B757-200
Flight Crew Flight Engineer; Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 185; Flight Crew Total 18800; Flight Crew Type 11265
Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Flight Deck / Cabin / Aircraft Event Smoke / Fire / Fumes / Odor
Flight Crew Inflight Shutdown; Flight Crew Returned To Departure Airport; Flight Crew Returned To Gate; General Declared Emergency; General Maintenance Action
Manuals; Human Factors; Aircraft; Procedure
At V1/rotation; we felt vibration and heard a muffled bang. At first; I thought we might have blown tires; but the failure of the left engine became obvious as we lifted off. Then; in rapid succession; we received multiple; repeated calls from the ground and from flight attendants. First; taxiing aircraft reported that our left engine was on fire. Then; the Tower called and repeated that our left engine was on fire. Meanwhile; below 1;000 FT; the cockpit chime was ringing repeatedly as the flight attendants attempted to call us. I heard the flight attendants on the interphone say something about smoke in the cabin and a call to get a halon fire extinguisher. These events all combined to significantly disrupt our normal after takeoff flow. Specifically; neither pilot called for or accomplished gear retraction or the After Takeoff Checklist. I took over the radio as the First Officer began running the Engine Failure Checklist. I asked the Tower for an immediate return to the airport; and realized we should run the Engine Fire Checklist instead; I called for that checklist. We secured the left engine; and even though there was no cockpit fire indication; I directed the First Officer to discharge a fire bottle; since fire was reported from the ground and by the flight attendants.I attempted to engage the autopilot on crosswind; but after several seconds; it disengaged. I made no further attempts to engage it; since I felt troubleshooting would add to my distractions. Hand flying; however; significantly added to my workload. Soon; a jumpseating pilot (who had been riding in the cabin) came to the cockpit and assisted the First Officer by reading checklists. I learned from him and the flight attendants that smoke in the cabin was transient; and there was no cabin fire. Our traffic pattern and final approach were very short; due to both the fire situation and nearby weather in the area. I made a PA to advise the passengers to remain seated after landing. I accomplished configuration changes myself. The First Officer and jumpseater finished checklists at approximately 500 feet. We landed with autobrakes 4; and as we stopped; I made another PA for the passengers to remain seated while the fire crews inspected the aircraft. They reported no visible anomalies. The highest brake temperature indicated 4; so we elected to taxi to the gate; fire crews followed the aircraft. Passengers deplaned at the gate without further incident. The engine failure was recorded in the aircraft logbook; Maintenance then removed the logbook from the aircraft. We completed the Engine Flameout or Loss of Thrust/Inflight Shutdown form and left it on the center console. We realized after the logbook was removed from the aircraft that the overweight landing had not been documented. I spoke with the Maintenance Coordinator over the telephone and provided him with the aircraft gross weight and approximate sink rate at touchdown. He informed me that he would set the aircraft up for an overweight landing inspection. I complied with the FOM Post-Incident/Irregularity Checklist. I did not realize that I had missed the Post-Emergency Checklist in the FOM. Specifically; I was late notifying the Dispatcher of the event.
There were numerous distractions in a high workload environment close to the ground interrupting normal flow processes. I requested a straight out and advised the Tower we had an engine failure. At a 1;000 FT AGL; the Captain requested vectors back to departure airport.An evacuation was not commanded nor initiated by the passengers.The flight attendants were trying to get in touch with us frantically which added a compounding distraction. (Talking with them in more depth after we landed; they wanted to tell us that we had a fire in the engine on the Captain's side (great way to describe it - Captain vs. First Officer's side) and some smoke in the cabin.) Typically we train to have one guy fly and take over radio transmissions while the other guy runs the QRH checklist. This got compounded by the center autopilot not staying engaged. Now I felt like it became a multitasking event for both of us. I was taking care of the engine fire checklist and trying to support the Captain and in all of the chaos I forgot to do an After Takeoff Checklist. We were both task saturated.
An engine failure at rotation; compounded by multiple and immediate calls from ATC; other aircraft and the flight attendants regarding a fire in the left engine and smoke in the cabin compounded the difficulties for the flight crew of a B757-200; yet a successful; albeit imperfect; synergistic chain of events followed to get all aboard safely back on the ground in short order.