Save the Passengers... and the flight crew is on their own..

EppyGA said:
Why would the flight crew be on their own?
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From the pictures it doesn't appear as though they are invited. Activate this system a whole lot of people are going to be saved and you ain't one of them :nonod:
 
Silvaire said:
From the pictures it doesn't appear as though they are invited. Activate this system a whole lot of people are going to be saved and you ain't one of them :nonod:
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So there is no door they could walk through before separation? ;)
 
I didn't have to click the link, I've seen this all over Facebook. Hardly innovative; kids in the 1950s were drawing similar ideas on their textbook covers. It doesn't help much on takeoff and landing accidents, or anything sudden or catastrophic (like an explosion), which are most common.

I guess the crew will have to run to the back and hope there's an empty seat :)

Imagine if they had used that on flight 1549? Where would the pod have landed? Get snagged in the top of a 50 storey building? And where would the rest of the plane have crashed into?

Yeah, not a great idea.
 
So, of all airline events in the past 20 years which involved fatalities, in how many of them do we think this might have possibly helped?
 
BradZ, now that you mention, it was a feature of International Rescue's Thunderbird 2.


And the thread title was a (weak) attempt at humor and to be an attention getter.
 
Brad Z said:
Hardly innovative; kids in the 1950s were drawing similar ideas on their textbook covers.
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I'm certain it's been thought of.

This guy appears to be the first asking for money.

I don't think he has a single clue what the development, testing and implementation would cost.
 
Or, dump the excess weight and drag so you can make it to the airport......
 
While there may be some differences in the details, I'm not sure that this is an especially new idea:

us7234667.jpg
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
So, of all airline events in the past 20 years which involved fatalities, in how many of them do we think this might have possibly helped?
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The United DC-10 in Sioux City, The DC-9 that lost control of the tail over the ocean in Southern California. MAYBE the United 737 at Colorado Springs.

Since most accidents happen on takeoff or landing, this would not be of much use. This idea is a non starter as far as commercial viability goes. Too expensive, too much weight.
 
This circles the Internet about once a year and pops up on pilot forums as a new fad. However, it is not. As others have pointed out, it is an older idea.

If they can make it feasible, it would definitely have life-saving potential.
 
When this showed up a few days ago I did a quick survey of the past six years of fatal airliner accidents. I found exactly two where this might (and that's a big MIGHT) have been a useful escape mechanism. It's not going to do squat on takeoff/landing accidents, CFIT, bombs/missiles. It's worse than the existing scheme for cabin fires.
 
The funniest part is that despite the fact that the flight crew gets left behind they are gonna "rescue" all their baggage too. Yay!! :D
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
https://youtu.be/wp_wznCVHHs
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Hahaha. Great memory. :)

And, from the comments, I learned for the first time that Trekkies have an official Star Trek Technical Manual that is regarded as canonical. Who knew.

Based on my interpretation of the TNG tech manual you can. From what it says, forward propulsion is achieved by firing the warp coils sequentially with each coil's field building on the one before it. Reverse the order of the firing, and you've got reverse thrust. Though backing off the throttle slightly and/or using the saucer's impulse engines to accelerate would probably be more accurate given the recent warp speed discoveries in real-life!
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Maybe those NASA airbags they use on Mars landers would work. That Aisiana flight that came down short at SFO would have bounced for miles.
 
You guys have it all wrong! This is not intended to save passengers. It's intended to get rid of them!

If a passenger is annoying and demands and extra blanket, get rid of the lot of them.

Won't be long before all passengers learn to behave...
 
RalphInCA said:
You guys have it all wrong! This is not intended to save passengers. It's intended to get rid of them!
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It's especially handy if the airplane is going to be invaded by a swarm of twelve foot piranha bees or attacked by an enormous mutant star goat.
 
"Um,......Center, we seem to have lost our pod somewhere over Pasadena! "
 
Gentlemen, let's think for a moment. It's simple physics really, we already sit up in the pointy end of the airplane. If anything happens there's a lot behind us that will undoubtedly come forward. It's not like we aren't making this sacrifice already.
 
I was wondering if the flight crew would be able to be saved in the detachable cabin. The cabin would be able to be detached but not the cockpit.
 
N918KT said:
I was wondering if the flight crew would be able to be saved in the detachable cabin. The cabin would be able to be detached but not the cockpit.
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That would be a handy tool for a terrorist who wanted to drop everyone in the ocean.
 
I can see it now..... Oops that was the wrong lever, we just dropped all the passengers in the ocean.
 
Combine this with the semi-stand airline seat and it has the potential of saving all 900 passengers on an Airbus!

arton4380.jpg
 
I would almost like to watch them deploy that design just once, except I want to watch the remainder of the airliner when it's CG swings out of whack.
 
I wonder how many G11 parachutes it would take? G11's are good for 42,000 lbs. Plus a lot of people forget that you need a cutter or timed release because the chutes will pull a load over on its back once it hits the ground.

The F111 had a crew ejection pod

f111caps.gif


Here's one from 2010.

airlinerescapepod1.jpg

airlinerescapepod2.jpg
 
Silly for safety purposes, but something similar proposed a few months ago to make turnarounds quicker / more efficient / save tons of money? Idea being that you board your "pod" while the inbound flight is landing and taxiing, the arriving pod is removed and your pod put on the plane, and then you're ready for push-back (pending fuel). The arriving pod deplanes ("depods?") separated from any propulsion mechanism, so you never have an airplane sitting around wasting money on the turnaround.

Still seems way too expensive / contrived for what it's worth, but at least a more plausible explanation.
 
mcmanigle said:
Silly for safety purposes, but something similar proposed a few months ago to make turnarounds quicker / more efficient / save tons of money? Idea being that you board your "pod" while the inbound flight is landing and taxiing, the arriving pod is removed and your pod put on the plane, and then you're ready for push-back (pending fuel). The arriving pod deplanes ("depods?") separated from any propulsion mechanism, so you never have an airplane sitting around wasting money on the turnaround.

Still seems way too expensive / contrived for what it's worth, but at least a more plausible explanation.
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Do you really think that would save time on turn arounds?

Yes, passengers would be loaded on the pod, be the pod would still have to be moved to the airplane, carefully menuvered into place, attached, safety checks would have to be done, the transporter machine moved out of the way.

Also, it takes time to get the old pod out of the way. All this would have to be done very carefully/slowly.

Might save a little time, but not much.

...and before you say it, I'm aware that little time savings here and there add up to large time/cost savings at the end of the day.
 
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Let'sgoflying! said:
So, of all airline events in the past 20 years which involved fatalities, in how many of them do we think this might have possibly helped?
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Damn few. I had to go beyond twenty years but just working from memory there's the JAL 747 that blew an aft pressure bulkhead. There's the UAL DC10 that lost all hydraulic systems due to the engine disintegrating. That's all I got.
 
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