Aircraft Towing

Teamwork in Motion

Groundops

Flight crews play a pivotal role in safety
during business jet towing and parking.
© Chris Sorensen Photography

a

ircraft damage that delays or cancels
flights prompted Dassault Falcon Customer Service in France to investigate
causal links between aircraft towing and
ramp accidents. The company’s data analysis
in early 2007 confirmed that such eventsare a
major cause of flight schedule disruptions.
“Most events are preventable: Systematic
precautions, patience and careful handling may
avoid personnel injury and expensive repairs,”
Dassault said in a service advisory.1 “These best
practices are applicable to any personnel using a
vehicle in the vicinity of an aircraft such as a tug,
truck, limousine, airport vehicle, etc.”
Eventsfrom the first quarter of 2000 through
the first quarter of 2007 were used to develop
the advisory and to help raise industrywide
awareness. “The 68 events studied are the
number of occurrences for which we had a sufficiently detailed description of the event for our
analysis,” says Pascale Heitz, Falcon 900-series
support program manager. The importance of
avoiding such events was emphasizedby the fact
that 44 events (65 percent) occurred away from
the operators’ home bases, where the consequences are more difficult to handle.
An internal alerting system sounded the
alarm when delayed/cancelled flights for the
Falcon fleet increased after 2003 to an overall
www.flightsafety.org | AeroSAfetyworld | september 2007

By Wayne RosenkRans

rate of about 10 towing/parking eventsper year.
“In the last 12 months, towing incidents have
been the number one cause of delayed/canceled
flights on the Falcon 900EX EASy aircraft, with
three occurrences out of the approximately 70
aircraft in service,” Heitz said.
Heitz believes that the problems should
receive wider attention for several reasons. “The
trend most probably is similar for other business jets, as most eventsoccur outside home
base — that is, generally involving a tow vehicle
not maneuvered by the Falcon operator — and
the number of towing incidents involving two
aircraft was significant,” she said.
When towing/parking events occur, immediate consequences can include the need for
extensive repairs in an urgent aircraft-on-ground
scenario, plus a sudden requirement for alternate
transportation.“For Falcon aircraft, a substitute
airplane costs about US$4,000 per flight hour, so
it is a big expense for the operator if the aircraft
takes some time to be repaired,” Heitz said.
Injuries, while rare, also have been a significant consequence — especially injuries to ground
service personnel or bystanders. “We may have
to report the event to our airworthiness authorities and follow up toreview if we could improve
something in our documentation, communication, design or training,” she said.

Flight crews add
a line of defense
against towing
mishaps if they not
only observe FBO
personnel but check
their equipment
and familiarity with
aircraft-specific
procedures.

| 47

Groundops
Causal Categories

landing gear leg or the nosewheel steering system typically
wasdamaged because of failure
to disconnect the nose landing
gear torque link prior to towing.
Falcon aircraft require this step
because the turn radius of the
gear will be exceeded if the torque
link remains connected.

Company analysts assigned the following causal categories:
• The most common example of
24 maneuvering error events was
a towed aircraft striking a parked
aircraft (Figure1) — often inside
a hangar. Variations included the
towed aircraft striking the hangar
door or a parked vehicle or the tow
vehicle striking the towed aircraft,
or the tow vehicle operator moving
the towed aircraft off the tarmac.
• When the 22 torque-link connected events occurred, the nose

• When the eight incorrect towbar
installation events occurred,
the aircraft typically...