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crashdive123
01-15-2009, 05:29 PM
I'm watching live coverage of a US Airways plane crash in the Hudson River. Apparently one or both engines exploded shortly after take off from a bird strike. Pictures of people in business suits from a passenger ferry jumping onto the wing of the plane to help people to safety. Looks like everybody made it out. In an area that gets a pretty bad rap, it's nice to see that passerbys without hesitation jumped to help strangers.

You just never know when you are going to be placed in a survival situation.

crashdive123
01-15-2009, 05:30 PM
There are some news stories up on the net about it. Here's one. http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D95NQM883&show_article=1

Pal334
01-15-2009, 05:56 PM
It is an amazing survival story. Pilot apparently did an excellent job under the circumstances. Then crew and passengers made an orderly exit. And contrary to the common perception, passerbys did react quickly and heroicaly

Riverrat
01-15-2009, 05:56 PM
Just watching it on CNN, nice to hear all got out and like you say, strangers jumped right in to help....good to hear!

RunsWithDeer
01-15-2009, 06:15 PM
That pilot made an amazing landing. Had to be a perfect belly landing, if a wing caught first it would had cart wheeled. Good job on the part of the responders too.

Runs With Beer
01-15-2009, 07:11 PM
Yea I saw that today, Somebody was watching out for those people,I dont think I would fly a kite after that!

Ole WV Coot
01-15-2009, 07:15 PM
The pilot did a great job and the people did the unexpected. They stayed calm and helped each other, something new and maybe we have a spark of hope in mankind after all.

SARKY
01-15-2009, 10:35 PM
First, I don't know why NewYorkers get such a bad rap. NewYorkers are a gruff bunch but would certainly give you the shirt off their back if you really needed it, unlike Californians who would simply point and laugh.
The pilot was an old F-4 Phantom pilot. The joke about the F-4 is.. if you put enough thrust behind it, you can even make a stone fly. So dead sticking a plane that has a glide ratio better than a stone had to have a breeze for him.

dolfan87
01-15-2009, 10:43 PM
First, I don't know why NewYorkers get such a bad rap. NewYorkers are a gruff bunch but would certainly give you the shirt off their back if you really needed it, unlike Californians who would simply point and laugh.
The pilot was an old F-4 Phantom pilot. The joke about the F-4 is.. if you put enough thrust behind it, you can even make a stone fly. So dead sticking a plane that has a glide ratio better than a stone had to have a breeze for him.

I think the folks from New York are comparable to a family full of brothers. They may give each other a lot of crap, but when push comes to shove they take care of their own.

rebel
01-15-2009, 11:41 PM
Pilots (plural). It took more than one and don't forget the cabin crew. I've seen a simple evac fall apart from terror.

Thank God it was daylight. With the temps, you might be looking at 30% - 50% casualty rate if it was dark. Thats if, a correct ditching could have taken place in the dark.

So, pack a light and, know how many rows you are from the nearest exit.

I would like to add, as in this case, the nearest exit may not be usable. The cabin crew acted correctly in not using the aft exits because they were underwater. Had those been opened the aircraft would have rapidly filled with water .

Pict
01-16-2009, 11:05 AM
Often you hear "Do not inflate your vest until outside the plane". I asked a flight attendant to explain that to me once. She said that they don't explain it to not cause panic but if you inflate it inside the plane and the plane starts to fill with water that the rising water will trap you in the plane and prevent you from going under to get out the door. You only want to be float outside, not inside. Made sense to me. Mac

crashdive123
01-16-2009, 03:38 PM
Often you hear "Do not inflate your vest until outside the plane". I asked a flight attendant to explain that to me once. She said that they don't explain it to not cause panic but if you inflate it inside the plane and the plane starts to fill with water that the rising water will trap you in the plane and prevent you from going under to get out the door. You only want to be float outside, not inside. Made sense to me. Mac

Makes a great deal of sense. Going through submarine escape training we had to duck through a hatch to start our assent after inflating our floataion device. Not the easiest manuever, but it beats the option.

Blood Groove
01-16-2009, 10:56 PM
Man I wish that there was som film of that plane landing on water. That seems pretty amazing to me that a jet can land on water and float for a while. Those pilots must have been amazing flyers, to glide a multi ton plane onto water! There's another situation where panic would have lead to disaster.

endurance
01-17-2009, 12:01 AM
I was just reading that one of the reason it floated for so long was because it was full of fuel, which is lighter than water.

As for the vests, it also makes sense that if you have 150 people on a plane and make them twice the diameter upon inflation, things just aren't going to go as quickly.

Kudos to the whole crew and for that matter, the passengers for keeping cool heads, too. A few folks in a panic could have really thrown a wrench in the works. It seems like something must be working with the changes in crew training because the Christmas-time crash in Denver went incredibly smooth, too.

primeelite
01-17-2009, 12:58 AM
Yeah the plane wasn't as heavy either because both engines fell off the plane on impact with the water. The pilots did a heck of a job landing that thing and the main pilot also did what he was supposed to and I guess they said he walked the plane as he was up to his neck in frigid water to make sure every person got off his plane safely. Was a great story that could have been a very tragic one. It does let us also see that at any moment you could be put into a situation in which you must survive.

endurance
01-17-2009, 02:26 PM
Video of the ditching from CNN here (clicky) (http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/01/17/usair.splash.video/index.html?eref=rss_topstories). Wow!

crashdive123
01-17-2009, 03:04 PM
I heard an aeronautical engineer that was familiar with this aircraft describe the frangible struts that were used to mount the engines. They are designed to break if enough force is applied, thereby dropping the engines. He said this feature is so that the wings don’t get torn off. There was also something about this aircraft being equipped with a feature (don’t recall the name of it) that basically allows the pilot to instantaneously shut any hull penetration, allowing the aircraft to stay afloat longer.

endurance
01-17-2009, 04:51 PM
I was wondering if something like this was in the newer planes. After the Denver incident I was scratching my head as to why the left engine dropped off after hitting the grass. I'd assumed it was a cause, but no one from the NTSB even mentioned it as a possibility. Given that the side that lost its engine was the side they escaped from while the other side started on fire (from the engine that was still attached), it appears that it saved lives in that case, too.

I'm personally drawn to aviation accident investigations. My father was killed in '71 on a commercial DC-9 when an F-4 Phantom hit it in mid-air over the San Gabriels. Since then, I try to understand every crash, at least from a layman's perspective. I find the new life-saving features fascinating and the stories of both idiocy (Tenerife (http://www.airdisaster.com/special/special-pa1736.shtml)) and heroics (Sioux City (http://www.airdisaster.com/eyewitness/ua232.shtml)) amazing.

rebel
01-17-2009, 06:08 PM
Engines are designed to come off in the event of an imbalance. An imbalance is caused when blades are thrown from the fan or compressor sections of jet engines. This design is not new to aviation. It prevents the engine from causing structural damage to other parts of the aircraft. Wing, if the engine is attached to the wing. Tail, if the engine is attached to the tail, like the DC-9.

On the Airbus there is a ditching pushbutton switch that when pushed it closes certain valves. The outflow valve, pressure relief valves, and others. All pressurized aircraft can close outflow valves. Some are closed electrically like the airbus and some are manually closed. This feature is also used in case you loose cabin pressure at altitude in the event of pressure control problems. The pressure control problems would be a controller malfunction or an air conditioner malfunction.

As for the Captain walking the isle. Thats his duty in the event of a evacuation / ditching. Just as it's the First Officer's (co-pilot) duty to leave from the nearest exit and assist with passenger evacuation from the outside. That is, get the passengers away from the plane, together in a group (preferably 50 yards in front of the nose if on the ground). That way, they will be in less danger of being hit by the crash/fire/rescue vehicles.

For life jackets. I know the crew and infants have jackets. I think the Bus uses seat cushions for the passengers. So, nothing to inflate.

crashdive123
01-17-2009, 06:11 PM
The live pictures showed passengers being taken away still wearing their inflatable life vests. Don't know if they all had them or not.

rebel
01-17-2009, 06:22 PM
The live pictures showed passengers being taken away still wearing their inflatable life vests. Don't know if they all had them or not.

Well, they do then. Some aircraft do and some use the seat cushion.