HN Reader

That is very exceptional. I've written fuel estimation software for airliners (cargo, fortunately), and the number of rules regarding go-arounds, alternates and holding time resulted in there usually being quite a bit of fuel in the tanks on landing, by design. I've never heard of '6 minutes left' in practice where it wasn't a massive issue and the investigation into how this could have happened will make for interesting reading. A couple of notes: the wind and the time spent on the three go-arounds + what was necessary to get to the alternate may not be the whole story here, that's actually factored in before you even take off.

I'd be very wary to get ahead of the investigation and make speculative statements on how this could have happened, the one thing that I know for sure is that it shouldn't have happened, no matter what.

Under FAA rules this was a screwup. [edit: see my own reply] (However, the rules are subtle, so they can be partially forgiven.) However, I'm not only a dispatcher but also a philosophy BA, so I've found a good way to explain it.

Your reserve fuel (the "extra" fuel over what the actual flight burn) can of course be used (hello, that's what it's there for) but—and here's the rub—you can never plan on using it.

That is to say, in this case, when they missed their first or second approach, they CANNOT say, "We'll use our reserve fuel and make another go at it" because that would be intentionally planning to burn your reserve.

You may only dip into your reserve when you have no other choice. In this case, when the only fuel they had left was reserve, they are obligated by law to proceed to the alternate airport, which clearly they did not do [correction: they did do the proper thing; see my 2nd reply below]. No bueno.

[this is a slight simplification (minor details omitted for brevity) but the kernel of the issue is properly described]

Looks like they tried two attempts to land in Prestwick over two hours, then flew to Edinburgh and made one aborted landing, then finally went to Manchester.

What a nerve wracking experience for those pilots. I wonder if on the final attempt they knew they had to force it down no matter what.

> One pilot who reviewed the log said: “Just imagine that whenever you land with less than 2T (2,000kg) of fuel left you start paying close attention to the situation. Less than 1.5T you are sweating. But (220kg) is as close to a fatal accident as possible.”

> The Boeing 737-800 had just 220kg of fuel left in its tanks when it finally landed, according to a picture of what appears to be a handwritten technical log. Pilots who examined the picture said this would be enough for just five or six minutes of flying.

For reference, passenger airlines immediately declare emergency if their planned flight path would put them under 30 minutes of fuel (at least in the US). Landing with 5 minutes remaining of fuel is very atypical

For anyone interested, here is the flight playback:

https://fr24.com/data/flights/fr3418#3c7f91f4

Better links

https://avherald.com/h?article=52dfe5d7&opt=0

https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/1nzet3a/flight_a_...

Quoted:

Incident: Malta Air B738 at Prestwick, Edinburgh and Manchester on Oct 3rd 2025, landed below minimum fuel By Simon Hradecky, created Sunday, Oct 5th 2025 14:39Z, last updated Friday, Oct 10th 2025 15:02Z

A Malta Air Boeing 737-800 on behalf of Ryanair, registration 9H-QBD performing flight FR-3418 from Pisa (Italy) to Prestwick,SC (UK), was on final approach to Prestwick's runway 20 when the crew went around due to weather. The aircraft entered a hold, then attempted a second approach to runway 20 about 30 minutes after the go around, but again needed to go around. The aircraft again entered a hold, about 10 minutes after entering the hold the crew decided to divert to Edinburgh,SC (UK) where the aircraft joined the final approach to runway 24 about one hour after the first go around but again went around. The aircraft subsequently diverted to Manchester,EN (UK) where the aircraft landed on runway 23R about 110 minutes after the first go around.

On Oct 5th 2025 The Aviation Herald received information that the aircraft landed below minimum fuel with just 220kg fuel (total, 100kg in left and 120 kg in right tank) remaining.

The aircraft returned to service about 13 hours after landing.

On Oct 10th 2025 the AAIB reported the occurrence was rated a serious incident and is being investigated.

A passenger reported after the first go around at Prestwick the crew announced, they would do another attempt to land at Prestwick, then divert to Manchester. Following the second go around the crew however announced they were now diverting to Edinburgh, only after the failed approach to Edinburgh the crew diverted to Manchester.

> the Boeing 737-800 had just 220kg of fuel left in its tanks... enough for just five or six minutes of flying

Maybe I'm just unaware, but it's crazy to me that these planes burn 40 kilograms of jet fuel per minute.

Possibly related, but not definite, this apparently has happened before with Ryan Air.

https://avherald.com/h?article=454af355

https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/exclusi...

These were not definitive but it did raise concerns due to the budget nature of the airline.

The latest Captains Speaking podcast has an discussion about one of the hosts being in a similar situation: https://youtu.be/5ovlZ221tDQ

Fortunately, the flight left with extra fuel, because it was cheaper to carry excess from the origin airport than to buy it at the destination airport, so reserve fuel wasn't needed, but it was close. Also, there was lots of lightning.

This very recent Mentour documentary is extremely relevant, came to mind immediately. Multiple redirects due to bad weather, extreme "Get-there-itis" and eventually running out of fuel.

Great edutainment if you're feeling in the mood for that. If you're inpatient you can skip to 14 minutes, before that it's just backstory.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vK_7q9tixX4

It reminds me of a Transavia flight from Girona to Rotterdam that had to be diverted to Amsterdam back in 2015 (1 attempt at Rotterdam, decided to divert to Amsterdam, then 2 attempts in Amsterdam).

It was a particularly stormy weekend and it turns out from the article that they had 992kg of fuel left:

https://avherald.com/h?article=489d4c3f

Massive respect for pilots and the job they do.

As a naive person, I have a simple question - why would they even fly to an airport where there's 100mph winds? Wouldn't ATC know this and tell the flight way in advance to fly to a different destination?

I wonder if the pilots considered Newcastle (or Teeside)? The METARs showed favourable weather conditions at Newcastle and many planes landed there that day without issue I believe. Also far closer to Edinburgh than Manchester. I wonder if they thought that Manchester being further south, had a better chance of better weather?

The only real question for the inquiry is how the decision was made to divert to Edinburgh and whether that was a reasonable decision at the time.

United Airlines Flight 173 ran out of fuel while circling Portland International Airport trying to troubleshoot a landing gear. Six more minutes of fuel could have helped the airliner to land in the Columbia river by the airport or belly land on the runway. The captain chose to keep troubleshooting and crashed just 6 miles away from the airport.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Airlines_Flight_173

I look forward to watching this one on Mentour Pilot

The headline is about the landing, but the issue here happened at takeoff. There were 100 mph winds at the destination and this was their 4th fallback attempt and their third airport. This flight should never have taken off, the risk of multiple diversions was easily predictable, but the flight took off headed toward an airport in dangerous conditions, got diverted to a second airport that was just as dangerous, then finally to a third where conditions were so bad other flights were being cancelled (https://uk.news.yahoo.com/storm-amy-brings-flight-chaos-2019...) and where it finally landed because it was either land at that airport or land somewhere that is not at all an airport. Once this flight was in the air, disaster was more or less inevitable and we lucked into a narrow eviting window.

This seems to be a case where the error was that the 2nd diversion was to another commercial/passenger airport. The situation after it was determined Edinburgh was a no-go was dire and making it to an airport like Manchester was a luxury they did not have safe fuel for.

> The pilots had been taking passengers from Pisa in Italy to Prestwick in Scotland on Friday evening, but wind speeds of up to 100mph meant they were unable to land.

> After three failed attempts to touch down, the pilots of Ryanair flight FR3418 issued a mayday emergency call and raced to Manchester, where the weather was calmer.

#1 - if Prestwick had wind speeds up to 100mph, then why the h*ll was the airport not closed down?

#2 - if the pilots had experienced conditions that dire during their first two landing attempts at Prestwick, then why the h*ll did they stick around for a third attempt?

EDIT: The article's a big vague, but it seems to have been 2 attempts at Prestwick, then 1 at Edinburgh, then the last-minute "oops, do I really want to die today?" decision to run to Manchester.

This one is pretty straightforward so it doesn't need an AAIB report. Failure of pilots to brief destination weather conditions and anticipate proper bingo fuel accordingly. Storms in the area == brief max go arounds, brief alternates, and carry extra fuel. They screwed up by taking unnecessary risks of too many go arounds and barely making an alternate because they didn't play it safe by carrying additional fuel. Take these bold pilots to the chief pilot's office for an uncomfortable conversation without tasty snacks.

Can anyone say whether airline pilots make each diversion decision solely based on their own information and judgment, or do they loop in the company?

Are there any good online databases with fuel level details for individual commercial flights? I've been on a few flights that had to circle for a long time / had a number of go-round attempts, and I've never been able to find details after the fact about how close to the margins we were.

This happened in my country with I think a Vistara flight, where they had 5 minutes of fuel left.

I myself went from Bangalore to Delhi a couple of weeks back, and the poor pilots told the air hostesses at least twice or thrice to prepare for landing but the plane did not land until much much later.

Had a 1 maybe 1.5h holding pattern in Oslo once in Ryanair where they hoped they could land in extreme snow. Then diverted in the end (surprise!). Happened in 2009 though. Joked they were very desperate to land at Oslo because they cant afford to divert.

And that is how fuel reservoir requirements rise for all. Im sure, the whole airline industry is looking at the whole markets share prices going down- writing happy songs and packing gift baskets for Ryanair.

On the positive side, if they had made a crash landing with so little fuel, there would not likely have been a fiery explosion, and many more passengers would have survived than normal?

I saw this plane out my window when it was landing at Prestwick. It was dark and windy about 60mph and I said to my wife "what's that in the sky". The airport is about 5 miles away, for some reason this one caught my eye - in the hundreds/thousands of planes that go by I've never said that before, don't know if it was pointed an odd direction but it appeared stationary. We thought it was like a star, but too bright. We looked it up on flight radar to see if it was a plane and it was the one that later came out.

I know this will not be relevant to anything but I thought it was a strange coincidence then I saw it on my hn feed.

Even fighter jets have more fuel reserves when they land. This is insane.

Looks like the emergency reserve management worked?

The Guardian can’t be trusted with their sensationalist headlines.

The flight couldn’t land in 3 other airports and eventually declared emergency.

The plane landed with approx 67 gallons of fuel. They typically land with 670 gallons.

A US gallon of Kerosene weights approx 6.5 lbs

Why such a large surplus?

So this is about the stopping problem, but for airplane fuel, kinda?

Guess which airline I won't be flying with next time...

Ryanair: Cutting cost at all cost

Nothing beats a Jet2 holiday...

Is it like in the car where you have no fuel left but there’s a reserve of another 10 liters?

Another metric conversion error?

Sounds like pilot error - they didn't pay the extra fee to have reserve fuel.

I imagine the next step will be RyanAir asking passengers to carry fuel cans onto the plane. B*tards.

Between overworked, understaffed ATC and undertrained pilots, I'm expecting some major disasters in the coming years.

Story time, from my past.

Waiting on full flight in Europe, good airport, for take off. Pilot says over speaker : " We are delayed becuase FUEL guy got UPSET on tarmac and has QUIT. We know need someone ELSE to fill the plane with FUEL. " Said in a COMPLETELY nonchalant voice.

Immediately I get concerned, try not to think what cause a FUEL TECH to QUIT regarding THIS PLANE and fuel issue. Just close my eyes, relax.

2 minutes later pilot comes on intercom again "For some WEIRD reason, someone wants to get off the plane. Now we have to wait for ground crew to find his suitcasebecause of rules. How annoying.."

Plane waits for an hour on tarmac for BOTH passenger to get off and for FUEL to be finally "resolved".

Arrive eventually at destination.

Most of the trouble would have been avoided if the pilot had not sounded nonchalant about a "NON ISSUE about FUEL that a technician just QUIT OVER". I swear i even rememebr saying the statement with a hint of humour, like what on earth is the problem.

This is a true story, and the fact this incompetence happened to me, well I wouldnt have believed it otherwise.