A300
Time Pressure; Training / Qualification; Situational Awareness; Confusion; Workload
Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Ground Event / Encounter Fuel Issue
General None Reported / Taken
Aircraft; Procedure; Manuals; Human Factors; Company Policy
The airplane was released with Auxiliary Power Unit (APU) deferred; thus required air-cart start procedures in the gate.  Preflight; airplane setup; briefings; checklists; crew duties; paperwork; ground interactions were all normal; and (Minimum Equipment Lists) MELs were complied with.  Normal air-cart start and subsequent pushback were all normal.  After clearing the ground crew off the headset; the Right; Number 1 Inner Tank Fuel Pump faulted.  We complied with the instruction to turn off the pump; and contacted Ramp Control and Maintenance on separate radios.The Captain worked with Maintenance while the First Officer worked with Ramp Control.   The Captain discussed the need to do a deferral and the First Officer received instructions for us to taxi to spot for off the gate maintenance; or something to that effect.  Neither of us had ever heard of such a thing; and I told the First Officer to say; 'No; we're not doing that.'I called on my cell phone and told them about the situation; and we began discussing the need for a maintenance deferral; and whether or not we had enough fuel under the circumstances.  I suggested we look at deleting the alternate from the flight plan if it would be legal to do so.  The Dispatcher said he'd begin working on it.  It was about this time that Maintenance suggested we go to a designated spot for hot refueling.  I again said we wouldn't do that and that the best plan should we need fuel would be to just taxi into the gate we just left; shut down; get fuel; and have Maintenance sign off the fuel pump.  Maintenance told me that that wasn't the best idea because if we did that we'd have a long delay and have to do the paperwork over again.  I called Dispatch back and he said there was no way we could just do the deferral and that we'd need to go back for fuel; and I said fine we will do that.  As a note; Dispatch told me that he had also never heard of hot refueling. At that point I told Maintenance what we were going to go back into the gate.  Maintenance proceeded to explain that the hot refuel was done all the time and that the FAA and that Company Safety had approved of the procedure.  He was adamant that the hot fuel was the best way to proceed.  Ramp also confirmed the procedure; so after discussing it as a crew; we agreed it sounded like a legitimate request; and we agreed to go to the spot and proceed with the fueling there.  When we arrived; we were stopped by a pickup truck pulling close to the airplane that made me stop.  There was no further guidance from Ramp; other than to ask us to pull the tail clear of a taxi lane.  A second vehicle with built-in airstairs arrived at the airplane.  He began giving us hand signals that made little sense; and eventually hooked up to the intercom system; and asked us to shut down the engines.  I suggested that was not a very good idea and that we could have done that in the gate and that we were there for hot fueling.  He then said to just shut down engine number two and to open the door so he could give us a fuel slip.  I asked the First Officer to do an after landing flow to make sure we were caught up; and then to open the door after disarming the slides.We received fuel; a fuel slip; coordinated hand signals; ran appropriate checklists; did a cross-bleed start to get engine number two back on line; accomplished the after-start checklist; and taxied via Ramp's instructions.  The First Officer made adjustments to the aircraft performance data and we ran a new performance briefing; noting a two knot increase in the new V speeds; and feeling comfortable that we had returned to safely normal operations. We proceeded to taxi and takeoff with normal operations.At cruise we received a message from Dispatch that we didn't do a new weight and balance.  He asked for our fuel onboard; we sent them. Either an ill conceived procedure or a lack of adequate resources for flight crews to safely conduct this procedure.The Pilot in Command shouldhave stuck to his first decision.  And from a more proactive approach; a checklist should be developed and added to the QRH.  The maintenance deferral flowchart should mention the need to revisit weight and balance. requirements and anything else we might have missed.  Additionally; I would highly encourage a module during simulator training that runs crews through this exercise and the use of new flow charts and a checklist.
The flight blocked out and then had a maintenance problem.  Right Inner Tank Inoperative. This not a flagged item; so the decision was made to put the aircraft in a maintenance area on the ramp. The Minimum Equipment List (MEL) requires 8800 lb penalty fuel and adjust fuel for FL200. Fueling is allowed in the maintenance area.  Since it was not a block turnback; a new release was not required. We did the prescribed procedure with Maintenance and I then sent a mini flight plan showing the new numbers with fuel penalties. After fueling was finished; I sent an ACARS asking for the new fuel breakdown so the hub could send a new Weight and Balance. However; the plane had already blocked and departed without an up to date to the weight and balance. I informed the Duty Officer and then tried to send the new weight and balance. The new weight and balance never showed up in the crew's ACARS messages although it showed up in the playback screen in ACARS. So I copied and pasted and sent the information; but did not notice that the information in the weight and balance that the hub sent was the information from the original block out. Even though we had received the correct fuel breakdown from the crew enroute.  The flight landed at its destination and I talked with the crew and passed them on to the Duty Officer. The initial problem was caused by crew departing without an updated weight and balance. I suggest following procedures when an aircraft blocks back to a maintenance area
A Flight Crew and Dispatcher reported the flight departed with incorrect weight and balance information due to being distracted after issues refueling on the ramp with an engine running. The flight crew was not familiar with refueling with an engine running and could not find any guidance or published procedures that allowed this.