Observant ground crew advised the flight crew of a B757-200 that the APU was throwing sparks.

Attributes
ACN	848522
Time
Date	200908
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	B757-200
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Parked
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	APU
Person 1
Function	Captain Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 150 Flight Crew Total 13500 Flight Crew Type 3500
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical Flight Deck / Cabin / Aircraft Event Smoke / Fire / Fumes / Odor

Narrative:

After arriving at the gate I started the APU in preparation to secure and shut down the engines. As the cabin door was opened a ground employee quickly ran up into the aircraft and knocked on the cockpit door to inform us that the APU was throwing sparks out of the exhaust. We had 'no' indication of any irregular operation or malfunctions of the APU. Ground power was already connected so I immediately shutdown the APU and the sparks from the exhaust stopped. The ground employee had also already called for crash fire rescue equipment as a safeguard just in case. No fire had occurred.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Observant ground crew advised the flight crew of a B757-200 that the APU was throwing sparks.

Narrative: After arriving at the gate I started the APU in preparation to secure and shut down the engines. As the cabin door was opened a ground employee quickly ran up into the aircraft and knocked on the cockpit door to inform us that the APU was throwing sparks out of the exhaust. We had 'no' indication of any irregular operation or malfunctions of the APU. Ground power was already connected so I immediately shutdown the APU and the sparks from the exhaust stopped. The ground employee had also already called for CFR as a safeguard just in case. No fire had occurred.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.