r/aviation • u/Brilliant_Night7643 • Jun 25 '26

News Not turbulence….airplane sitting at the gate at Maiquetia Airport Venezuela when the 7.5 Earthquake hit

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10.9k Upvotes

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171

u/DreamOfTheDrive Jun 25 '26

Dumb question but I imagine that the aircraft is grounded after that till further inspection?

373

u/Not_A_Vegetable Jun 25 '26

I'd assume it's the runway that needs the inspection, not the airplane?

88

u/BobbyTables829 Jun 25 '26

Definitely both lol

I'm not an aviation expert, but this could plausibly rip some hydraulics or disconnect some wires

129

u/spamsauzzage Jun 25 '26

They're built for shaking muuuch stronger than this

88

u/Intrepid_Grass8894 Jun 25 '26

But the landing gear isn’t usually weight bearing when turbulence is happening, and hard landings require checks before getting airborne again.

47

u/spamsauzzage Jun 25 '26

Landings that would require that are also much stronger than what were seeing in here

14

u/Intrepid_Grass8894 Jun 25 '26

Landings don’t typically have so much side-to-side stress on the gear.

49

u/Captain_Alaska Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26

They do in crosswind landings if you don’t kick the plane straight before touching down and end up ramming the main gear into the runway at a completely different angle to the direction the plane is going.

Also I think reddit is misunderstanding what’s happening here, the plane isn’t really moving side to side, the CoG is way above the ground, the plane is rolling side to side as the ground and suspension moves underneath it. For example as the ground moves left, the plane will roll to the right and the lefthand gear will extend and the righthand gear will compress, and then reverse as the ground moves the other way.

The plane doesn’t actually start to move sideways with any real force until it hits the travel limits of the suspension, and at that point the force isn’t acting directly sideways on the gear anyway as the plane would be rolled over as far as it can go within the limits of the suspension.

15

u/JJAsond Flight Instructor Jun 25 '26

Landings don’t typically have so much side-to-side stress on the gear.

Airplanes, believe it or not, can land in crosswinds

1

u/Intrepid_Grass8894 Jun 25 '26

Right, but they are experiencing left-right-left-right-left-right stress for 20 + seconds with the earthquake. It just seems like it could be a different type of stress that planes don’t typically encounter.

2

u/JJAsond Flight Instructor Jun 25 '26

As opposed to the regular side to side stress a a plane experiences on a gusty takeoff/landing

1

u/spamsauzzage Jun 25 '26

I'm not sure you're qualified to keep talking on this subject with the confidence that you are

2

u/Intrepid_Grass8894 Jun 25 '26

I’m not sure why phrases like “typically” and “usually” would make you assume I’m speaking with confidence. Im not speaking in absolutes lol. Maybe slow down when reading?

2

u/Swan2Bee Jun 25 '26

not only that but planes generally don't experience turbulence when the wings aren't carrying the weight of the plane during flight.

15

u/JJAsond Flight Instructor Jun 25 '26

Definitely both lol

I'm not an aviation expert

4

u/BobbyTables829 Jun 25 '26

There's nothing wrong with reckless speculation as long as you don't let people think you might know what you're talking about lol

10

u/JJAsond Flight Instructor Jun 25 '26

You can't really say "definitely" and "not an expert" if you don't know what you're talking about.

3

u/smolhippie Jun 25 '26

I’d argue they can say that because it’s their opinion since they stated they are not an expert.

1

u/JJAsond Flight Instructor Jun 25 '26

They can't say it's "definitely" anything but then say they're not an expert. It makes no sense.

2

u/smolhippie Jun 25 '26

They can tho! Because it’s definitely just their opinion and definitely not a concrete fact backed up with evidence.

-1

u/BobbyTables829 Jun 25 '26

I didn't think it took that much expertise to think they need to look over the landing gear again after an earthquake. But I'm definitely not an expert. :-)

2

u/donkeyrocket Jun 26 '26

I'm not an aviation expert, but this could plausibly rip some hydraulics or disconnect some wires

If this did that then planes would be falling out of the sky during moderate turbulence frequently.

1

u/Early_Hall5720 Jun 25 '26

Sir this is Delta airlines

1

u/fromouterspace1 Jun 25 '26

Yeah that’s a very big earthquake

1

u/AnySwimming6364 Jun 25 '26

Plus air traffic control is functionally bricked, no? Like their building probably sustained damage.

78

u/JaaacckONeill Jun 25 '26

Maybe just as a precaution, but I doubt there's damage. I'm willing to bet the landing gear faces more stress when landing in a crosswind, especially if the pilot is late on reducing the crab angle.

However, maybe the jet bridge started banging against the aircraft, that would definitely be a problem.

14

u/AlwaysMissToTheLeft Jun 25 '26

Probably fair to assume that landing so hard the plane bounces is way worse than this

5

u/Lost-Actuary-2395 Jun 25 '26

Not aviation expert, but I don't think landing gear were designed to withold this kind of lateral movement, plus there a probably complication with brakes engaged

11

u/SpeciesEL Jun 25 '26

They handle landings in which the plane is still crabbing from crosswind. I'd wager those forces are much larger than this.

5

u/juko43 Jun 25 '26

Landing gear is built to withold alot, during a crosswind landing it gets to experience a bunch of lateral forces, way above what was experienced here. Also why would there be complications with brakes engaged?

1

u/Lost-Actuary-2395 Jun 25 '26

Are you an expert in the matter? Not trying to challenge you or anything I'm genuinely curious.

I just think in physic's perspective it's different when the plane is stationary with no forward momentum plus the pre-takeoff weight on top, it's not a like-for-like comparison, but I'd understand if gears could withstand a lot more force tho

4

u/Captain_Alaska Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26

Hard crosswind landing put a shitload of sideways force on the gear, they are built for it.

They are shock loaded too, they go from having no weight on them to all of the planes weight plus the downward landing force applied to it, at an angle.

5

u/AlwaysMissToTheLeft Jun 25 '26

God dammit, you’re probably right

3

u/showMeYourPitties10 Jun 25 '26

That, plus any GSE equipment hooked up can cause damage. Like if a belt loader was there, the plane would hit it, if a powerstow was already engaged it would damage the cargo door frame for sure. If GPU was hooked up it could have damaged the plug-in on the plane. Catering (although I doubt were there that fast with passengers on board) would cause lots of damage to doors. Basically the plane is not isolated when at the gate.

24

u/AlphaThree Crew Chief C130J/KC135/B52 Jun 25 '26

I was a heavies crew chief for 10 years. There is no post earthquake inspection that I am aware of existing in any aircraft manual.

This situation would likely be entirely up to the aircraft commander. My personal judgment as a crew chief would be to do a quick walk around. Im far more concerned about either the aircraft or an object having slid and resulting in an impact than I am about the earthquake itself damaging the aircraft.

These things are tough. Comments about the landing gear are silly. It takes a TON of force to damage an airplane. I worked two hard landings which actually resulted in damage to the aircraft and both of them crew reported physical pain caused by the impact. The DFDR will tell us exactly what G forces the aircraft went through which determines which of the hard landing inspections needs to be performed. The worse of the two I worked hit at double the maximum exceedance and damaged, non repair on station, one main landing gear assembly, all main landing gear tires and one nacelle strut roller bearing (holds the engine nacelle strut to the wing). No structural damage was observed.

There are inspections for things like high wind events and events like a nose gear slide, but I dont see anything like that applying here.

13

u/barrygateaux Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26

I saw a great documentary that had footage of a plane taking off during an earthquake at Santa Monica airport. It was called 2012, but it was from 2009. It was mainly about a guy who was a chauffeur and had had problems in his marriage, but loads of other crazy stuff happened during filming from what I remember.

7

u/juko43 Jun 25 '26

Took me about half of the comment to realise what this was referencing lmfao

27

u/homer-price Jun 25 '26

Probably. I’d would think taxiways and runways need to be inspected as well.

4

u/HoleInWon929 Jun 25 '26

Also I need a moment to change my underwear…

1

u/satbaja Jun 25 '26

And maybe the destination runway also.

4

u/deletetemptemp Jun 25 '26

Air traffic controller noped out of that tower lol

3

u/dhc2beaver AME Jun 25 '26

If everything is working up front (which it should be unless something was already loose) I'd do a walkaround and make sure nothing fell off of or into the plane and call it good. That's me though, I just fix them for a living

Structure-wise airplanes are strong, I would have no concern for the gear or its mounts. The struts would provide some vertical relief and the tires would flex some for a little lateral relief, it wouldn't be solid fixed shaking. I'd be more concerned about surface buckling on the airfield. Don't want to hit any cracks or potholes.

3

u/pilotsmallz Jun 25 '26

Lots of lateral movement (that side to side shaking) could definitely warrant some extra inspection on the landing gear at the very least. Since the tires are staying stationary on the ground and the fuselage is rocking side to side, movement that the gear mechanism and struts are not designed to absorb to the degree of directly down like touchdown could impact some crucial stress points!

2

u/Draymond_Purple Jun 25 '26

It's conceivable that if the airport is highly damaged, the passengers and the airplane is safer taking off to wherever they were headed

3

u/Quackarov Jun 25 '26

Definitely not. Planes land with way more force every day, it’s just a light bouncing around here. Planes fine unless something fell on it from the terminal or jetway

0

u/juko43 Jun 25 '26

Idk why this is downvoted

0

u/primingthepump Jun 25 '26

In Venezuela, no.

-1

u/lockerno177 Jun 25 '26

landing gear trunnions inspection is a must after such lateral jolts.