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Opening a plane door mid-flight
- tyingq 9y agoThe repeated use of the word "stewardess" in the article is somewhat interesting.
- xienze 9y agoNot really. That's the word for a female steward. It lets the reader know they were females. Yeah yeah patriarchy, why are gendered words even a thing in 2017, let me save you the trouble.
- tyingq 9y agoFlight attendants have pushed pretty hard to get rid of the term over a long time period, and have been pretty successful with it. For reasons beyond gender.
- tgb 9y agoGoogle ngrams shows not a single occurrence of "flight attendant" in their British English corpus. https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=Flight+attendant%2Cstewardess%2Cattendant%2Csteward&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=6&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cstewardess%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Cattendant%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Csteward%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=Flight+attenda...
- vertex-four 9y agoErr, yes it does? ngrams is case-sensitive by default.
- tgb 9y agoGood catch, that's what I get for working on a phone.
- anc84 9y agoThere is a pretty good chance that the term "flight attendant" has been preferred for longer than you are alive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_attendant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_attendant says "By the end of the 1970s, the term stewardess had generally been replaced by the gender-neutral alternative flight attendant."
- danso 9y agoI was thinking the same thing. Because it seems fairly common to have male flight attendants, and not knowing typical BBC-style, I was curious whether the use of "stewardesses" was intentional -- i.e. To specifically refer to the attendants who were also women, or was just used generically. Yes, I know that the article refers to at least one of the employees as "she". But I'm picturing a gaggle of attendants intervening against the passenger.
- plg 9y agoSo it can only really happen at low altitudes, and at low altitudes, planes are designed so that an open door is not catastrophic. I don't know about you but I actually find this story reassuring, despite the sensationalism. tldr: if someone is about to open the cabin door mid flight, and it's actually going to open, buckle up your seat belt and you will be fine.
- zaxomi 9y agoIf the door is opened when armed, the evacuation slide will be inflated. When it breaks off the aircraft it can be sucked into the engine or damage the tail.
- imsofuture 9y agoYeah, the entire story was 'it was physically impossible for this dude to open the door, ANYWAY let's talk about what would happen in an entirely different scenario that also would be entirely safe'.
- Kiro 9y agoYeah, I don't understand the "If you’re a nervous flyer then look away now." disclaimer. I'm a nervous flyer and this made me feel more secure.
- BigChiefSmokem 9y agoI don't get it, so why can't they just put a $2 bolt lock on the release mechanism (the big handle thing) while in-flight and call it a day? What am I missing here?
- tass 9y agoBecause the door needs to be opened in an emergency, and being locked would prevent that.
- ccozan 9y agoAnd also is meant to be opened be _everyone_, so the mechanism has to be very simple too.
- Rebelgecko 9y agoThere are redundant systems (IIRC 3 or more) that keep the exit doors locked when the plane is at altitude. When the plane isn't very high, opening the door is less of a big deal.
- yborg 9y agoI am somewhat disappointed that the BBC has to resort to clickbait titles now. At no point is the aircraft door actually opened, the title is completely false.
- weberc2 9y agoTo be fair, they do describe what happens when a door is opened.
- jaclaz 9y agoYep, but the generic point on quality of current BBC stands nonetheless. IF I hadn't just read this sentence on this article: >Nevertheless, things wouldn’t have been quite so dramatic as in Iron Man 3, where all the passengers get sucked out of a hole blown in an aircraft. I would have never believed possible that it came from BBC, as well as - since one or more bottles of wine were involved in the incident - the presence of a stock photo of two bottles of wine (unopened/completely full) and a half full glass, resting on a wooden crate is something that would be maybe appropriate to a wine related blog.
- london888 9y agoThis is the BBC 3 part of the site rather than BBC News, so it's meant for a younger audience.
- jaclaz 9y ago>This is the BBC 3 part of the site rather than BBC News, so it's meant for a younger audience. Maybe, but I still don't understand why the younger should be fed with crappy "dramatization". And younger as they might be they should know how a bottle of wine is made and need not an illustration of it (that continues making little sense).
- weberc2 9y agoI don't dispute.
- RipRap 9y ago1148 hours EDT
- RipRap 9y ago1152 hours EDT
- weberc2 9y agoI'm curious about the motive. Was this guy just angry or mentally ill?
- Flammy 9y agoThe local article from the day of the event makes it pretty clear he was having some sort of mental breakdown. This BBC article has a lot more generic details about opening a plane door but the local article has a few more details about the incident: http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/florida-man-charged-with-interfering-with-crew-on-seattle-to-beijing-flight/ http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/florida-man-c... > Hudek, who was sitting in first class and traveling on a “dependent pass,” ordered one beer before takeoff and showed no signs of intoxication, FBI Special Agent Caryn Highley wrote in the complaint. > About an hour into the flight, Hudek briefly went into the lavatory, according to the complaint. He then went back out and asked one of the flight attendants a question in the galley area, the complaint says. > Hudek returned to the lavatory for about two minutes. After he walked out he lunged toward the emergency exit door, grabbed the handle and tried to open it, the complaint alleges.
- soccerdave 9y agoAssuming that this was a mental breakdown, what can we as a society do to help these people or prevent this from happening? I imagine that the consequences for this will be quite severe, and I also imagine that many people know someone that could have had a mental breakdown like this and done something like this.
- digi_owl 9y agoStress reduction would probably be a good start. Be it shorter work weeks, social safety nets, and/or less focus on perfection in (social) media.
- DanBC 9y ago> and I also imagine that many people know someone that could have had a mental breakdown like this and done something like this. This kind of dramatic event is very rare. You could focus some attention on early intervention services that work with people experiencing first episode of psychosis. Ideally those services would be all age, but pragmatically I guess 14 to 35 would cover most people. About 1% to 2% of the population has a psychotic illness. I think that prevalence, with the rarity of events like this is reassuring. You're far more likely to come to harm on a plane from a drunk or drugged person, or from someone dropping their bag on your head as they get something from the overhead locker. And this risk from drunk / drugged people shows perhaps another thing to target: phobias are very treatable. People don't know this, and can't afford the treatment, so they self-medicate with alcohol and meds and drugs.
- rdl 9y agoWhat is hard for me to believe is that other passengers didn't immediately respond to the conflict. Post 9/11 I assumed US passengers would use if anything too much force to respond to threats against the aircraft. While stuff like the UA fight club is happening too, once the aircraft is flying and something looks like it would either bring down the aircraft or cause a shoot down of the aircraft, a reasonable person would act to end a threat.
- DeusExMachina 9y agoThis is a very common reaction called "bystander effect". (1) Cialdini explains it very well in his book "Influence". Despite thinking that we are perfectly logical, we often look at others and look for social proof to decide what the appropriate behavior for a situation is. So, when nobody is acting, we don't either. This is subconscious, it's not a rational decision. This lasts until we receive instructions on what to do, which allows us to break out of the effect. That is why in streets accidents, instead of asking for generic help, it is better to ask people to call an ambulance. I suspect that the passengers that intervened did so only after the attendant explicitly asked for help. And even after that, the effect was probably still so strong that most passengers stayed in their seats. (1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bystander_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bystander_effect
- toomuchtodo 9y agoThis is why when an emergency is occurring, someone must assume command and delegate tasks. Not "someone call for help!" But point at someone and say "call for help now", point at someone else and say "do this action now". The more you know
- odammit 9y agoThey teach that in CPR training for the exact reason. Otherwise people just rubberneck to watch someone die. In this case the flight attendant should have said "You in seat 1A perform the eye gauge" Edit: s/stewardess/flight attendant Is stewardess "politically incorrect?"
- CydeWeys 9y agoPro-tip: The best weapon you have available in such a situation is repeated full-armed swings to the head with a laptop, aimed in such a way to impact using the corner of the laptop instead of the flat. That's the most effective weapon you're likely to have with you on an airplane. Someone is not going to be able to shrug that off like they will a wine bottle being broken over their head (which, in breaking, dissipates most of its energy).
- ccozan 9y agoI don't think that is a good pro-tip. Have you noticed lately that laptops are becoming smaller and lighter? I can't imagine an X1 Carbon doing anything to a skull...And hitting with the corner may be life dangerous, after all you don't want to kill the person, but incapacitate it. No, the pro-tip would be ... box the hell of the guy. Your fist/knee is a very reliable weapon.
- CydeWeys 9y agoDepends on what laptop you have. The metal 2013-era Macbook I have would make a nice weapon. Definitely more damaging than bare fist punching. Most people don't have boxing experience and don't actually know how to throw a punch that's very damaging.
- BrandoElFollito 9y agoUsing a weapon (any kind of, starting with a rolled magazine up to a laptop) is a much better solution. You are likely to break your hand if you try to boxe someone out of the blue, especially if you hit the skull. Kicking is a better option if there are no weapons. The melee option is not bad either in the configuration they had (not much space to show off martial arts skills learned in a J Chan movie) - with a few people on him he is not likely to be able to move. Source : 14 years of self - defence, had to use my skills only once, ran away twice.
- DanBC 9y agoA rolled magazine used in a thrusting, not swinging, motion might be better.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- 11thEarlOfMar 9y agoI am much more interested in what was going on with this guy. Appears to be a psychotic episode, and if so, brought on by what? In high school, PCP was a thing and would generate stories such as taking a wine bottle to the head without effect. Maybe it's just morbid curiosity, but I fly a lot and am as concerned about mentally ill passengers as I am anything else... If he had a tendency to behave this way, or a serious mental illness, was there any way to know before he boarded a plane? Did he take a prescription med and have an unexpected side effect? Or was it illicit combined with profoundly bad judgement? Or did he just have a really bad day and decide to end it and take a plane load of souls with him? Hoping there is follow up on this story with an explanation.
- rdl 9y agoA lot of the "crazy drug strength" stories today seem to be attributed to "bath salts", "spice", and other legal hacks (chemicals which weren't illegal to trade, provided not for human consumption, to get around prohibition of far more well studied drugs.)
- bboreham 9y agoWhy do they suggest the plane was at a low altitude? It was an hour into a flight from Seattle to Beijing; by that time they will be cruising above 30,000 feet.
- darklajid 9y agoWhere did they suggest that? I read it as "If still at low altitude, the door actually would open". In othrr words, because they were at a high altitude, the door didn't open and everything turned out alright.
- bboreham 9y ago"at a lower altitude, and with the door being disarmed as it was" The second of these two clauses refers to what actually happened; the first is counterfactual. But since they didn't put the facts about altitude in TFA the impression is that both are true.
- london888 9y agoHeadline is a bit misleading. Was hoping for a photo of chaos.
- chiph 9y agoIf the door had been opened by this lunatic and the slide then deployed (flight attendants normally disarm it when you taxi up to the terminal), my main concern is that it'd get torn off and be sucked into an engine. That'd turn a bad situation into a very serious one.
- TheRealDunkirk 9y agoJet engines can "eat" a lot of stuff before failing, and exploding, like in the movies. They're 3,000 degree incinerators with giant 30,000 RPM food processors in front and back. I'd be more worried about the slide wrapping over the wing, and fouling the control surfaces. Surely plane engineers have thought through this scenario though, and have some mitigation strategies in the design?
- greenyoda 9y agoFlight 1549, which famously landed on the Hudson River in 2009, had its engines disabled by ingesting a few geese: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Airways_Flight_1549 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Airways_Flight_1549
- TheRealDunkirk 9y agoDefine "few" and I'll define "a lot". ;-)
- jjuhl 9y agoThe guy wants to get off. I say "let him get off". Don't hand him a parachute and close the door (or land) after he departs.