Air Tragedy

[lynbrown]

Would the passengers have lost consciousness before impact?

[Peter Pedant]

It depends

where you start from and the rate of descent

Everest is 29 000 and you cant really climb it without oxygen
and this plane was travelling at 36 000 so loss of consciousless could be expected...
but would they wake up on the way down ?

well historically some have I am afraid.

I cannot recollect about Lockerbie - but I do remember the bits taking around 20 mins to come down....

and there was a Japanese plane where they video'd final messages to each other and passed around pens to write final messages in passports.

So I think we will have to wait and see

( sorry another non-mimsy reply )

[DTCwordfan]

3000 to 4000 feet a minute steep descent can be made, safely - that gels with the 8 minutes.....

[chrissa1]

What about the AUTO-PILOT?

[DTCwordfan]

probably off, Chrissa, and especially if not an immediate massive decompression. Pilots are trained to (i) bring the plane in under control (ii) once that is achieved, then to look to reroute into a nearby airport or, failing that, a flat landing area and (iii) only when they have the first two done, to communicate - inc the Mayday.

[chrissa1]

Thanks, DTC. However, why was it probably off? They had reached a safe cruising altitude, above the mountains, everything was fine, they didn't deviate at all, except downwards. I'm mystified.

[237SJ]

If they had a decompression and started to descend, they would have disengaged the autopilot. I haven`t read anything about this because I have been at the hospital all the time in recent days so don`t know the facts.

[DTCwordfan]

Yes, the autopilot would automatically be disengaged and the pilots taking over, a whole rack of alarms going off......

[rockyracoon]

God! I hope they were all unconscious :(

[delboy3]

There's been no reports of passengers making frantic phonecalls or text messages if they were conscious and aware of impending doom... which makes me think that rapid decompression was likely and that everyone including the pilots quickly passed out. Remember Helios Airways, and Payne Stewart?

[Gromit]

The voice recorder picked up passenger screams in the last seconds before the crash.

They were conscious.