My 2ps worth...
The best part of this post is the number of know-alls who have posted "facts" that are easily shown as rubbish...
Anyway, we spend all our time preaching to the PAX to listen to the safety demo, and we complain when they don't. In that demo, we tell them how to open the door (we don't say wait for the cabin crew to do so), how to deploy the side (if it doesn't do it automatically) etc. etc. And that's before the special requirements for overwing exits not manned by Cabin Crew. So its hardly surprising that once in a while some actually do listen to that demo, and when they perceive a fire, they do what we have told them...
<<I've had and seen a few Hot-Starts and they are indeed nothing more than momentry flashes. Certainly not a reason for a passenger to initiate an uncommanded evac.>>
I'm glad you were there, and can categorically state exactly how THIS hot start looked. I have seen a few, varying from a small flash, to a number of seconds worth of 20-30 feet of flames (usually after a "wet start"). Not dangerous, but to a PAX probably looks so.
This is one of those incidents that is probably inevitable from time to time. It is worth investigating, to try and minimise a recurrence. However, lets not blow it out of all proportion....
<<Imagine if the crew had started to taxy just as the first pax hit the slide>>
Well - I hope they would stop when they got the door open indication!
<<Chutes on an overwing exit? My god I gotta read the AOM some more>>
Another "know all" !! B742? A320? Sounds from someone here B757 as well....
NoD