[canucklad]

[quote quote=952355](hence earlier comments about ‘acrid smoke’ appear rather odd).[/quote]

Morning Simon

I was just quoting directly from a comment made to the Independent newspaper ….

“She said: “It was very scary. The flight was just ending, and with 10 minutes to go the flight started descending rapidly as smoke started to fill the cabin. It was horrible white acrid smoke”

You’re right , in as much as we weren’t there and a 26 second clip is only a snapshot in time . And as Poshgirl58 correctly states, I’m no expert either.

However , my question if I was a passenger on that aircraft would be simply this…..

If was safe to stay on the aircraft for 5ish minutes after landing why then deploy the chutes ?

[SimonS1]

That’s the challenge these days isn’t it. People just repeat what they read somewhere else as if it were fact. Clearly it wasn’t – that is pretty clear from the video which shows people behaving and breathing in a normal fashion. And as the newspapers also reported only 3 people went to hospital for checks…hardly what you would expect in an acrid cabin.

Why deploy the chutes? Who knows. That I imagine will be what the investigation establishes. In the stress of the moment many things can happen, and sometimes it is best to evacuate first and analyse after. Use of the chutes doesn’t indicate life was at risk.

I would anticipate BA would also want to review why some people exited the plane with their baggage. I have said for years (including on here) that this is a consequence of HBO travel, and that one day there will be a major incident in which the amount/weight of cabin baggage will be a factor, at which stage the regulator will belatedly step in and force airlines to behave responsibly. However that (like the issue of phones pre flight) may or may not be relevant here.

1 user thanked author for this post.

AircraftLover

[AFlyingDutchman]

Have they determined a cause of this incident yet?

[rferguson]

Well none of us (crew or passengers) know how we will react until we are in a similar situation. Very few of us get on an aircraft expecting something like this to happen. On approach it is probably far from everyone’s mind and the passengers are thinking about their holiday.

It is not clear who initiated the evacuation. Either cabin crew or the pilots can. The evacuation alarm is audible but again it is not known who this was initiated by. The safety training at BA IS very good (and this is coming from someone who has flown for two other airlines previously). Whereas at my previous airlines there was a very defined ‘script’ of what you should do, BA allows real world lee-way with a focus on always leaning on the side of caution. There is a recognition at BA that there will never be a ‘perfect’ crash landing/fire etc and while there are certain drills we follow our training encourages to think out of the box and off script if practicalities to not allow us to follow the drill.

Another thing I noticed is that the crew member in the footage was not wearing Portable Breathing Equipment (PBE) which are onboard for crew use in such a scenario. That could be because either she felt it wasn’t necessary and was breathing uninhibited. Or she felt that the PBE would inhibit her giving instructions to passengers, which a PBE would.

Would I initiate an evacuation myself? I’m not sure. It would depend on a number of factors. Is the smoke acrid (are there people coughing and spluttering and gasping)? Is it getting more dense or less dense? What is the outside environment like that we would be evacuating into? Are we at a crowded airport like LHR where there are potential hazards all around and it may be MORE dangerous to send people running on to a taxi way? Or a quiet airport where I can see the coast is very clear and no hazards.

One thing that really peeved me off with the press is that many passengers onboard complained that the crew ‘did not drop the oxygen’ and insinuated that this was some poor judgement. And the press of course did not give a counter to that. Namely that every single one of those hundred -odd chemical oxygen generators are flammable and would be the last thing you want activated in a potential fire incident!

***THESE ARE PERSONAL OPINIONS ONLY***

9 users thanked author for this post.

IanFromHKG, Poshgirl58, Jacob, K1ngston, Johnnyg, ASK1945, DerekVH, esselle, AFlyingDutchman

[LuganoPirate]

It depends, while we don’t know the circumstances, this is probably not very newsworthy, but if the aircraft caught fire, exploded or whatever, then it could provide very useful evidence for investigators. Personally I’d be more concerned with getting out though than taking pictures!

1 user thanked author for this post.

Poshgirl58

[CathayLoyalist2]

The return flight took off the folowing afternoon so probaably not a major problem, albeit no further updates from BA and anyway they have their hands full with the latest IT fiasco

[Swissdiver]

[quote quote=952496]The return flight took off the folowing afternoon so probaably not a major problem, albeit no further updates from BA and anyway they have their hands full with the latest IT fiasco[/quote]

G-MEDN seems to still be in Valencia… https://www.flightradar24.com/data/aircraft/g-medn/

1 user thanked author for this post.

CathayLoyalist2

[SimonS1]

[quote quote=952504]

CathayLoyalist2 wrote:

The return flight took off the folowing afternoon so probaably not a major problem, albeit no further updates from BA and anyway they have their hands full with the latest IT fiasco

G-MEDN seems to still be in Valencia… https://www.flightradar24.com/data/aircraft/g-medn/[/quote]

Indeed G-EUXF was positioned to collect the stranded passengers. MEDN will presumably remain there while BA and authorities complete their investigations, also it would take some time to reinstate the chutes etc.

1 user thanked author for this post.

CathayLoyalist2

[IanFromHKG]

Fascinating story and discussion, and thanks (again!) to rferguson for giving the inside view.

The video did not seem to me to show people in respiratory distress. It does appear something went badly wrong, and I must confess that if I had been in an exit row (as I usually would be on an intra-Europe flight if not in CE!) I think I would have been sorely tempted to open the emergency exit and get the h**l out (after bundling my family out first, of course)…

The young boy in the video did mention people dealing with bags. I have said it here before, and no doubt I will say it again – ANYONE who opens a locker to get hand luggage out in an attempt to remove it from the aircraft in an emergency should be prosecuted. If the law does not provide for this, the law should be changed and such an offence should be introduced.

Even under the current law, if such behaviour leads to the death of another passenger I believe it is possible to, and that it should be standard policy to prosecute pax in order to, convict them of manslaughter or, in egregious cases, murder. Statements to this effect should form part of the safety briefing – not just “do not remove belongings from the overhead locker”, but “if you remove belongings from the overhead locker during an emergency you face prosecution with penalties up to, and including, life imprisonment”.

In an ideal world, those lockers would be automatically locked off in an emergency, but I suspect that would just lead to a vast number of stupid people hammering on lockers and blocking the aisles even more effectively than if the selfish ****s had managed to get their bags out (sigh).

[On a separate note, the Captcha system on this site has become extremely annoying, I have just had to click eighteen times (due to recurring images) to get this message “approved” – can’t we have a “trusted contributor” system to bypass this?]

[canucklad]

[quote quote=953004]I have said it here before, and no doubt I will say it again – ANYONE who opens a locker to get hand luggage out in an attempt to remove it from the aircraft in an emergency should be prosecuted. If the law does not provide for this, the law should be changed and such an offence should be introduced.[/quote]

Agreed, and in this incident it seems there was plenty of time for passengers to realise the likelihood of an evacuation and prepare before touchdown,
I and others have mentioned on the forum many times before the following …..

On my body, in my pockets on both take-off and landing is my wallet , phone and passport just in case. As well as keeping my shoes on.

1 user thanked author for this post.

Jacob

[frequentflyer1985]

Although 26 seconds this clip seems rather tame for a smoke filled cabin. I can only imagine the amount of smoke inhalation each passenger would have to suffer when trying to leave the aircraft. I get teary eyes just lighting the bonfire in winter.

[Author]

Posts