If it was food poisoning, why would they fib to the captain causing him to tell center he had a "fume event"? Also keep in mind this little stunt caused rescue personnel to board the aircraft wearing respirators, according to interviewed witnesses, which probably didn't do much to comfort the already uneasy passengers.

What a screwed up situation this seems to be! I, for one, would welcome some ridiculous headlines from The Sun or whoever as has been suggested above. The only way we'll get any facts on this, it seems, is if the media starts badgering BA with questions.

With this situation, what is the conflict between passenger safety (need cabin crew in case of emergency while on ground) and the need to get cabin crew to hospital? Any thoughts on how this aspect could have been better handled?

I have strong opinions regarding how the aftermath should be handled!

As I understand the entire cabin crew disembarked in an orderly fashion, with baggage, leaving an aircraft full of punters?

It beggars belief.

There is no evidence that this event was not handled in the best manner; i.e. could what was done be done better.
Crews are expected to handle situations as they are understood. Manage the immediate threat to life - that of the cabin crew. The time of main threats to passenger safety - landing and/or evacuation had been passed; thus the 'present' focussed attention on the cabin crew.

By all means consider 'what if' scenarios, but do not attempt to base these on scant information, and particularly without understanding the crew's perception and decision process.

If you swap the big "Emergency" sign with a "Hilton" sign, this would look like a typical day on the job!

http://i.cbc.ca/1.3820101.1477396398...cy-landing.JPG

While I am not familiar with particular BA procedures, it is my experience that on such a flight, all CC would be on duty until the dinner service was finished. Then half of the CC would take their rest, and after another 3-4 hours, the second half of the CC would take their rest. They would then be all back on duty roughly 1.5 to 2 hours before touchdown to serve breakfast.

The fact that the dinner service was not yet complete before the PAN was announced suggests that all CC would have been in the main cabin when the s___ hit the fan. Again, if BA allows some CC to take their rest immediately and not participate in the dinner service, my speculations are incorrect. But in any event, the vast majority of the CC would have been in the main cabin during the entire several hour length of the flight, so if there was a real problem, it would seem to have had as its origin something that happened prior to the flight, not during the flight.

BALPA & Aerotoxic - April 2005
 

Aluminium Shuffler - please do everyone the courtesy of reading BALPA's April 22nd 2005 position on cabin air which when contaminated by toxic engine oil is either harmful or it isn't.

Then ask yourself whether it is more likely than not that BA, CAA etc can never, ever accept the 70 year old inconvenient evidence...

Proceedings of the BALPA Air Safety and Cabin Air Quality International Aero Industry Conference. Held at Imperial College, London (2005) - Aerotoxic Association

Many thanks and respectfully.

There were several passengers interviewed on the national television news last night stating that they were told to return to the airport at 4am the next day to rebook new flights back to the UK. They turned up at 4am to find the airport devoid of any BA staff. As reported by several passengers, not one - several. Are you still content to suggest that BA handled this well - from the pasengers perspective?

The F/A's apparently weren't on break if the passengers are reporting that they started rushing around picking up trays. And even if they were on break in the lower rest area gas did ALL if them fall ill and NONE of the passengers?

Food poisoning? Someone figured out which of the 400+ means the F/A's would eat? Or gave a snack to the F/AA's that emitted a fume??

As I have just posted on 'the other' similar Jet Blast subject... Is it normal for all the crew to have a tea/coffee brew up before pax boarding? Certainly on all my 'fam flights' tea or coffee was served in the cockpit before boarding. If the cabin crew also do that then to me there must have been something in the water.
Again... ready to be shot down!

1. The pax drank tea/coffee made from the same water, and they didn't get sick. This bad water must have been carefully crafted by a terrorist to only affect FAs.
2. Bad water doesn't take over your brain and make you tell lies about a "fume event". Me, I'd be in the loo instead of yapping with my coworkers trying to create hysteria or worse.

Anytime.

Not necessarily.

The passengers hadn't finished their meal when the cabin crew started collecting their trays in a hurry, so they may have been still waiting for their tea/coffee.

DaveReid- Is it not normal in the UK to have a beverage during your meal? Coffee off-limits until dinner is completed over there? Rough crowd! I find it hard to believe that with 400+ pax, nobody had something containing the same water before/during their meal. Or folks taking medications in the lavs, etc.

I would counsel against drinking water from tanks on any aircraft unless it's been boiled.
For cold drinking I want to see bottled water.

I refer, of course to bacterial contamination.

At 8000 ft water boils at 91C/196F. Only drink the beer!

core dump:

"Coffee off-limits until dinner is completed over there?"
Yep, that's about it, especially on the Continent.

And at home we don't drink coffee from pint-size polystyrene mugs.

The food poisoning/contaminated water idea is as good as any other speculation in this thread. Less speculative is the suggestion that people going to hospital with food poisoning are far more likely to be carrying barf bags than cabin bags.

It's safer to drink from the fuel tanks

Crew looked happy on videos posted by Canadian media outlets. They took they baggage, buttoned down their jackets and walked to bus on their own power.

Foreign Air Operators
Transport Canada is responsible for the certification and safety oversight of all foreign air operators conducting commercial air services into and out of Canada; for certification and continuing safety oversight of Specialty Air Service (SAS) operations conducted pursuant to the Free Trade Agreement; and for approving overflights within Canadian airspace and technical stops at Canadian airports.

Canadian Aviation Regulations CAR 705
Embarking and Disembarking of Passengers
705.222 (1) Subject to subsections (2) and (3), an air operator who operates an aeroplane to carry passengers shall ensure that all flight attendants assigned to a flight using that aeroplane are on board during passenger embarkation and disembarkation.