Ryanair Loss of Pressurisation 25th Aug

[Beausoleil]

But why is it felt that there will be an interest in this among the general readership, when in the repeated briefings given in the cabin at the start of flight there is such little interest by many of the pax ?

People pretty much know what the safety briefing says - it's reasonable to expect more information in a newspaper article. I at least now know what they mean by "pull the mask towards you" or similar.

Maybe they should finish safety briefings with "any questions?"

[Discorde]

pressman: a good point. The effectiveness would depend on the quality of the equipment (mask mike & cabin speakers), extraneous cabin noise and clarity of speech.

[overthewing]

A pa done through the oxygen mask sounds very poor , it might even scare the pax even more , it's barely understandable . have done it once and wouldn't do it again .

I imagine it would sound as if Darth Vader had taken control of the flight deck.

[befree]

Text message at Fl370??

Mobile phone masts do have a range of around 30 miles. The beam widith is likely to be wide enougth to include aircraft at 8000feet 20 miles way. The text message will also have plenty of time to get sent from the fone as it is not real time. You need a lot less signal to send a text than to make a voice call.

[speedbird716]

This tugging **** is wrong!!!!

If the mask is dangling there it should be activated.

How hard is a "tug" (thinking when the aircraft is plummeting a tug is like 400lbs)

As I understand the oxygen system, the masks drop and a short quick pull of the O2 mask pulls a key from the O2 generator system and starts the flow of O2. I know this system exists on the 777 and it is necessary to pull the mask before donning it. I am pretty sure it exists on the 737...the last time I flew AS they mention in their safety briefing to pull the mask down firmly before placing it over your nose and mouth. That is the reason for doing so.

I agree with those that state that if passengers paid more attention to the safety briefing, there would be far less panic...if the O2 masks drops at altitude, pull the mask, put it over your nose and mouth and expect a rather precipitous drop until the a/c reaches 10000ft (or lower).

speedbird716

[norman2008]

Do mobile phones and planes mix

Not wanting to add to the endless speculation on this thread but reading that someone sent a text message reminded me of an incident when flying to Canada. Flight BA085 London to Vancouver 27 April 2000. We where crossing Newfoundland when the cabin pressure decreased by at least 3000ft (measured using an altimeter) causing my ears to pop. The Captain came on the PA asking the idiot with the mobile phone to turn it off so he could regain control of the aircraft.

[pappabagge]

Out of interest..a Concorde "what-if..?"

Can any of you Wise Old Owls out there advise what the parameters were for rapid and/or explosive decompression on the Concorde? I can imagine that cruising along admiring the curvature of the Earth at FL600, and seeing the Gucci rubber jungle pop down must have been food for thought. 60.000 down to 8.000 takes how long in the SSC? Larger Alka-Seltzer tabs in the O2 generators? Anyone know? Uncle Dickie Brown of Shepperton listening (ex Birdseed Maintenance Control)?

Capt P Haddock (explorer extraordinaire)

[pappabagge]

His real name..

Just found out our intrepid explorer's real name is.. (drum roll)

Rupert Nigel Pendrill Hadow

if that wasn't enough, an anagram is.. (another drum roll)

Nerd Pulling Tripe Ad Howler

Funny thing, coincidence innit?

[Flintstone]

Originally Posted by norman2008

The Captain came on the PA asking the idiot with the mobile phone to turn it off so he could regain control of the aircraft.

In the nicest possible way Norman I very much doubt that the crew lost control of the aircraft because of a pressurisation problem even IF that system were affected by a mobile phone which certainly wouldn't be the case on anything I've ever flown.

Nice story though

[aeroDellboy]

I read this story whilst on a plane to LHR this morning (SLF). In the Daily Mail it seemed sensationalist and to be honest I skipped over it and did the Sudoku, then read the Independent later, where the story was covered quite well, balanced, no use of plummet, disaster or other such wording.

However, on page 34, 'The Big Question' - Is there any evidence that airlines are cutting back on safety? WTF...

The consensus seems to be that NO, airlines are not cutting back on safety, so why write the damn article?

I have never been in a depressurisation, and imagine it would be frightening. I was in a plane struck by lightning once, and whilst nothing happened, it was still disconcerting. The Captain made an announcement straight afterwards and reassured everyone. You expect the crew to get the plane under control and understand what they are doing before telling the passengers. FWIW I think the crew did a great job, and don't think it matters whether it is Ryanair or BA, when it comes to safety they all have the same aim.


I was on what appeared to be an ex BA Airbus in semi bmi livery... With a business class that we weren't allowed to use, bmi having decided that cattle class is all that domestic travellers need.

[llondel]

The one mystery of decompressions is why don't the pilots get an auto drop down O2 mask (just like the passengers) but have to 'work out' that they might need one (from a noisey alarm and a big red light) and then put them on manually?

If you're dealing with an incident and have a high workload, the last thing you want is to have the mask suddenly drop down in front of you and obscure your vision. If your first sign of a problem is loss of cabin pressure then it might not matter, but if you're dealing with other issues and the cabin pressure reaches critical a few minutes into the event then you might not appreciate it.

[oopspff7]

As a VIP piece of SLF,as the wife calls me.I cannot believe the $hit this ice-cube explorer has kicked up.Flying into Limoges on a regular basis,without disturbing the cows in the bottom pasture,I might add, I have always found the flight and cabin crews to be totally informative.Should you care to watch the cabin crew,you will see exactly how you should manage the oxygen mask.This culture of blame,fame and no shame makes me worry for my retirement and really worry for my kids future.

[Kyunghee]

http://http://www.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/00796/ryanair-emergency-l_796317a.jpg

Until the DT put me right, I was thinking Mt Everest was in the Himalayas...

And it seems Pen Hadow wasn't on plane at all. He was, according to his profile...

... climbing Everest solo, without oxygen

[777den]

http://www.aviationoxygen.com/delivery_above_25000.html shows examples of current crew O2 mask systems. They are large bulky things and not at all fun to wear. They have to be connected to precision demand-dilutor pressure regulators and have integrated microphones. Many also have integrated smoke goggles.

[captjns]

I was very happy to see that there are level headed unbiased individuals about.

Interesting read.

SOS and O2 aboard Ryanair aircraft -Times Online

I think that the discoverer of ice should do just that... keep his opinions to himself and keep on hunting for new species frozen H2O.

[jewitts]

I have a question. Was Limoges the nearest airport, or the nearest Ryanair base?
It seems a bit fishy that another Ryanair plane with a medical emergency on-board yesterday 27th Aug ...
BBC NEWS | UK | Leaking mushroom soup halts plane
landed at "Frankfurt Hahn", another place where Ryanair have negotiated landing fees?
It must be somewhat advantageous to land at an airport where you have a base, but for a medical emergeny surely it should be the nearest airport with facilities to treat the emergency. Having a wife with severe allergies, I know the importantance of rapid treatment.
Or is this just complete coincidence?

[Icare9]

Speaking solely as SLF, my requirement would be for the pilots to concentrate on getting plane to breathable air level, then ease off the descent to avoid too much ear damage. Of course they may have no knowledge of what caused depressurisation, from hopefully a small leak or window or worse still, a door. Once down to a breathable level they then have to find out whether they still have working controls and the rest of the aircraft is still intact behind them.
As a passenger, surely there was some indication of loss of pressure (noise etc?) then seeing oxygen masks descend would indicate to any sensible person that a pressure failure had occurred. grab the mask, pull to release oxygen generator and keep your wits about you. I'm sure a rapid descent will hurt, so I'm sure the four minutes or so to get to safe level will seem an eternity.
Seems as if a few passengers acted like headless chickens and in their panic forgot what they should do (maybe oxygen deprivation if leak was initially slow and near where they sat?). They then point the finger at anyone else to blame. I think this was a textbook operation by crew and I'm sure that if passengers were being sucked out one by one, no survivor would criticise the speed of descent!!
Perhaps the only improvement would be to have an automatic announcement whenever masks are triggered. That may have happened but not heard in the initial panic, if so then maybe set it to repeat continuously....
Just my view, good job by the crew to control the problem then deal with the remaining issues.

[baftabill]

Things we know

So, things we now know.

The incident was handled well by the crew (source - many professionals on this site)

Pen Hadow made some false statements which he appears to believe to be true, which MOL countered well. (Original BBC piece)

'Professionals' react very badly to Hadow's statements. s*** storm falls on Hadow and BBC - (much from this site, letters to newspapers etc)

Professionals are very angry, and sometimes quite abusive, towards passengers who don't pay attention to safety briefing. (source - this thread)

Many make direct link between Hadow's misunderstanding and 'not listening'. (no source)

Much bemusement from passengers that professionals believe that safety briefing is sufficient to prepare them for situation where they think they may die. (this thread)

BBC and several other sources write pieces about depressurisation (BBC NEWS | UK | What to do when planes lose pressure, Learmount etc)

So, the slightly bizarre consequence of this is that many, many people now have a better understanding of depressurisation, oxygen masks, and how 'emergencies' are dealt with.


One thing we don't know:

Have the 'professionals' who seem to believe that the 3 minute safety briefing will prepare ALL passengers for ALL emergencies had that dangerous belief shaken in any way.

Watch the Air Dolomiti fire to see how real people behave if not directed well. They may be stupid, but more importantly they are in a situation for which they have no model of behaviour.

http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/3...ug-2008-a.html

I went on a brilliant First Aid course for rugby.
The instructor said, "A child is on the floor, he doesn't seem to be breathing, what do you do?"

"Listen for breath"

"Good, but the wind is blowing, there's a crowd around all shouting, and you're hyperventilating because you think a child may be dying in front of you."

"Take his pulse"

"Good, but your hands are shaking because you think a child may be dying in front of you."

"Ah..."


I thought this was a brilliant demonstration of how our assumptions in the quiet of the training room will become useless in a real situation.


I'm confident that these issues are fully considered by the industry, but I think you do yourself no favours when you react so aggressively to passengers who don't fully understand.

Put it simply, in my opinion, if you believe that the safety announcement prepares passengers fully for emergencies you are a fool.

[lorel]

I have a question. Was Limoges the nearest airport, or the nearest Ryanair base?
It seems a bit fishy that another Ryanair plane with a medical emergency on-board yesterday 27th Aug ...
BBC NEWS | UK | Leaking mushroom soup halts plane
landed at "Frankfurt Hahn", another place where Ryanair have negotiated landing fees?
It must be somewhat advantageous to land at an airport where you have a base, but for a medical emergeny surely it should be the nearest airport with facilities to treat the emergency. Having a wife with severe allergies, I know the importantance of rapid treatment.
Or is this just complete coincidence?

Hi,
First of all Limoges is not a ryanair base but solely a destination.
Secondly, with the ryanair network you're all the time very close to a destination or even a base.
In my opinion, if time permits off course, it's preferential to divert to a destination or a base for several reasons.
As you can imagine when an emergency arises at your cruise level, let's say FL370 you still need time to get down. From FL370 this would take approximately 100nm. So any destination within this range could be suitable.
Besides that, some preparation needs to be done to conduct the approach. So an airport the crew is familiar with would actually expedite the whole process.
Maybe Hahn or Limoges were not the closest ones but they could have been the better ones for a safe and expeditious landing.

Lorel

[stator vane]

jewitts

as for possible diversion options---

whilst i am flying, i preselect my diversion airports--using a combination of distance, ability to obtain the current weather--(limoges has an ATIS on frequency 128.075), approaches available, (limoges has an ILS RWY 22), and of course my knowledge of the airport and local area. so, yes, the scales would be favouring limoges above bordeau, la rochelle, poitiers, clermont or toulouse-the only other airports i see in that area on the map i have at hand.

if perchance the weather/wind or visibility are adverse, i continue searching for a suitable airport within a reasonable range until i find one that i am satisfied with.

i've overheard too many emergencies on the frequencies to wait until after something happens before i make my diversion decisions.