Why is it that when an incident like this occurs it's totally beyond the British press to report it correctly...is a de-pressurisation followed by an emergency descent and landing not exciting enough for them?
Why isn't the safety briefing changed? ``In the event of a loss of cabin pressure, masks will drop from the ceiling. Pull towards you and place the elastic around your head. Fit yours first before helping other people. The plastic bag will not inflate. The plane will then descend to an altitude at which you can breath normally.''
I fly as a passenger regularly, and the closest I've come to ``an event'' was when I was inbound to LHR T4 when the IRA mortars went in. I know, as a hopefully educated passenger, that a fairly rapid descent is a checklist item following depressurisation. Most people don't know that, and they assume that the loss of inflow and/or sudden outflow, plus the masks, has caused the plane to dive uncontrollably, hence all the general purpose hysteria amongst passengers and media.
How hard would the extra sentence in the briefing be? Job done, and the cabin crew will have fewer hysterics to deal with.