A380 VORTEX PROBLEMS?
IAG Blog
ex-problems.html
Jan 16 2009
CA
This is what is reported on a professional pilot site "An Armavia
Airbus A320-200, flight U8-968 from Sochi (Russia) to Yerevan
(Armenia), was enroute about 30nm north of Tiblisi (Georgia), when
the airplane encountered severe clear air turbulence, which caused the
autopilot to disconnect and threw the airplane into steep banks three
times. The crew managed to regain control of the airplane and completed
the flight without further incident. No injuries have been reported.
Armavia reported, that their aircraft was cruising 1000 feet below
an Emirates Airbus A380-800 registration A6-EDB flight EK-201 enroute
from Dubai (United Arab Emirates) to New York,NY (USA) and suspects,
that the turbulence was caused by wake vortices created by the A380."
Now the word is that 4NM separation traffic behind a widebody and 6NM
for traffic behind a 380 is the rule. After the quote above there
are two more that are eye opening. "I’ve encountered this during
the cruise too, 2000′ below an A340 (we were in a 737-8), mod to
severe turbulence, a/pilot kicked out, extreme banking, pretty scary
stuff! A quick call to atc allowed us a change in direction out of
the wake, problem solved!" and "I’ve flown at right angles 4000′
beneath the course of an A380 on test so probably light, and had
severe turbulence. There is definitely something different about the
A380’s wake."
Take a look at the plane – its wings are massive. REALLY massive. Look
at that wing in the picture above. The wing is really much bigger
(by comparison to a 747) than the plane seems to need. Surely that
wing must be generating huge amounts of dirty air at cruise.