To land or to go around? [Archive]

flybywire

22nd Apr 2006, 16:31

Yesterday I was operating on a flight to TLS. The aircraft was a 737-500 with a configuration of 110. Every single seat was taken and, as the landing gear came out and we strapped in for landing, a guy sitting in 19E (opposite the only toilet at the rear) sneaked out and locked himself in the loo.

My colleague who was sitting next to me immediately got up and started knocking on the door. No response. I got up too and called the SCCM and informed him of the situation. He immediately contacted the captain and told her the cabin was no longer secured for landing. She requested we called in again as soon as the pax was strapped in or she would have to abort the landing.
I started knocking even harder and when I was just about to open the door from the outside, he came out. Just in time for our final approach.

Now, apart from the huge b******ing this guy received from me and my (very tall:uhoh: ) colleague, we managed to make him fasten his seatbelt quickly and to pass on the cabin secure message before a GA had to be initiated. However, we started discussing this later on as some doubts came to my mind.

What if we hadn't been able to secure it again?

Captain already knew the cabin wasn't secure so, in theory, she couldn't have landed in those circumstances - unless she was prepared to take on a huge responsibility in case something had gone wrong with the pax!

What if the crew are still trying to secure the pax - wouldn't a go around be even worse, safety-wise? Also I wouldn't like to be standing around when power is applied to those engines!!

Would you just sit down and let the pax take their time - at the end of the day you've done all the PA's, told him a million times, and secured him earlier on and now it's their responsibility?

Not informing the SCCM would have been a stupid thing to do for obvious reasons and also for the fact he would have been able to see what was going on anyway as we only have 18 1/2 rows on a 500 and you can see the back galley easily from the front one.

I felt it was a lose-lose situation and for the first time in my flying career I felt I was about to lose my temper! That passenger acted irresponsibly and put my (and my colleague's) safety at risk. And possibly everyone else's on the aircraft.

What would you do in such circumstances? Any experiences?
Any flight crew who would share what they would do?

Cheers

FBW:)

Hand Solo

22nd Apr 2006, 16:46

Sooner or later you've got to land, whether the cabin's secure or not. There are only so many times you can tell the passengers what to do and if they choose to ignore you then they put themselves at risk. Personally I would probably break off the approach at 1000ft and get delaying vectors or hold until the passenger decided to behave or we approached our reserve fuel levels, at which point the safety of everybody else and the aircraft takes precedence and we land. Then the police come and take the disruptive passenger away in handcuffs.

Virgin Boi

22nd Apr 2006, 17:12

Shouldn't the toilets have been locked off for landing as part of securing the cabin for landing?

TopBunk

22nd Apr 2006, 17:32

Personally, I wouldn't wait as long as Hand Solo before landing.

The pax are told well in advance of the landing time and the seatbelt sign comes on well before landing (10 or 20 minutes).

As for the cabin crew, as far as I'm concerned you discharge your duty of care by pointing out to the pax that they should be seated as you are about to land. After that it is the personal responsibility of the pax for their safety.

I would not go-around and burn an extra 2-3 tonnes of fuel on a 747 for someone on the loo. As you say, the go-around manoeuvre itself with sudden pitch and power changes can cause someone to fall over and may be more damaging to them than landing.

So in summary, tell the pax to return to their seat and stay safe yourself, leave the rest to fate.

flybywire

22nd Apr 2006, 17:57

My airline's policy is not to lock the toliet doors. We just have to check that nobody is in the toilet for take off and landing as part of our cabin secure checks. I have seen in other airlines people who lock them open to make sure nobody goes in but I don't do it as I think it's not a good fire prevention procedure.

When this pax went to the loo the gear was already down and we were strapped in. It was also very windy and quite rough!! If we hadn't done anything he probably would have ended up landing inside the toilet. I didn't feel like ignoring the thing!
If he had hurt himself (however badly) my colleague and I (neither the captain nor the f/o) would have been the ones stuck there trying to help him, etc. Lots of hassle not to say that a more serious medical situation (Imagine he had seriously hit his head on landing) is the last thing a cabin crew wants!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I also know though that a go around not always is the safest option and I don't want to be standing in the cabin if a go around is initiated. I do not want to put my safety at risk because somebody can't be bothered to comply to safety regulations!!
Tricky.

Catabolic IBS

22nd Apr 2006, 18:29

I think that everyone has a "Duty of care" that means that the flight deck and cabin crew are responsible for the passengers safety. In any enquiry this would be the bottom line. Overall conditions permitting (and the cabin is not secure) a GA should be initiated and the cabin crew should ensure their own safety during the GA. Once the Px is "Extracted" have them detained and charged with endangering the flight. Don't beat around the bush:mad: em!

skyvan

22nd Apr 2006, 21:26

Flybywire, you did the right thing. The Captain may not land until the cabin is ready, and needs to know when it is ready.

The pax may have had a rather urgent need for the loo, maybe he was just being a total idiot, but you did what you are required to do...you advised the Captain that the cabin was no longer ready. It now becomes her decision whether the go-around or not. Her options are delineated by a number of factors (weather, fuel remaining, etc), and she would have to make a decision based on those factors, and the trouble she would inevitably find herself in if she had landed with someone still on the potty. That there was still time enough before landing for the pax to do his business, and the cabin to be restored to the ready state, shows the Captains trust in you to fix the problem before landing, before she took the drastic action of having to go-around for repositioning.

So you did a good job. Don't stress too much over it. Remember, the pax had probably packed his brain in with his checked-in baggage :hmm:

6chimes

22nd Apr 2006, 22:12

Once again it comes down to that age old saying...."the needs of the many outway the needs of the few."

If your quite sure the pax is not ill then once you are sure you have warned them of the safety implications/consequences, get back to your seat and sod 'em.

Dont stress over it.

6

sinala1

22nd Apr 2006, 23:21

When this pax went to the loo the gear was already down and we were strapped in

Out of curiosity, when is the 'no contact' phase of sterile flight deck with your airline? In the airlines I have worked for, the landing sequence no contact phase is from the time the gear is lowered, until the a/c has slowed to taxi speed, however I respect that may possibly vary from airline to airline.

ozangel

23rd Apr 2006, 06:45

Ive had a similar scenario - except I was sitting down the back, between the two toilets on an f100, and with them locked, a large hairy man cocked his arm ready to hit me if i didnt let him in, his other huge hand was around my upper chest, pushing me into my jump seat, after my several requests to sit down as we were about to land.

We were on long finals, in moderate turbulence.

Unfortunately the two crew up the front didnt notice the guy, as they were chattering away!! :ouch:

I unlocked the toilets with my fingernail almost ripping it off and let him in.

I called the CM, who called the captain. This was in our no contact zone, as the landing gear had just lowered. Wrong as this may be, our airline had an understanding with the pilots to press the call button once, and workload permitting, theyll get to us - but only if its a fire/cabin secure issue.

The captain smoothly levelled off, slowly applied power and went around. This i suppose was helped by the fact that the airport wasnt exactly a busy one, and it was about 2300local.

The captain made a PA, along the lines of 'Ladies and Gentlemen, the captain speaking. You may have noticed us going back up - unfortunately a gentleman has risked yours and my safety by leaving his seat to use the toilet. It is not safe nor legal for me to land this aircraft unless everyone is safely restrained, so we will be up here a bit longer until the gentleman returns to his seat. We know you want to get home, however your safety is more important. Thank you.

The guy emerged, apologetic but still angry, and I sat him alone in the last row in the only available spare seat.

After we landed, I told him what he did was completely unacceptable. I reported him to operations, who in turn advised his company who had chartered about 50% of the seats on the service.

He never flew again.

CherokeeDriver

23rd Apr 2006, 09:47

FBW. Don't get too stressed about it. When I was doing some work with "the worlds favourite" a couple of years ago they had a 'prototype not for passenger use 757 rigged up with some onboard Internet Access (now called Connexions I think...) Anyho... we went up for a jaunt to test this stuff out and in a non-commercial situation. No flight Crew just a few tekkies and a marketing droid from said airline. We were asked to buckle up etc.. but the tekkies were twiddling with insturments, walking around, checking under seats during the take off roll, climb, cruise, descent and landing. Nobody got hurt or injured. I'm not saying that failing to buckle up at any time in a flight is a good idea, but the reality is the 'plane needs to hit severe weather or have some unusual manipulation before any unbuckled person is in any real danger.... I await the flames from the more safety paranoid:hmm:

Lembrado

23rd Apr 2006, 09:47

fbw,

What gives you (and your tall friend) the right to give this passenger a "huge bollocking"?

As was previously mentioned maybe he needed to go to the loo urgently?

There was no need to embarrass this individual in front of everybody else. I put it to you, that a better tact would have been to take the individual to one side (after landing) and explain to him calmly the pros and cons of getting out of ones seat just before landing.

To some of the other posters,

Some of you seem to take great pride and satisfaction from; getting individuals "banned" from flying and getting them "taken away and detained". Come on guys - bit over zealous.

L.

homeoftheblizzard

23rd Apr 2006, 11:36

What if the passenger in the loo had, at the last stage of the flight, finally summoned up the nerve to detonate a bomb he had smuggled on board?? Any innapropriate behaviour these days has security connotations - surely the best thing would be to land the aircraft asap. The days of going around to prevent possible, but unlikely, injury to a passenger who is clearly breaching a security norm (i.e being seated for landing) should be consigned to the 'quaint but no longer appropraite' bin.

As for being over-zelous - ZERO tolerance of stupid and irresponsible behaviour is the policy I want to see enforced as a paying passenger.

ozangel

23rd Apr 2006, 11:39

Lembrado, are you crew?

Im not in the habit of getting people banned. For your information, the guy was banned by the company which employed him for bad behaviour. I believe he was actually sacked - and you know what, part of me feels sorry for him. One brief silly action took away his lively hood - but we all have to be accountable right?

Now, im sorry, but physically threatening me was something he could have been arrested for. He got off lightly.

You seem to forget that the plane is hurtling through the sky at great speed, in a phase of flight where that gets reduced to zero very quickly. On the other side of the coin, fbw's concern was the opposite, in a go around the speed, and attitude changing in the opposite direction.

Now when it comes down to it, I dont want a womans handbag flying at me at high speed, let alone a 120kg bloke. He was a regular flyer, and did know better.

CherokeeDriver makes a point when he says 'not for passenger use'.

I guess that sums his post up. Cabin Crew are there to make sure the passengers are safe.

When it comes down to it, the first thing he would have done if injured would have involved trying to sue the airline.

I also, despite how he had behaved, went out of my way to avoid him suffering further embarrasment, by insisting he sat in the last row near me.

The fact of the matter is, in this day and age, we all have to be accountable. Crew are humans, and what kind of message does quietly chatting to them after the flight. Theyre off the plane, they couldnt care less.

Had the guy not been a regular, I probably would have been a little more firm and direct, just like fbw. Unfortunately I knew that if I didnt report it, the rest of his colleagues would have, I would have been questioned and I would have been in the wrong. Immediately I knew this guy was going to lose his job, whether I liked it or not. My choice was do I follow the rules, or risk getting in trouble myself to cover for a physically aggressive bloke who regardless of how often he flew, should have known better.

captainyonder

23rd Apr 2006, 11:49

Lembrado, the guy was putting his own personal safety at risk as well as that ofthe crew, he deserved what he got by the sound of things. If the seatbelt signs are on you stay in your seat, especially if the gear has just gone down, any Tom, Dick or Harry that has been anywhere near an aircraft knows this. It is extremely irresponsible behaviour and it sounds like flybywire handled the situation in the best possible way.

banewboi

23rd Apr 2006, 12:54

zero tolerance, all the way. if there were no pax our jobs would be so much easier!!!!

i don't think you can be over zealous when safety comes into it. you're safe, or you aren't and a man doing god knows what in a confined space in the final stages of flight is a risk, he could have a bomb, he could be smoking, he could be stood up injecting drugs, he could be scared or he could just be evacuating his bowels, either way he is a grown man and should be able to contain himself until a safe taxing speed is achieved, he should have the common sense to do what he is told by trained proffesionals in an aluminium tube going at 400 mph 10000 feet up! and he should obey the commanders commands at all times when onboard (not doing so is a criminal offence and the seatbelt sign is classed as a command)

we have a right to work in a safe environment and to be empowered to maintain that safe environment, if the aircraft hits a microburst or weather bubble or something else technical that substantially changes the aircrafts attitude enough to disturb it's occupants the fd have enough on their plates with keeping a hurtling lump of metal in the air without having to worry about some stupid bloke down the back doing exactly as he pleases and ending up with a broken arm because he's hit the ceiling and landed on an armrest! he jeopardised the safety of himself, other pax and the crew and is unaccepatable and his bollocking was well deserved, as for mr forceful anyone touching a fa and pushing their luck should be met by the police,

at the end of the day since 9/11 you shut up, sit down, drink your tea and if we tell you to perform the oki koki you do it! if people don't want to get into trouble they should do as they are bloody well told!

i'll get down off my soap box now but finally i must say that we don't tell people what to do for the good of our health, it's for the good of theirs and they should respect it!

really, i'll get down now. promise.

ChewyTheWookie

23rd Apr 2006, 14:18

As was previously mentioned maybe he needed to go to the loo urgently?

Well he should have gone before shouldn't he? it's blatently obvious to even the most stupid passenger when the flight is drawing to an end...

Lembrado

23rd Apr 2006, 14:42

To quote:

"zero tolerance, all the way. if there were no pax our jobs would be so much easier!!!!"

Ah, customer service is alive and well!

L.

BANANASBANANAS

23rd Apr 2006, 15:01

Exactly that happened to me (767 Capt) at my last airline. We got the normal cabin secure, commenced the approach, then got a call to say that a pax had unstrapped and locked themselves in the loo.

Fuel and weather considerations dictated that we land anyway but to be perfectly honest I would have landed in any event because of the possible security implications and, at the end of the day, if the pax has a real problem he/she is better off on the ground.

I submitted a Voyage Report and never heard anything back from it. I think there is a case for locking the loos as part of the cabin secure procedure as some airlines obviously do. Thoughts anyone?

flybywire

23rd Apr 2006, 17:33

Just to answer a few things here

Sinala...yes interphone silence starts after the cabin secure has been given and end when the aircraft turns off the runway. At this point communication to the flight crew is only via the SCCM and only if something happens that needs their attention.
However, the Cabin Secure is a very important condition for landing in our company (and possibly in all companies I like to believe) and once it was not secure anymore the SCCM felt the flight crew must be informed.
Our Captain was fine with it and she informed us she would not land if the cabin was still not secure in a few minutes' time.

As for Lembrado......I don't know whether you're crew or not. However my company states ON ALL SAFETY CARDS that it's an offence to disobey crew's safety instructions and to remove safety equipment from the aircraft (life jacket, seatbelts etc.) and this is stated also on the A.N.O. (air navigation order) - maybe something you want to remember in the future when you feel you gotta go two minutes before landing! That pax put his safety, mine and the whole aircraft's in danger and just to reassure you, NO, it wasn't an urgent thing. He only needed to pee and did so allover the floor as well as it was quite rough!!:yuk:

Even if he had been sick, we carry a huge amount of sick bags, unless it's a life-threatening situation I should not even think of getting up from my seat after the SCCM has given the order to take the seats for landing.
So the huge bollocking was right and hopefully taught him something.

If I cannot say anything about safety issues on board, what am I there for???????????

flybywire

23rd Apr 2006, 18:25

FBW. the reality is the 'plane needs to hit severe weather or have some unusual manipulation before any unbuckled person is in any real danger....

You should have been on the aircraft I was supposed to operate on the other day then....brand new F/O.....smashed the damn thing onto the ground and as a consequence the aircraft had to be grounded because of an unforseen "heavy landing"....:ouch:

And have you ever seen the pictures of SkyService 767 (leased from MyTravel if I am not wrong) it "landed" in what we would call a normal situation and the aircraft has been written off!!!!! You never know what's going to happen. I fly day in and out and don't want to risk more than I have to! I never take things for granted. Also I had my first rejected take off about a month ago, wouldn't have liked to be standing around then, I promise you. The adrenalin was still in my system after hours.

ChewyTheWookie

23rd Apr 2006, 18:59

Irrelevant to the discussion but just for your info, the skyservice 767 was not written off, it was repaired and returned to MyTravel. It's disappearance from Skyservice lead to some confusion.

6chimes

23rd Apr 2006, 19:48

Most of the posts here seem to have fallen into two main catagories; those that think we should lighten up and those that think we should err on the side of caution at every occurence.

There are some people that suffer from illnesses that do not allow them to wait if they find that they need to use the toilet and why should they notify us on boarding of what is most likely to be an embarassing complaint. There are more people than you might think suffering with these kind of ailments.

What I am trying to say is you need to tread carefully when dealing with pax that have transgressed any of our rules, there could be any number of reasons why. How would you feel if someone tore strips of you in another environment because you had "crossed a line" and you had not understood the real implications that usually takes some form of training to understand.

Each situation is different and requires to be treated as such, but with some reasonable SOP to follow we might get better at getting it right.

6

skytrax

23rd Apr 2006, 21:40

We locked the doors. It's much safer like this.
When I have a pax who wants to use the loo I just tell him that it's not safe."Please, take ur seat and wait until we land." If he doesn't listen me he won't get in anyway. He ll take his seat and wait.
does it make sens?!

skyguy_yyc

24th Apr 2006, 15:33

This very thing happened to me too on a flight. A mother brought her child to the washroom, girl in tears needing to use the washroom soo badly. I was getting ready to take my seat, and I advised the mother that we are on the approach to the airport and it is unsafe to use the washroom at that time. She said the child would be quick, and i again advised her that it was a good idea to take her seat. The mother chose to ignore my recomendation and proceded to the washroom with her daughter. We were getting extremely close, so i knocked on the door and said through the door to stay in there, hold on tight and do not come out until i knock on the door again. We landed and after we got to the gate, I knocked on the door and the mother and daughter came out unharmed. She thanked me and apologized for putting the crew in an awkward situation. I just nodded and asked if they were ok. She said they were and deplaned.

tuismile

25th Apr 2006, 13:58

How would you feel if someone tore strips of you in another environment because you had "crossed a line" and you had not understood the real implications that usually takes some form of training to understand.

Each situation is different and requires to be treated as such, but with some reasonable SOP to follow we might get better at getting it right.

6

I'm sorry, but what kind of training do you need to understand the fasten seatbelt sign?!!! It's very simple...pax must conform to all written and verbal commands and if you can't adhere to them then don't fly!!

At the end of the day, if i've told you to fasten your seatbelt and u don't do it, I as a "safety officer" have a duty to inform you of the implications of doing so.

And Lembrado I don't think you are crew to be honest, but if you are, you try telling someone quietly that what they're doing is wrong and see if they give a :mad: . It just goes in one ear and out of the other. And at the end of the day if we don't tell them how it is, they will just do it again and again....we need to prevent these incidents from happening!!

Right I'll get off my high horse now, but hey!!! I'm passionate about my job!!

xx

Piltdown Man

27th Apr 2006, 10:18

The reason I put the seatbelt sign on and expect people to be securely seated is because there are, will or may be conditions which require their use to ensure the safety of the passengers.

Flybywire - Your job is check to make sure that the cabin is secure. You did, and you also, I my opinion, correctly informed the flight deck that the "secure" status if the cabin had changed. The ball is now with the flight deck. Leave it there - you've done your job. They will then choose to hold, land or go-around, as appropriate and you will also probably be informed as to their decision and any of any other actions they require you to take . Leave it at that and I'd suggest that any "bollocking" comes from others (like your company or the court system).

Lembrado - An aircraft is not a democracy. If I say sit down and secure your seat belt, you do it. If you need to go to the toilet, you will either have to wait or soil your clothes. There is only one Captain on my flight and that is ME! If you choose not to obey my order, I will call the police, I will ask them press charges, I will attend court, my company will not accept further bookings from you. This is because you have not only endangered yourself but more importantly, the others around you by your action.