Wayward Dreamlifter captivates the Air Capital

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /></div><script async="" src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script><!-- 3 --><br /><ins class="adsbygoogle" data-ad-client="ca-pub-4973891917352186" data-ad-slot="2995338919" style="display: inline-block; height: 250px; width: 300px;"></ins><script>(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); </script> <br /><div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Cambria, Georgia, serif; font-size: 28px;">Wayward Dreamlifter captivates the Air Capital</span></div><div><ul id="story_meta" style="background-color: white; color: #999999; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><li class="byline author vcard" style="font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">By <span class="fn">Rick Plumlee and Molly McMillin</span></li><li class="creditline source-org vcard" style="font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span class="org fn">The Wichita Eagle</span></li><li class="creditline source-org vcard" style="font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><br /></li><li class="creditline source-org vcard" style="font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.kansas.com/">http://www.kansas.com</a></li><li class="creditline source-org vcard" style="font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><br /></li><li class="creditline source-org vcard" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><br /><span class="org fn"><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">In a town used to having very large planes in its skies and at its airports, the Air Capital city became captivated for hours Thursday by a plane on the ground.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">But not just any plane.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">A wayward Dreamlifter – a massive Boeing cargo plane – missed its intended destination of McConnell Air Force Base on Wednesday night and landed nine miles to the north at city-owned Jabara Airport.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">As word spread early Thursday about the incident, crowds braved the cold and windy weather to gawk at the plane near 37th and North Webb Road. Some sat in cars that crawled along Webb or in parking lots across the street. Others lined a fence about 100 yards from the runway.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Plenty of people took pictures.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">When the Dreamlifter – piloted by a different crew than the one that goofed – finally took off at 1:15 p.m. without a hitch, the crowds cheered and honked horns.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">About 20 minutes later, the gigantic white plane with a funky hump on top safely landed at McConnell – more than 16 hours late.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“The whole event was a non-event,” said Victor White, director of Wichita’s city airports.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Not to Lisa Stewart, who stopped by after taking her husband to work.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“It’s bigger than an airplane,” she said. “It’s just so amazing.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Or to Travis Clark, a former sailor aboard the aircraft carrier U.S.S. John F. Kennedy who watched as the modified 747 left Jabara.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“I thought it was amazing that a plane that big could get up enough speed and take off on a short runway,” he said.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Some of the fuel was removed to lighten the plane’s load so that it would be able to take off from a short runway.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“They’ve just got enough fuel to make it to McConnell,” said Paul Spranger of Midwest Corporate Aircraft, the fixed base operation at Jabara.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">The event also drew the attention of federal officials. The Federal Aviation Administration got involved; the National Transportation Safety Board took notice.</div><h2 style="color: black; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 7px; padding: 0px;">‘Thanks for your hospitality, Jabara’</h2><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Questions and concerns started flying about 9:40 p.m. Wednesday when the Dreamlifter landed at Jabara. It was not long before the plane had its own Twitter account as <a href="https://twitter.com/KAAODreamlifter" style="color: #145ea7; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Jabara Dreamlifter</a>.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">As the plane became airborne again Thursday, an anonymous person wrote on the Twitter feed: “And, we’re off! Thanks for your hospitality, Jabara. We’ll try not to do that again.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">The giant air transport routinely flies to McConnell to pick up forward fuselages from nearby Spirit AeroSystems for assembly of Boeing 787 Dreamliners in Seattle or South Carolina.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">In this case, though, the plane was coming from Italy via New York and bringing 787 parts to be stored at Boeing Wichita, Boeing officials said.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“The tower was in contact with the pilot,” McConnell spokesman Stefan Bocchino said. “They were the ones who told him where he landed. From what I understand, the guy just landed and had no clue where he was landing.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Radio traffic between McConnell’s tower and the pilot indicated as much.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Moments after the tower cleared the Dreamlifter to land Wednesday, the air traffic controller told the pilot: “McConnell is nine miles south of you.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Pilot: “Yes, sir, we just landed at the other airport.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Pilot: “Apparently, uh, we, uh, have landed at (Beech Factory Airport, which is between McConnell and Jabara).”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">McConnell: “Verify. You are on the ground at Beech airport?”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Pilot: “We think so.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">McConnell: “… You are at Beech?”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Pilot: “Affirmative.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">McConnell: “Are you able to make an approach, correction, a departure off the airport and back in the air and to McConnell?”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Pilot: “We are working on those details, sir.”</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">It was soon sorted out that the plane was at Jabara. Or: very, very big plane at small airport.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Jabara’s runway length of 6,101 feet is almost half the size of the one at McConnell. There were heavy skid marks at the end of the runway where the Dreamlifter stopped.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Boeing contracts with New York-based Atlas Air for pilots to fly one of four Dreamlifters to ferry parts for new Dreamliner construction. Boeing has a permit to use McConnell’s runway, Boeing officials said.</div><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Atlas officials referred questions to Boeing</div><div style="color: black; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;"></div><h2 style="line-height: normal; margin: 0px 0px 7px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Runways easily confused</span></h2><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">It’s not unusual for pilots who aren’t familiar with Wichita to mistake Jabara for McConnell, said Steve Stowe, a former chief pilot and manager of flight operations at Boeing in Wichita. Stowe is now a senior engineering test pilot for Bombardier Flight Test Center in Wichita.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“It’s happened before in reduced visibility where a pilot on approach to McConnell mistook Jabara but figured it out pretty quickly,” Stowe said.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">When he was at Boeing, “we mentioned this issue to visiting pilots in our local area briefing guide,” he said.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">The runways at McConnell and Jabara are also in close alignment and nearly parallel. That could cause a pilot to see Jabara before McConnell, he said. The pilot landed the Dreamlifter coming in from the north.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Beech’s runway is also parallel but farther to the west, Stowe noted.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Atlas Air, which has operated the Dreamlifters since 2010, brought in two specialty pilots from New York to get the plane off the ground at Jabara and to McConnell.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Before allowing the Dreamlifter to leave Jabara, the FAA required that K-96 be shut down near where it runs south of the airport. The plane was on the far south end of the runway facing north, with its tail only about 1,300 feet from K-96.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“At full power, there was concern that the jet blasts could cause debris to fly back over the highway,” White said.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Law enforcement also shut down 37th and 45th streets between Webb and Greenwich for safety reasons, he said.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">After all the concern about Jabara’s short runways, the pilots needed only half the runway to take off.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“These guys were excellent,” White said.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">The only hitch was that the jet blasts broke a few runway lights, which was expected, White said.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Jabara, which had to be closed after the Dreamlifter landed, reopened shortly after the takeoff.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">One concern remains: the runway’s condition.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">The Dreamlifter weighs about 600,000 pounds – about 10 times the weight that Jabara’s runway is designed to handle.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">Preliminary checks by engineers indicated there was no damage.</div><div style="line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">“We didn’t see anything visible,” White said, “but engineers will come back in the spring – after there’s a chance for settling and cracking and we have the winter freezes and thawings – to see if there’s any problem.”</div><div style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; height: 1px; line-height: normal; overflow: hidden; width: 1px;"><br />Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2013/11/21/3132439/dreamlifter-lands-at-jabara-airport.html#storylink=cpy</div><div style="font-size: 14px;"></div><br /><div style="color: black; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;"><br /></div><div style="color: black; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; height: 1px; overflow: hidden; width: 1px;"><br />Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2013/11/21/3132439/dreamlifter-lands-at-jabara-airport.html#storylink=cpy</div><div style="font-size: 12px;"></div><div style="color: black; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; height: 1px; overflow: hidden; width: 1px;"><a href="http://www.kansas.com/">http://www.kansas.com</a><br />Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2013/11/21/3132439/dreamlifter-lands-at-jabara-airport.html#storylink=cpy</div></span></li></ul></div></div>

Wayward Dreamlifter captivates the Air Capital Wayward Dreamlifter captivates the Air Capital

Wayward Dreamlifter captivates the Air Capital By  Rick Plumlee and Molly McMillin The Wichita Eagle http://www.kansas.com In a town used t...

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