Originally Posted by
FlightDetent
No. Our job is to give a signal to those who may wish to follow the advice.
After 28,000 hours flying, and over 40 years in accident investigation, I remain stunned by the disregard in general that the travelling public have for their own safety. The attention asked for by the regulator and the crew, both flight and cabin crew is for their safety, yet it is routinely more important to SMS some other party than to take 120 seconds to protect your own life. Having evacuated aircraft quite routinely in my life before the airlines, I still take the time to review emergency procedures prior to any flight, as a captain or as a passenger. I do take note of any others that are also taking some interest, as they are the ones that I will rely on to evacuate a smoke filled wreck. The others, that are SMS'ing, I assure you, I for one will not risk my life to defend yours, you have the right to disregard your life; you have no right to ask anyone else to show more care than you do for your skin.
From bitter experience, watching your own skin burn is not something you want to ever experience. Anyone standing between me and an exit with a suitcase is not going to be politely asked to do anything, such actions are a direct threat to the survival of everyone else irrespective of the mental dysfunction that may exist due to shock and lack of preparedness.
Certification calls for demonstrated evacuation in 90 seconds, using half of the available doors, and with incapacitation. It gets done, it is often not pretty, but it is passed. The problem is, as Airtours at Manchester showed, that the kinetic world we live in works by its own rules, and sometimes, that temporal luxury doesn't exist on the day. Once the tin is being wadded up, it is not a good time to start wondering where the exists may be.