Aircraft tail strikes happen every now and again, though this is one of the more unusual ones that I’ve seen caught on camera…
In this post:
DHL A300 has dramatic tail strike at London Heathrow
BIG JET TV does an amazing job capturing video footage of aircraft taking off and landing at some of the world’s busiest airports. They were recording today (Sunday, October 12, 2025) at London Heathrow Airport, and goodness, did they catch quite a landing.
A 34-year-old DHL Airbus A300 with the registration code D-AEAG was performing flight QY2212 from Leipzig (LEJ) to London (LHR), scheduled to arrive a little after 5PM.
In video footage posted online, the plane can be seen attempting to land on runway 9L. It seemed to be a little windy, but nothing out of the ordinary. The plane’s left main gear touched down before the right main gear touched down, and there was a bit of side-to-side bouncing. However, it didn’t look like there was anything too alarming… until the plane was pitched up drastically.
It was pitched up so far that the plane suffered a tail strike… only for the pilots to then perform a go around.
The plane was then sequenced in for another approach, and landed on runway 9R without incident around 20 minutes later, at 5:33PM.
What on earth went wrong with this approach?
First of all, it’ll be interesting to see for how long this plane is grounded. It could be that just an inspection needs to be performed and that everything is more or less fine (aside from some missing paint). Or it could be that there’s structural damage, and that the plane will be out of service for months.
At least visually, this doesn’t appear to be one of the harder tail strikes I’ve seen, so perhaps this won’t be that big of a deal. That being said, visuals don’t always tell the full story.
This whole situation is a bit odd. Based on watching the video, it would appear the pilots just couldn’t get the wheels down in a stable way. Yet they deployed the reverse thrust and speed brakes, only to then perform a go around, with elevator inputs sending the nose up.
The A300 looks rather “pudgy,” so it looks like a plane where it would almost be difficult to have a tail strike (unlike an A340-600, for example). It’s pretty incredible to see the angle of attack at the time of the tail strike — that nose was way up there!
Bottom line
A DHL Airbus A300 suffered a tail strike while attempting to land at London Heathrow today. Tail strikes happen once in a while, but the entire attempt was strange. The pilots deployed the reverse thrusters and speed brakes, only to then pitch the nose way up and go around.
Hopefully the plane isn’t damaged too badly, though something tells me that a pilot or two may be headed for some extra simulator hours…
What do you make of this strange DHL attempted landing?
Doesn’t take much to get a job flying freight in Germany. A tailstrike in Leipzig, by an A300 flying for DHL, Feb 9 2024, occurred while the First Officer was Pilot Flying. She had 589 hours total flying experience, of which 433 were on type (115 landings).
Could this have been caused by improper loading, with freight shifting toward the back?
Maybe someone onboard forgot to put their cellphone on airplane mode…
A couple observations:
It's pilot induced. Note the hardcore nose up inputs on the elevator position.
Followed by nose down inputs, and spoiler deployment.
Spoilers put a load on the aft of the wing, which exacerbates any nose-up moment.
This was followed by what looks to be FULL nose up on the elevators.
Early on in this sequence, it was irrecoverable. But, provided that the other commenters' assessments that the...
A couple observations:
It's pilot induced. Note the hardcore nose up inputs on the elevator position.
Followed by nose down inputs, and spoiler deployment.
Spoilers put a load on the aft of the wing, which exacerbates any nose-up moment.
This was followed by what looks to be FULL nose up on the elevators.
Early on in this sequence, it was irrecoverable. But, provided that the other commenters' assessments that the weather was clear and free from wind gusts is accurate, I can see no excuse for this event.
People tend to over-control. This tendency must be trained out of pilots, and in this case, I'm not sure that was successful.
Hi Ben.
I enjoy your blog. Usually fun and interesting articles and you are quite knowledgeable regarding aviation operations. 1 thing I will correct you on is that the reverse thrust was NOT deployed. Every airliner that I have flown, 8 as of now, are to NEVER perform a go around once the reverse thrust has been selected.
You want to watch the video more closely, the reverser was deployed shortly
@Oscar, At what time stamp do you see that? I watched it several times and see no indication of reversers. Unless it is while the engines are out of the shot, I would also say no reversers deployed
@CPH-Flyer, At 0:16 the reversers deploy. It’s only visible for a moment but it definitely happens.
If I was a betting man… and if my understanding of the Airbus FBW system is accurate, they probably commanded TOGA thrust right at the “third” touchdown, roughly the same time the reversers came out. With both mains touching the ground, the flight computer would have transitioned to ground law control rules which would have allowed the full elevator deflection.
@Timtantrak
Thank you. I see it now. I wonder if any actual reverse thrust was generated or it was stopped too quickly again? Blink and you'll miss it.
Apologies for the user name typo.
Correct.
Everyone has a bad day at the office occasionally.
I have no expertise to add to this conversation whatsoever, but I do live in northwest London (roughly on the letter W of Wembley on the map in Ben's article) and saw this plane going around over my house at about 3,000ft as I was playing in the garden with my daughter! We immediately recognised it as a go-around and when the two BA A320s following it also went around we thought that there must...
I have no expertise to add to this conversation whatsoever, but I do live in northwest London (roughly on the letter W of Wembley on the map in Ben's article) and saw this plane going around over my house at about 3,000ft as I was playing in the garden with my daughter! We immediately recognised it as a go-around and when the two BA A320s following it also went around we thought that there must be been something wrong. Presumably they did a quick runway check.
How exciting to finally be vaguely involved in one of Ben's posts! Thanks for the great content, Ben!
For the record it was a beautiful afternoon in London with no wind at all, so no idea what was going on with the landing.
Not an expert but A300 do have a bit of a reputation when it comes to landing. They are not the most agile/responsive at low speeds and feel a bit like a flying cow, so it can be hard to stick a landing, specially if heavy with cargo.
That was such a superb example of pilot error, good viz and practically no wind to speak of.
I can't believe this wasn't a Delta pilot. This is the first article on OMAAT in several weeks when it wasn't a Delta pilot screwing up...
Oopsy, maybe the pilot was an Ex-Delta Airline employee? …. :-)
Boy you’re working late on a Sunday, Ben! We love the quantity of content but get some rest and time with family!