Smoke lingers , air con mist disappears, like in restaurants,bars,cars, shops in fact most places you see an air con unit!

Smoke smells, air con mist doesnt smell like smoke.:ugh:

Some people:rolleyes:

How about only hiring deaf pilots? :eek:

Good to know you have good experience with A/C systems. You would spend less time in restaurants,bars,cars and shops and more in planes you would get another type of experience telling you how to deal with passengers, I mean if that's your job.
Captains are sometimes generously paid for their "responsibilities" in regard to the number of souls on board, logically it should be their responsibility to prevent such situations with a proper cabin crew briefing.

I think I'm with Rainboe on this one.

I would not allow anyone without eight bar epaulettes to bang on our flightdeck door because there are seven bars in there already.

If the crew allowed this to occur I think I would relegate them to PAX.

Rotation is a critical manouvre and if if we cant hear "pos climb...gear up"
we wont be going very far.

Just my two bobs worth of course.

Commercial aviation prides itself on the "no-blame" culture as the best means of continuous improvement in flying safety. This should extend to passengers (at least to the sober, non-violent ones).

The incident occurred. It was reported. Recommendations should follow that reduce the risk of it happening again.

Presumably mist from the air con only occurs during certain specific ambient temperature/humidity combinations? Could these not be established and a timely warning issued in the safety briefing?

No excuse for pax getting out of their seats really in this situation I feel but this is a symptom of our culture now which knows little about rules and regulations and follows the "anything goes" chav mindset.

Rainboe, have a look at RYRNick's location. I think it explains a lot.:ok:

There's a common theme running here.

The passengers on this flight appear to be morons. A large number of the posts in this thread appear to be by people on the same intellectual plain.

Just what exactly do you expect crew to do during a take off roll if a passenger stands up? The sheer ignorance on display here perfectly highlights the kind of attitude these idiots must have had. Thousands of people fly on these aircraft every single day and being bmi, the crew were without question highly trained and amongst the best in the business.

Quite simply i'd point it out as soon as was appropriate and let the crew get on with their jobs. You know, the ones they're trained for and are checked on at least twice a year. I might even offer to help. What I would not do (and assuming this report is accurate), having a modicum of intelligence, would be stand up, start shouting about fire and bang on the flight deck door during a take off roll.

Like I said, bloody idiots.

Of course it was a stupid thing to say! No self respecting pilot would carry out a very dangerous action to teach another one "a lesson". Key's may have been unpopular but that would not have been the way to show it to him.

Unfortunately, Virgo, the first part of your post (above) was correct the second is not. It was NEVER established who selected the LE "droops" up. This was in the days before CVRs.

Lots of posters blaming the cabin crew here.

I have the (questionable) pleasure of seeing a large cross-section of the Great British population in times of stress, and am used to how they react.

Sadly folks, there is a small but noticeable percentage who will make up their minds based on nothing more than a room temperature IQ and a LARRRGE collection of misconceptions, and who will also, when presented with anything other than validation of their own point of view, will do anything, upto and including verbal/physical violence, to avoid accepting the alternative.

These people almost invariably also believe normal rules don't apply to them, and are perfectly capable of e.g. standing up during a take-off role.

Past a certain point you can't actually manage them however hard you try, and they won't be educated, so what do you do?

Is this what you're talking about?? Harldy looks threatening... :ugh:

http://i512.photobucket.com/albums/t...ndensation.jpg

Empathy
 

Quote from Topslide6:
The passengers on this flight appear to be morons. A large number of the posts in this thread appear to be by people on the same intellectual plain. (sic)

I've not checked your profile, but very much hope you are not cabin crew, Topslide6.

There has always been a minority of flight attendants that are incapable of looking at situations from a passenger viewpoint, and I fear this may be increasing since 9/11.

If the first passenger to cry fire had never seen a cloud of condensing water vapour from an air conditioning system before, then his/her action would have been rational, if unfortunately timed.

The senior cabin crew member, on the other hand, would have experienced it many times before. It does not take much of a stretch of the imagination to predict that someone off the street might mistake it for smoke on one of his/her flights.

Quote:
Just what exactly do you expect crew to do during a take off roll if a passenger stands up? The sheer ignorance on display here perfectly highlights the kind of attitude these idiots must have had.

The rational thing would have been to keep in mind a form of words that could be used in a PA, like "L & G, the cloud in the cabin is only water vapour from the air conditioning. We often see it. No cause for concern. Kindly sit down." It seems that this was not done.

Passengers are normal human beings in an unfamiliar environment. The cabin crew are there to guide and assist them, not to treat them like morons or potential terrorists. They are the meal ticket.

I think this have to be the funnest incident by pax ever! :rolleyes:
can you imagin the rest of the pax seeing those Plonkers shouting smoke....:bored:. I would love to see them reacting to transit in DXB:ooh:

Safe and happy flying to all from Sybil, Poly and Manuel:ok:

BF

Did you ever consider that maybe the above PA was made, but the pax invloved didn't want to listen? I know pax are perfectly capable of being decent humanbeings, I also know they can be bloody minded and stubborn. A lot of blaming the crew here with very little actual facts.

any one hear of the aer lingus capt that got a punch from a pax for diverting in to luton on orders from co.??

You guys who fly the aeroplane please take a step back for a moment and consider that some people do not enjoy flying particularly and any unusual distraction that could threaten their well-being will frighten them.

I love flyng and I have a current PPL(A). I have flown on lots of commercial flghts as SLF as well but have never seen the A/C mist as described earlier or shown in the pic. I wouldn't jump up screaming about it but I would consider asking cabin crew what it was in case it was harmful.

I think a little more friendly information from the flight deck as well as those awful automated safety briefings (which no one appears to watch/listen to) could also help to alliviate these sort of problems and calm potentially nervous passengers.

Brilliant - let's have the professional just dismiss us pax as morons, stupid, ignorant ... whatever any way to hide the fact that they were all just very probably extremely frightened people who felt trapped in a situation which was going to cost them their lives. In a situation like that you're not thinking rationally, not acting rationally and the flight impulse (as in away from the perceived danger) takes over. We haven't had years of training, we haven't had tests to see how we cope with the pressure of the situation. We're coming across something that we've never experienced before, have not by the sound of things, been prepared for by the 'trained professionals' and the colour of our underwear is probably changing. We need someone to take control and allay our raging fears. If that wsn't done then a few 'highly trained' people ought to sit down and work how this situation can be avoided in the future.
(This situation would have had me frozen in my seat but then as a terrified flyer I spend 90% of a flight with my eyes closed and grasping my seat with no intention of letting go ...)

As a very regualr pax but witha keen interest in civial aviation I did find this interesting because of two things that happened to me.
One occason was just theorectical after I posted some comments about what happened to me on a thread about Sept 11 . I was on a flight that turned back and was held for about 6 hours overhead Lands End. I commented on the fuel dumping and unusual long noisy bumpy return to LGW with lots of flap and gear dangling all the way from Lands End.to Gatwick saying the engines seemed close to climb power. I got flamed seriously, told numerous times I was an diot , got ti all wrong, mistook what i saw and heard etc until a reply came in from the FO /PF on my trip. No he said what i described was exactly what happened-very unusual yes but an unusual event. Perhaps some of those who had a go at me were pilots but there was a srrong sense of what could you know as just a passenger.

Second time was for real- Off on holiday in the 90s Gatwick to Faro with Ambassador?? long defunct on a 737-200 . I am sitting by the wing leading edge-and they do not extend the leading edges. On and on we taxy towards the holding point and still no leading edge extension. Now we are at the hold and frankly I am pretty scared since I doubt we will fly far without the leading edge flaps but what do I do? Say something to a 20 y/o FA and be told to mind my own business or just sit there , I know the crew probably cannot see the actual wings and well it is a rather dirty shabby example of a 73 so maybe they have a false indication up there. A few minutes go by at the holding point whle I agonise and finally just as we start to move slowly towards the runway down go the leading edges. I was worried, I think rightlly so but in the end I never said anyhting, I suppose because I did trust the crew and presumeably they had there reason for the late slat extension.
(Mind you the appraoch and landing in Faro made me wonder whether I had been right to trust them -LoL)

Anyway I do thnk it s a bit unfair to dismiss pax as idiots-sure some-maybe many are and the scene on the BMI flight appears inexcusable. However,and I know this varies from crew to crew. it seems to me that sometimes a few words from up front go a long long way to making sure the folks in back are relaxed and on a humid day mentionng such phenomena is surely a good idea. I used to fly on BA Cityflyer 146s with there noisy musical flap extensions sounds whch did make people sit up and stare when nothing was said. Several crews hwever realised that the 146 is different and notceably so in this respect from most peoples previous experiences and always mentioned it in a seensible downbeat often gently humourous way and when the noise duly appeared no one batted an eyelid compared to the swivelling heads and widening eyes common when no warning was given.

So a difficult judgement I suppose but as in many things in life a little bit of ommunication and respect for customers can go a long long way. At the end of the day we are your customers and we do pay your wages as much as we should behave ourselves when on your plane.
PB( Ducks quickly)

Hi lexxity,

Yes, it did occur to me (post #52) that a suitable PA may have been made, but I was responding to Topslide6's simplistic diatribe; and taking the original story on face value. I agree that we are labouring with limited information: situation normal on PPRuNe.

As an old fart, I think people may be less tolerant in public than in years gone by, and this probably applies to passengers and crews alike. But I think it's vital for the cabin crew to empathise with passengers – even the dodgy-looking ones – from the moment they board. As you settle the passengers down and – later – do the cabin checks for take-off, you have to inspire confidence, without being intimidating. A few minutes later, you will all be belting along a runway. And things can happen...

The one saving grace on take-off and landing is that the cabin crew have nothing to do other than watch and listen. A timely PA should have nipped this in the bud, unless the passengers were drunk and/or disorderly, which would have been spotted before or during boarding.

Chris

So, what kind of "few words" would work then with a bunch of panicked retards? Passengers have responsibilities as well as the rights they are so fond of quoting. This is not touchy-feely customer service stuff; it's beyond stupid to jump up out of your seat on a take off roll, panic other pax and go banging on the cockpit door - we're not exactly talking about using your cellphone despite being told to switch it off here. You have to ask yourself, if If you’re a seated pax on that flight and some guy jumps up screaming fire, we’re all going to die, and makes a run for the cockpit door, are you going to join him? Do you see queues of people lining up to go with the odd person who wigs out and tries to open an exit door? Are we going to end up reading a pre-tax takeoff list to pax for an hour over the intercom to cover the million potential eventualities that may concern them in their ignorance? Yes, we're sure the doors are locked, yes, we're sure the aircraft has been checked by a qualified engineer, we have enough fuel, yada yada. Do you think people like that would listen to a cc briefing on the intercom in the first place, or pay attention to the safety drill even? And if there is something genuine spotted by concerned pax, it's not best communicated by banging on the cockpit door, that's the kind of thing that could get you shot in the States as someone else pointed out, even if you're not on a takeoff roll.

What happened to these people after the event, have they been charged or will they be blacklisted?

Here is something that happened on one of my flights which shows that pax do NOT listen to the crew when you give them an instruction on the PA in what they perceive to be an emergency.

I am the SCCM on the flight and we are on final approach into MAD. The Landing gear was down and had been down for around about 1 minute, you could see through the window that we were very low. A pax presses a call bell at around about row 7, I picked up the PA and said "For the passenger who has just pressed the call bell, the cabin crew are not able to come to you at this time as they must be seated for the landing - once we have touched down on the runway a member of crew will come to you". Another call bell goes off a few seconds later and we are now no more than 30 seconds to touch down, I again repeated my PA saying we can not come but will do in less than 1 minute after the aircraft has landed.

Next thing I know there were several passengers standing up, looking fearful and shouting at myself and my crewmate working at the front of the aircraft to come over, I snatched up the PA again and said "Sit down immediately, the cabin crew CAN NOT attend you at this time, we are about to touch down on the runway YOU MUST SIT DOWN NOW or you risk being injured on the landing - Crew will immediately attend to you AS SOON as we have touched down", the standing pax still kept shouting at us to come over and more and more stood up, I am now screaming down the PA "SIT DOWN IMMEDIATELY, YOU RISK BEING SEVERELY INJURED IF YOU DO NOT", some other pax in the cabin assisted me by also shouting at them to sit down, the last pax sat down literally 2 seconds before touch down. The landing was rather bumpy and any pax standing would have been thrown off of their feet and more than likely would have been hurt.

What was the cause of the excitement in the cabin? Well it was a young woman who had feinted in her seat. It as a warm day and she was wearing around about 20 layers of clothing and due to the heat of her clothing she had feinted.

For those of you wondering why I did not contact the flight deck, well the aircraft was below 800feet and the A319 interphone does not allow communication with flight deck once you go below that level.

Once we were on stand I went over to the passengers and said to them "Do you realise the danger you put yourselves in by standing up?" they said that we should have attended the woman, I replied saying "I have to stay in my seat for landing for the same reasons that you do, if I am out of my seat and the landing is heavy I could get a nasty injury, possibly even killed" I went on to say that "If the pilots had heard my screaming at you to sit down they could have taken the aircraft back into the sky performing what is called a 'missed approach', if that happened and your friend needed urgent medical attention she would have had to wait possibly as long as 10-15 minutes before the aircraft could get back on the ground, and that could have had potentially fatal consequences however, as we were less than 1 minute to landing if she had been seriously ill we could easily get paramedic assistance within just a couple of minutes". I pointed out to them that we the crew are trained to look after the passengers and have the necessary experience to decide when it is best to wait or to do something and this was one of the occasions when you have to wait a few moments before taking any action. I said all of this in the nicest way that I could so that they wouldn't walk off of the aircraft feeling really stupid, angry or upset and they did apologise in the end for not having done what I had instructed, but they said that at the time they were too busy thinking of their friend and didn't even recall hearing what I had said to them over the PA and it was only when the people sat near them were shouting at them to sit down that they actually heard!

Now, this goes to show that even when the cabin crew do try to explain, some people just will not hear what has been said. It's like putting a pair of blinkers on someones head, things are happening around you but you can only see what is directly infront of you. Perhaps on this flight in question that the thread is originally about the cabin crew did give a decent explanation over the PA, but the pax were too involved in their perceived fear to actually HEAR what was being said and therefore their primal survival instincts took over and they felt that they had to take action themselves.

Teevee,

Fair point. However, has it occured to you that there's not a great deal that can be done during a take off roll and the crew were doing exactly the safest thing, which is fly the aircraft safely first and foremost and deal with any issues once the safety of the aircraft is assured.

Lexxity makes a very valid point. The fact is that there is every chance the cabin crew made the PA that you've all suggesting they should have. I've witnessed first hand passengers calling cabin crew liars when they've been handed information of a similar nature. Many simply don't listen when told, and I would suggest that at least 50% couldn't point to their nearest emergency exit when asked as they hadn't listened to the safety brief. I stand by what I said. Anyone who stands up and starts shouting whilst an aircraft is taking off is an idiot. That's not said with a pilots hat on, it's called being an adult. If true, these people have acted like children. I would even suggest most children would act more responsibly.

Both bear11 and getoutofmygalley have summed it up perfectly. If they weren't, these passengers were very lucky not to be arrested.

Harldy looks threatening...
 

Hardly looks like 2 bints trying to open doors they weren't supposed to either! I think this was taken after the event when things had all calmed down.

Also, wasn't actually on this flight, was talking about other stuff

I stand by my (wordy) post. Arseholes exist. Fact. Not everyone's an arsehole though.

:ok:

This thread has degenerated into right / wrong camps, ignoring the fact that many instances fall somewhere between the two. The simple matter is that any real professional will listen to relevant information, no matter what the perceived source.....

Back in January I was SLF on an AC Jazz flight from T/Bay to Winnipeg. The a/c had been de-iced, but was delayed due to slush-clearing from the runways. From my window seat just behind the left wing, it was clear that snow and ice was reforming on the control surfaces during the intervening 20 minutes.

When the F/O announced push-back, I called the cabin attendant, informed her that I was a private pilot (20 years on bush planes) and asked her to advise the flightdeck that there was a visible fresh accumulation of snow/ice on the control surfaces. She called the flightdeck and within 15 seconds the FO announced there would be a very short delay while the a/c was de-iced again.

Should I have kept my mouth shut as a 'courtesy' to the flight crew? Maybe we would have been fine, but why try and save 5 minutes in this world to arrive decades too early in the next? I think this shows the crew considered third-party information for something they could not themselves see, judged it relevant and acted on it accordingly.

Everybody won.

You did exactly right! You calmly informed a CC member of your concerns. This bears no comparison with uninformed idiots storming the flight deck because they saw some odourless fumes in the passenger cabin.

A lot of talk about "professionals doing their job" here.

Well, I'm sure it depends on the airline, but I have witnessed some pretty unprofessional behaviour by cabin crew on board an aircraft.

If you want to prevent these kinds of situations arising, deal with them when they arise in a professional, assertive manner.

That means: NOT pissing with laughter while you make a PA, NOT flirting with other members of the cabin crew and NOT muttering rude comments about the people on the flight deck which are clearly audible to the first row of passengers.

And don't be surprised when perfectly rational people get a little unsettled at seeing what they think is smoke in the cabin.

Finally, to flight deck and cabin crew, if you actually made your pre-flight PAs audible and spoke clearly, maybe more passengers would listen!

The captain made an announcement over the pa on this bmi charter flight whilst in the cruise , he made it clear that the aircraft was operating correctly and the only thing that risked the safety of the flight and all on board was the complete idiots who were out of their seats and running around during take off.

Well put Get out of my Galley.

I spent 8 years as cabin crew and passenger nervousness/fear is a powerful disabler of logic (and come to that hearing).

Yes a p.a. at the beginning of the flight to warn of possible 'smoke' would seem sensible. The pax would have been calm enough to understand assuming they are alert and not burried in the latest copy of Heat. (Which incidently seems to be the preferred method of receiving the safety demo).

I would say though that I always took notice of pax concerns - anything that they pointed out as unusual I would either be able to reassure (yes turbulence is normal) or double check with the chaps at the pointy end. CRM training hammers this point home - accidents are a result of a chain of events and that the observation of pax/cabin crew can remove a crucial link - even if I felt ridiculous pointing out something that was in all probablility normal.

Going back to this incident though - they were on the take off roll - there is a limit to how much you can do at this point - Hurtling down the runway is not the time to explain the finer points of mist/smoke differentials or get on the interphone to chat to the pilot as he calls V2. Shouting at the pax to sit down and issuing curt p.a.'s is about the limit.

I believe that more emphasis should be placed on the 'unexpected' realities of flight - be it misting, how bad turbulence can actually be - or how you actually check to see your o2 is flowing in a decompresion. The airlines general emphasis seems far to much skewed towards beer, peanuts and flowery music.

er340790,

You did exactly the right thing but the two situations are completely different. You had some knowledge to back up your question and you called the FA and asked her a question. This was done whilst on stand.

We are talking here about people running around, shouting and banging on doors during a safety critical phase of flight because they thought something might be wrong.

A professional and experienced crew would have anticipated this very common issue. Airlines are fine to sell tickets to retards (which by the way are paying your salaries). Crews are used to show how to fasten and unfasten seat belts which for many of us look basic. Why explaining this smoke issue would be unacceptable ?
Crews are paid to carry out commercial operations, including services. The captain is responsible of this. It's part of professional crews to anticipate this kind of issue which is not new. Failure to do so can lead to such situations, but there is no point to blame passengers sincerely scared the **** out of their pants. This has nothing to do with those damn drunk tourists enjoying low costs flights to have booze and cheap girls and which would deserve to be banned for trying to open the doors in flight.
When you know passengers might be scared by the smoke, isn't it normal to inform them ? If not you are the retard. If you don't even know they might be scared, you're even more a retard.
Next time I will calm down a vapor scared passenger sitting next to me I'll send the bill to the airline since the crew missed it...

Condensation or fumes?
 

Shortly after take off in a BAe 146 a few years back the # 1 called to say that ‘There’s a fire in the rear toilet’ – as best as she could see. The passenger cabin was filling with visible white smoke fumes.

The cockpit kept clear and we the pilots saw nothing.

We landed back as soon as possible - after which it became clear that the smoke was caused by a dodgy bleed air valve, not from a fire in the rear toilet nor condensation.

The problem would appear to be allowing professional aircrew to differentiate between condensation and smoke in a quick, logical and accurate way.

Why is there is still no detection method for identifying the foul fumes that are occasionally introduced into the confined space from faulty bleed air systems; apart from the aircrews and passengers noses and eyes?

Bunkrest is right – discussion about this subject is not welcome and the long term health effects of the fumes very poorly understood; my health deteriorated rapidly after this event.......Don’t start me.

DB :mad:

@ Groundloop

To put this to bed. I WAS NOT advocating "teaching a lesson" to Kay - and you are correct in that no self respecting pilot would ever knowingly jepodise his aircraft. I was merely relaying a theory that I have read elsewhere regarding the Stanes accident!!! So please don't shoot the messenger! Further, it wasn't me that bought a totally unrelated accident into this thread! :hmm: Nil further.

The scenario getoutof....... found themselves in is one I put to Commanders under training. I ask them what would they do if they became aware of a child running around the aisle at 500ft on the approach. As they think about it I count down 400, 300, 200 - to drive the point. If you go around you'll plant them in the rear galley (if they haven't wrapped themselves around seat legs etc in the process of tumbling down the aircraft). If you land, you'll probably plant them in the flight deck door/galley. Rock and a hard place?

What would you do?

A4

PS I had this a couple of weeks ago.........

A4, given the position of the aircraft on appraoch and the positive sink rate and hence inertia of a large aircraft - land.

Hi ya,

Can someone please list the occasions when passengers knew better how to deal with the problem than the crew paid to do so

yes, I can list three occasions, where the passengers (and f/a) know it better:

• Libyan Arab Airline B727 in 1973, where the occupants of the cabin know, that they was intercepted by IDF Phantoms, not by Egyptian Mig-21 (as the cockpit crew thought).
  
• Air Ontario F-28 was mentioned before.
  
• The Northwestern DC-10, which landed by mistake in Brussel and not in Frankfurt. The crew didn´t realized, that they were misguided by the ATC, but the occupants could follow the flight path on their cabin monitors.

Gross exceptions, indeed, but you never say never.....

Regards,

Excellent timing there, Hoskins. Well done.

Horse. Barn door.

:hmm:

@shack37.....If you are saying "a crucial part of..." Erm well if a pilot can't listen/not listen to warnings from PAX in any phase of flight then maybe they are not pilots...I agree with post No. 2...

Whilst I do agree that they panicked I do wonder why are they retarded!
Pilots and FA are trained for years and do deserve my respect, however calling SLFs "retard" it is too offensive.
The day you will stand down from your pedestal you might understand what is going on the real word.
We should ask to ourselves why people panicked on board on a fully functional a/c?
Did the FA and the pilots provide the correct info to the SLFs? Sometimes many of you forget that SLFs have brains (not like palets, that the reason why they can self load themselves) and might wonder what's going on. Eventually providing information might help
Regards

Oh ManRow you are such an ignorant one...just like the other...Excuse me but how the hell would you react if you knew nothing about planes and saw smoke? WELL! Like you're going to know that the pilot knows it's alright! I'm sorry but if I was a PAX and they thought something was risking their life...I would get up...Why should I risk my life...the pilots have a responsibility for 300 people...we pay/paid your wages so shut up and eat up!

A2qfi...Another from a 60+ year old that has no point of view from another's perspective...what is it with some! Odurless? oh that makes it ok then...Thank god Carbon monoxide Smells to hell! Thank goodness that Rohypnol smells of strawberrys...What's happened has happened...and it's happened for a reason...And it wasn't 1 person 11 cannot mean it was nothing to them! end of story

trident staines
 

No it wasn't retracting the slats to teach the Captain a lesson it was a brow beaten young first officer who made a mistake. Saw the printed read out of the Flt recorder in the "readout room "at base showing the slats were selected up not the gear it was very sorry reading and it not only affected aircrew but the people who signed for the "Check A"done the previous evening as a Stall recovery check was part of the check,it did bring about at least 1 nervous break down and several suspensions until all were exonerated weeks later by the board of enquiry
sorry about the tirade but the" mechs "were friends and workmates of mine