Emirates 777-300 crash-landing at DXB

[Inquirer]

I've read through the posts above and I have to give it to Flanker2 that using the megaphone iso just shouting a command like one could see being done in that video might have been a good idea.
Would it have prevented people from taking things with them?
That is a matter of discussion indeed, but it certainly wouldn't have done any harm, so why not?
The megaphone is there: better use it then, no, even if it doesn't really bring anything extra.
If I may add a suggestion of myself: why no automated evacuation commands (possibly in the language of (most of) the pax too, then)????

That and maybe the idea to have those overhead bins lock in certain cases are 2 interesting improvement inputs, IMHO.

Its one of my personal frustrations in traveling on planes these days: the huge amounts of luggage carried onboard. You didn't see that 10 or 15 years ago, and quite honestly I am not sure it's an improvement to allow people to do that nowadays, not just for safety reasons like we see here, but also for many other reasons. OTOH, I admit I am guilty of packing everything in hand luggage too, so what to do about it?

*sigh*
How many loudhailors are there on an aircraft the size of a B777 you think?
The amazing amount of ..... 2
So what about the 8 other doors that arent covered then? (yes flanker, a B773 has 10 stations)
Cabin crew members have one priority only in an evac and that is: OPEN THE DOOR AND GET EVERYONE OUT.
90 sec is the maximum amount given. The amount of time to unstrap from your seat, check outside conditions, open the door and wait for the slide to inflate is roughly 20 seconds. you dont want to extend that by moving from your door to collect a megaphone and then shout something. By that time everyone is already and moving, shouting. You can just as much try and have a conversation with the toilet door. In the mean time the clock is ticking and no-one is protecting the door from being opened by a passenger

But hey what do I know, you guys are clearly the experts in my field

NOT even pretendending I am an aviation evacuation expert, just saying that even as there are only 2 megaphones available, then by all means use them!
Not using something which is hanging there and which would have helped carry the message is not the very best practice, IMHO, even though it wouldn't have made a material impact, I am pretty sure.
Noting to do with being an expert or not, but once again, you demonstrate here that you are overly obsessed with the professional status of people, and add weight to their suggestion depending that status. "Experts" aren't always perfect either and outsiders can make valid points to improve things further too, you know, and this seems to be one: use voice amplifying tools whenever possible. It's a basic rule in case of evacuation of loud factory floors too, BTW.

I say this not to degrade the performance of this particular crew or the profession you want to represent here as a whole, but to point out that things might have been done even better than they were, with exactly the same available resources even!

Back to topic: do we already know WHY they ended up in this situation in the first place????

[Inquirer]

Automated evacuation commands should be a given on a 200 million USD jet.
Sometimes pax are asleep and they shouldn't have to figure out by themselves that something happened and that people are evacuating the aicraft after seeing the last people run to the exits.
In English and local languages please.

About the locks, I think that it's a good idea, as long as pax know about it beforehand as part of the safety demo or something. This way they won't put valuables in there and keep them handy.
The technical execution is a bit more complicated, as overhead bins are just a series of hanging racks.
A completely mecanical solution would require an overhead bin redesign.
An electrical solution would require electrical wiring or integrated batteries that need replacing or charging.
Power is already coming to the personal lighting units, so all you need is light wiring that sends the impulses.
It can be done affordably and it would add to safety as overhead bins are known to open by themselves in crashes, with contents dropping on the pax. A lock would prevent that.

I think you forget that there is no electrical power on the A/C anymore during such an event. So the automatic evacuation command you can forget. The same for the locking system on the bins. The power for the PSU's is lost when the electrical power is gone. Thus the only way to keep the bins locked is to supply power via battery packs. This is possible but will require testing each so many hours and replacement each so many hours, bringing a big maintenance cost with them + it makes the A/C heavier which increases fuel use.

Not an electrical engineer either, but you can also design a system which needs electricity to UNLOCK, thus staying firmly locked whenever the electricity is lost: think your car's door lock for instance: cutting the electricity from your car doesn't open your doors and lowers your windows, luckily, or thieves would long be using that technique!

[sean1982]

I've read through the posts above and I have to give it to Flanker2 that using the megaphone iso just shouting a command like one could see being done in that video might have been a good idea.
Would it have prevented people from taking things with them?
That is a matter of discussion indeed, but it certainly wouldn't have done any harm, so why not?
The megaphone is there: better use it then, no, even if it doesn't really bring anything extra.
If I may add a suggestion of myself: why no automated evacuation commands (possibly in the language of (most of) the pax too, then)????

That and maybe the idea to have those overhead bins lock in certain cases are 2 interesting improvement inputs, IMHO.

Its one of my personal frustrations in traveling on planes these days: the huge amounts of luggage carried onboard. You didn't see that 10 or 15 years ago, and quite honestly I am not sure it's an improvement to allow people to do that nowadays, not just for safety reasons like we see here, but also for many other reasons. OTOH, I admit I am guilty of packing everything in hand luggage too, so what to do about it?

*sigh*
How many loudhailors are there on an aircraft the size of a B777 you think?
The amazing amount of ..... 2
So what about the 8 other doors that arent covered then? (yes flanker, a B773 has 10 stations)
Cabin crew members have one priority only in an evac and that is: OPEN THE DOOR AND GET EVERYONE OUT.
90 sec is the maximum amount given. The amount of time to unstrap from your seat, check outside conditions, open the door and wait for the slide to inflate is roughly 20 seconds. you dont want to extend that by moving from your door to collect a megaphone and then shout something. By that time everyone is already and moving, shouting. You can just as much try and have a conversation with the toilet door. In the mean time the clock is ticking and no-one is protecting the door from being opened by a passenger

But hey what do I know, you guys are clearly the experts in my field

NOT even pretendending I am an aviation evacuation expert, just saying that even as there are only 2 megaphones available, then by all means use them!
Not using something which is hanging there and which would have helped carry the message is not the very best practice, IMHO, even though it wouldn't have made a material impact, I am pretty sure.
Noting to do with being an expert or not, but once again, you demonstrate here that you are overly obsessed with the professional status of people, and add weight to their suggestion depending that status. "Experts" aren't always perfect either and outsiders can make valid points to improve things further too, you know, and this seems to be one: use voice amplifying tools whenever possible. It's a basic rule in case of evacuation of loud factory floors too, BTW.

I say this not to degrade the performance of this particular crew or the profession you want to represent here as a whole, but to point out that things might have been done even better than they were, with exactly the same available resources even!

Back to topic: do we already know WHY they ended up in this situation in the first place????

This is ON topic. And im not talking about my expertise im talking about the expertise about every human factor specialist in the field who are all saying the same!
You CANNOT lose time searching for loudhailors while leaving your doors unprotected an not doing what you are paid to do which is GETTING PEOPLE OUT. What you shout is irrelevant. Its even irrelevant on a NORMAL flight. People do whatever they want and definatly when their live is in danger.

NO airline in the world trains his crews to get a loudhailor first. Sure, they are all wrong and you and flanker are absolutely right

[Inquirer]

*sigh*
How many loudhailors are there on an aircraft the size of a B777 you think?
The amazing amount of ..... 2
So what about the 8 other doors that arent covered then? (yes flanker, a B773 has 10 stations)
Cabin crew members have one priority only in an evac and that is: OPEN THE DOOR AND GET EVERYONE OUT.
90 sec is the maximum amount given. The amount of time to unstrap from your seat, check outside conditions, open the door and wait for the slide to inflate is roughly 20 seconds. you dont want to extend that by moving from your door to collect a megaphone and then shout something. By that time everyone is already and moving, shouting. You can just as much try and have a conversation with the toilet door. In the mean time the clock is ticking and no-one is protecting the door from being opened by a passenger

But hey what do I know, you guys are clearly the experts in my field

NOT even pretendending I am an aviation evacuation expert, just saying that even as there are only 2 megaphones available, then by all means use them!
Not using something which is hanging there and which would have helped carry the message is not the very best practice, IMHO, even though it wouldn't have made a material impact, I am pretty sure.
Noting to do with being an expert or not, but once again, you demonstrate here that you are overly obsessed with the professional status of people, and add weight to their suggestion depending that status. "Experts" aren't always perfect either and outsiders can make valid points to improve things further too, you know, and this seems to be one: use voice amplifying tools whenever possible. It's a basic rule in case of evacuation of loud factory floors too, BTW.

I say this not to degrade the performance of this particular crew or the profession you want to represent here as a whole, but to point out that things might have been done even better than they were, with exactly the same available resources even!

Back to topic: do we already know WHY they ended up in this situation in the first place????

This is ON topic. And im not talking about my expertise im talking about the expertise about every human factor specialist in the field who are all saying the same!
You CANNOT lose time searching for loudhailors while leaving your doors unprotected an not doing what you are paid to do which is GETTING PEOPLE OUT. What you shout is irrelevant. Its even irrelevant on a NORMAL flight. People do whatever they want and definatly when their live is in danger.

NO airline in the world trains his crews to get a loudhailor first. Sure, they are all wrong and you and flanker are absolutely right

Just because everybody is currently doing it one way, doesn't mean its the absolute best way forward forever, you know? With such an attitude no progress would ever be possible.
Besides, I notice quite a few official bodies suggest increased use of the megaphone, as per Flanker2's previous posts, so its not like it's such a crazy idea at all that he came up with, other than that it goes against your daily drilled routine.
I'm sure you are aware one of the human factors most annoying is its reluctance to accept change, right?
Having the megaphone readily at hand near one of the crew seats at all times might be a good suggestion to improve its usefulness on board in future because now it indeed looked a bit a silly underuse of this particular tool available.

[sean1982]

That aint possible either cause fire fighting equipment needs to legally be close to every crew station measured up to the cm. That leaves no space to have additional equipment near on most aircraft types

[Passenger]

And im not talking about my expertise im talking about the expertise about every human factor specialist in the field who are all saying the same! You CANNOT lose time searching for loudhailors while leaving your doors unprotected an not doing what you are paid to do which is GETTING PEOPLE OUT. What you shout is irrelevant. Its even irrelevant on a NORMAL flight. People do whatever they want and definatly when their live is in danger. NO airline in the world trains his crews to get a loudhailor first. Sure, they are all wrong and you and flanker are absolutely right.

Well, the onboard video proofs that all those worldwide specialists in the field should review their opinion that passengers will behave as they (= the specialists) think they will behave. What we've seen, is far worse then "they don't listen". Fact is that some Emirates passengers were put in extreme danger because other passengers behaved terribly stupid (because of stress and/or going into panic modus). Fact is that there was no intervention from the crew when passengers took their time to get their hand luggage: no P.A. call, no loudhailor call, no direct instruction, no knock on the shoulder. Only luck made them escape on time, and nothing else.

[sean1982]

And im not talking about my expertise im talking about the expertise about every human factor specialist in the field who are all saying the same! You CANNOT lose time searching for loudhailors while leaving your doors unprotected an not doing what you are paid to do which is GETTING PEOPLE OUT. What you shout is irrelevant. Its even irrelevant on a NORMAL flight. People do whatever they want and definatly when their live is in danger. NO airline in the world trains his crews to get a loudhailor first. Sure, they are all wrong and you and flanker are absolutely right.

Well, the onboard video proofs that all those worldwide specialists in the field should review their opinion that passengers will behave as they (= the specialists) think they will behave. What we've seen, is far worse then "they don't listen". Fact is that some Emirates passengers were put in extreme danger because other passengers behaved terribly stupid (because of stress and/or going into panic modus). Fact is that there was no intervention from the crew when passengers took their time to get their hand luggage: no P.A. call, no loudhailor call, no direct instruction, no knock on the shoulder. Only luck made them escape on time, and nothing else.

Sure cause they had time for that when they were trying to get people like you their ass out of the plane. Plenty of time to go: excuse me sir, would you mind leaving your bag. People behaved exactly as the experts predicted them to behave. The crew in turn did exactly as they were trained to deal with it. With quite some succes may I add. Everyone got out alive. Bunch of morons

[RTM]

After being off-line for a couple of weeks, I only learned that there has been a crash last weekend. I am happy everybody made it of the aircraft safe in time. Though my thoughts go out to the firefighter family and friends.

Sifting through the sense an the non-sense in this topic, I did not read all, a few things strike me.
First, though it is very early, and I really do not want to speculate on the cause of the accident, but I immediatly thought of the BA 777 crash at LHR...

Secondly, how the evacuation went... I think in recent incidents/accidents we are seeing a new developement in pax behaviour. Like in Las Vegas, people behave very selfish, and care more about their belongings then about the safety of others. That is something that has been developing in the last couple of years. If I remember correcty, this was not an issue in Toronto with the AF 340 or even the Hudson 320... Luckily, because in those accidents it would have cost lives... So I think this phenomenon is something aircraft manufacturers and regulatory organisations as FAA and EASA will have to look into this, and I am sure they will. I also do not think that the suggestion here to lock the overhead bins in case of an emergency is a bad idea. At least it is a constructive way of thinking toward a solution of this problem. Time will tell what the answer of the industry will be. Hopefully before lives are lost due to this behaviour. But it needs to be adressed.
Bickering about how a cabin attendant should do their work in such cases I think do not bring any value to this topic. Every "expert" has an opinion, and is pushing it, while the (to my knowledge) only professional at this level in this topic is being either ignored, or told he is wrong... Lets respect the expertise that is around please.

[Passenger]

Sure cause they had time for that when they were trying to get people like you their ass out of the plane. Plenty of time to go: excuse me sir, would you mind leaving your bag. People behaved exactly as the experts predicted them to behave.

When a flight attendant sees that passengers block the ail during an emergency evacuation, he/she must intervene immediately. One person at the door to shout "jump! jump! is enough when there is a more urgent matter that needs to be addressed. And when the experts indeed knew that this behaviour would happen, it's even worse because they then failed to instruct the crew how to deal with it.

. The crew in turn did exactly as they were trained to deal with it. With quite some succes may I add. Everyone got out alive.

Alive but not safe. Ten people had to be hospitalised, plus three with minor injuries. And with all respect for the crew: the evacuation took more then the 90 seconds from the safety certificate.

Bunch of morons.

Another one of those predictable reactions from you... All those who agree with Sean are experts. All those who disagree with Sean are morons.

[PttU]

Its one of my personal frustrations in traveling on planes these days: the huge amounts of luggage carried onboard. You didn't see that 10 or 15 years ago, and quite honestly I am not sure it's an improvement to allow people to do that nowadays, not just for safety reasons like we see here, but also for many other reasons. OTOH, I admit I am guilty of packing everything in hand luggage too, so what to do about it?

I don't know if it's the case with this flight, but as you can see more and more flights with no checked luggage included in the price, a lot of economy-travellers take all their luggage in the hand luggage to save the cost of the (extra) check luggage.
Furthermore this makes the hand luggage bigger, stretching the limits, and making it harder in case of an evacuation. If you only have a small purse, briefcase or backpack, it's easier to grab it and evacuate than with 55x40x25cm trolleys.

Sometimes such trolleys are put in the cargo at the gate, can't this be done with all such trolleys, bringing back hand luggage to smaller items and items you'll use while flying and bringing back safety when evacuating?

[Flanker2]

So what about the 8 other doors that arent covered then? (yes flanker, a B773 has 10 stations)

Sean, I'm not happy with this post because it shows your very theoretical approach and lack of attention.
Yes, the B773 has 10 stations, but I was talking about getting feedback during an emergency. Usually, the one organising the communication and seeking feedback is the purser and is communicating from one of the stations and within direct contact of the station of the opposite door.
As such, getting feedback from your station (ECHO? Echo! ) and the station across would seem a bit superfluous in an accident scenario, don't you think?
It's pretty obvious if you can just picture the scene. After all, you are the purser, you should be able to imagine better than me what it would be like to be the purser o a B773 in such a situation.

This was my post:

2. How do you know that all cabin crew and pax can hear the PA? Do you wait too get feedback from each station, ie 8 stations on the B777? What if one of the stations doesn't confirm receiving the instructions?

As for there being only 2 megaphones, that's a company decision.
In theory, you can carry 10 or 100 if you want to. Megaphones are quite compact nowadays.
It is people like you (cabin crew trainers, etc...) who are part of the decision-making process, so that explains how you end up with a big aircraft carrying only 2 of those. If you are not lucky and mx don't do their job, the battery may even be depleted.

Automated evacuation commands should be a given on a 200 million USD jet.
Sometimes pax are asleep and they shouldn't have to figure out by themselves that something happened and that people are evacuating the aicraft after seeing the last people run to the exits.
In English and local languages please.

About the locks, I think that it's a good idea, as long as pax know about it beforehand as part of the safety demo or something. This way they won't put valuables in there and keep them handy.
The technical execution is a bit more complicated, as overhead bins are just a series of hanging racks.
A completely mecanical solution would require an overhead bin redesign.
An electrical solution would require electrical wiring or integrated batteries that need replacing or charging.
Power is already coming to the personal lighting units, so all you need is light wiring that sends the impulses.
It can be done affordably and it would add to safety as overhead bins are known to open by themselves in crashes, with contents dropping on the pax. A lock would prevent that.

I think you forget that there is no electrical power on the A/C anymore during such an event. So the automatic evacuation command you can forget. The same for the locking system on the bins. The power for the PSU's is lost when the electrical power is gone. Thus the only way to keep the bins locked is to supply power via battery packs. This is possible but will require testing each so many hours and replacement each so many hours, bringing a big maintenance cost with them + it makes the A/C heavier which increases fuel use.

I'd like you to think about it again.
1. Do you really need AC for an automated evacuation broadcast on the PA?
2. Regarding the locking, why wait until an accident occurs to engage the lock? It can be locked and unlocked every time together with the seat belt sign coming on and off. This way, if an accident like EK521 occurs, the bins remain locked even if power supply is lost during an acccident. It would also serve the purpose of giving the bins a double lock in heavy turbulence.
Whenever the seat belt signs are on, pax have no business opening the bins.
The mechaism could consist of a simple solenoid actuator together with an electronic switch, so it could be simple to replace. A solenoid could weigh 200 grams, the added wiring 50 grams, the support about 200 grams. On the entire aircraft, the added weight could be about 50kg.
Yes, there would be a bit of added cost, but if lives can be saved...

[Poiu]

Most modern jets have an evacuation horn, it can be activated by both cabin crew or flight deck, so no need to loose time by calling other stations Flanker.
It would be very difficult to sleep through it Passenger.
It is powered by the aircraft batteries, so no AC needed.
I am sitting next to someone who survived a real life evac:
-everybody is pushing everybody, crew needed one hand even two in order not to pushed out
-babies were thrown out of the aircraft by their parents
-screaming leave bags behind by the crew was ignored
-some couldn't get out of their seats because they simply forgot to unfasten their seat belts
-10% got injured: broken limbs and burning wounds from the slides were most frequent

[Pocahontas]

If someone wants to take his/her belongings, you can shout as much as you like...
Let's not forget that FCM/CCM are not used to crashes, so nobody can tell how one would react. It is easy for us to comment on this forum, luckily we were not on the plane. As for every crash, also here lessons will be learned.

[sean1982]

Sure cause they had time for that when they were trying to get people like you their ass out of the plane. Plenty of time to go: excuse me sir, would you mind leaving your bag. People behaved exactly as the experts predicted them to behave.

When a flight attendant sees that passengers block the ail during an emergency evacuation, he/she must intervene immediately. One person at the door to shout "jump! jump! is enough when there is a more urgent matter that needs to be addressed. And when the experts indeed knew that this behaviour would happen, it's even worse because they then failed to instruct the crew how to deal with it.

. The crew in turn did exactly as they were trained to deal with it. With quite some succes may I add. Everyone got out alive.

Alive but not safe. Ten people had to be hospitalised, plus three with minor injuries. And with all respect for the crew: the evacuation took more then the 90 seconds from the safety certificate.

Bunch of morons.

Another one of those predictable reactions from you... All those who agree with Sean are experts. All those who disagree with Sean are morons.

Most single aisle aircraft carry minimum crew which means that you dont have spare CCM to intervene in the Cabin. In some aircraft like the A319 for example you have more doors than cabin crew (depending on how many seats)

On wide bodies you usually have more than the amount of doors (2-4 extra crewmembers) but they already have specific tasks assigned. Redirecting passengers, making sure dried up exits get people again. (On Aircraft with high premium seating the exits in those areas will dry up soon)

We are not meant to keep passengers safe in an evaction, that's impossible. The very nature of evaction dictates that people will get injured. We are meant to save them ie. Keep them alive. It took em 75sec btw.

What I call morons are people who believe themselves experts at other people's job whilst in reality they dont have a clue about the rules, regulations and realities that surround it.

[sabtech81]

Automated evacuation commands should be a given on a 200 million USD jet.
Sometimes pax are asleep and they shouldn't have to figure out by themselves that something happened and that people are evacuating the aicraft after seeing the last people run to the exits.
In English and local languages please.

About the locks, I think that it's a good idea, as long as pax know about it beforehand as part of the safety demo or something. This way they won't put valuables in there and keep them handy.
The technical execution is a bit more complicated, as overhead bins are just a series of hanging racks.
A completely mecanical solution would require an overhead bin redesign.
An electrical solution would require electrical wiring or integrated batteries that need replacing or charging.
Power is already coming to the personal lighting units, so all you need is light wiring that sends the impulses.
It can be done affordably and it would add to safety as overhead bins are known to open by themselves in crashes, with contents dropping on the pax. A lock would prevent that.

I think you forget that there is no electrical power on the A/C anymore during such an event. So the automatic evacuation command you can forget. The same for the locking system on the bins. The power for the PSU's is lost when the electrical power is gone. Thus the only way to keep the bins locked is to supply power via battery packs. This is possible but will require testing each so many hours and replacement each so many hours, bringing a big maintenance cost with them + it makes the A/C heavier which increases fuel use.

Not an electrical engineer either, but you can also design a system which needs electricity to UNLOCK, thus staying firmly locked whenever the electricity is lost: think your car's door lock for instance: cutting the electricity from your car doesn't open your doors and lowers your windows, luckily, or thieves would long be using that technique!

electrically unlocking wouldn't be a smart thing to do. if you experience an inflight power failure or a load shed, most of the times not even noticed by the pax, you might be unable to open the bins after a normal landing. The cabin systems (IFE, PSU's, galley's, ...) are 1 of the first things to be switched off in case something happens in the electrical system. You can always install locks, like on a car, a battery pack or any other mechanical release system but again more weight is added.

The only effective thing is teaching the people discipline again, which is probably hopeless

[luchtzak]

Dubai crash survivor defies odds with 1.000.000 USD lottery win: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-37038144

[sn26567]

The 282 passengers will each receive 7,000 US$ from Emirates as compensation for their lost baggage and eventual medical costs.

[Boeing767copilot]

Accident
- Preliminary Report -
In just less than a month

https://www.gcaa.gov.ae/en/ePublication ... A6-EMW.pdf

[quixoticguide]

interesting article

https://livingsafelywithhumanerror.word ... expertise/

[luchtzak]

One year ago: https://www.aviation24.be/who-remembers-th ... i-airport/