787: Ctrl+Alt+Delete

ShanwickOceanic (netAirspace FAA) 03 Apr 20, 08:01

The US Federal Aviation Administration has ordered Boeing 787 operators to switch their aircraft off and on every 51 days to prevent what it called "several potentially catastrophic failure scenarios" – including the crashing of onboard network switches.

The airworthiness directive, due to be enforced from later this month, orders airlines to power-cycle their B787s before the aircraft reaches the specified days of continuous power-on operation.

The power cycling is needed to prevent stale data from populating the aircraft's systems, a problem that has occurred on different 787 systems in the past.

According to the directive itself, if the aircraft is powered on for more than 51 days this can lead to "display of misleading data" to the pilots, with that data including airspeed, attitude, altitude and engine operating indications. On top of all that, the stall warning horn and overspeed horn also stop working.

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/04/0 ... tale_data/

https://ad.easa.europa.eu/ad/US-2020-06-14

My friend and I applied for airline jobs in Australia, but they didn't Qantas.

miamiair (netAirspace FAA) 03 Apr 20, 11:19

Old news...

That has been going on for a while.

And let's get one thing straight. There's a big difference between a pilot and an aviator. One is a technician; the other is an artist in love with flight. — E. B. Jeppesen

ShanwickOceanic (netAirspace FAA) 03 Apr 20, 19:01

New AD, though, no? I understood it to be the same issue but on different systems.

Of course, if you're already rebooting anyway because of the old issues, you likely won't see the new ones.

My friend and I applied for airline jobs in Australia, but they didn't Qantas.

Lucas (netAirspace ATC & Founding Member) 03 Apr 20, 21:05

This could have made a great IT Crowd episode. Douglas Reynholm calls in about why his private 787 isn't working.

DXing 05 Apr 20, 13:49

I'd be amazed if any 787 in commercial service went 51 days without being totally powered down for some type of maintenance. Certainly won't be a problem for the next few months.

What's the point of an open door policy if inside the open door sits a closed mind?

vikkyvik 06 Apr 20, 14:18

DXing wrote:I'd be amazed if any 787 in commercial service went 51 days without being totally powered down for some type of maintenance.

That's what I was gonna ask. Do they really stay powered up for weeks/months at a time?

Of course, I suppose I don't exactly know what "powered up" means in this case. Is an airplane parked on a remote ramp overnight still "powered up"?

DXing 07 Apr 20, 11:26

vikkyvik wrote:
DXing wrote:I'd be amazed if any 787 in commercial service went 51 days without being totally powered down for some type of maintenance.

That's what I was gonna ask. Do they really stay powered up for weeks/months at a time?

Of course, I suppose I don't exactly know what "powered up" means in this case. Is an airplane parked on a remote ramp overnight still "powered up"?

Miami Air would be more knowledgeable than me on this but I would assume it means all the electronics powered down, no external ground power, APU off, batteries not selected. Any 787 that is parked now due to the covid-19 flying downturn would most likely be completely powered down and dark. On an aircrafts regular line schedule it wouldn't be too hard to accomplish that task since the directive evidently doesn't give a time period for the shut down. So it could be as short as the infamous, turn it off, give a 10 second count, then turn it back on. IT's standard band aid to any electronic item acting up.

What's the point of an open door policy if inside the open door sits a closed mind?

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