Aerosucre 727 crashes on takeoff

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: 727Sky

I heard they're looking at weight and balance. Operating out of that airport they're always right on the edge, but from what I understand the forward, below deck cargo hold is pretty easy to overload if you're not careful.

Airport elevation 164 ft AMSL

Runway 5,933ft

After you add fuel to 141,000lb ZFW there's not much left for payload is there?

a reply to: sy.gunson

or the 727-200
I'm not sure your figures are for the straight -200 model with the -7/9/11 engines. My AFM fshows an empty weight of 97,650 pounds, a ZFW of 136,000 pounds and a Max Takeoff Weight of 172,000 pounds. When you consider they loaded a reported 90,000 pounds of fish and for the planned flight of one hour, they would have put on at least 9,000 pounds of fuel. Way over gross weight. Your chart is for a "Standard day" which means 15 degrees C. The actual temp was close to 30C. If the aircraft was the -200Advanced, MTOW would be 209,500 pounds. The Advanced model had better JT8D-17A engines. But even then, given the weight, temp,and everything that happened, it would have struggled a little even without going through a fence and hitting the building. Sort of a typical South American operation, though, where max gross weight is seen as a goal and not a limitation.

a reply to: F4guy

It was a 727-2J0F Adv, the database shows it had -15s.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: F4guy

It was a 727-2J0F Adv, the database shows it had -15s.

The -15 had 500 lbf more thrust than the -11s on the straight 200 but 500 lbf less than the -17 and almost 5000 less than the later -200As with the 17A. The JT8D was a good noise engine but took forever to spool up from idle and was very prone to compressor stalls. And since it is a low-bypass engine, it is too noisy to operate in many countries without adding a million dollar hush kit to the engine.

a reply to: F4guy

Sorry you're right I thought I had copied Standard Day +25F but copied the wrong page. HK-4544 was Advanced with the JT8D-15 engines. Thanks for info about payload.

Lemme find the right chart & post it again.

a reply to: sy.gunson

Someone needs to hang for that one. Almost 80000 lbs overweight? Did I read that right?

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: sy.gunson

Someone needs to hang for that one. Almost 80000 lbs overweight? Did I read that right?

Did I depict it right?

In disbelief myself.

Whilst I am a mighty fan of the Boeing 727's impressive capabilities, I am not that big a fan of proving it.

a reply to: sy.gunson

I've seen 'em do some amazing things too, but that's entering the realm of insanity.

80000 divided by 2000 equals 40 tonnes overweight. How do you not notice that? I've loaded ships, and trucks...and I knew almost to the pound how much I'd loaded at any given point. It's even more important for airplanes I should think...

Someone needs hanging. Several someones. Negligent homicide, four counts. Or something like that.

a reply to: seagull

As a kid I loaded Carvairs to a weight & trim calculation where even 50lbs over was a serious issue. When a plane is so overweight trim instability becomes a huge issue as well. I noticed someone previously observed the elevator was trimmed full nose up. That means any disturbance to trim like ripping off a flap and they had no more elevator travel.

a reply to: sy.gunson


That doesn't add up. The BOW (Basic Operating Empty Weight of the 727-200A is 100,700 pounds. Add 90,000 pounds of fish and 9,000 pounds of fuel and that means a takeoff weight of 199,700 pounds. The MTOW for this model is 209,500 pounds. But that is a structural limitation. The operating limit, givrn the weight and temperature meant then needed a whole lot more runway than they had. I think you are adding payload and fuel to the "wing bending weight" or "zero fuel weight." You add payload to empty to make sure that is less than WBW. The empty or basic operating weight (empty weight plus crew plus unusable fuel plus anything else you need to operate except fuel) is 100,700 pounds. What makes it even worse is that they took off with a tailwind component of about 4 knots. That adds to the required runway length.

a reply to: F4guy

Yeah you are right I just realised my error. Sorry folks

Should have started from OEW not ZFW

a reply to: F4guy

So they weren't that much overweight?

Sorry if I sound confused, but I'm in over my head with this stuff. I do know taking off with a tail wind isn't actually a good thing...but that's about as far as it goes.

a reply to: seagull

They were probably under their Max takeoff weight, but overweight for a 5900 foot runway.

Let me start again. Apologies for the error.



I have added 9,000lb Fuel & 90,000lb payload to 102,215lb standard OEW for JT8D-15 powered -200 advanced

circa 162,500lb remains the Take off weight limit for a 5,933ft runway

a reply to: Zaphod58

Ah, I see.

Not the plane itself, but for the conditions it was operating in.

a reply to: sy.gunson

No worries.

We all goof.

a reply to: seagull

Yeah sorry Seagull, the curved lines are where take off weight (bottom) intersect runway length (vertical scale)

This runway was almost at sea level beside a river near the border with Venezuela. This chart is also the graph for standard temperature +25 degrees Fahrenheit. Hot air is less dense thus lengthening the take off distance.

The engines are important because different versions of the Pratt & Whitney JT8D offer different thrust & imply different weights for the aircraft.

a reply to: Zaphod58

It still turns out that their take off weight was 201,215lb for a B722 variant with 191,000lb MTOW,

Using Runway 24 they shouldn't have attempted take off with more than 162,500lb, so they were still 38,715lb over weight. I wonder how many times previously this same pilot had gotten away with this?

originally posted by: sy.gunson
a reply to: Zaphod58

I wonder how many times previously this same pilot had gotten away with this?

On that runway, at that weight, with that temperature and tailwind - none.