hi all
I was on the flight and can help your questions:
1. We were already descending with crew strapped in when the smoke started to fill the cabin. I was in row 11 and there was one flight attendant on her own strapped in to the right facing row 10. When the smoke came in she got on the internal phone and told us she thought it was the A/C.
2. The thickness and speed of the loss of visibility were frightening. The “smoke” was not hot and it wasn’t like bonfire smoke. It smelt horrible enough for people to put their jumpers over their faces but we didn’t ever feel like we didn’t have oxygen. We were afraid that this would change and that the smoke would take over and we wouldn’t be able to breathe. The flight attendant was telling us to try to get our faces down low and we were shouting the message back to others. Because we didn’t have any announcements over the communication system with any explanation of what was going on people were afraid. The only info we had was from the flight attendant who was on the phone. She was visibly afraid but she was also on her own and trying to calm the guy facing her who was having a meltdown. The smoke was very thick but before we knew it we were on the ground. I don’t know what the smoke was but although it smelt horrible it didn’t leave our clothes or bags with a smell afterwards.
3. We landed and people jumped up and shouted “please open the doors”. The flight attendant near to me was trying to get her mask/suit out and on as quickly as possible. She did get it over her head but then for some reason threw it off. She couldn’t open the door straight away - after two or three minutes a light next to the door went on and a beep sounded and then she opened the door. My husband was by the opposite side emergency exit and he couldn’t open the door so he gave up. Once the slide inflated after the flight attendant opened her door we just instinctively jumped down onto it.
3. I was fourth out of the plane and the three people in front did not have their bags with them. It was the ones who piled our after who were carrying their luggage. People had time to grab their bags because the doors weren’t opened immediately and they were queuing to get off. By this time no one was choking, the doors were open and they just felt like it wasn’t an emergency ! I can clarify that I didn’t hear instructions from anyone telling people not to take their bags but I was off that plane like a shot !
4. I saw one or two fire engines and one fireman. I initially stood at the bottom along the slide to catch people but they flew past me so fast I couldn’t catch anyone ! The fireman came and took over !
5. We were directed straight to buses. And driven to the terminal. The cabin crew came down the slides after the last passengers. I spoke to them as they came off the slides. They were really shaken. I saw them come into the terminal nearly three hours later and they’d been out at the plane the whole time. When we were bussed back out to pick up our hand luggage hours later the pilot was till on the plane. The crew were very shaken and said that they had never gone through this in a real situation before and couldn’t believe that people Took bags down the slides. I asked why there wasn’t more instruction and they said that people are meant to follow what they’re told during the safety briefing.
6. The ground staff were ill equipped for the situation. We were brought into the terminal and had to explain why we didn’t have our passports. We all sat on an empty baggage carousel for three hours. The liaison lady came in from home and just kept saying that they were securing the plane so we could get our bags. We were brought boxes of water when we complained that we were hot and thirsty and deydrated. We should have been taken to an empty departure lounge with seats and been looked after properly really. When the flight attendants came through they were shocked to see us all there and they stopped to talk to me. One flight attendant called the pilot on his mobile and arranged for the turn around person to come into the terminal and help us. He arrived five minutes later and took us back to the plane 5 at a time to get our luggage. When we asked about the hold luggage they didn’t know how long it would be. Someone told us to go to customer services to leave our names but there was a mile long queue of people who were trying to get home given their flights were cancelled. My husband and I just left with our kids. We got our bags back by filing a missing luggage report. An exhausted courier arrived at 10pm the next night having delivered a lot of bags !
7. It’s taken two days to get a proper email from BA with a contact line for help over the trauma.
I hope that helps and maybe with this info someone can tell me what they think the smoke was