Seven pages in, and this is what it boils down to.
A) It is really quite important to listen to the safety briefing.
Or:
B) You don't really have to bother.
You forgot one.
C) Why
don't we brief the over wing exit passengers on the lack of a slide from the 737 over wing exits? We cover the door operation etc but I'll be the first to admit, I've never thought to mention that there won't be a slide. And I've never heard it mentioned by anyone else either.
As crew, we fly on these aircraft day in, day out. They are old friends to us and we know all their little foibles, even down to the slightly different characteristics that can often be found between aircraft of the same type. We often forget that our passengers don't know these aircraft like we do and that what may seem obvious to us isn't always obvious to those that haven't had safety drills pounded into them year after year.
It's all very well saying, "read the safety card" but as many have pointed out, it's apparently not obvious that there are no slides from the wing on many, if not most. But even if it is, how many people scan the safety card and see what they expect to see, rather than what is actually there? After all, they're probably tired, distracted and would possibly rather not dwell for too long on what might go wrong.
I actually have to thank Jean. She has reminded me that when I came to the 737, having worked on the 757 and 767 for years, I was surprised by the lack of a slide on the overwing exits. Yet I'd positioned regularly on 73's. How had I, as crew, never noticed such a thing? Would I have realised in time, if an evacuation had been called? I can't honestly say that I would and I do read the cards. While that wouldn't have stopped me sliding off of the wing, it might have made me pause for a split second. Jean, who hasn't been through the training, would have been able to see the slides from the doors so should we really be surprised that she stood on the wing wondering where her slide was? All the arrows in the world aren't going to help if you are not seeing what you expected to see at the end of them.
A couple of extra sentences during the over wing briefing will change that. I will now be adding those sentences and will be briefing my crew to do the same. We can't help those that refuse to listen to the demo but we can at least improve the chances of the Jeans of this world. SLFandProud and Running_In have hit the nail on the head, in my opinion.
This may be a non event to some but as with many other incidents that we have learned from - FR Decompression and the bag not inflating comes to mind - one comment by one passenger has highlighted a seemingly small detail that has actually turned out to be pretty important.