Books
Epic Fail
QF 32
De Crespigny, Richard. Sydney, Australia: Pan Macmillan Australia, 2012. 358 pp. Photographs, appendixes.
On Nov. 4, 2010, and the following day, jaws dropped all over the world as facts of the accident involving Qantas Flight 32 — QF32 — became known. The near disaster and its successful resolution were the stuff of compelling drama.
The flight began when Richard Champion de Crespigny, a Qantas captain and pilot-in-command of QF32, signed for Nancy-Bird-Walton, an Airbus A380, the world’s largest passenger aircraft. The doors were closed and the airplane was now “his.” Four minutes after a routine takeoff from Changi Airport in Singapore, headed for Sydney with 469 people aboard, the no. 2 engine (left inboard) was ruptured by an explosive failure while the airplane was climbing through 7,400 ft. De Crespigny describes what happened immediately afterward:
“The huge Rolls-Royce Trent 90…
