DC-10 air tanker wing tip strikes hangar at Pueblo

(Published at 1:50 p.m. MDT July 12, 2016)

DC-10 wing into hangar
DC-10 wing impacts hangar at Pueblo Airport, July 10, 2016. Photo from the SAFECOM.

One of the three DC-10 Very Large Air Tankers, Tanker 912, was involved in an incident while taxiing back to the loading pits at the Pueblo, Colorado airport on Saturday, June 9. A  wing tip struck a hangar causing damage to the aircraft and the hangar. There were no injuries to anyone on the ground or the five personnel on board the air tanker.

After the accident occurred, with the wing tip still partially embedded in the structure, the DC-10 was left in place until Monday morning while the stability of the hangar was assessed and decisions were being made about how to proceed in order to minimize further damage.

“Yesterday [Monday] we had some structural engineers out to assess the hangar’s structural stability”, said John Vigil, Interim Director of the Pueblo Airport. “We were able to just cut off a couple of pieces of steel and then were able to push [the DC-10] back with a tug.

“From what I could see”, Mr. Vigil continued, “the damage was minimal to the aircraft. It was really just the wing tip. The damage to the hangar was a little bit more substantial. We’ll meet with the insurance company tomorrow [July 13] and get an assessment. The good news is the hangar didn’t collapse. There was a small [general aviation] plane in there, we were able to take it out and get it out of harm’s way, and then start to work getting the DC-10 free.”

A tug pushed the aircraft back on Monday, extricating the wing tip from the hangar. Later in the day mechanics from 10 Tanker Air Carrier, the operator of the three DC-10’s, began repairing the damage to the wing.

A SAFECOM was submitted at 12:07 p.m. on July 12, 2016. The FAA also a brief report.

T-912
File photo of Air Tanker 912 departing McClellan Air Field June 11, 2016 while working a fire on the Klamath National Forest. Photo by Matthew Rhodes.

On July 19, 2014 another DC-10 Very Large Air Tanker, T-910, incurred some damage to a wing while it was taxiing at the air tanker base at Moses Lake, Washington. While relocating in the loading pit area the aircraft struck a portable “air stair”, a structure that can be pushed up to the aircraft door. Two people on the ground were marshaling the DC-10 as it slowly moved, directing it where to go and supposedly watching for obstructions.

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