The aviation experts at Heathrow Airport of London were baffled to witness a “British Airways A380 Superjumbo” land with “a stunning square-shaped tyre”. The flight “BA-32” had originated from Hong Kong, which was designed with a “square shape” deflated tyre as “part of the landing gear”.
As per the Aviation Herald, the crew got a “tyre pressure” indicator when the airbus “A380-800” was almost at the “top” of its climb during the take off from Honk Kong. The crew member then proceeded with thirteen hours flying journey and requested for a “tow tug” on reaching London, in case the aircraft failed to “taxi on its own”. Reports informed that: “The aircraft landed safely on Heathrow’s runway 09L and taxied to the gate”.
In the words of a “British Airways spokeswoman”: “The A380, in common with other large commercial aircraft, is designed to be perfectly safe when landing with a deflated tyre.”
However, the crew members were “puzzled” to be informed that the “right outboard body tyre had deflated on four corners” instead of the usual bottom, while a “Civil Aviation Authority” added that something like this was indeed unusual. Furthermore, the aviation experts also looked at the A380’s “square- shaped” tyre’s photograph with surprise.
In the words of the one “serving airline captain”: “The tyres are pressurised to around seven times that of a car tyre. Once depressurised the tyre will have ‘flatted’ while the a/c was braking and once it did so it would then rotate through 90 degrees to another part of the tyre and then do it again – hence the four flats you see. “Is it dangerous? No. To lose one is no big deal”.
References: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/
