Cardiff City Footballer Feared Missing after aircraft disappeared near Channel Island
The most tragic cases of CO poisoniung usually come from campers in the UK. When camping a popular dining solution is to just fire up a disposable barbeque - it's easy, gives a nice charcoaled flavour and involves minimal washing up. But on a typical British camping holiday there is a very high probability that it will be either:
1. Hissing down with rain
2. Blowing a gale
3. Hissing down with horizontal rain
Sadly some decide to use the babeque anyway. To do this they might tip up the sides of their awning/dining-shelter or even just bring the whole thing inside the tent - I've even heard people suggest that this allows the baberque to warm up the tent a bit. The unfortunate fact is that the charcoal burns underneath a layer of ash (the white bit) which resticts the flow of oxygen such that the almost pure carbon produces lots of carbon monoxide (colourless, odourless and deadly). Even in a drafty dining shelter the CO concentration can reach lethal levels very quickly - if the used disposable barbeque is left to burn out inside a tent you will have created a remarkably cost-effective gas chamber for ad hoc executions. So if nothing else, I would ask readers to take away the thought that barbeques are only ever outdoor things - only use in very well ventilated areas no matter hoiw inconvenient that wind may be!
PDR
1. Hissing down with rain
2. Blowing a gale
3. Hissing down with horizontal rain
Sadly some decide to use the babeque anyway. To do this they might tip up the sides of their awning/dining-shelter or even just bring the whole thing inside the tent - I've even heard people suggest that this allows the baberque to warm up the tent a bit. The unfortunate fact is that the charcoal burns underneath a layer of ash (the white bit) which resticts the flow of oxygen such that the almost pure carbon produces lots of carbon monoxide (colourless, odourless and deadly). Even in a drafty dining shelter the CO concentration can reach lethal levels very quickly - if the used disposable barbeque is left to burn out inside a tent you will have created a remarkably cost-effective gas chamber for ad hoc executions. So if nothing else, I would ask readers to take away the thought that barbeques are only ever outdoor things - only use in very well ventilated areas no matter hoiw inconvenient that wind may be!
PDR
Carbon monoxide poisoning is an extremely rare cause of aircraft fatalities in the UK.
This aircraft had already flown for over an hour so what could have gone wrong?
This aircraft had already flown for over an hour so what could have gone wrong?
Any number of things - the two that immediately leap to mind being either a piece of corrosion in a heat-exchanger finally burning through to give a hole, or simply that the late night return flight was through cooler air so the cabin heather was turned up to a higher level (increating the amount of CO being pushed into the cabin). It's equally possible that the CO leak was present from the moment the engine started, but it too half an hour to build up to a fatal concentration.
The whole "it worked yesteday so it is strange that it broke today" argumnent that we hear so often is utterly inappropriate for complex systems - it assumes dice have a memory, which they don't (I checked).
PDR
The whole "it worked yesteday so it is strange that it broke today" argumnent that we hear so often is utterly inappropriate for complex systems - it assumes dice have a memory, which they don't (I checked).
PDR
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Given that the pilot responded to ATC calls immediately prior to the crash, the claimed potentially fatal levels of carbon monoxide found in the blood may not be quite what they appear from a simple reading of the analytical report. The pilot being considerably less fit and much older than the passenger should have succumbed much more readily to the effects of carbon monoxide poisoning. Biological processes are capable of producing high levels of alcohol and other substances in the blood after death.
There can be absolutely no doubt that carbon monoxide poisoning may have been a contributory factor in this incident, but the primary factors are still weather, an unqualified pilot, and an aged aircraft that had apparently not been maintained to the highest standards. Everything was being done on the cheap in order to save money. There's your cause!
There can be absolutely no doubt that carbon monoxide poisoning may have been a contributory factor in this incident, but the primary factors are still weather, an unqualified pilot, and an aged aircraft that had apparently not been maintained to the highest standards. Everything was being done on the cheap in order to save money. There's your cause!
There is evidence that sedentary smokers are less prone to hypoxia than fit non smokers.
I have no idea if that maps to CO poisoning, but I suppose it's at least hypothetically possible.
G
I have no idea if that maps to CO poisoning, but I suppose it's at least hypothetically possible.
G
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The interesting one in this incident is yet again the one that relates to human factors. By that is meant what was it that placed this particular pilot and his passenger in that aircraft for that fateful flight.
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M.O.T
Maintenance has started to become an issue for obvious reasons.
My understanding is that from what Mr Penney has stated is that the aircraft was due an MOT at the end of the year, so a good guess is December.
So other flights in the said aircraft could have taken place before the fatal night.
i suppose my thoughts are: could this
CO poisoning produces permanent damage to red blood cells - it's a signature which remains and can be identified even in a long-deceased body and it gives fairly precise values of the scale. CO poisoning is not just a matter of lack of oxygen (as happens with CO2) - it is actually a poisonous gas. CO "locks" the haemoglobin in the blood such that it can't take oxygen even when it's present. If you suffer CO poisoning beyond a certain level even getting you away from the CO and giving you 100% oxygen via a mask won't save you - you will die unless you are given a rapid and massive transfusion of red blood cells (which is rarely possible).
So the detection of CO poisoning in "a body that had been under seawater for so many days" is not in any way remarkable or strange.
PDR
So the detection of CO poisoning in "a body that had been under seawater for so many days" is not in any way remarkable or strange.
PDR
Avoid imitations
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My first post as I have had an interest in this from the start and sat and watched what people have been saying.
Maintenance has started to become an issue for obvious reasons.
My understanding is that from what Mr Penney has stated is that the aircraft was due an MOT at the end of the year, so a good guess is December.
So other flights in the said aircraft could have taken place before the fatal night.
i suppose my thoughts are: could this
Obviously, regular maintenance on an aircraft costs a lot of money.
This is one of the reasons why real professional operators get very upset by amateurs undercutting them on price and therefore on safety. See the posts placed here by SND, for example.
Cold you point me to some background on that? My understanding is that, as you say, CO binds very tightly to Hb blocking O2 attachment, but I wasn't aware of any detectable damage to the rbc's themselves. And even if that was the case, I would expect virtually every rbc to be lysed so long post mortem. I had assumed that CO would eventually dissociate from Hb after death because of all the changes that must completely screw-up the Hb molecule. i guess maybe some blood deep in the tissues would be preserved well enough for an analysis?
CO-Hb itself seems to be a remarkably robust and stable molecule which doesn't decay much in normal conditions, and barely decays at all when chilled, so a few days on the sea bed is unlikely to compromise the results significantly. There was a reason why I was aware of all this which I'm afraid I can't go into, but the subject of post-mortem determination of C) poisoning is a well published field because (I understand) CO-poisoning is the most common form of lethal poisoning in the western world. Most of the papers get very technical very quickly, but an easily digestable source would be this one:
https://acutecaretesting.org/en/arti...em-co-oximetry
You may be espcially interested in the section headed "STABILITY OF COHb WHEN MEASURED BY CO-OXIMETRY" (about 2/3ds of the way down) which provides the following:
"A number of studies [23, 27, 28] have addressed the issue of stability of COHb as measured by CO-oximetry in stored blood samples. They have confirmed that COHb is remarkably stable.
No change in CO-oximetrically determined COHb from baseline was noted in postmortem samples collected into heparin and stored for up to 3 years in a refrigerator [28].
Hampson [27] determined that there was no significant change from baseline in COHb for unrefrigerated samples mailed across the US and back again. And Kunsman et al[23] confirmed that stability of CO-oximetrically determined COHb was not dependant on the use of a particular anticoagulant/preservative combination."
HTH,
PDR
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I am not an expert, but also curious about the reversibility of COHb binding. Wikipedia gives some clues: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carboxyhemoglobin
COHb has a half-life in the blood of 4 to 6 hours.
Supplemental oxygen takes advantage of Le Chatelier's principle to quicken the decomposition of carboxyhemoglobin back to hemoglobin:
HbCO + O2 ⇌ Hb + CO + O2 ⇌ HbO2 + CO
HbCO + O2 ⇌ Hb + CO + O2 ⇌ HbO2 + CO
1. At body temperature in a living being, CO poisoning is slowly reversible through the circulation.
2. The absence of oxygen and blood circulation, and/or low temperatures would "freeze" the binding process.
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People have left key less car engines running, but modern cars have cats, so not much smell.
The few problems i have had with light aircraft gave me head aches which turned out to be faulty exhaust and a crank vent that wasn't blowing out board and a split in the scat hose to the windscreen de misters. All very smelly.
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I can assure readers that CO is a cockpit hazard at concentrations much less than are "noticeable" by smell. Detection requires an appropriate detector, Your nose will not provide adequate warning - mine didn't.
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I simply cant understand what part of the colourless odourless gas part of the Description of CO people on this forum have not got into their brains.
Each year I see in the press tragic events from CO poisoning from gas stoves, central heating boilers and other combustion sources , there are a great number of regulations in the industrial and domestic environments, this reflects the danger that the authorities see CO poses to the users of such equipment simply because of the subtle way CO incapacitates it’s victims.
Both the aircraft manufacturers and aviation authorities recognise the danger of CO and put in place regulation mitigate the risks .
Yet with all this evidence some above think they will smell the CO and be able to something about is, perhaps the only comfort we can take from this attitude is these people will simply not know what killed them.
Each year I see in the press tragic events from CO poisoning from gas stoves, central heating boilers and other combustion sources , there are a great number of regulations in the industrial and domestic environments, this reflects the danger that the authorities see CO poses to the users of such equipment simply because of the subtle way CO incapacitates it’s victims.
Both the aircraft manufacturers and aviation authorities recognise the danger of CO and put in place regulation mitigate the risks .
Yet with all this evidence some above think they will smell the CO and be able to something about is, perhaps the only comfort we can take from this attitude is these people will simply not know what killed them.
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I simply cant understand what part of the colourless odourless gas part of the Description of CO people on this forum have not got into their brains.
Each year I see in the press tragic events from CO poisoning from gas stoves, central heating boilers and other combustion sources , there are a great number of regulations in the industrial and domestic environments, this reflects the danger that the authorities see CO poses to the users of such equipment simply because of the subtle way CO incapacitates it’s victims.
Both the aircraft manufacturers and aviation authorities recognise the danger of CO and put in place regulation mitigate the risks .
Yet with all this evidence some above think they will smell the CO and be able to something about is, perhaps the only comfort we can take from this attitude is these people will simply not know what killed them.
Each year I see in the press tragic events from CO poisoning from gas stoves, central heating boilers and other combustion sources , there are a great number of regulations in the industrial and domestic environments, this reflects the danger that the authorities see CO poses to the users of such equipment simply because of the subtle way CO incapacitates it’s victims.
Both the aircraft manufacturers and aviation authorities recognise the danger of CO and put in place regulation mitigate the risks .
Yet with all this evidence some above think they will smell the CO and be able to something about is, perhaps the only comfort we can take from this attitude is these people will simply not know what killed them.
Here is an extract from it:"Safety challenges For the 20 per cent of respondents who believe gas safety has worsened, eight times out of ten they say it’s because customers are getting gas work done on the cheap. Illegal gas fitters – people who work on gas who are not Gas Safe registered – and under-skilled engineers were given as key reasons by those who thought gas safety had worsened. Illegal gas fitters are believed to be cheaper, so consumers need to be aware of the risks they are taking to save money. A few training bodies mentioned that some training is less thorough, although not all think this is the case, and others cited under-skilled gas engineers. "
The irony in this case is that the pilot was a heating engineer who one would have expected was well versed in the case of Gas Safety, but seems he may have succumbed to the effects of a faulty heater whilst conducting what appears to have been an illegal flight on the cheap one might say, rather than pay the going price charged by an organisation fully licensed and approved to do the job safely.
CO poisoning produces permanent damage to red blood cells - it's a signature which remains and can be identified even in a long-deceased body and it gives fairly precise values of the scale. CO poisoning is not just a matter of lack of oxygen (as happens with CO2) - it is actually a poisonous gas. CO "locks" the haemoglobin in the blood such that it can't take oxygen even when it's present. If you suffer CO poisoning beyond a certain level even getting you away from the CO and giving you 100% oxygen via a mask won't save you - you will die unless you are given a rapid and massive transfusion of red blood cells (which is rarely possible).
So the detection of CO poisoning in "a body that had been under seawater for so many days" is not in any way remarkable or strange.
PDR
So the detection of CO poisoning in "a body that had been under seawater for so many days" is not in any way remarkable or strange.
PDR
They are no less likely to be hypoxic on assay of blood gases but as they are used to permanent mild hypoxia (and of course low level carboxyhaemoglobinaemia) their nervous system tolerates it better.
However, I'm not aware of any research into the natural degradation of carboxyhaemoglobin over time and under high pressure in an anaerobic environment, so while the measurement can be made accurately I'd be uncomfortable with the statement that it was a precise representation of the level at impact.
PDR
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So has this aircraft been lifted from the sea yet?
And if not, why not.
Also i noticed the CO detector in one of our aircraft has the name SleepSafe on it.
Bit late if it changes whilst you are asleep.
The electronic one i use in my camper is what needs to be fitted to all aircraft with exhaust heaters.
They are fairly cheap.
But would it be heard through noise cancelling headphones?
Just ordered two with digital read out, less than £12.
And if not, why not.
Also i noticed the CO detector in one of our aircraft has the name SleepSafe on it.
Bit late if it changes whilst you are asleep.
The electronic one i use in my camper is what needs to be fitted to all aircraft with exhaust heaters.
They are fairly cheap.
But would it be heard through noise cancelling headphones?
Just ordered two with digital read out, less than £12.
Last edited by BigEndBob; 30th Aug 2019 at 21:48.