A Jumbo Recovery using Inflatable Buoyancy Bags

A Boeing 747-400 Jumbo-jet crashed in bad weather whilst trying to land at Hong Kong’s international airport. Miraculously, there were no fatalities nor any serious injuries when the aircraft overshot the runway and ploughed into the harbour waters. The subsequent salvage operation, unprecedented in aviation history, became a race against time. This was mainly because the position of the ditched aircraft was preventing operations on one runway and restricting those on another.

The plane had come to rest in shallow water with the vertical tail fin obstructing the flightpath. This was removed by The Royal Hong Kong Police using explosives. The fuselage was patched and pumped out prior to being towed to a specially laid mooring. Seaflex air lift bags were used for the re-floating, tow and mooring of the aircraft.

Despatch Note
Seaflex received the order at 1535hrs and by 1930hrs that evening, 304 tonnes of fully enclosed lift, packed on air-freight pallets, had left our factory bound for Heathrow Airport.

After careful preparation, HKST’s 350t floating crane barge ‘Proteus 1’ lifted the aircraft while a smaller crane alongside supported the nose. With 184 tonnes of Seaflex lift still attached as a precaution, the entire spread was moved 2 miles by tugs to the landing site ashore.

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