I honestly try not to post because I'm not a professional, but I have to say this:
if you look above you will see may references to stupid, moronic, idiotic, passengers. I won't bother to list them all but many insults have been used.
But also you will see many references to the Helios pilots who, despite being trained failed to take the right action in an emergency situation.
I hope no one here would describe them in the way that passengers, and specifically Pen Hadow has been.
Accidents happen often when small things add up.
My point is this: if you dismiss passengers who fail to comply with the safety briefing in an emergency as 'morons' you are guilty of ignoring and oversimplifying a genuinely important issue.
The issue is that we, SLF, are not fully prepared for emergency situations, and never will be until we all go on a 6 week course before each flight.
If I'm ever unfortunate enough to experience an emergency, my chances of survival will be higher than, for instance my wife's. Because I have lots of background information about aviation - I find it interesting. She doesn't know how many engines there are on the plane she is in.
A fair number of people above would take the view that she is an idiot, but once again that doesn't help anyone.
Do air-accident investigators ever write "the crew were idiots, they had been trained so they should have done everything right. We recommend keeping all SOP's and training exactly the same."?
I will shut up now. I have huge admiration for the industry and it's exemplary safety standards, but since this is open to us SLF (?) you have to put up with us.