Speaking of Boeing

Both the fuel dump and the RAT shownI am not entirely sure what happened, but a Virgin Atlantic Boeing, hull number G-VZIG, aborted a flight from Heathrow to Seattle, dumped fuel, and landed with the ram air turbine (RAT) deployed.

Obviously, dumping fuel when aborting a flight that was going to be flying about 4800 miles (8000 km) is kind of a given, but deploying the RAT?  That is not normal.

On Saturday, January 27, a Virgin Atlantic aircraft was forced to return to its departure airport after an inflight incident, per The Aviation Herald. The aircraft, which was a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner, departed London Heathrow International Airport (LHR) in the United Kingdom when the flight crew was forced to halt its initial climb. The aircraft dumped its remaining fuel and returned to London Heathrow with its RAM Air Turbine extended and in operation. The Dreamliner returned to the airport safely with no further issues.

The Virgin Atlantic Dreamliner, which is registered as G-VZIG, was scheduled to perform flight VS-105. This operation connects London Heathrow to Seattle Tacoma International Airport (SEA) in Washington. Typically, this flight departs London at approximately 12:25 local time. The aircraft then arrives in Seattle at around 14:20 local time, after about nine hours of flight time.


G-VZIG departed London about 15 minutes late, departing at 12:42 local time. The Boeing 787 departed from London Heathrow's runway 09R. The aircraft reached an altitude of about 23,000 feet (FL230) before the flight crew halted the aircraft's climb. The flight crew leveled off at 23,000 feet to dump fuel. While returning to London Heathrow, the flight crew deployed the aircraft's RAM Air Turbine. 

My guess would be an issue with the electrical system, probably the generators, otherwise the RAT would not have been deployed.

If anyone has any knowledge of WTF happened, please post in the comments. 

Boeing has had a very bad streak of luck lately, but, to quote John Milton, "Luck is a residue of design," and corollary, "Bad luck is a residue of bad design," appears to apply here.