I suspect that the monotone "Brace Brace" and evident complete lack of any passenger control on the part of the FAs didn't do much to help matters.

The crew were chanting this as passengers started to clap - I started to chuckle while watching it. It completely failed to convey any kind of importance, yet alone urgency or danger, in its delivery.

Who knows what information the pilots were privy to; but it seemed there was very little time in-between the remaining engine being shutdown after the aircraft came to a stop, and the order to evacuate being given. In my mind's eye, I could see the Emergency Evacuation checklist being actioned; after the engine was shutdown, there were the three dings, then the command to evacuate. I could not see evidence of smoke or reduced visibility in the cabin at any point in the video (sure there was haze/smoke in the other video) that showed the start of the evacuation.

Why the unseemly haste?? The only suspicion that comes to mind is that poor information was conveyed to the pilots.

I'd be very embarrassed if I were in the safety/emergency procedures training department of JetBlue. Something very unsatisfactory transpired on this occasion.

But, hell, no one was hurt this time, so it can hopefully be used to fast-track changes in procedure to plug glaring holes in their system before somebody does get hurt.

Minor injuries are common during an evacuation. Four on this occasion, reportedly.

Well it would help if we as passengers in steerage could actually get into a brace position.
The safety card "helpfully" shows a position one is totally unable to get to as the the seat in front of you is a matter of a foot away.
So not surprisingly passengers don't read/pay attention anymore to this rubbish.

At the end of the day, I am sure that many will agree that, a landing that we can all walk away from, is a good landing. And great work to the crew involved for making such an act happen. No loss of lives + am sure the "injuries" might have been over hyped ie. a buns burnt from sliding down the shoot could count for an injury? (legally that is... might be a lawyers/legal thing)

Not to mention falling bags on heads when opening baggage compartments (which is pretty much a must avoid too, like, using mobile phones to take videos in an emergency!) yeap - it could all count for an injury.... any excuse to make future claims eh? Anyway..

These are trying times for the aviation industry IMHO, and if you would look at what happened from the Satire news site on the MH131 (FAKE) case, we can see how the public just got it wrong, even when there really was nothing wrong.

Many have already spoken on why oxygen masks don't automatically deploy and how it's merely for rapid decompression etc so won't touch on it, but yes, will most definitely want to review the actions to help improve my own CRM knowledge -- esp the coordination between the flight deck, the cabin, the controller, the company and the customers! Believe there might have been a break in the chain somewhere but, was not there, don't have the data, so can't comment. What we read in books is one thing, having the variables from real-life stories, make it even more dynamic for learning + self improvement.

Am pretty much interested to know why the 2nd engine failed and/or caught fire too! Also, the crew's actions leading up to it. Leaving out the whole pandemonium inside the cabin aside. That, we can leave to the media to get ratings.

Here's the classic 'I hoid a bang and I knew we wuz gonna die' tabloid style news item on the incident from CNN:

JetBlue passengers endure scary emergency landing - CNN.com

I'm very hesitant to second guess the crew given the good result of the safe return and evac. These days any decision you make will be criticized by the geniuses on the ground here and elsewhere.

Fortunately, the only place I've ever made the evac call is in the simulator.

Where do you get the idea that both engines failed ?

Oh, you know what he means, Dave.

One thing I am curious about: Are US carriers prohibited from unlocking the cockpit door when they have an emergency?
That door is a true CRM killer. Direct communication could have stopped them from evacuating the aircraft.

Unlock is on top of my to do list when something serious happens.

"YOU CAN HEAR BABIES CRYING"

Hardly indicative of an emergency, I've heard babies crying on any flight where babies were being transported.

I'd rather Brace
 

I am no expert, but what if the engine suffered an partially contained failure, with shrapnel that may latently affect AC control ? Engine failures are so rare, I 'd rather brace unnecessarily than wear a spinal "brace" for the rest of my life .....

oxygen masks
 

Again, I am no aviation expert, but I think in this situation, deployment of the masks is not a bad thing ( except from an economic viewpoint).
Firstly, with such thick smoke, there is considerable risk of passenger panic, with its safety impact. Many people associate oxygen with something that helps the body to survive. In this sense the presence of these masks can help allay anxiety.

Secondly, with such amount of smoke, there is a chance that some passengers with lung diseases such as asthma may get bronchospasm (tightening of the respiratory airways). In this situation, the extra oxygen may actually be of medical help.

No, the oxygen mask does not supply pure oxygen, they mix O2 with ambient air. So you tell the passengers to suck polluted air while they think they are breathing clean air.
They will be much better off breathing through some clothing/fabric. There is a reason why passenger oxygen masks are not in the smoke check list. I can't be bothered to look it up, but I believe Boeing advices AGAINST dropping the masks when you have smoke.

On two occasions had to decide between an emergency evacuation and continuing to gate. One I used all the slides, positive sabotage threat, and the other was smoke throughout the aircraft and we deplaned at gate.

Every situation is different but keeping the FA's in the loop is very important. Our airline procedure would be to not activate passenger oxygen masks. We didn't use brace for either because landing was not the problem.

On the first emergency I asked for push up stairs twice, once with dispatch and once with ops to avoid using the slides but they never arrived so had to make a last minute change with FA's to a full evacuation with slides.

It was a full B737 and as a new captain was relieved no one was injured.

Correct, ManaAdaSystem, and the cabin crew cannot deploy the passenger's oxygen masks, that's only possible from the flight deck. Unless these masks fell down by a technical glitch or heavy shock/vibration, there were more serious mistakes from the flight crew.

Boeing instructs crew to don oxygen masks, but does NOT include deploying passenger oxygen. (737)

I suspect you don't really mean that.

Cabin crew cannot initiate a mass deployment, but they can deploy as many individual seat rows' masks as they have the time and patience to do.

Any competent commercial pilot will be appalled after watching those videos.

Hmmm...Why?

then this crew must even be worse, because this would mean that they not only don't know their procedures, but they also loose valuable time to by doing very wrong things: You simply don't use oxygen masks in case of fire and smoke. Better use your time to make contact with the cockpit or serve wet towels.

This accident becomes to a true show off for imcompetency...

I am a pilot and have voiced my views.

I do offer the concept that smoke rises and putting your face near the floor might provide slightly better air to breathe, whether on a plane or in a hotel room.

I do hope a firefighter will add to this thought.

This does prove something though! Its better to be lucky, than good!

C Duct is the name of the reverse cowls. It seems that the panel in the photo is the one that cover the c-ducts latches, below engine. Must problably blowed out as a result of explosion.

(In this video, the one showed opened at 3:17
)

Oxygen masks deploy automatically when airplane is above 10,000 feet more or less. So for them to be deployed so low, pilots should use a dedicated switch which deploys them no matter how highh the plane is.

Deploying the mask, pilots must probable avoided pass affected by smoke. It was a very good decison.

only when Cabin altitude rises above 10 000 feet (more accurate: above 13 500 to 14 000 ft, depending on type).

It's very unlikely that they had an engine fire/overheat/smoke and a cabin decompression at the same time. This has never happened so far I know. It's physically not very likely, because if air is being blown overboard, smoke is less likely to happen.

Please take a look in this accident report at the possible cuase for fatalities. Note it was a an engine fire on ground!


PROBABLE CAUSE: "The cause of the accident was an uncontained failure of the left engine, initiated by a failure of the No 9 combustor can which had been the subject of a repair. A section of the combustor can, which was ejected forcibly from the engine, struck and fractured an underwing fuel tank access panel. The fire which resulted developed catastrophically, primarily because of adverse orientation of the parked aircraft relative to the wind, even though the wind was light. Major contributory factors were the vulnerability of the wing tank access panels to impact, a lack of any effective provision for fighting major fires inside the aircraft cabin, the vulnerability of the aircraft hull to external fire and the extremely toxic nature of the emissions from the burning interior materials. The major cause of the fatalities was rapid incapacitation due to the inhalation of the dense toxic/irritant smoke atmosphere within the cabin, aggravated by evacuation delays caused by a forward right door malfunction and restricted access to the exits.

Are you talking about an uncontained engine failure? This has most likely not happened on this occasion.

No. I noted to pay attention to possible causes of fatalities near the end: smoke!!

A couple of points...

The triple chime that repeats about every 30 seconds is likely the Lav Smoke Detector Alert and not the cockpit-to-cabin call. Note that it sounds on a regular cycle, including during the flare.

There was a possible turbine burst - based on the reports that schrapnel hit the fuselage and cowling parts were found on the ground. I did hear internally that a fuel line burst or was cut, causing the fire to take longer than expected to extinguish. In my opinion, this alone could have primed the Captain to tell the flight attendants to prep for possible evacuation. Add in the smoke in the cabin and I can understand the Evac mindset during the 13 minute flight. A lot was happening in a short time.

Once on the ground, the PAs don't seem to match what was being told to ATC. This is a head-scratcher. There is clearly a PA telling the flight attendants to take their stations, then the Easy Victor call. (That's our EVAC command and we all know it's archaic and confusing.) Once started, it's extremely difficult to stop an evacuation. Based on the selfie-video, I don't see any evidence that the passengers were panicking or opened an exit before the Easy Victor call.

All in all, kudos for the crew for getting on the ground quickly. The NTSB and FAA will have a field day with the video evidence of how effective the company procedures are.

Personally, I am quite unhappy with seeing the passenger response and lack of true command of the cabin. Seeing the lack of reaction from the passengers as they were more concerned with turning on their cellphones and taking videos tells me that we need to adjust our culture and make sure there is no ambiguity when the Evac decision is made.

Cabin crew could've been put on station after the stop completed.
Crew talking to ATC then advised that evacuation started.
Safest thing to do then is to avoid confusion and command the evacuation including the other items on its checklist.

no, the masks don't prevent smoke inhalation, they simply add oxygen, not ideal if there is a fire in the cabin.

if this was the British Airtours incident at MAN, then the smoke came from outside the cabin and the fuel fire rapidly spread, so no real relevance to this situation.

Your understanding of how passenger oxygen systems work is wrong. The masks work similar to nasal tube systems. They simply add a small amount of oxygen to ambient air. They provide no protection in a smoke event and for that reason both Boeing and Airbus caution pilots not to deploy the system in the event of smoke in the cabin. The oxygen canisters also burn very hot and can generate a light smoke adding to confusion.
In this case the pilots did not deploy the masks. The flight attendants deployed them manually in the cabin. This suggests that Jet Blue's flight attendant training is lacking.

You are right. My mistake. Thanks for correction.

I don´t know the oxygen confirguration for the Jet Blue´s Airbus A320 but for the standard aircraft there is no Flight Attendant Oxygen manual release for the Oxygen passenger mask from their stations.
For dropping "manually" the cabin crew should use the "manual release tool" for each passenger row.

So for dropping all the mask at the same time there is only a switch at the cockpit or the automatic mode due to the loss of pressurization at 14,000 ft cabin preassure.

The actor that was tweeting the events said the FAs were going through the cabin releasing the oxygen masks.

No comment on JB's flight attendant training...

I have no comments on whether the evacuation was necessary or not, but "a few bruises" and "flesh burns" are not the worst injuries you can sustain using slides. I've heard of spinal injuries (after faulty slide deployment) and broken limbs (in one case possibly caused by a person carrying something at the time).

Widebody evacuations often involve serious injuries or even deaths. The decision to use the slides requires careful consideration.

Absolutely, the slides must be used with much discretion. The CC is expecting direction from the cockpit so keeping them up to date on your situation and intentions is critical.

I would like to know how JetBlue briefs passengers seated at emergency exits...
For a lot of airlines these days there is no briefing at all, and the pictographic instructions just tell you, not to open the exit in case you can spot a fire outside.
So matter of fact that bloke may just have done what he was poorly instructed to do...
Alternatively indicating that someone forgot to lock the thrust reverser correctly... It happened before for fan cowl doors, it may happen for thrust reversers as well, but with a totally different effect. After all the airflow which produces the fan thrust blows through it, and the engine will probably not like a half blocked passage at climb thrust...
But the report will clearly indicate the root course of the engine trouble, so no need for speculation.

Two things to note here:

1. CRM seems to stop at the flight deck. Why is there no brief to the pax on what is going to happen and what they are meant to do immediately after landing - even if it is stay where you are until we tell you to do something. Why use 'secret' codes for evacuation - perhaps if pax were better briefed their response might be better. Even Sully's Hudson adventure was nearly screwed up by a pax opening a rear exit door unrequested flooding the rear cabin.

2. "instructions just tell you, not to open the exit in case you can spot a fire outside" There has been a recent tendency for cabin crew to tell pax to close the blinds before leaving the aircraft and for pax in window seats to close the blinds anyway to 'play' with various electronics. In an emergency these will be left down and after a crash that stresses the airframe the blinds may well be jammed shut - so it will not be possible to "spot a fire outside". Cabin crew turn off the lights before take off - they should also open all the binds before engine start until after takeoff and reopen any closed blinds before landing.

Not sure about the US, but in Oz we were instructed during the brief to tell them to only do so (window/self help exit) if they hear the command 'evacuate evacuate' and there is NOT an FA in the vicinity of the exits...

I always used to tell them what I wanted them to do if the exit was blocked/after exiting eg 'do not open the exit and do not let anyone else open unless it is safe' 'once you exit help the others away from the aircraft and upwind'

Ok maybe it was a bit more than required but it made me feel more comfortable and a number of them always commented 'I always wondered what you were supposed to do afterwards'

I am not sure Easy Victor is a secret code. At my airline it is a warning to the flight attendants that a evacuation may be needed. It is however not a evacuation order. If evacuation is needed the flight crew is supposed to make a clear PA to the flight attendants and passengers to evacuate the aircraft and include any needed instructions as to exits to use. I suspect the same is true at JB and easy victor is not a evac command.

At our major airline Easy Victor meant evacuate now.

You are incorrect in your assumption. At JetBlue, there are three PAs to choose from after the brake is set after an RTO or Emergency Landing:

Remain Seated = do not evacuate.

Cabin Crew at Stations = evacuation possible, wait for command.

Easy Victor - Evacuate.

If it is decided that an evacuation is not warranted after the "cabin crew at stations" PA, then it will be followed by "remain seated."

At no point is there an actual "evacuate" PA given, just the coded PAs.