Issue 294: QF32 Returns

The repairs and the return of Qantas A380 VH-OQA Nancy-Bird Walton

“Profound” is how Captain Richard Champion De Crespigny describes the significance of A380 VH-OQA Nancy-Bird Walton’s return to the Qantas fleet.

Qantas’s first A380 and hence the symbolic flagship of the airline’s fleet, it returned safely to Singapore under Captain De Crespigny’s command after an uncontained explosive failure of one of its Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines soon after takeoff when bound for Sydney on November 4 2010, operating flight QF32.

“The aircraft was challenged in an incident that is not part of the certification requirement. It was damaged beyond the certification requirements and to some degree we were on our own,” Captain De Crespigny recounts.