available a fuselage or section thereof for testing and so where testing has occurred, it has been carried out on something similar. To summarise, then, we appear


to have a situation here wherein an aircraft can be struck by GSE but which will not, necessarily, illustrate any evidence of this action. That fact alone is a pregnant one, which poses the blindingly obvious question. How exactly do you assess something that is unseen? At the GHI conference, this topic certainly stirred the audience. In the absence of any clear-cut answer, various expedients were suggested, amongst them special paint that would change hue if subjected to a blow. This, in retrospect, would appear to be a cost- effective and highly practical answer to the question but one suspects that not too many fleet operators want to end up with multicolured aircraft. Mind you, take a closer look at the doorframes of the next aircraft that you board and you might well be rewarded by the sight of random, after-market aluminium patches. Where, then, is the difference?


A measure of success


In the absence of any positive information on this topic, I felt that it was worth contacting Boeing for


COMPOSITE AIRCRAFT HANDLING 35


clarification. I, for one, would not feel at ease working around something that could be inadvertently dented yet which would not overtly admit to that action. I raised the issue with the airframe manufacturer’s Dreamliner Communications department. I posed the following question:


“How can a ramp agent team leader or similar authority make a decision over releasing an aircraft for flight if that same aircraft has been hit by GSE during the turnaround? It has been suggested that an engineer with special equipment might be required to check the integrity of the panel, but clearly this type of solution is impractical on a day-to-day basis.”


Boeing’s answer was indicative of someone playing their cards close their chest:


“Boeing has developed and provided to operators maintenance instructions and training for dealing with GSE impact to 787s. High energy, wide area blunt impact events (such as a GSE impact) require an instrumented inspection prior to dispatch.” This didn’t fully answer my question, so I laid out the query in a different


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