Fire & clothing

[Dude~]

Short of wearring a nomex flight suit, of which I have one, but never wear because its ridiculous, what are the 'least' dangerous clothes one coulf wear. I've never understood the difference between acrylics and nylons and wool in terms of burning/melting.

Can any one shed any light? I know jeans are useless because I once threw a pair on a bonfire and they went up a treat!

Cheers.

[FNG]

My friend in the AAC (whom I very much hope to be safe somewhere in Iraq) gave me a very cool black nomex flying suit but I can only wear it when open cockpit flying as otherwise it's too hot and looks silly. Jeans are less useless than nylon or polyester. Natural fibres will of course burn but don't melt into your skin. A lot of people wear fleeces but I've always thought them to be a bit risky from the fire point of view. Plastic trainers possibly ditto. A good excuse to wear posy leather flying jackets, but not, I hasten to add, ones with badges or wings on (these, naturally, catch fire the most quickly). As for those icky polycotton shirts with epaulettes on favoured by, ahem, certain flying schools, yecchhh.

[Thrifty van Rental]

Good question, and I think FNG hits the nail on the head.

Long cotton trousers, cotton shirts, wool jumpers. Keep to the natural fibres, and cover as much skin as the weather and cabin temperature will permit.

Epaulettes! Pah! I get fed up of them at work, without wearing them when I am playing :D

[Monocock]

I always request that my female passengers wear something cotton, light and airy.

Skirts must always be WELL above the knee too to avoid them getting caught up in the controls......



:E :}


On a serious note, I have never really paid enough attention to this subject but in the event of a fire on landing I suppose it could suddenly become a rather important issue.

I'm surprised noone has designed some kind of lightweight cotton-like fire proof material for people such as ourselves to wear in the form of shirts etc.

[QNH 1013]

I don't consider a flight suit "ridiculous" when flying. The reason they are so popular are they are extremely practical, keep your clothes clean, the zip pockets mean you still have your car keys on you to drive home from the airfield, and they give some protection in the event of fire. One of the aircraft I fly has the AVGAS tank between my knees.
I would much rather get my flight suit dirty when pre-flighting than ruin the clothes underneath.
However,
1. I don't have any badges on my suit, (or my car or anywhere else!)
2. I wear ordinary clothes when flying something civilised, like a Mooney

I think I paid less than fifteen pounds for my flight suit. I think it was money well spent.

[RomeoTangoFoxtrotMike]

The basic advice to balloonists, and their crews, who get a bit closer to very big naked flames than most other pilots :ooh:, is to stick to natural fabrics as much as possible. As has been said already, nylon, and other man-made fabric, don't just burn, they melt onto your skin, which is seriously bad news :ouch:

Wear nomex, or at least leather gloves, so that you stand some chance of reaching towards the fuel shutoff in the event of a fire, and keep your arms and legs covered, again for protection in the event of a fuel leak -- propane squirts all over the place (no shorts and tee-shirts, even on a hot summer's day :ugh: ) Possibly a bit excessive for fixed-wing, but the principles will apply...

[Edited to add... ] many balloonists wear flight suits for much the same reasons...

[Dude~]

Cheers for the replies,

A similar debate as 'will I wear my leathers today on my bike, even though its 25C?'


My flight suit only cost £20 from an army surplus shop, but although it is fire proof treated, I have been wared that it is far from heat resistant, and that for heat resistance I should wear thermals underneath. Less than ideal. Mind you, bet it doesn' look as silly as 3 people donning wetsuits at Popham for a cross cahnel flgiht in winter, then peeling them off at Le touquet such as I did a couple of years ago!

I would like to think that it woulmd give valuable seconds though and wouldnt catch fire itself.

Just read an horrific AAIB report of a plane landing safely, then swerving off the runway and bursting into flames. Pilot got 75%burns, managed to crawl out, pull his wife out, then died, horrible.

[MLS-12D]

Interesting posts.

I think that Dude draws a good analogy re wearing leathers whilst motorcycling. I haven't ridden a motorbike in many years, but always wore a minimum of helmet, gloves, boots and jeans, regardless of the weather.

I don't think that it is ridiculous to wear a flight suit in a light aircraft. Admittedly I rarely do this myself, but there have been times when I have, especially in a single seat airplane or one with tandem seating. It strikes me as less necessary when flying a spam can, in which one has a passenger to hand you things, or at least an empty right seat to keep your stuff on (how many pencils have I lost! :rolleyes: ).

I have a Nomex jacket that I inherited from the Queen, and I'm happy to wear it when the temperature is appropriate. But although I have matching black trousers, I never wear them (to say nothing of the shiny boots!).

[englishal]

You could of course wear an ex-soviet space suit and helmet, available at all good online surplus stores, then you'd be totally protected from fire.


I imagine a good leather flying jacket would offer some protection.

EA:D

[AerBabe]

MLS-12D - How do you fit your headset over the bearskin hat? :confused:

I don't own a growbag yet, but I always try and wear natural fibres. Even at primary school we were given a very vivid demonstration of the burning properties of various fabrics. I seem to remember a bin-sized burned patch in the carpet afterwards. :D

Growbag is being, erm, acquired now as I'm getting away from my dear old C152 and playing around with much more dirty, oily, lovely aircraft. When I finally get to play with Tigers, Stampes, Turbys and so on I'll be the one with the sheepskin flying jacket too. ;) What ho chaps! Can't wait. :)

[KevinHadley]

Some very interesting views – I cannot help but agree with the apparel for women!

I also agree with the flying suit arguments. As a tail dragging performance bi-plane flyer, I feel I am at most risk in two areas.

Tearing off the wings during aeros – for which a chute is my backstop. An accident on landing which renders me unconscious and an ensuing fire. Therefore helmet and fire resistant flight suit and are my choice of apparel.

However, on those rare hot summer days, t-shirt and shorts is appealing!

[MLS-12D]

I saw a Stearman go over on its back last Friday at Sun 'n' Fun; don't know if the pilot was hurt, but a helmet could not have done him any harm. There wasn't any fire, thank goodness.

[Genghis the Engineer]

I'm another who wears a nomex flying suit whatever I'm flying; open cockpit I add an Irvin jacket over the top. If you don't like the appearance of it, take it off as soon as you get out of the aircraft and leave it on the seat.

Like others, I forgot to give my suits back to HMQ when I left, but for those who prefer non-Green there are plenty of sources of new nomex or cotton flying suits for about £30-£40. Badges are of-course optional, I make no apology for having badges on mine, but that's just because I spent enough years wearing a green growbag with badges on and it seems right to me.

For the same reasons, I almost invariably fly in a cotton polo neck, and reasonably substantial shoes or boots. And all pockets zipped, velcroed, or empty - I can live without a FOD induced control restriction.

And of-course, leather gloves under most conditions, and a helmet for aeros or open cockpit flying. Over water an emersion suit - or for that matter for a long open cockpit flight in winter, they keep the cold air out a treat.

A couple of further thoughts. Leather flying helmets look great and feel wonderful in an open cockpit, but I really don't believe that they provide much in the way of crash protection. A thin summer flying suit over shorts is no hotter than jeans and a t-shirt, so I really don't accept the argument that it's too hot to wear one. I'd certainly much rather have my arms covered, just in case my next prang is more exciting than the last.

It may of-course be possible that I'm either paranoid, or an aviation fashion victim, or both. But, frankly, I don't care.

I do draw the lines at two things. No gold bars, ever. And I've so far avoided the orange flying suits beloved of the flight test departments at BAe and Westlands.

G

[Windy Militant]

Having spent time as a steel erector/welder I can vouch for the benifits of wearing natural fibres next to the skin.
If you do buy overalls or flight suits in cotton go for Sanforised or Proban-treated ones they cost a bit more but stay fire proof longer. All materials become more prone to catching light with age as the material wears especially if you have frayed edges, as one of my apprentices found out. So save the frayed jeans for going uptown topranking!
Leather flying jackets are fine if they are sheepskin but beware many replicas have acrylic fleece which flares and melts
Bomber jackets also often have synthetic linings which again melt and stick to your skin. So don't scrimp pay that bit extra for the silk lining. ;)

[CS-DNA]

I have just started my microlight flight training (ultralight
as it is called here in Portugal).
I'm flying on a Quicksilver wich has an overhead fuel tank
and a completely open cockpit.

I have asked arround for prices on nomex flight suits but
there are not that many local sources and the prices I
have been quoted are on the range of 150 to 200 EUR
(102 to 137 GBP).

So, I was wondering if there are any EU on-line stores
dealing with flight suits that any of you would recomend.

Thanks.
DNA

[Genghis the Engineer]

Try http://www.silvermans.co.uk/ enter the shop and search on "Flying Suit", should a selection starting around GBP40.

G