Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

airspacemag.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 81 posts

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#71

Post by slavik81 »

naniwaduni wrote: post #44
bmitc wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes sense at first glance, but it's something I'm in control of. I was even thinking of this before, because the comparison is a little mismatched. I'm 100% likely to be a passenger when I'm in any plane, whereas I'm probably >98% likely to be a driver when I'm in a car. I'm not sure why I was downvoted, because I'm just stating I'd like to understand (data/studies) instead of people's anecdotes and opinions,…

Considering that ~half of collisions involve multiple vehicles, I suspect your feeling of being in control is a bit of an illusion.

My father always said that accidents tend to happen when two people make mistakes. Even when fault technically lies with a single party, it's often the case that both parties had a chance to prevent the mistake from becoming a collision.

For example, if a turning vehicle cuts off oncoming traffic, it could get hit. An attentive driver in the oncoming lane might see the problem and hit the brakes, while an inattentive or speeding driver might not react in time. The turning vehicle is at fault, but that doesn't mean they were the only one that could have prevented the collision.

There are sometimes events you cannot control, but a lot of those multi-vehicle collisions were preventable by either party.

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#72

Post by [deleted] »

nradov wrote: post #69
zipiridu wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC takeoff and landing are the most dangerous parts, so I'd be more interested fatalities per trip. An intercontinental plane ride would cover more miles than I drive in a year which makes the per mile stat meaningless to me. I think it would still be in the plane's favor but probably not as significantly. And in that case if you're a safe driver (healthy adult, doesn't drink or do drugs, doesn't speed, etc) it mig…

In many years the US commercial airlines have literally zero fatalities. You're more likely to die by falling in the shower. https://www.airlines.org/dataset/safety-record-of-u-s-air-ca...

[deleted]

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#73

Post by sklargh »

tialaramex wrote: post #63
throwaway0a5e wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Choice of weather conditions is within your control, just don't drive in terrible weather. Being a good driver does a ton to insulate you from the shenanigans of Equipment failure is basically a rounding errors but also within the driver's control since "flat tire at speed" is probably lion's share of crashes in that category.

Bad weather is certainly a factor in a lot of General Aviation accidents. VFR into IMC (Visual Flight Rules, ie you fly by looking where you're going; into Instrument Meteorological Conditions, ie you can't see very far due to low cloud or nightfall) kills a bunch of people every year. Some of those killed are IFR rated. In theory they know how to fly a plane when you can't see where you're going, but theory and prac…

This is a nice summary. VFR into IMC and pilot task saturation/distraction are such killers in the broad GA space. Literally forgetting the fly/operate the plane.

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#74

Post by sklargh »

nemo44x wrote: post #40
bmitc wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have personally never liked being blankly told that flying is safer than driving, because I’d like to understand how safe flying is versus driving when something goes wrong .

Things “go wrong” fairly “frequently” on airplanes but they are hardened for this with redundant systems and manual (as well as computer) overrides. You don’t hear about most of them but they are all logged and used for improvements. The main difference is when a car has a catastrophic failure there’s a good chance the people involved survive.

Sort of interesting how the edge of catastrophic failure has moved out in both cars and commercial aircraft.

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#75

Post by jfengel »

gumby wrote: post #5

Having been once in a aircraft-damaging emergency landing* decades ago I am surprised lap only belts are still the norm. There's a reason the crew has four point restraints, and I'd like to have it too. * I won't call it a crash since the aircraft made it to an airport and to a runway. We had equipment failure in flight so there was plenty of time for the flight attendants to review our crash positions, confiscate sh…

"Confiscate shoes"?

I'd think they'd want to make sure your shoes were on, so that you could walk safely over whatever debris was produced.

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#76

Post by fragmede »

tialaramex wrote: post #63
throwaway0a5e wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Choice of weather conditions is within your control, just don't drive in terrible weather. Being a good driver does a ton to insulate you from the shenanigans of Equipment failure is basically a rounding errors but also within the driver's control since "flat tire at speed" is probably lion's share of crashes in that category.

Bad weather is certainly a factor in a lot of General Aviation accidents. VFR into IMC (Visual Flight Rules, ie you fly by looking where you're going; into Instrument Meteorological Conditions, ie you can't see very far due to low cloud or nightfall) kills a bunch of people every year. Some of those killed are IFR rated. In theory they know how to fly a plane when you can't see where you're going, but theory and prac…

Eh? It's absolutely an option, from a technical weather forecasting perspective, to see that a storm exists, and to abort a particular plane flight before it takes off, or reroute to another airport. This happens all the time in extreme weather conditions (eg winter anywhere it snowstorms). That airlines choose not to more proactively cancel flights in moderately inclement weather is a business decision, not a shortcoming of our weather forecasting abilities. Flights often get delayed by weather at the other end - it's jarring to hear the pilot say the flight you're on is delayed due to heavy rain at your destination, when it's a gorgeous sunny day in your current location, but it happens quite frequently!

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#77

Post by t0mas88 »

twelve40 wrote: post #61
gumby wrote: post #5

Having been once in a aircraft-damaging emergency landing* decades ago I am surprised lap only belts are still the norm. There's a reason the crew has four point restraints, and I'd like to have it too. * I won't call it a crash since the aircraft made it to an airport and to a runway. We had equipment failure in flight so there was plenty of time for the flight attendants to review our crash positions, confiscate sh…

What I find funny is that this year I got to fly newer first class (places I fly to are $1k+ economy and close to $10k first class, so normally I avoid the latter), the type where you get to sit diagonally in your own little "bunk". Despite the whole seat obviously designed for more comfort, the belt had the lap and the shoulder parts, and many times they were much more anal about having both parts buckled up. Guess…

It depends on the position of the chair, direction and hard surfaces you could hit. A shoulder strap is common on seats that don't face straight forward.

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#78

Post by t0mas88 »

gumby wrote: post #59
anonAndOn wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At an airline training session I attended, a man who survived a famous passenger aircraft crash advised that one should get as low as possible in their seat and put their knees up against the back of the seat in front of you, while still buckled. The passengers that died around him were killed by the heavy luggage exploding out of the overheads and breaking their necks, so it's important to have your head below the s…

Interesting; this was the position they had us all adopt. They also moved the "old"* people in the exit rows and asked a couple of us young men to take their places. Back then there was no pre-questioning to see if you're willing and able to open the exit windows. Interestingly, they gave us special instruction which was: "Don't open the window unless I [flight attendant] am disabled. I might not be opening it for a…

That instruction is standard procedure. Same for the cabin crew, they're instructed not to evacuate unless told to by the cockpit crew or unable to communicate with the cockpit after an incident.

The main reason is knowing which engine is on fire vs shutdown. So in almost all cases you want to captain to decide the moment of evacuation, not the cabin crew and certainly not a passenger.

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#79

Post by t0mas88 »

fragmede wrote: post #76
tialaramex wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bad weather is certainly a factor in a lot of General Aviation accidents. VFR into IMC (Visual Flight Rules, ie you fly by looking where you're going; into Instrument Meteorological Conditions, ie you can't see very far due to low cloud or nightfall) kills a bunch of people every year. Some of those killed are IFR rated. In theory they know how to fly a plane when you can't see where you're going, but theory and prac…

Eh? It's absolutely an option, from a technical weather forecasting perspective, to see that a storm exists, and to abort a particular plane flight before it takes off, or reroute to another airport. This happens all the time in extreme weather conditions (eg winter anywhere it snowstorms). That airlines choose not to more proactively cancel flights in moderately inclement weather is a business decision, not a shortc…

The comment you're responding to is talking about general aviation, small propeller planes. Those have a relatively high incident count for flying into bad weather. When the pilot is only trained to fly visually (VFR) and enters low visibility or clouds they're very likely to crash.

This isn't a problem in airline flights. There are very specific rules about when you can and cannot depart and when an alternate airport and fuel for it is required. No airline takes off without satisfying all the rules and almost no airline cancels a flight for weather while the rules say it could go.

Re: How the airline industry got wise to seat belts

#80

Post by t0mas88 »

bmitc wrote: post #43
nemo44x wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things “go wrong” fairly “frequently” on airplanes but they are hardened for this with redundant systems and manual (as well as computer) overrides. You don’t hear about most of them but they are all logged and used for improvements. The main difference is when a car has a catastrophic failure there’s a good chance the people involved survive.

I suppose by wrong I mean something more than the redundant, robust, and various protection systems can handle. For example, on a car, I wouldn't consider the anti-lock brake system kicking in as something going wrong. I've had an engine failure in my car while driving it. I simply was able to slow to a crawl until I got home. I don't think engine failure on an airplane is such an anti-climatic event, on average.

Engine failure on a modern airplane is quite anti-climatic. We train for it regularly, and there are standard procedures to follow after the failure. Basically secure the failed engine, if it's just after takeoff climb to a safe altitude (sometimes following a predetermined route) using the other engine, then select a runway for landing and land almost normally.
Post reply on HN