Landing jet's spoiler defect puts airport on standby

Monday, 27 June 2011

An Air New Zealand flight called for emergency services to be put on standby at Wellington airport last night after the pilot discovered a 'spoiler defect'' minutes before landing.

The Airbus A320, carrying 165 passengers, had flown from Melbourne and landed in Wellington without incident around 11pm.

An Air New Zealand spokesman said the pilot aboard flight NZ 842 requested Wellington Airport standby after learning there was a spoiler defect.

Spoilers are surfaces on the top of a wing which can be extended upward into the airflow to 'spoil it''. They are used to reduce lift in an aircraft and are used during landing.

The defect was not connected to the ash cloud which has plagued New Zealand airspace for the past week, he said.

'The pilot had an indicator fault saying the spoiler wasn't operating so he called a local standby a couple of minutes from landing.''

The defective spoiler was subsequently not activated for landing.

'That aircraft is operating from Wellington to Melbourne today but via Auckland.'

Staff had carried out maintenance work on the aircraft this morning, he said.

'The only issue they still now have is the crew that operated that service, because it was late by the time they had done the debrief papers after the incident, are now short on operating hours.''

Passengers on this afternoon's flight would now have to fly to Auckland so new crew could board.

A Wellington airport spokeswoman confirmed the airport's emergency services had been alerted to the incident last night.  

'An alert was put out and everyone was made aware of the situation. We assessed what was happening and when the plane landed safely everyone was stood down.''