Another Ground incident at Pearson Airport
 

Two planes clipped wing & tail. Sunwing tail caught fire. A Westjet aircraft evacuated via slides. No injuries reported. Toronto Pearson Fire on scene.

WestJet comments:
https://twitter.com/westjet/status/949440573642977280

...its Sunwing again...nuthin to see here move on...

Globe and Mail transport reporter points out it’s not the best time to go sliding when you are probably still in holiday clothes and looking to change in the terminal - would have been maybe -16C at the time?

It's Sunwing's fault that someone towed their empty (no crew) plane into another plane ?

Plane evacuated after Toronto airport collision - BBC News

SLF Video - Evacuate Announced at 0:24
 

Planes collide on Toronto airport tarmac, no injuries - Toronto - CBC News

Looks like the Sunwing APU area caught fire while the WJ winglet (and possible fuel vent) was making out like a marshmallow on a stick:eek:

From the CBC story, there are yet more reports of passengers trying to retrieve their carry-on items during an evacuation. I'm sorry folks. I know there are few practical ways to prevent unhelpful passenger behaviour. But stories like this infuriate me.

Transport Canada and airlines really need to do a better job emphasizing and enforcing fundamental standards of passenger behaviour. I think it's time for the public to wake up and recognize that everyone on board an airplane has responsibilities---including passengers.

If it were up to me, everyone witnessed trying to retrieve their bags during an evacuation would be charged under section 7.41(1)(c) of the Aeronautics Act:

Excerpt from CBC News:

'It was chaos'

When the planes struck, amusement turned to panic on board WestJet's Boeing 737-800, according to passenger Gustavo Lobo.

"Out of nowhere there was an audible crunch and the plane rocked slightly," Lobo told CBC News. "We looked out the window and saw that the plane had backed up into us. Everyone was a little shocked and kind of chuckling at the situation."

They didn't laugh for long, he said.

"Panic set in when [we saw] what seemed to be fuel spewing from the crash. After a couple of seconds the entire thing ignited and it was chaos inside the plane. People screaming and panicking all while the flight attendants shouted to try and control the situation."

Lobo took a video of the fire, and said eventually everybody slid down the emergency slides to safety, though the process was slowed by passengers who insisted on taking their carry-on luggage with them.

Ali Alagheband, also on the flight with his wife and 12-year-old son, said a "big ball of fire" lit up the right-side windows just seconds after the plane rattled with the force of the collision.

"Everybody was saying the F-word and screaming," Alagheband said, adding that he mostly stayed calm until black smoke seeped into cabin.

"The flight attendants kept saying 'remain seated, remain seated,'" he recalled. Fearing they'd soon be gasping for air and stuck on the plane, he told his son to stay calm and wear an oxygen mask if they fell from the cabin's ceiling.

"There was fire and there was fuel in that wing," he said. A mechanical engineer by trade, he could tell "it wasn't a good situation."

Nobody knew an evacuation was underway until a passenger stood on his seat and yelled that a door had opened, he said.

But as the crowd moved toward the door, some passengers blocked his family's escape.

"I was yelling at people reaching overhead to get their bags. It was ridiculous," he said. "I was literally yelling, 'Get the F off the plane."

Those overheads should be locked on landing. Pax should be given ample warning this will happen and if there is any small emergency item they may need they should keep it on their person. So passports, credit cards, keys, medication, phones, can all fit in a pocket. The rest can’t be used to risk lives. Once Pax are aware of this rule they can’t legitimately complain. If they don’t like it, take the bus.

Good call from the crew for an evacuation.

And probably an easy call with visible flames. This is what we train for, I agree, good job. :ok:

Pineapple frenzy...I completely agree with you.

But every time this happens, no authorities ever do anything at all about it even though they always have extensive videos outside the plane showing exactly who the culprits are.

Then there are lengthy "discussions" on the board saying oh well you can't legislate common sense etc. (as though what they are doing is mildly annoying and just violating a teeny little "law" instead of putting people's lives in direct danger.)

I doubt this incident will change things, though I wish it could. If the federal authorities in the respective country arrested and tried them and they did some time with a huge fine for breaking all the aviation laws, it would focus people's minds very quickly. But it is never treated like the serious crime it is.

I was on a chute situation many, many years ago in the Midwest. When the crew said evacuate we did.

No delays, no retrieving our stuff --nothing. Just one guy who was seated away from his friend kept holding up the line near the front standing in the aisle looking back down the plane behind him for his friend, like he was at a night club.

He was lifted roughly by two pax who came up and didn't even pause as they tossed him aside and he ended up arse-up in the window seat. He recovered quickly and got his tail out into the aisle and down the chute.

I don't advocate rough justice but we had smoke and a wing that was just about to erupt and sparks were flying. So 2 male pax "solved" the problem with him in an instant. I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often.

I suggested to a friend who is a captain that when on take off or approach there should be a locking mechanism on all the overheads and it is engaged when the landing seatbelt sign goes on and it's last call for landing. Then the only way it gets disengaged is manually by the crew after arriving safely at the gate. And also locked at push back until the seat belt light goes off on cruise.

But of course he said too expensive to solve the problem--it will take people dying when trapped by these morons before anybody cares. And even then I'm not sure they'd put teeth in the laws and prosecute.

It just seems to be a problem that has been allowed to go on forever and nobody seems to care.

People also don't realize that when they hold up the evacuation they also are putting cabin crews in danger! They are responsible for getting everybody out and a delay somebody causes could mean their deaths as the last trying to evacuate.

Hard to tell....do I hear engines spool down five seconds after the Evacuate call?

Meanwhile in US

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DS2-PWqU0AYSmnH.jpg

A China Southern 77W and Kuwait Airways 77W have collided on the ground at JFK.

Something winding down there...

But the flames were on the other aircraft and letting people loose on the tarmac doesn’t sound like a good plan to me. Especially with all the emergency vehicules driving around in the dark. Remember the woman killed by a fire truck in San Francisco?

ATC audio recording here: .

It seems like it took the ground controller a mental tick or two to realize what was happening, continuing to clear aircraft to taxi and standby to the problem aircraft after the mayday/evauate call. Possibly it is multiple ground frequencies on the same recording.

IF the Sunwing aircraft was towed into a correctly 'parked' stationary aircraft, then, yes it is. It's their fault whether it was a Sunwing employee doing the towing, or a 3rd party doing so under contract from Sunwing. The rules are such that you may outsource the work, but never the responsibility.

Who initiated the evacuation?
 

No apparent injuries among the passengers, But was it such a good idea to Evacuate 160+ people in the dark from an aircraft that was not on fire ?

There have been previous incidents where people have been struck and killed by Emergency Vehicles.

Did the Crew initiate the evacuation, or did a passenger panic when they saw flames coming from the Other Aircraft, and someone opened an Emergency Exit, everyone else followed ?


I have now Listened to the Audio of Post #8, 5 or 6 times, since I first posted yesterday.
At 0:00 seconds a male voice says "It's not our plane on fire."
At 0:12 seconds the PA chime is heard.
At 0:21 seconds the Captain comes on the PA "Captain, Captain, EVACUATE"

To be fair, you look out the window and see fire. It’s unclear if you’re going to be able to move away from the burning APU any time soon, you don’t even know it’s just the APU burning and your wing tank is full of fuel....

So at 32 seconds on the Audio recording above, West Jet 2425 says "Mayday, Mayday,Mayday West Jet 2425 we're evacuating". YYZ Ground answers " 245 standby. (with wrong call sign)"

Fortunately a more competent woman controller takes over..on Ground freq.

Westjet's engines. Part of the evacuation procedure?

The ATC recording in post #17 makes it pretty clear that the Westjet crew (at least initially) believed that their aircraft was on fire, and that they initiated the evacuation.

The cold temperature notwithstanding, I can't think of a better place to initiate an evacuation than right next to the terminal, with plenty of marshaling staff nearby to shepherd passengers to safety. The crew made the right call.

If you listen to the audio recording above, (post #17) at 32 seconds, the Captain (or F/O) says on Ground Freq,
"Mayday, Mayday, Mayday; West Jet 2425 we're evacuating.."

So the crew made a decision to evacuate based on information they had at the time. Not a passenger opening an Emergency Exit..

Every time there is a slide evacuation we have the same problem with passengers trying to take their luggage with them. It doesn't seem to matter which continent this happens on, or what passenger profile is travelling on the flight, a sizable percentage of the passengers will not leave their possessions behind.

Given that this reaction is unlikely to change, and no amount of fining dissuades drivers from speeding so we can discount that as ineffective, perhaps we need to get the manufacturers to look at how an evacuation can be made possible WITH hand baggage?

Two possible partial solutions to the problems caused by passengers who delay evacuations by taking items from the overhead lockers:

1) Recognise and allow for the propensity of passengers to reach for their hand luggage during an evacuation when determining the maximum number of occupants in a cabin. A benefit to passenger comfort, but not necessarily to airfares, could be a reduction in seat rows, with a corresponding increase in seat pitch.

2) Allow at least one hold bag on all fares and charge for anything more than minimal cabin baggage. Enforce the size rules rigorously, and demand payment at a high rate for anything too big that makes it to the gate.

The recording is a mish-mash of frequencies. Until Red5 calls, all the calls are on two different apron frequencies. When Red5 calls, he is on 121.9 and is responded to by a male controller. The female controller is working 121.65.
Apron gave the "pushback at your discretion" approval with Westjet directly behind the Sunwing aircraft. Discretion was not used it seems. The view from the Apron tower is limited but...

For the mentally challenged who feel the need to retrieve stuff from overhead bins there is a law in Canada which suits this act, "Reckless endangerment".

"An individual that engages in conduct that has a substantial risk of causing serious physical harm to others can be charged with reckless endangerment"

Whether a court would find such is entirely another issue!

I completely agree with you about the need to prioritize the preservation of life over the preservation of baggage.

However, the problem of applying 7.41(1)(c) seems to me (and I am not a lawyer) to be that in all these cases the aircraft is not in flight, its firmly on the ground and stationary,so that the regulation does not apply.

My emphasis on in flight.

Question for the legal experts:

(a) Are there laws which inhibit passengers in any public conveyance from actions which endanger the lives of other passengers (regardless of whether the action is to preserve baggage), and

(b) If so, would the applicable law be that of the country of registration of the aircraft, or be that of the country of location of the action?

You don't need to be a lawyer. Just read a few lines further on in the Act:

"(3) For the purpose of subsection (1), an aircraft is deemed to be in flight from the time when all external doors are closed following embarkation until the time at which any external door is opened for the purpose of disembarkation."

So ..... once doors are opened for evacuation, is the aircraft no longer in flight ?

Chances are the emergency exits have opened when people start to open the overhead lockers.

ATA chapter 52 covers doors.

ATA chapter 52 sub chapter 20 covers emergency exits.

So it is clear Emergency Exits are doors.

No! It says right in the regulation:
The aircraft had not reached its disembarkation point (the gate) when the evacuation commenced. Since the doors were opened for a purpose other than disembarkation, the aircraft is still considered in flight for the purposes of the Aeronautics Act.

Not sure the Emergency Exits are opened for the purpose of embarkation ever.

Simple SLF here. I have NEVER heard cabin crew tell passengers they should not attempt to retrieve bags from the overhead in case of evacuation. Maybe that should be emphasized by crew during the briefing, possibly saying something like

"If there is an emergency evacuation do not attempt to retrieve bags from the overhead bins. Time to evacuate the aircraft is critical for passenger survival."

Maybe a bit explicit, but drives the point home.

Edited to add: When I'm seated I stand up (yeah, I know) and look around the cabin, specifically looking at the distance fore and aft to exits. I also try and look at the persons sitting in the exit rows and judge whether they look capable of doing their job. I also look at the aircraft emergency card to understand whether the exit hatches in particular locations are to be inboard or outboard disposed (if you get my drift). I also look over the seat backs and decide whether I am willing to climb seats rather than wait in the aisle. When my wife travels with me I advise her (with little effect) that she should just forget her purse and escape in the event of an emergency. I tighten my seat belt (used to race Formula Ford and wish they were six point) at the application of power. I also, if possible, check to see that flaps are lowered before take off and intend to shout loudly if they aren't. Call me paranoid, but I want to maximize any possibility of continuation in case of an accident. Some of us really care and actually think about things. There are studies about who survives in accidents and one of the critical attributes of survivors is the desire to live and persistence in escape. Count me in.

Regarding problems inherent in evacations, how some pax behave or misbehave, what pax of all ages should know, and should or should not do, and being mentally prepared:

Interestingly, YouTube has barred anyone under their age minimum (18 or 21 or 50 or whatever) from viewing the video linked to on post #8.

Someone decided it did not meet their "community standards" - presumably because one can hear the "F-word".

The nannystaters apparently are more terrified a 16-year old might hear the "F-word" (surely he/she never has before) than that same individual -- one never knows when, for those 168 pax it was last night -- might suddenly encounter an emergency evac situation.

When that moment occurs, one must know what to do, to already comprehend the chaos that often accompanies emergency evacs, what happens when people insist on retrieving carry-on bags, and more.

Or would you rather bury your child, than let him or her hear the "F-word?" (or rather, to admit they probably already have - and surely would during the course of an evacation that goes badly.)

Sorry if a digression, but refusal to confront reality can be frustrating.

Could not agree more 389 - but censorship because of someone's not meeting their idea of "community standards" is common practice.

I have often said the evac should be a safety video that is played before take-off - one being the result of people stopping flow by grabbing bags - then the correct way with a happy ending. It would not need to be graphic but clear on the result.

Same for inflating life vest inside the cabin.

The airlines have made it very beneficial to try carry more on board and less in the hold. I have even heard an announcement to the effect 'no more checked bags or else the plane will be too heavy - carry on only please'. The regulators have turned a blind eye to the amount of weight in the overhead bins, and the quantity of 'missiles' in the event of a crash - laptops, duty free liquor etc.

I travel light and have a small bag that can easily fit under the seat or the overhead bin. I know I would spend less time screaming and swearing, and use that time to gather my goods and plan my exit. But I'm carrying one small shoulder bag, not a laptop bag, overnight bag and duty free bag.

The world has changed - you can do almost nothing without a drivers licence, passport and iPhone nowadays. Even an expired drivers licence won't get you on the next flight, never mind across the border. You try get a new passport in an overseas country. And the airlines are not known for really looking after their passengers after an incident. Now everyone is surprised that bags are a high priority in an event?

I watched the video - the flight crew is trying to get people to sit when it was pretty obvious it was time to bail? We've all seen fires like this consume an aircraft in seconds. If there was any time wasted, it was the 30 seconds or so that the crew finally decided to evacuate? Thats an eternity in a real event.

The only change I can see helping, is a 'can take' size bag and a 'must leave' size bag, and a whole lot of educating?

So you don't think the crew should take a few seconds to evaluate the situation before ordering an evacuation or even run through the QRH?

Did this one? Are you an airline pilot? How long does it take you to run through the Evacuation procedure?