Mainsail
Good Day All
Firstly I am not a professional pilot nor am I a professional pilot wanabee.
My field of expertise is the marine industry and one of the jobs I do in my professional capacity is the pre-inspection of hazardous cargo before shipment.
I accept that ships and aircraft are not the same, but the systems for dealing with hazardous cargo are similar.
IMHO The biggest problem with hazardous cargo is the stowage and packing of the cargo, I kid you not, I have seen cartons of cigarette lighters put in shipping containers with a 2000kg crate of machinery placed on top!!!!
The paperwork and correct declerations are vitally important, but don't get to hung up about it,
Correct paperwork and bad packing is much more dangerous than bad paperwork and good packing.
What do you do, both industries need robust check systems and random inspections, but as has been said before some problem cargo will always get through.
A lot has been said about a third crew member who can fight a fire whilst the two pilots fly the aircraft. Correct me if I am wrong but I assume that most cargo loaded on aircraft are unit loads (pallets or containers)
1. It would be very difficult to access a fire inside pallets or containers
2. The working conditions would be almost impossible with the heat and smoke
3. I know that in a burning aircraft health and safety rules may go out of the window, but I do not think that any airline or shipping line would allow one person to go into a burning cargo hold. You would need a fire fighting team of two or three,
for one person trying to work in that enviroment it would be tantamount to suicide.
Again IMHO the only answer is a very good fire suppression system. Ships have lots of space for firefighting kit, and minimum manning levels to ensure that you have the capacity to fight fire, you also have usually, more time before the situation gets critical, and ultimatly you have the option of abandoning the vessel.
Nobody knows if hazardous cargo played a part in the loss of this aircraft and crew but it appears that both industries have the same problems with hazardous cargo.
Please forgive a non pilot for intruding into your forum but I thought that you might like to hear opinions from an industry with similar problems.