Earlier this week, at an airport in Seattle, USA, a software error was responsible for an incident known as 'tailstrike' on two Alaska Airlines flights.
In the aviation universe, a 'tailstrike' is an incident in which the tail of the aircraft hits the runway, the ground or even another stationary object. Generally, these episodes occur during takeoff or landing and are not usually considered dangerous moves - however, this is not always the case, as these incidents can seriously damage aircraft.
At Seattle-Tacoma International Airport these accidents happened twice in the same morning, both involving Boeing aircraft operated by Alaska Airlines, even leading to the suspension of flights and temporary interruption of this company's airline activity across the country.
According to further investigation, a bug was found to be responsible for this incident: according to the Seattle Times newspaper, these 'tailstrikes' happened after a software error in a program sold by a Swedish company called DynamicSource. This program is supposed to provide key information regarding weight and balance that pilots enter into their flight computers, to help determine, for example, how much thrust the engines will provide and how fast the plane will be available for takeoff. In this particular case, the error ended up transmitting incorrect data that seriously underestimated the weight of both aircraft.
The original article via Gizmodo can be read here.
