[محمد احمد عسيري]

Incident: Jet Airways B773 at Amsterdam on Apr 21st 2017, tailstrike on departure

A Jet Airways Boeing 777-300, registration VT-JEW performing flight 9W-234 from Amsterdam (Netherlands) to Toronto,ON (Canada) with 337 passengers and 15 crew, departed Amsterdam's runway 18C when tower advised the next departure to expect a delay due to a runway inspection needed following a tail strike. Tower handed the Jet Airways off to departure without mention of a tail strike. Following the runway inspection with no findings the next departure was cleared for takeoff. The Boeing continued the climb and was cleared to climb to FL240. Amsterdam Radar complained the aircraft was not showing their callsign on Mode-S (Transponder), it was all 0s, the crew advised they had set it, the aircraft was subsequently showing the callsign climbing through about FL140. A minute later the crew advised they'd like to divert back to Amsterdam and needed to dump fuel, they requested to descend to FL100 or below. Radar then informed the crew that tower believed to have seen their tail contact the runway surface upon departure, the crew acknowledged "that's correct". The aircraft descended further to FL060, dumped fuel and landed safely back on Amsterdam's runway 27 about one hour after landing back.

Ground observers reported no damage was visible on the aircraft.

The Dutch Onderzoeksraad (DSB) reported they dispatched investigators for exploratory research of an incident during takeoff at Schiphol Airport.

The airline reported the aircraft suffered a suspected tail scrape during departure and returned to Amsterdam. The aircraft is currently being examined by maintenance engineers.

A passenger reported that no evidence of a tail strike was discovered, however, the passengers were kept on board for 6 hours and became very impatient, then the flight was postponed to the next day and the passengers were taken to hotels.

The occurrence aircraft is still on the ground in Amsterdam 12 hours after departure.

On Aug 15th 2017 the DSB reported in their quarterly bulletin that the aircraft did suffer a tail strike during rotation from runway 18C. The crew dumped fuel to reduce the aircraft weight to maximum landing weight and landed back. The occurrence was rated a serious incident and is being investigated.

https://avherald.com/h?article=4a7eeac3&opt=0