aviation cure-all
As a commercial pilot without a job, I know first-hand how frightened people are of flying. Most of this is based on misinformation: people generally don't understand the physics involved, and are fed by propagating media reports about the occasional incident or accident, thus they fear "them wind-powered people-movers."
First off, let's decipher those. An incident is an unexpected occurrence that damages persons and/or property involving an airplane without the intention of flight. You guessed it, an accident is something that occurs with the intention of flight, with damage to persons or property. In flight school--and this is the truth--we were taught that a person can approach you to ask for a flight. As a commercial pilot, you agree. The person walks out to the airplane and hits his (stupid) head on the flap while boarding, then needs stitches, but the doctor decides to keep him for observation overnight to collect some insurance and rule out that he didn't get anthrax, herpes, flesh-eating bacteria, or testicular cancer from the white paint on his forehead. You have officially been involved in an aviation accident: Damage to persons or property, involving an airplane, with the intent to fly.
Same scenario, but the moron wasn't going with you and you weren't headed for the runway: an aviation incident. If you decided to taxi your airplane from a tie-down to the hangar, then inadvertently crashed into the hangar and sent explosions rocketing through the twelve Leer jets parked nearby, causing hundreds of millions in damage, you've officially been involved in an "incident," and the media is never the wiser. But good God they will report all over those stitches.
I illustrate this because the average frightened citizen can Google the number of airplane accidents in a given period of time, and come up with a really big number. They don't realize that aviation adheres to such strict guidelines that almost any stupid act can fall into that category.
I was watching the news a while back, and my local station (Evansville, Indiana) decided to report on an airplane in FLORIDA that took off, then smoke filled the cockpit from some engine/exhaust malfunction. The pilot made an emergency landing that shoved the nose gear up into the cowling, but everybody was fine. The idiot reporter was standing at the airport in the middle of Highway 41 traffic with drivers of cars and trucks wizzing by while talking on their cellphones, changing the radio station, and steering with their knee. He was saying things like "Well, that was a dangerous situation," and "What can we do to avoid these disastors in the future?" I prayed that someone would at least clip him with a sideview mirror.
And Joe Passenger, who was just about to buy a ticket to see his mother in California--the ticket that would tilt the scales and open up the industry just enough for me to get a freakin' job at Southwest--logs off Expedia with frantic mouse-clicks in sheer terror, and grabs the keys to his 10-mile-per-gallon Expedition instead.
Thanks again, Fox News.
This sort of thing happens on an almost weekly basis nationwide. Worst-case: the pilot and passengers die. Oooh... "Three people in Kentucky are now dead," the newscast would announce, while five of the people who stop to watch it are plowed over by drunk teenagers who jump the curb. "Flying is dangerous." "Why isn't the FAA stricter?" "Someone died somewhere when a shark bit them while they were dangling bloody fish bait... this just in, there was an airplane in the vicinity."
Did you know, that on a worldwide scale, you are more likely to be involved in a terrorist attack then in an airplane accident? Of course, that wasn't the case before Bush, but nonetheless it is now. He could be just what I need!
Here are my solutions to all of this, and the media would do well to pay attention when it happens:
Solution 1:
There is actually a type of construction that has been used with storage compartments, also known as the baggage compartments in the back of large aircraft, that is literally bomb-proof. Where the cheaper, slightly lighter construction used now is completely shattered when an explosive goes off, this newer option simply inflates and contains the blast without destroying the airplane. Weigh the cost of the extra weight (a few hundred pounds) and the price of the new construction against all the security measures in place now for preventing a bomb from boarding an aircraft. Hmmm... ride in a plane that blows into tiny bits at FL300 (that's 30,000 feet based on the standard altimeter setting) every time a terrorist gets his luggage past the fat security lady who's pawing through your bag of undies, but pay a penny less for your ticket; or ride in a plane in the same situation that only "shudders" when the bomb goes off, pay a penny more for your ticket, and pay 5 cents less because bags won't have to be scanned or inspected. Hmmm...
Solution 2:
Ballistic Recovery Systems. These are huge parachutes that are currently only available for small aircraft. Click here to read an article about how it saved a pilot from a flat spin, which is nigh unrecoverable in any situation. (it's what caused Maverick and Goose to eject in Top Gun, and, *sniff*, why Goose died that terrible death)
BRS is working with NASA to find a way to slow and save a 747 traveling at 600 knots. What's brilliant about the BRS is that you don't have to have a stalled or damaged airplane to use it. If you're plane is flying ball-to-the-walls full throttle, straight-and-level, in full control, and then some foreigner or idiot redneck comes bursting into the cockpit with a pair of tweezers and a nail file, you can reach down, yank the red lever, and sit back at ease. The airplane will fire out a high-tension parachute from a cannon-like mechanism, then will actually slow the full-throttle plane down to a crawl. Even if the terrorist tweezes you to death, they won't be able to do anything about the parachute. No matter what happens, the airplane with float to the ground. It is rendered "unflyable," and with good reason. Take that scenario, and add it to all the other instances that an airplane's engine can't be turned off or falls out of control, and you've got a lot of weight on the side of the BRS. It should be included on every airplane. The 747 shouldn't have been built without one, but geez, that would have added a couple hundred thousand dollars to the cost of these quarter-billion dollar aircraft... that would have taken... goodness, a whole two weeks to pay itself off!
Here's a challenge: start an airline that doesn't have airplanes with nice DVD players or snacks of any sort. Just stock it with 737's or even Canada Jets that have bomb-proof luggage compartments and ballistic recovery systems, then advertise it. Guarantee to passengers that it is the safest airline in the world, and back it up with a few demonstrations. I'd buy a few shares in that company. Dear God, I'd feel safe if a 14-year-old was flying the thing, knowing that all they had to do was pull the "panic" lever and everything would be alright.
But instead, a stupid doctor with a private pilot's license does a 180 on takeoff in Florida, and the people of Evansville, IN are terrified of these "death machines from above."
That's as ridiculous as scrambling F-18's when a $20,000 Cessna 150 stumbles into Washington, DC airspace. The thing was traveling about 90 miles per hour. The F-18's couldn't even slow down enough to signal to the pilot without stalling, but they were damn sure gonna start up a panic in DC and all over the headlines. One ultra-conservative idiot congressman even said that they should have been shot down to set an example.
The Moral:
Airlines are stupid for not using Ballistic Recovery devices. They are also stupid for not using blast-proof luggage compartments.
The Media is stupid because, well, God made it that way.
The people are stupid because they don't care enough to learn anything, but care enough to believe any propaganda when it's flashed in front of them. (see previous article "what, the media, conflicting? no!")
The Conclusion:
I hate everything that isn't ME.
dfb
First off, let's decipher those. An incident is an unexpected occurrence that damages persons and/or property involving an airplane without the intention of flight. You guessed it, an accident is something that occurs with the intention of flight, with damage to persons or property. In flight school--and this is the truth--we were taught that a person can approach you to ask for a flight. As a commercial pilot, you agree. The person walks out to the airplane and hits his (stupid) head on the flap while boarding, then needs stitches, but the doctor decides to keep him for observation overnight to collect some insurance and rule out that he didn't get anthrax, herpes, flesh-eating bacteria, or testicular cancer from the white paint on his forehead. You have officially been involved in an aviation accident: Damage to persons or property, involving an airplane, with the intent to fly.
Same scenario, but the moron wasn't going with you and you weren't headed for the runway: an aviation incident. If you decided to taxi your airplane from a tie-down to the hangar, then inadvertently crashed into the hangar and sent explosions rocketing through the twelve Leer jets parked nearby, causing hundreds of millions in damage, you've officially been involved in an "incident," and the media is never the wiser. But good God they will report all over those stitches.
I illustrate this because the average frightened citizen can Google the number of airplane accidents in a given period of time, and come up with a really big number. They don't realize that aviation adheres to such strict guidelines that almost any stupid act can fall into that category.
I was watching the news a while back, and my local station (Evansville, Indiana) decided to report on an airplane in FLORIDA that took off, then smoke filled the cockpit from some engine/exhaust malfunction. The pilot made an emergency landing that shoved the nose gear up into the cowling, but everybody was fine. The idiot reporter was standing at the airport in the middle of Highway 41 traffic with drivers of cars and trucks wizzing by while talking on their cellphones, changing the radio station, and steering with their knee. He was saying things like "Well, that was a dangerous situation," and "What can we do to avoid these disastors in the future?" I prayed that someone would at least clip him with a sideview mirror.
And Joe Passenger, who was just about to buy a ticket to see his mother in California--the ticket that would tilt the scales and open up the industry just enough for me to get a freakin' job at Southwest--logs off Expedia with frantic mouse-clicks in sheer terror, and grabs the keys to his 10-mile-per-gallon Expedition instead.
Thanks again, Fox News.
This sort of thing happens on an almost weekly basis nationwide. Worst-case: the pilot and passengers die. Oooh... "Three people in Kentucky are now dead," the newscast would announce, while five of the people who stop to watch it are plowed over by drunk teenagers who jump the curb. "Flying is dangerous." "Why isn't the FAA stricter?" "Someone died somewhere when a shark bit them while they were dangling bloody fish bait... this just in, there was an airplane in the vicinity."
Did you know, that on a worldwide scale, you are more likely to be involved in a terrorist attack then in an airplane accident? Of course, that wasn't the case before Bush, but nonetheless it is now. He could be just what I need!
Here are my solutions to all of this, and the media would do well to pay attention when it happens:
Solution 1:
There is actually a type of construction that has been used with storage compartments, also known as the baggage compartments in the back of large aircraft, that is literally bomb-proof. Where the cheaper, slightly lighter construction used now is completely shattered when an explosive goes off, this newer option simply inflates and contains the blast without destroying the airplane. Weigh the cost of the extra weight (a few hundred pounds) and the price of the new construction against all the security measures in place now for preventing a bomb from boarding an aircraft. Hmmm... ride in a plane that blows into tiny bits at FL300 (that's 30,000 feet based on the standard altimeter setting) every time a terrorist gets his luggage past the fat security lady who's pawing through your bag of undies, but pay a penny less for your ticket; or ride in a plane in the same situation that only "shudders" when the bomb goes off, pay a penny more for your ticket, and pay 5 cents less because bags won't have to be scanned or inspected. Hmmm...
Solution 2:
Ballistic Recovery Systems. These are huge parachutes that are currently only available for small aircraft. Click here to read an article about how it saved a pilot from a flat spin, which is nigh unrecoverable in any situation. (it's what caused Maverick and Goose to eject in Top Gun, and, *sniff*, why Goose died that terrible death)
BRS is working with NASA to find a way to slow and save a 747 traveling at 600 knots. What's brilliant about the BRS is that you don't have to have a stalled or damaged airplane to use it. If you're plane is flying ball-to-the-walls full throttle, straight-and-level, in full control, and then some foreigner or idiot redneck comes bursting into the cockpit with a pair of tweezers and a nail file, you can reach down, yank the red lever, and sit back at ease. The airplane will fire out a high-tension parachute from a cannon-like mechanism, then will actually slow the full-throttle plane down to a crawl. Even if the terrorist tweezes you to death, they won't be able to do anything about the parachute. No matter what happens, the airplane with float to the ground. It is rendered "unflyable," and with good reason. Take that scenario, and add it to all the other instances that an airplane's engine can't be turned off or falls out of control, and you've got a lot of weight on the side of the BRS. It should be included on every airplane. The 747 shouldn't have been built without one, but geez, that would have added a couple hundred thousand dollars to the cost of these quarter-billion dollar aircraft... that would have taken... goodness, a whole two weeks to pay itself off!
Here's a challenge: start an airline that doesn't have airplanes with nice DVD players or snacks of any sort. Just stock it with 737's or even Canada Jets that have bomb-proof luggage compartments and ballistic recovery systems, then advertise it. Guarantee to passengers that it is the safest airline in the world, and back it up with a few demonstrations. I'd buy a few shares in that company. Dear God, I'd feel safe if a 14-year-old was flying the thing, knowing that all they had to do was pull the "panic" lever and everything would be alright.
But instead, a stupid doctor with a private pilot's license does a 180 on takeoff in Florida, and the people of Evansville, IN are terrified of these "death machines from above."
That's as ridiculous as scrambling F-18's when a $20,000 Cessna 150 stumbles into Washington, DC airspace. The thing was traveling about 90 miles per hour. The F-18's couldn't even slow down enough to signal to the pilot without stalling, but they were damn sure gonna start up a panic in DC and all over the headlines. One ultra-conservative idiot congressman even said that they should have been shot down to set an example.
The Moral:
Airlines are stupid for not using Ballistic Recovery devices. They are also stupid for not using blast-proof luggage compartments.
The Media is stupid because, well, God made it that way.
The people are stupid because they don't care enough to learn anything, but care enough to believe any propaganda when it's flashed in front of them. (see previous article "what, the media, conflicting? no!")
The Conclusion:
I hate everything that isn't ME.
dfb
posted by dfb on Thursday, July 14, 2005
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