Originally Posted by MerrylParker
Dan Gryder is definitely opinionated. We will find out in the future if he was correct in whole or in part.
Sadly I don't think we ever will:
Gryder's assertion that the pilot was a fine upstanding union man with a spotless record has absolutely no bearing on his useful time of consciousness when experiencing a subtle decompression.
Captain Heffner may well have passed a class one medical yesterday but that does not reduce his chances of suffering a massive heart attack today. When I reached the age of forty it was mandatory to switch to a 6 monthly periodicity for UK class one medicals. I must have done two or three medicals like that. One day an RAF loadmaster aged in his late forties walked out of his medical and straight into a brief for a sortie. As he walked out to the aircraft 30 minutes later he dropped dead from a massive heart attack. It was at this point that the medical establishment reconsidered the validity of giving 6 monthly ECGs and the practice ceased. Now it is only mandatory for the over 60s.
We understand that there was no flight recorder on this aircraft and the dynamics of the crash simply left aluminium confetti. In the circumstances it seems very unlikely that any post-mortem evidence will be available to witness an explosive decompression. The Comet incidents mentioned above involved massive failure of the rear pressure bulkhead resulting in high speed loss of the empennage. That alone would have resulted in bodies being sucked clear of the aircraft and free-falling to earth around 120mph. Post mortem examination might have revealed at least some of what led to the death of the victims. A bizjet impacting at 29,500 fpm is quite another proposition. Therefore it seems unlikely that any evidence remains in this case that might witness the true cause of the crash.
There is a good reason that ATP pilots stop flying at the age of 65. It's nothing to do with the individual and all to do with balance of risk that comes with age.