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This person did not bother to read anything about the incident but is quick to blame "people's stupidity". There were plenty of details available before this wa

This person did not bother to read anything about the incident but is quick to blame "people's stupidity". There were plenty of details available before this was posted on May 9th, including the Wikipedia article. > If indeed lightning touched off a fire aboard Aeroflot 1492, this would be highly unusual No, the lightning did not set off a fire. There was no fire until it landed. See Wikipedia Aeroflot 1492. > there’s evidence that the death toll was higher than it should have been, thanks to the selfish actions of a number of passengers Fails to reference any of this evidence. All eyewitness accounts I've read (see below) say the passengers with bags were business class and they did not interfere with the evacuation. The state news said 4 days ago the evacuation was completed in 55 seconds (last link at the bottom). Sure, they are lying and this guy has better sources but he failed to mention where he got his "evidence" from. Eyewitnesses (a passenger and a flight attendant) say the back of the plane filled with thick smoke and started melting even before it stopped. The only people who survived in the rows 12+ were the two who rushed to the front while the plane was still moving. By the time the plane stopped people in rows 12+ were most likely already unconscious. Yet, TFA's author is smearing people as "stupid" and is 100% certain it was the stupid luggage people. https://ria.ru/20190507/1553334256.html https://ria.ru/20190507/1553334256.html https://lenta.ru/news/2019/05/06/saved/ https://lenta.ru/news/2019/05/06/saved/ https://tass.ru/proisshestviya/6403085 https://tass.ru/proisshestviya/6403085

arcticbull 7y ago
Anyone getting off the plane with a carry-on should be charged with negligent homicide or similar. 55 seconds vs 45 vs 35 could be the different between 40 dead and 42 or 44. One life matters, your laptop does not. Only one of these things can be restored from iCloud. Leave. Your. Bags. On. The. Plane. This apologism has to stop. Other than that very little you said is disrupted by the author — they themselves point out it’d be very unlikely the fire started in the air. They are a pilot after all. To your own point anyone who stops and grabs carry-on from the overhead bins while the cabin is filling with smoke and anyone past row 12 is passed out is criminally stupid. I don’t care if it took 55 seconds or 12, it’s not okay. How thrilled would you be if your grandmother died because someone couldn’t leave their laptop aboard?
- neuronic 7y ago
  Should they? There is evidence in psychology studies about human reaction to catastrophes such as this. People often default to habitual behavior, possibly because active decision making may be "disabled" as responsible regions of the brain get overwhelmed. It reaches an extent where people are entirely incapable of unbuckling their seatbelts because a more common and therefore default mechanism for unbuckling is the one you would use in your car. And that works entirely different from the ones in planes. https://consumerist.com/2016/07/12/why-are-there-seatbelt-demos-on-airplanes/ https://consumerist.com/2016/07/12/why-are-there-seatbelt-de...
  - FabHK 7y ago
    Yeah, they should be charged. The psychological studies you cite could then be entered by the defence and taken into account by the judge.
    - evilolive 7y ago
      I'm reading this comment and I'm thinking : you're absolutely right, they should be! Yet. I have been in plane on fire and I did grab my backpack.. I didn't really act consciously, and somehow I had rationalized the order "everyone, get out now!" as some kind of random evacuation exercises. (European in my teens back then and one of my first flights)
      - Xcelerate 7y ago
        > Yet. I have been in plane on fire Commercial? What happened?
      - UnFleshedOne 7y ago
        But maybe a few public court cases (even if everybody was acquitted in the end) would cause some people to remember not to grab the bags in the next accident. Maybe instead of pointless court cases, lots of publicity about correct behavior for the same effect.
  - 7y ago
wjnc 7y ago
Please, before I rush to judgement, in what way does taking a suitcase even by a single individual not create a few seconds lost for those further down the line? I saw the footage and my first thought was exactly that of the OP. Tens of suitcases means tens of seconds delay. In an incident that gives you at most a few minutes for evacuation at least some of the dead are attributable to the actions of those carrying suitcases. That is criminal negligence in my book. I now see another response quoting a Russian reponse indicating there was no congestion. Technically only the last survivor coming out could answer that question. For me, it seems strange that all the fatalities were instantaneous, while the survivors were unhindered. I'd imagine that with a broken up fuselage but not with a unbroken fuselage on fire. Perhaps the OP is overly emotional, but it's emotion pointing to something that is clearly wrong: people value belongings wrongly in case of serious accidents and the training should help people cope with that. I once saw a video of people trying to get their backpacks in case of a flash flood. They did not survive. Your property is basicly worthless compared to you being alive. We should learn to extend that to other people in case of emergency.
- twelve40 7y ago
  > few minutes for evacuation The evacuation was completed in 55 seconds. People in the back were stranded/unconscious/buckled-up before the plane even stopped. The eyewitness reported (see links in my post) he had to _crawl on all fours_ out of the plane through thick smoke through a completely clear aisle. People with bags were the ones sitting immediately in the first few rows, they did not cause a congestion. I would be pissed off as anyone if luggage grabbers killed someone, but it seems they weren't the "deadly stupidity" here? I mean, the dude just wrote the whole pompous blog post with a flashy title off an unlikely rumor?
  - wjnc 7y ago
    Well the OP kind of did worse. It's just a repost of the exact same text in earlier incidents.
  - neuronic 7y ago
    The unlikely rumor was spread on reddit as a fact for days. In fact I believed it until I saw further accounts and discussion. Admittedly, the real stupidity here is attributed to ME. I really need to stop caring about details/"news" before some time has passed to filter out the rumors and the garbage that people produce on places like reddit.
ricardobeat 7y ago
> No, the lightning did not set off a fire. There was no fire until it landed. There is video on YouTube from a passenger, showing the left engine spewing out massive flames, apparently before the first contact with the ground - the plane is speeding forward at a stable angle. > Yet, TFA's author is smearing people as "stupid" and 100% certain it was the stupid luggage people. In the other videos you can clearly see passengers going down the emergency slide with bags in hand. One passenger carries a bag so heavy it bends the slide halfway through and violently hits the ground - how is that not stupid?
- twelve40 7y ago
  The plane bounced 3 times and the flames erupted on the second or third bounce: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9_xh7aK2No https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9_xh7aK2No I don't know what video you are referring to, but the ones I've seen from the inside look like the plane is taxiing after the third bounce, which likely caused the fuel leak and the whole fire. Grabbing bags is stupid, here in this case people died for a different reason.
- p_l 7y ago
  Bags risk damage to the slide, which could prevent passengers from using them, as well as causing physical impact injuries to passengers below. There is no excuse.
  - LoSboccacc 7y ago
    exactly. "but this one time nothing happened" is just sloppy complacency there was this article on the hn front page not longer than a month ago about this very issue https://fastjetperformance.com/podcasts/how-i-almost-destroyed-a-50-million-war-plane-when-display-flying-goes-wrong-and-the-normalisation-of-deviance/ https://fastjetperformance.com/podcasts/how-i-almost-destroy...
- seandougall 7y ago
  > One passenger carries a bag so heavy it bends the slide halfway through and violently hits the ground Not to discount the stupidity involved in holding onto one's bags (which I absolutely agree is absurd, whether it's attributable to simple human nature or not), but that makes it sound like the slide was defective as well. Even a very heavy carry-on is relatively modest compared to the weight of the person carrying it.
soneil 7y ago
It seems a little disingenuous to say the evacuation was completed in 55 seconds. Over half the passengers perished - the evacuation was never completed. I think it'd be accurate to say there was a survivable window of 55 seconds, and 37 people managed to deplane in that time. It seems very convenient to picture that rows 1-11 were just fine and rows 12+ were SOL. But it does seem just as likely that there's a shade of gray between the two - could row 12 have exited given more time? or did the smoke just form a wall at this point. Of course, this is all based on zero information. If the accident investigators find a single body in the aisle rather than strapped into its chair, then it'd remain a worthy question. But even if it turns out those in 12+ really were sealed by fate, I think it's still worth reminding people of every single time - because next time it could be you in row 12. "ignore the experts, it's probably fine" serves no-one.
reubeniv 7y ago
Reading a BBC piece on it, it looks like the rear emergency doors were stuck also https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48175029 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48175029
- FabHK 7y ago
  The rear outside was engulfed in flames, exiting there would not have helped.
bipson 7y ago
Hm. Technically, can we even say the evacuation was "completed" when a considerable amount of passengers never left the plane alive? Have you ever unboarded a plane? If so, you clearly remember that every single hand luggage item, every single person on the isle causes congestion, even those in business class, right? I think it is impossible to state that "just the hand items that did not cause congestion were taken". Further, was there a magic curtain between the areas of the plane that were unaffected from smoke and fire, and the affected parts? Fire and smoke spread, right? If not, at least some passengers were catched in fire and smoke after the plane had landed. Some of these passengers might have been able to escape, given an open isle. Only considering the opposite (unlikely case) is ignorant. The ones taking luggage with them most certainly slowed down the process and caused a jam. Once you stop in the isle, drag a luggage item down the isle and down an emergency ramp, you slow down the process. Unless somebody behind you is also causing a jam, you are directly to blame.
gukov 7y ago
A few things played a significant role: - Superjet cannot dump fuel - Due to its weight the landing gear collapsed puncturing the wings - The sparks from sliding on its engines ignited the fuel
- prolepunk 7y ago
  Not being able to dump fuel seems like a pretty serious design flaw.
  - greglindahl 7y ago
    There are many common aircraft that can't dump fuel.
    - outworlder 7y ago
      Most can't. Including the 737.
gumby 7y ago
> This person did not bother to read anything about the incident "This person" (Patrick Smith) did read up on it but more importantly is a senior pilot and from even before then an aviation nerd. I've been reading him for more than a decade and he's pretty smart and thoughtful. It's unusual for him to comment quickly which implies he does see something to say. >> If indeed lightning touched off a fire aboard Aeroflot 1492, this would be highly unusual > No, the lightning did not set off a fire. There was no fire until it landed. See Wikipedia Aeroflot 1492. And indeed that's what he says: "[the claim is the the plane was on fire due to lightning but] it appears the plane touched down rather violently, resulting in the subsequent fire and crash. Planes are designed to withstand lightning strikes (see below), and almost never do they cause serious problems." (emphasis mine).
rurban 7y ago
Exactly. The "luggage people" might have even saved some lifes. "According to a witness some baggage fell from overhead compartments during the hard landing and passengers removed them in order to free the passage." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_1492 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_1492 https://www.newsru.com/russia/11may2019/luggage.html https://www.newsru.com/russia/11may2019/luggage.html

arcticbull 7y ago

Anyone getting off the plane with a carry-on should be charged with negligent homicide or similar. 55 seconds vs 45 vs 35 could be the different between 40 dead and 42 or 44. One life matters, your laptop does not. Only one of these things can be restored from iCloud. Leave. Your. Bags. On. The. Plane. This apologism has to stop. Other than that very little you said is disrupted by the author — they themselves point out it’d be very unlikely the fire started in the air. They are a pilot after all. To your own point anyone who stops and grabs carry-on from the overhead bins while the cabin is filling with smoke and anyone past row 12 is passed out is criminally stupid. I don’t care if it took 55 seconds or 12, it’s not okay. How thrilled would you be if your grandmother died because someone couldn’t leave their laptop aboard?

neuronic 7y ago
Should they? There is evidence in psychology studies about human reaction to catastrophes such as this. People often default to habitual behavior, possibly because active decision making may be "disabled" as responsible regions of the brain get overwhelmed. It reaches an extent where people are entirely incapable of unbuckling their seatbelts because a more common and therefore default mechanism for unbuckling is the one you would use in your car. And that works entirely different from the ones in planes. https://consumerist.com/2016/07/12/why-are-there-seatbelt-demos-on-airplanes/ https://consumerist.com/2016/07/12/why-are-there-seatbelt-de...
- FabHK 7y ago
  Yeah, they should be charged. The psychological studies you cite could then be entered by the defence and taken into account by the judge.
  - evilolive 7y ago
    I'm reading this comment and I'm thinking : you're absolutely right, they should be! Yet. I have been in plane on fire and I did grab my backpack.. I didn't really act consciously, and somehow I had rationalized the order "everyone, get out now!" as some kind of random evacuation exercises. (European in my teens back then and one of my first flights)
    - Xcelerate 7y ago
      > Yet. I have been in plane on fire Commercial? What happened?
    - UnFleshedOne 7y ago
      But maybe a few public court cases (even if everybody was acquitted in the end) would cause some people to remember not to grab the bags in the next accident. Maybe instead of pointless court cases, lots of publicity about correct behavior for the same effect.
- 7y ago

wjnc 7y ago

Please, before I rush to judgement, in what way does taking a suitcase even by a single individual not create a few seconds lost for those further down the line? I saw the footage and my first thought was exactly that of the OP. Tens of suitcases means tens of seconds delay. In an incident that gives you at most a few minutes for evacuation at least some of the dead are attributable to the actions of those carrying suitcases. That is criminal negligence in my book. I now see another response quoting a Russian reponse indicating there was no congestion. Technically only the last survivor coming out could answer that question. For me, it seems strange that all the fatalities were instantaneous, while the survivors were unhindered. I'd imagine that with a broken up fuselage but not with a unbroken fuselage on fire. Perhaps the OP is overly emotional, but it's emotion pointing to something that is clearly wrong: people value belongings wrongly in case of serious accidents and the training should help people cope with that. I once saw a video of people trying to get their backpacks in case of a flash flood. They did not survive. Your property is basicly worthless compared to you being alive. We should learn to extend that to other people in case of emergency.

twelve40 7y ago
> few minutes for evacuation The evacuation was completed in 55 seconds. People in the back were stranded/unconscious/buckled-up before the plane even stopped. The eyewitness reported (see links in my post) he had to _crawl on all fours_ out of the plane through thick smoke through a completely clear aisle. People with bags were the ones sitting immediately in the first few rows, they did not cause a congestion. I would be pissed off as anyone if luggage grabbers killed someone, but it seems they weren't the "deadly stupidity" here? I mean, the dude just wrote the whole pompous blog post with a flashy title off an unlikely rumor?
- wjnc 7y ago
  Well the OP kind of did worse. It's just a repost of the exact same text in earlier incidents.
- neuronic 7y ago
  The unlikely rumor was spread on reddit as a fact for days. In fact I believed it until I saw further accounts and discussion. Admittedly, the real stupidity here is attributed to ME. I really need to stop caring about details/"news" before some time has passed to filter out the rumors and the garbage that people produce on places like reddit.

ricardobeat 7y ago

> No, the lightning did not set off a fire. There was no fire until it landed. There is video on YouTube from a passenger, showing the left engine spewing out massive flames, apparently before the first contact with the ground - the plane is speeding forward at a stable angle. > Yet, TFA's author is smearing people as "stupid" and 100% certain it was the stupid luggage people. In the other videos you can clearly see passengers going down the emergency slide with bags in hand. One passenger carries a bag so heavy it bends the slide halfway through and violently hits the ground - how is that not stupid?

twelve40 7y ago
The plane bounced 3 times and the flames erupted on the second or third bounce: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9_xh7aK2No https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9_xh7aK2No I don't know what video you are referring to, but the ones I've seen from the inside look like the plane is taxiing after the third bounce, which likely caused the fuel leak and the whole fire. Grabbing bags is stupid, here in this case people died for a different reason.
p_l 7y ago
Bags risk damage to the slide, which could prevent passengers from using them, as well as causing physical impact injuries to passengers below. There is no excuse.
- LoSboccacc 7y ago
  exactly. "but this one time nothing happened" is just sloppy complacency there was this article on the hn front page not longer than a month ago about this very issue https://fastjetperformance.com/podcasts/how-i-almost-destroyed-a-50-million-war-plane-when-display-flying-goes-wrong-and-the-normalisation-of-deviance/ https://fastjetperformance.com/podcasts/how-i-almost-destroy...
seandougall 7y ago
> One passenger carries a bag so heavy it bends the slide halfway through and violently hits the ground Not to discount the stupidity involved in holding onto one's bags (which I absolutely agree is absurd, whether it's attributable to simple human nature or not), but that makes it sound like the slide was defective as well. Even a very heavy carry-on is relatively modest compared to the weight of the person carrying it.

soneil 7y ago

It seems a little disingenuous to say the evacuation was completed in 55 seconds. Over half the passengers perished - the evacuation was never completed. I think it'd be accurate to say there was a survivable window of 55 seconds, and 37 people managed to deplane in that time. It seems very convenient to picture that rows 1-11 were just fine and rows 12+ were SOL. But it does seem just as likely that there's a shade of gray between the two - could row 12 have exited given more time? or did the smoke just form a wall at this point. Of course, this is all based on zero information. If the accident investigators find a single body in the aisle rather than strapped into its chair, then it'd remain a worthy question. But even if it turns out those in 12+ really were sealed by fate, I think it's still worth reminding people of every single time - because next time it could be you in row 12. "ignore the experts, it's probably fine" serves no-one.

reubeniv 7y ago

Reading a BBC piece on it, it looks like the rear emergency doors were stuck also https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48175029 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48175029

FabHK 7y ago
The rear outside was engulfed in flames, exiting there would not have helped.

bipson 7y ago

Hm. Technically, can we even say the evacuation was "completed" when a considerable amount of passengers never left the plane alive? Have you ever unboarded a plane? If so, you clearly remember that every single hand luggage item, every single person on the isle causes congestion, even those in business class, right? I think it is impossible to state that "just the hand items that did not cause congestion were taken". Further, was there a magic curtain between the areas of the plane that were unaffected from smoke and fire, and the affected parts? Fire and smoke spread, right? If not, at least some passengers were catched in fire and smoke after the plane had landed. Some of these passengers might have been able to escape, given an open isle. Only considering the opposite (unlikely case) is ignorant. The ones taking luggage with them most certainly slowed down the process and caused a jam. Once you stop in the isle, drag a luggage item down the isle and down an emergency ramp, you slow down the process. Unless somebody behind you is also causing a jam, you are directly to blame.

gukov 7y ago

A few things played a significant role: - Superjet cannot dump fuel - Due to its weight the landing gear collapsed puncturing the wings - The sparks from sliding on its engines ignited the fuel

prolepunk 7y ago
Not being able to dump fuel seems like a pretty serious design flaw.
- greglindahl 7y ago
  There are many common aircraft that can't dump fuel.
  - outworlder 7y ago
    Most can't. Including the 737.

gumby 7y ago

> This person did not bother to read anything about the incident "This person" (Patrick Smith) did read up on it but more importantly is a senior pilot and from even before then an aviation nerd. I've been reading him for more than a decade and he's pretty smart and thoughtful. It's unusual for him to comment quickly which implies he does see something to say. >> If indeed lightning touched off a fire aboard Aeroflot 1492, this would be highly unusual > No, the lightning did not set off a fire. There was no fire until it landed. See Wikipedia Aeroflot 1492. And indeed that's what he says: "[the claim is the the plane was on fire due to lightning but] it appears the plane touched down rather violently, resulting in the subsequent fire and crash. Planes are designed to withstand lightning strikes (see below), and almost never do they cause serious problems." (emphasis mine).

rurban 7y ago

Exactly. The "luggage people" might have even saved some lifes. "According to a witness some baggage fell from overhead compartments during the hard landing and passengers removed them in order to free the passage." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_1492 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_1492 https://www.newsru.com/russia/11may2019/luggage.html https://www.newsru.com/russia/11may2019/luggage.html