Wednesday, Nov 18, 2020 at 10:13
Ah, yes, Alan, the "Gimli Glider".
For others who may not get your reference ..
A Boeing 767 was refuelled in Toronto, Canada, IIRC, for a flight across the country to a western destination. Due to the physics of combustion, aircraft fuel use is universally calculated and measured by weight, but delivered to the tanks by the refuellers and charged by volume. So... the American built aircraft's fuel needs are documented and gauged by the manufacturer (Boeing) in pounds and gallons. The Canadian aircrew who lived in a bi-lingual world of English and French that used kilos and litres had to calculate the amount required in pounds, convert that to gallons, then ask for that amount to be delivered by the French-speaking ground crew in litres.
Unsurprisingly, the wrong amount of fuel was delivered during refuelling. About halfway into the flight the aircraft ran out of fuel and to cut a long story short, landed in eerie silence on a small airport at a place called Gimli somewhere east of Winnipeg, Manitoba. Gimli airport was a disused Canadian Airforce base given over to motor sports. The arrival of the unpowered B767 caused it to become known in aviation circles as "The Gimli Glider".
AT/LT, PSI, Bar, PSIg - the mix up of units here is unlikely to have the same repercussions as it did the Gimli Glider but, Alan, your reference was certainly apt!
EDIT: My summary of the Gimli incident was from memory and is a little faulty - there was far more to it than a mix up of units. An accurate account can be found at
this Wikipedia entry. It makes fascinating reading.
Cheers
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