Planes, Ravines and What To Do in a Crash

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A couple of points about the airline crash in Canada yesterday. Congratulations must go out to the Airbus designers – the current regualtions for aircraft are that every passenger needs to be able to be evacuated from a plane within 90 seconds, using only half the doors. Yes you can test and test and test again (by offering £50 to the first 150 people out a 240 seater aircraft) but the only true test is real life. And it worked. They’re probably more worried about deciding if it was a lightning strike that brought the plane down, or a stubborn pilot who thought he had The Right Stuff.

What I’d like to do is get all the passengers together and ask them two simple questions. Did you listen to the safety briefing at the start of the flight(and half way through, as Canadian regualtions dictate for flights in excess of two hours)? I suspect the majority of them didn’t and when the plane hit they were unsure what to do or where to go. And will they listen to safety briefings on any subsequent flights they go on?

It always annoys me when people switch off during the saftey announcements wwhen I fly. As this accident shows, when something happens, it happens fast. You don’t have time to work out where the nearest door is, or how to get there when the lights go out, the cabin fills with smoke, you need to get out. If you paid attention to the safety talk,checked where the nearest exit is, and maybe counted how many head rests / seats you need to pass in the dark before turning right or left, then you won’t get in my way because you’ll be moving just as fast.

30 more seconds with your newspaper, or getting out a burning plane 30 seconds faster. You choose.

UPDATE: And I see this on BBC News. FlyBe Birmingham to Edinburgh fills with smoke and pilot does emergency landing at Bradford Airport, and “The captain came out shouting to people to evacuate, evacuate.” Again, everyone gets out. Again a cabin with no visual clues on what to do, passengers not in the calmest frames of mind. Folks, lets pay attention out there.