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Old 6th January 2008 | 02:09
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SIDSTAR
 
Joined: Jun 2005
Posts: 174
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From: Citizen of the World
It doesn't matter which aircraft type you fly, the basic process is the same. If the pilots don't survive nobody will, so you must first protect yourself (remember the Helios accident?)

You make sure you've got Oxygen masks on and establish crew comms. With O2 flowing you can be reasonably sure that your decision-making capability is normal.

The remainder of the process is easy

- get the aircraft going down,
-establish it's doing what you want it to do (FMA)
- then refine the speed, altitude and heading targets depending on the terrain, whether you have structural damage and ATC instruction.

When you get below MSA/10000 ft consider limiting your V/S to below 500fpm as everyone including yourself will probably have very sore ears or worse.

Cabin crew should sit down in the nearest available (pax) seat and grab the first available mask until the emergency part of the descent is complete. They should then be released to carry out checks on the pax and a/c and report the cabin situation to the commander. Their emergency drills would normally cover this.
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