Evacuation thoughts
The Coast Guard video offers a truly unique document of an aircraft evacuation "in earnest".
Let me first say the following armchair observations from the video should in no way bear on the crew and passengers, who suddenly found themselves in probably the scariest situation of their lives.
But I'm struck by the fact that so many passengers went out on the wings, when both overwing slides/rafts were clearly deployed. Standing on the wings the risk of falling into the water is probably much higher than in the raft. Had there been larger waves, or darkness, the risk would have been even higher.
The passenger safety sheet probably includes an instruction to turn aft towards the slide after exiting. But this did not seem to work for everyone in this event. I also seem to recall that the A320 wing has a nicely marked anti-slip service walkway painted on its top surface all the way out to the wing tip. This might have seemed the obvious choice to go for some passengers.
Should there therefore be a big red lighted blinking sign ten feet out on the wing which pops up in an evacuation, saying: "-> -> TURN AFT TO THE EVACUATION SLIDE -> ->" ?
Let's see if NTSB will address this point. I have a feeling next ditching may not happen in similar benign conditions, therefore this suggestion.