Incident: Air Canada B763 near Winnipeg on Aug 10th 2009, loss of cabin pressureAn Air Canada Boeing 767, AC-161 from Toronto,ON to Vancouver,BC (Canada) with 220 people on board, was enroute near Winnipeg*, when the crew received a cabin altitude warning and noticed, that the cabin was "climbing" at 800 feet per minute. The cabin oxygen masks were automatically released. The crew initiated an emergency descent down to 8000 feet, declared emergency and diverted to Winnipeg,MB for a safe landing.
Initial report from TSB indicates that the aircraft was dispatched with the left air conditioning pack MEL'd (out of service) and during the flight, a duct connecting the right pack failed, resulting in a rapid increase in cabin altitude. The oxygen masks were deployed, the crew descended the aircraft to 8,000 feet , declared an emergency and diverted to YWG.
An inspection of the right hand air cycle machine found the ducting of the heat exchanger had fallen off.
(CADORS Number: 2009C2173)
AVHerald report:
http://www.avherald.com/h?article=41e16d5a&opt=1Addendum: Similar problem with left air conditioning pack MEL'd (out of service) occurred on Halifax to Heathrow flight, same day:
Air Canada B763 near Halifax on Aug 10th 2009, air conditioning problem
http://www.avherald.com/h?article=41e29ad9&opt=1
* Actually it was in the middle of nowhere.
http://maps.google.ca/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=upper+red+lake&sll=48.019324,-94.88205&sspn=0.512561,1.234589&g=lower+red+lake&ie=UTF8&ll=48.010138,-94.677429&spn=1.025306,2.469177&t=h&z=9
It's hard to say what altitude they were at but a passenger posting on avherald says they were at 32,000 ft. when things started to unfold.
This is half way between Duluth, MN. and Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Sorry there's no audio, just this little piece of artwork to show you what 32,000 - 8,000 looks like.
Also a google earth file.
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