Airports and snowstorms in Europe

[Frank N. O.]

I was wondering, how come the airports outside of the Scandinavia seems to have such problems? Danish news just showed a fleet of articulated snowplows/snow-brushes, the reporter standing next to the runway said they could clear 3500 meters of runway in 10 minutes and the airport was almost never closed, the reason many planes are cancelled is that their destination airports are closed . I did hear something about Charles de Gaulle running out of de-icing fluid because the factory in Belgium couldn't deliver it since the roads were iced over so the trucks couldn't drive. I also heard something about Heathrow being run on a spanish airport plan which doesn't account for such amounts of snow, is that true or did I mishear something while channel-surfing?

I gotta say, those articulated snow-plows at EKCH were seriously cool, my dad would've loved to drive one of those. They were Mercedes-Benz trucks (real trucks, not pick-ups/delivery vans), seriously lifted ground-clearence and most likely driven on all axles (I saw both 2 and 3 axled  (6 and 10-wheeled) tractors). Found a picture here: http://www.cph.dk/NR/rdonlyres/841A88D9-BC79-47D6-B713-6096C9684F9F/0/Snekonvojpreview.jpg

Frank

[Oddball]

As far as I know the Scottish airports are open 

[Jupiter]

huh? from what I've heard the belgian airports were closed because the french factory couldn't deliver de-icing fluid
No problems on Schiphol either, except for cancelled flights because of the destination airports being closed...

[Frank N. O.]

Jupiter: Hmm, maybe I heard it wrong, or maybe it's from official airport sources were they throw the blame to another country

The manager of Kastrup (Copenhagen) Airport got a bright idea on how to cure the problem with snow-drifts: Get the firetrucks to hose the snow with water, that'll freeze the snow and it won't blow onto the runway anymore. He said got the idea while in the shower.

Can't helicopter fly in this weather? They don't need runways as such, but maybe a helicopter would just make another blizzard with all the light powder-snow. That made me think, can rotors freeze over and are there helicopters with de-icing equipment on the rotors?

Frank

[G-man]

That made me think, can rotors freeze over and are there helicopters with de-icing equipment on the rotors?
Frank

Both are correct. We can fly in snow, but need to be cognizant of whiteout clouds when landing.

[Ragwing]

That deicer caused havoc in the fleet.

Parts are showing up that have been damaged by the deicer.

[Frank N. O.]

How come? Is it corrosive so when the amount increases so does the concentration to the point it attacks metal or rubber?
It's starting to sound like wet road-salt here in Denmark, some new (quality) cars have had full rust-holes in their bodywork after just 3-4 years driving here. Not to mention what's happening to road-side trees etc.

Frank

[Ragwing]

In aircraft design, aircraft manufacturers look for compatible systems.

In selecting grease, the designers test the same grease from different companies to see how well they react to each other.
Then the manufactures and the FAA tell the mechanics when switching grease companies, the mechanics are not simply grease the aircraft but to use enough grease to replace the grease from a the old company.

Fasteners, fittings, bearings, etc from aircraft are tested in water, salt water, various types of fuel and solvents and an industry standard deicer.  Once they show that they are reasonably immune from these standard tests, they are released for use.

If a new solvent or deicer were to be applied to aircraft without fully checking out it's characteristics, it can do a lot of damage.
Seals and rubber can be destroyed, excessive corrosion started, etc.  Each of these parts will have to be replaced.

A few years go, the US Air Force found a great way to clean landing gear.  They pressure washed the gear with a new solvent.
As mechanics were cycled through training, they were shown this new method and returned to their bases with improvements.

Within a year, the Air Force was seeing the overhaul of landing gear significantly increase.  This was traced back to the new solvent that was used to make the pilots enjoy their shinny aircraft.
RW

[Frank N. O.]

That USAF story reminds of my mom's former car, a Peugeot 206, it was written in the manual that we weren't allowed to use pressure-washing on the underside of the car because it would scrape off the rust-proofing. No such thing written for the Mitsubishi though, which is good since under-car washing is needed to keep it from rusting thrue with all that road-salt. Some say here that the cars in DK should be washed all over at least once every week to avoid rust due to the road-salt.

The procedure of totally replacing instead of topping off when switching type/manufacturer is something I remember my dad did with our old cars, for instance when semi-synethic 5W-40 engine oil came out instead of 15W mineral oil.

Frank