Yesterday I was flying a short ferry flight from EBBR to EBLG. Everything went fine, Until I was about 10-12 NM out.

The Master Caution light lit up, and on the F/O's sixpack, the indication DOORS was active. No light was on on the overhead.

I decided to run through the QRH, which stated to continue normal operation if pressurization was normal. The pressurization was fine of course, since I was about to touch down anyway.

I landed at EBLG, taxied to the gate and shut her down. Afterwards, I decided to have a look at the failures, and saw the Airstair Hatch Failure was active. There's only one tiny little problem: the aircraft I was flying, doesn't have an airstair.

Now, I've been on quite a few 737 with and without airstairs, but it seems to me that the airstair hatch is only installed when there is actually an airstair in place.

 

Long story short, is this a bug?

 

TL,DR; Airstair not installed, airstair hatch failure active, what gives?

 

Now, I've been on quite a few 737 with and without airstairs, but it seems to me that the airstair hatch is only installed when there is actually an airstair in place.

 

There are actually quite a few that have the hatch, but not the actual stairs. They should have the indicator light though, I suppose.

We do have a few of those in our fleet, but they have the hatch because they used to have the airstair at a previous operator.

While the particular airframe I was flying on doesn't have the hatch in real life, it might do so in the sim. Although I can't see the hatch on the external model.

Not in the NGX, in the NGX you either have airstairs or you dont. Best you can do is paint the hatch on the repaint (if the painter is detailist enough ).

 

SkyEurope's NGs were all delivered new, however while none had airstars, first 16 (GECAS birds) had hatch for resale value.

I will see if I can find a picture of the overhead to see if they had the light.

Um...how do you tell whether or not it has airstairs?

You can see it in the CDU, also the door annunciation panel on the forward overhead panel will have an INOP sticker on it if the aircraft doesn't have airstairs.

WITH airstairs:

 

WITHOUT airstairs:

 

Aha!  Thanks.