evacuate or not ?

[gigi116]

You have, an engine fire when in cruise.

Apply all memory items / checklist as a result all indications disappears, everything is under control, you decide to land asap.

Do you evacuate the aircraft when on the ground ?

[Shiny side down]

I am interested in the thoughts on this. Here's my take.
My personal immediate response is-
Probably not
Only if the situation indicates a further problem on the ground would I expect to carry out an evacuation.
My reasoning being, if the problem has been contained, and there are no further indications that it will recur, then carrying out an evacuation may lead to Panic, injuries, stress, and many other problems.
Once on the ground, and stopped. I would be expecting to be met by the fire services. If they have given the all clear, then I would expect to taxi either to stand or a remote parking position, and deplane the pax using stairs or bridge.
All the time, being covered by the fire services.
Going back one stage further, After the situation is contained, I would expect to brief the Cabin crew about the problem, and that the problem is contained, a diversion is being made to XX, and that on arrival, the plane will be met by emergency services to check us over, and then we would expect taxy to a parking position and carry out a normal deplane with stairs.
The arrival and approach would be a single engine landing.

[stiffwing]

Must agree with shiny.. As the PIC, your primary responsibility is for the safety of the pax and crew..
If you think that it is safer on the the a/c than evacuating, then leave them on. People will be injured, many seriously, if evacuating via slides. An evacuation should be your VERY last option.

[IRRenewal]

everything is under control

Why risk an evacuation when everything is under control?

[airman13]

As you said ,if the situation is under control, I will say NO ,you have only to vacate the runway, you will be instructed to taxi in such an area (probably maintenance area) , pax will be disembarked and a/c will be checked to asses the damages,etc.

[international hog driver]

What IRR said.

If everything is under control.... then Operations Normal.

If unsure, Land, Stop, Park Brake On.

Engine fire on ground checklist.

Upon completion if you have fired both bottles and the fire is not out.

EVACUATE

If the fire is out

Operations Normal - taxi clear of the runway with the remaining good engine to the parking position.

[gigi116]

tanks guys,

answer was simple also for me but, during the last Sim the TRI confused me about "legal responsabilities" and told me :

1) if you evacuate "anyway", nobody will tell you did a wrong thing;

2) if you say simply the word "EVACUATE" without any mention to the side (left or right) you tranfer this responsabilies to the cabin crew and you are "legal protected".

what do you think about ?

[airman13]

But if any injuries occur(it seems to be in such a procedure of emg evacuation) belive me will be someone to ask you WHY?....On the other side,if you say EVACUATE, the cabin crew will use all emergency exits, so if a real fire exists on one side I'd prefer to say the correct one....

[lomapaseo]

answer was simple also for me but, during the last Sim the TRI confused me about "legal responsabilities" and told me :
1) if you evacuate "anyway", nobody will tell you did a wrong thing;
2) if you say simply the word "EVACUATE" without any mention to the side (left or right) you tranfer this responsabilies to the cabin crew and you are "legal protected".
what do you think about ?
I don't think about legalities.
I do imagine the final report may find a contributing cause was the failure of the captain to advise the cabin crew of critical information that might have been available.
On the other hand my own recall of history suggests that the cabin crew is more likely to know what side of the plane the fire is on simply by looking out their many windows

[Shiny side down]

I think if you evacuated and could justify the call, then you would be acting within your obligations.
But if you evacuated when the situation was otherwise under control, and someone was injured as a result, then I think you would be hardpressed to say that evacuation was the best thing to do.

As for stating which side to evacuate?
As commander, I feel it is still your obligation to do as much in your power to ensure that even if an evacuation is called for, that passengers are as protected as possible.

By leaving it open to interpretation by the cabin crew as to which side to jump from would seem to me to be a bit of a cheap effort. Surely it's a team effort until you have finished the post disaster pint, and head home.

[gigi116]

I will take the best of your answers to do my own mental procedure.
This things are not written on any book ...thank you again !

[Max Angle]

By leaving it open to interpretation by the cabin crew as to which side to jump from would seem to me to be a bit of a cheap effort.I don't think that in most cases it is possible to specify a side to evacuate from. The cabin crew are (should) be trained to evaluate the state of the exit and the area outside before using it. Engine fire on left engine?, are all the left exits unusable? almost certainly not on a big aircraft and how can you tell from the flightdeck. Don't tie their hands by rendering half the exits out of action before you start, quite possible a slide on the other side will not deploy leaving even less exits to use. I know the certification is done using half the exits but in reality you need every one you can get.

[Shiny side down]

Maxangle
Sorry, but my post wasn't really concise. (this one probably won't be much better)

My point was that the aircraft commander should not really consider keeping quiet beyond the "evacuate' order, just to pass the responsibility/liabilty on to someone else. This quote-

2) if you say simply the word "EVACUATE" without any mention to the side (left or right) you tranfer this responsabilies to the cabin crew and you are "legal protected".


That is just being slope-shouldered, in my view.

"Evacuate, caution fire on the left"

However, having never been in the position to demonstrate any of this, I am just saying what I would hope to achieve, not what might be achieved in a real event.

[AERO_STUDENT]

"Evacuate, caution fire on the left"


...Bearing in mind, of course, that most of the cabin crew are facing the other way to you, and your left is their right.....:rolleyes:

[ratarsedagain]

Bearing in mind, of course, that most of the cabin crew are facing the other way to you, and your left is their right

So you could quantify it by saying (for the benefit of the crew) that the hazard is on the Captains or the Co-Pilots side. (hopefully they know which side they're on!)

[Dream Land]

In your scenario the Purser would have already received a briefing of the situation, if in fact you choose to evacuate, follow your airline SOP, I was taught to use "Evacuate", FA's are taught to evaluate whether or not the exit is safe to use.

[sinala1]

From the Cabin Crew perspective, we think in terms of "Aircraft Left" and "Aircraft Right", not whichever way we happen to be facing at the time :} As for the suitability of the exit to be used, as has already been pointed out crew are trained to check the conditions outside the exit before opening it and sending pax down the slide. Admittedly the viewing windows provided on a lot of aircraft are useless to say the least - they often dont give any scope beyond the area directly in front of the door - so cabin windows are often used in making that assessment as well.

[Shiny side down]

Please, Don't misinunderstand what i am saying.

I do not advocate telling the cabin crew which exits to use/not use, without expecting them to use their own judgement.

By saying 'evacuate', the cabin crew should and will use their own observations to evaluate whether that door is viable.

By saying 'evacuate, caution, (fire, something) on the left' the cabin crew should still be using their own observation, and deciding accordingly. However, the reminder is there that there is a fire on the right, and the flight deck may have some information not immediately apparent/visible from the cabin crew stations. All that has been done is to point out a potential hazard.

Post incident/accident, we should all be following the training. But in most cases, it will be the first such situation experienced for real. And so peoples reactions and responses will probably vary quite considerably.

I would certainly look to keep things as simple as possible. At the same time, providing any useful support and information as I think would help everyone.

[international hog driver]

Our company procedure changed from the “Evacuate Left/Right/Front/Rear/All” to simply Evacuate.

The onus is on the cabin crew to determine if it is safe to evacuate from a particular door due to terrain (think 747 with no nose gear, tail in the air the 5L/R slide would be near vertical), fire, obstructions etc.

The moment you say “Evac…..” too late, those that understand the word who are compos mentis sitting at the overwing exits will be halfway out the door before you say L or R.

[CiFIcare]

Likewise: SOP is 'evacuate'

As mentioned the risk of confusion between who's Left/Right exists.

Furthermore, I would be very careful about saying things like 'caution fire left' etc etc.

- as soon as that 'E' word is mentioned, all hell will break loose back there.

'Evacuate, fire on the left' could be heard 'evacuate . . . left'