2009-05 · NASA ASRS report 837762
An ATR72 crew experienced vibration during takeoff and was told about tire debris left behind. An emergency was declared at the destination and after landing it was discovered that number three tire tread had come off.
We experienced some vibrations that appeared to come from the nose gear at rotation. Shortly after departure tower advised us that a departing aircraft behind us saw tire debris on the runway. With the vibrations experienced and evidence of tire debris on the runway after our departure; we had reason to believe we had blown a tire. We decided to continue to our destination since they had longer runways and better Crash/Fire/Rescue. We briefed the flight attendants of the issues at hand and informed them to prepare the cabin for an emergency landing. An emergency was declared and we followed the emergency checklist for abnormal gear. To get more information on the condition of the tires we coordinated a fly-by with the tower. The tower informed us that everything seemed normal from their position and that an aircraft awaiting departure agreed that the gear and tires appeared normal. We circled over and landed without incident. It was not until we got to the ramp that it was confirmed that the tread on the number 3 tire had come off.
On the flight we experienced an unusual vibration in the nose wheel well immediately after the nose gear touched down. After the aircraft was stopped; set the parking brake and had C/F/R inspect it; no visual defects. At that time; we contacted dispatch; then MOC and they said it was OK to taxi it to the gate; so we did. After deplaning; myself and the first officer inspected the nose gear and called Maintenance Control. Dispatch informed us Maintenance Control was unavailable and would call me back when in the office on my cell. No calls received. At that time we see contract maintenance shows up. No one ever told me that contract maintenance was on the way. Contract maintenance was in contact with Maintenance Control and inspected the nose gear and found unequal tire pressures and no other defects noted. They fixed the tire pressures and signed off the logbook as operations check good. We departed.At approximately 100 KTS on the takeoff roll we experienced a vibration coming from the nose gear area; and when the gear was retracted it felt like there was an unusual vibration in the nose gear wheel well. We continued the takeoff as per high speed abort procedure. After takeoff; we contacted Dispatch and they informed us Maintenance Control was unavailable. Approximately the same time; ATC informs us that they found blown tire debris on the runway after our departure. So at this point we planned for a blown nose gear tire for the subsequent landing. We ran the CG and had the flight attendants move passengers to the aft of the cabin for a more favorable CG for a nose gear problem.
Source: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (public domain). Reports are voluntary submissions and are not verified by NASA.
Loading the flight search…
Pick an aircraft model — Boeing 737, Airbus A320, A380, Boeing 787 Dreamliner and more — enter your origin airport, and FlightFinder shows every route that plane flies from there with live fares.
We support Boeing 737/747/757/767/777/787, the full Airbus A220/A319/A320/A321/A330/A340/A350/A380 family, Embraer E170/E175/E190/E195, Bombardier CRJ and Dash 8, and the ATR 42/72 turboprops.
Search and schedules are free. Pro ($4.99/month, $39/year, or $99 one-time lifetime) unlocks the enriched flight card — on-time stats, CO₂ per passenger, amenities, live gate & weather — plus My Trips with push alerts.
Live schedules come from Amadeus, AeroDataBox and Travelpayouts. Observed routes (which aircraft actually flew a given city pair) are crowdsourced from adsb.lol ADS-B data under the Open Database License.