Qantas Flight 30 suffers inflight fuselage rupture

QANTAS BOEING 747-438 VH-OJK (MSN 25067)

On this day back in 2008, Qantas Flight 30, a regularly scheduled flight from London Heathrow Airport (LHR/EGLL) to Melbourne Airport (MEL/YMML) with a stop at Hong Kong International Airport (HKG/VHHH), had to make an emergency descent and divert to the Philippines after an explosion ruptured the plane's fuselage.

The aircraft, a 17-year-old Boeing 747-400, carrying 346 passengers and 19 crew, completed the first leg of its journey, arriving in Hong Kong without incident. The jumbo jet departed Hong Kong at 09:22 local time, then approximately 55 minutes into the flight at 10:17, the passengers and crew heard a loud bang. Cabin pressure was immediately lost as a hole appeared in the cabin's floor and the cargo deck's outside wall. Oxygen masks were deployed, and the captain in charge of the flight, 53-year-old Australian Navy veteran and a Qantas employee for 25 years, John Francis Bartels, made an emergency descent to 10,000 feet, where it was possible to breathe normally.

After donning their own oxygen masks, the flight crew carried out the 'cabin altitude non-normal' checklist items and commenced a descent to a lower altitude, where supplemental breathing oxygen would no longer be required. A MAYDAY distress radio call was made on the regional air traffic control frequency. After levelling the aircraft at 10,000 ft, the flight crew diverted to Ninoy Aquino International Airport, Manila  (MNL/RPLL), where an uneventful visual approach and landing was made. The aircraft was stopped on the runway for an external inspection, before being towed to the terminal for passenger disembarkation.

Subsequent inspection revealed an inverted T-shaped rupture in the lower right side of the fuselage, immediately beneath the wing leading edge-to-fuselage transition fairing (which had been lost during the event). Items of wrapped cargo were observed partially protruding from the rupture, which extended for approximately 2 metres along the length of the aircraft and 1.5 metres vertically.
After clearing the baggage and cargo from the forward aircraft hold, it was evident that one passenger oxygen cylinder (number-4 from a bank of seven cylinders along the right side of the cargo hold) had sustained a sudden failure and forceful discharge of its pressurised contents into the aircraft hold, rupturing the fuselage in the vicinity of the wing-fuselage leading edge fairing. The cylinder had been propelled upward by the force of the discharge, puncturing the cabin floor and entering the cabin adjacent to the second main cabin door. The cylinder had subsequently impacted the door frame, door handle and overhead panelling, before falling to the cabin floor and exiting the aircraft through the ruptured fuselage.

Aircraft Information:

Airline: Qantas

Code: QF/QFA

Aircraft: Boeing 747-438

Registration: VH-OJK

Serial Number: 25067

Engines: 4 Rolls-Royce RB211-524G2

First Flew: 21/05/1991

Part of the story sourced from here 

On This Day In 2008: Qantas Flight 30 Suffers Inflight Fuselage Rupture (simpleflying.com)