[Closed] PSA: Plane crash program on Channel 4 NOW!

Front doesn't look a good place to sit.

"1st class" just got owned 😯

Seriously, keep the upgrade!

Front doesn't look a good place to sit.

"1st class" just got owned

Given that the massively overwhelming majority of flights [b]don't[/b] crash, I'll keep the flat bed and the champagne, thanks!

😉

(Upstairs for my next flight....they didn't test that, did they? 😉 )

If we hadn't had to move our holiday because our mum couldn't get the time off work, we'd have been on that Manchester flight :-0

Given that the massively overwhelming majority of flights don't crash, I'll keep the flat bed and the champagne, thanks!

And the ones that do, everyone normally dies....in the cheap seats you'll just be a bit dead and quite a lot more uncomfortable whilst you wait for it to happen!

CaptainFlashheart - Member

Upstairs for my next flight....

Penthouse eh? bling bling

pilots are deeeeed :/

dragging it out a bit though and as for that git with the dark glasses and 36 radios strapped to himself saying the bl%%ding obvious twice !!!!

That's the way I roll, Kato! Off to Vegas, baby....!

All well with you? Need to arrange a beer soon, dammit!

And the ones that do, everyone normally dies....in the cheap seats you'll just be a bit dead and quite a lot more uncomfortable whilst you wait for it to happen!

🙂

Besides, if I'm going to die, I may as well die in comfort. And with the port at the right temperature!

pilots are deeeeed :/

Well we've got to make sure they have the highest incentive to not hit the ground!

The reason I did my degree was to become a crash investigator. Kind of changed career tracks though...regretting that now 🙁

For the record I always sit above the wing box. We'll see if that is a wise choice in a bit when the results come in.

pilots are deeeeed :/

well the cabin came off but it was pretty well intact - who knows. I've helped rip apart an airliner (and partially detonate it too). The nose to the first set of doors is utterly, amazingly strong. It separated there because it has no give in it - the forces would have beens sent back to the rest of the fuselage. Even if you look back at Lockerbie where a plane came apart explosively and fell to earth - the cockpit is pretty much all together.

The next tough bit is a big circular girder around the fusilage where the wings attach.

I don't whether its healthier to be where the structure around you is crumpling and tearing and absorbing shock - or rock solid and passing that impact straight to you.

The crash itself was a bit less spectacular than expected. Reminded me of that 50s film where they blow up a train..

Anyway this has all been done before - they did it for Madagascar 2.

The crash itself was a bit less spectacular than expected.

it was intended to be - it needed to be survivable to be useful

In the DC10 that crashed at Sioux City due to engine failure taking out the hydraulics the crew +1 passenger who was a DC10 instructor and was helping them all survived despite the aircraft doing a cartwheel when a wing dug into the grass at the last moment.

andyl - Member

For the record I always sit above the wing box. We'll see if that is a wise choice in a bit when the results come in.

It would appear you would sustain minor injuries - I'm Booking Seat 21A next time

I'm going to stick with between the wings.

Watch out for fires and flying undercarriage tho.

In between the wings with the burny-hot engines and all that fuel??? I'm just gonna walk up n down the aisle and hope for the best

I'm going to stick with between the wings.

frankly its academic - what shocked me when we detonated our fuselage - luggage, everything the plane is constructed of is is fire proof and self extinguishing. Clothes and bags - burn like fury, stick like napalm, pretty much impossible to extinguish thick, black acrid. Genuinely horrifying.

andyl - Member
In the DC10 that crashed at Sioux City due to engine failure taking out the hydraulics the crew +1 passenger who was a DC10 instructor and was helping them all survived despite the aircraft doing a cartwheel when a wing dug into the grass at the last moment.

You missed that the cockpit snapped off and was basically just an unrecognisable ball of metal with the three of them inside! And, iirc, they landed at something like 250knts

4 of them wasnt there? DC10 would have had a flight engineer. And yup it snapped off but they still survived.

Brilliant prog, anyone know why the Mexican Govt wanted it removing asap - how much more could they have learned if they had had days to analyse every detail.

Still astounded by how much we don't know.

Sorry, yup 4. Normal pilot and co-pilot on the stick with the Instructor trying to juggle the three throttles and the Engineer probably spending most of the flight shitting himself!

Brilliant prog, anyone know why the Mexican Govt wanted it removing asap

probably the film crew's location manager rubbed them up the wrong way (or didn't rub them in the right way)

Mmm thought it was like crashing a mk2 cortina and saying modern cars are/are not safe

Entertainment value only

I assume you didn't watch it from the start then? Same fuselage as a 737 - which makes it very relevant

727 wasn't it?

The real point was really about the actions and vulnerabilites of the humans, not the plane. But it was an exercise in demonstration / visualisation, rather than discovery. If you were serious about learning anything you'd need to crash hundreds of planes.

If you were serious about learning anything you'd need to crash hundreds of planes.

Don't confuse the engineering of aircraft with that of cars. It always amazes me how an passenger plane or helicopter from the 70's can still pass as not that dated. Unlike a car from that era.

1970 Bell helicopter:

[img] [/img]

1970 747-121:

[img] [/img]

1970 British car:

[img] [/img]

😆

Okay, there has been huge improvements have been made in avionics, engines and materials but the engineering behind the structure etc has held true throughout the decades with just more optimisation that comes with evolution and increased knowledge and use of computer modelling etc.

probably more realistic.

IIRC that one was a test of a new fuel designed to not mist up and ignite during a crash. Because they messed up the test the metal spikes cut the plane up differently and caused the fuel to mist and ignite. Had they not messed up they may have missed the result.

Wasn't that NASA test was generally considered to be a waste of time. Not really much to learn from un-survivable crashes, more important to try and mitigate against that kind of crash occuring at all. Its survivable crashes that are important - overshooting the runway - landing in the husdson. That kind of thing. The fuselage we used been scrapped after it had been in that kind of event - a nose heavy landing that had written it off structurally - nobody hurt but they got to play on the slides.

Think it would have been more realistic if it had actually had the engines under the wings. Concerned me that the engines were still running/ drawing fuel after the cockpit had snapped off? Guess the throttle wires had jammed on?

does happen. There was a brand new Airbus written off a couple of years ago during engine testing when the test crew ran all 4 engines at full power and it hit a concrete blast fence. The whole cockpit section snapped off over the other side of the wall. Apparently one of the engines ran for about 9 hours until the fuel ran out as they couldn't shut it down. Details are sketchy though as when you write off a brand new aircraft you don't want to publicise it too much.

The engines should just snap off in such an impact as seen there.

IMO just behind the wings is the safest place. Since over the wings means over the fuel tanks.

Too far at the back and you're in bother if it crashes arse first, and you've got an APU at the back which can catch fire also (although minimal risk). The front isn't great as shown by C4.

Also window seats are nice but should be avoided to allow yourself faster access to the aisle.

.

You need to find out which seat the black box is under becasue if thats the only bit they expect to get back you need to strap yourself to it 🙂

Yes, amazing that the engine carried on running - maybe because the throttles were intercepted by the remote control?

Also interesting to see all those control cables running under the floor. You wouldn't see that in an Airbus and that was one of the main reasons why AF447 crashed - in a Boeing the co-pilot would have realised that the junior pilot was holding back the control stick in a blind panic causing the plane to go nose-up and stall.

I have flown in some knackered old 727s quite recently, Okada Airways in Nigeria were using them until they crashed most and cannibalised the rest for spares. You can still see the donors standing near the runway at Lagos with their engine cowlings just empty shells.

In a real crash once the pilot realised it was going down, wouldn't he have cut the engines and tried to dump fuel? And would it have gone down in that shape or would he have tried to land it belly down nose up a bit to try to skim it - seems like wheels on that sort of surface were a hindrance.

As to sitting near the aisle / exits. I've a mate who skippers 747's for the World's Favourite Airline (one of his colleagues is on here as well, can't remember who, but I met him on a ride a while back and had a 'small world!' moment) and flying with him is an education. The more we fly the more blase we get typically. He knew to the point of counting how many rows forward and back to the exit doors, read the card in the seatpocket intently. Having been through the training on what happens if an airliner does go down, he was leaving nothing to chance.

You have a 1 in 30,000,000 chance of having a plane crash and even then you've a 50:50 chance of surviving.

But you have a 1 in 45,000 chance of having a car crash.

Also interesting to see all those control cables running under the floor. You wouldn't see that in an Airbus and that was one of the main reasons why AF447 crashed - in a Boeing the co-pilot would have realised that the junior pilot was holding back the control stick in a blind panic causing the plane to go nose-up and stall

No, the reason AF447 crashed was due to (almost entirely) pilot error. The lack of feedback between the side sticks was a contributory factor.

In general, I would choose to fly any other European carrier (even Ryanair) over Air France. They have a lax safety culture; use flight data recordings to discipline crew; and by all accounts the flight deck is very much a “man and boy" operation.

in a Boeing the co-pilot would have realised that the junior pilot was holding back the control stick in a blind panic causing the plane to go nose-up and stall.

You have a 1 in 30,000,000 chance of having a plane crash and even then you've a 50:50 chance of surviving.

But you have a 1 in 45,000 chance of having a car crash.

[i]means[/i] nothing to people though. Half of all the people you know who smoke will die because they smoke - and yet they'll still get nervous when they get on a plane (and bring back a box of 200 duty frees) 🙂

Its the evident safety procedures that make flying [i]feel[/i] dangerous - being asked to consider a crash every time you fly. I used to have an old 60s sports car. The previous owner had fitted a little fire extinguisher under the passenger side of the dash. Its surprising how many passengers were made nervous by that - the presence of the extinguished made fire somehow more likely.