Part III: Believe us, we have the ability to send you safely to your destination!
But willpower can't last too long. People have physiological limits. What Liu Chuanjian needs to do right now is to low the flight level to get oxygen and higher temperature as soon as possible, otherwise the crew will be gradually frozen or asphyxiated, and the whole plane and 119 passengers will fall into the abyss.
Anchor: But do you know the situation below your feet?
Liu Chuanjian: The mountains, I know exactly all the highlands, I cannot go down further. I am very clear about it.
Anchor: How low is your bottom line?
Liu Chuanjian: My bottom line was…what I was thinking…When the second captain did not come in, I thought FL230. I can go down any more.
Anchor: or you could hit the mountains.
Liu Chuanjian: Yes, it's dangerous. May hit the mountains if lower than safety height.
Narratage: But at that time, the plane had already flown to the southeast edge of the Qinghai Tibet Plateau. Because of the densely distributed mountains in this area, most of the mountain height was up to the 5000-6000 meters. The plane could not fly on the mountains, at least keep the minimums of 600 meters safety margin. At the special region, even the decompression, the minimum safety height must be kept at about 7,300 meters, or FL230.
Anchor: To 7,300 meters?
Liu Chuanjian: Yes, FL230 in this mountain region. I can't go down any more. I must fly out of the region first before I go down further.
Anchor: But is it impossible for you to keep on that altitude of 7,300 meter for further operation in your situation of the decompression?
Liu Chuanjian: Impossible. The time to fly out the mountains region is too long to me. The oxygen of passengers is limited, the temperature is very low, and the human body is very uncomfortable.
Narratage: A West China unique route in world means that the aircraft cannot drop down immediately to the safe altitude. The pilot must bite the teeth and continue to fly at the height of over 7,000 meters until it arrives to the basin area and then make the second descent.
Anchor: at this time, what you need to do is to stabilize the aircraft while make sure the descent. How about this?
Liu Chuanjian: Very strong impact force, filling in, What a sense of oppression. Why we decelerate first? In order to alleviate the suffocation caused by shock rather than asphyxia. This is the place where the theory is different from the practice. What I worrying first is the oppression that may result the immediately injury to our whole body, and the damage to the plane. I just worrying the wind may break more and tear off bigger more cracks. The current high speed is too intense.
Anchor: Do you mean wind blowing directly from windshield?
Liu Chuanjian: Going on the back.
Anchor: The cabin?
Liu Chuanjian: Yes, if the speed is too big, it will make bad later
Anchor: Did you have time enough to think of these? The cabin safety?
Liu Chuanjian: Yes, the main concern in my mind. I was thinking about the cabin injury. I do not want the wind damage out cockpit and then following the cabin persons. I thought about slowing down. I mentioned early, I was very entangled at a bigger or smaller descent rate. It hurt my heart deeply. The entanglement.
Anchor: Why iso entangled to you?
Liu Chuanjian: bigger the descent rate, faster to go down but the safety of my FO may not be guaranteed.
Anchor: How can you balance this contradiction and make the final decision?
Liu Chuanjian: Yes, so I would say that I choose this speed in a relatively acceptable state of what I think is appropriate, and the relative decent rate.
Anchor: Is this a valuation made by your experiences?
Liu Chuanjian: No.
Anchor: What is that on?
Liu Chuanjian: It was a situation by that time. People felt a little better, feeling to do what you should do.
Narratage: And in the cabin, it was a different scene. The sudden violent jitter and rapid fall of the passengers made passengers extremely confused, crying and screaming. The chief purser with her four colleagues tried their best to soothe the passengers. A dining car lost control and injured a stewardess's waist.
Anchor: How can you comfort passengers at this time?
Bi Nan: The attendants are distributed in the different rows of the cabin at that time. They tell the passengers to believe us, because we are trained professionally and believe that we have the ability to send you safely to the destination.
Anchor: But you don't know what happened in the cockpit.
Bi Nan: I don't know. I don't know.
Anchor: You didn't go to the cockpit to see it.
Bi Nan: There's a connection, but there's no contact.
Anchor: How to contact?
Bi Nan: make a call.
Anchor: No reply?
Bi Nan: No reply.
Anchor: If the emergency is like this, the captain will not reply, will you be more worried inside?
Bi Nan: It's really sure, because I don't know what the instructions and arrangements I do next, maybe I'll think a lot more about it at this time.
Anchor: What do you think?
Bi Nan: Thinking about all kinds of schemes, all kinds of scenarios, all kinds of results.