This one never gets old!

Incident of the week #19

Sometimes while your airplane is cruising at 38000 feet and you´re enjoying your relaxing flight, reading some newspaper or savoring the entertainment system, oxygen masks suddenly appear in front of your nose and an automatic message streams trough every single loudspeaker, instructing you to pull them down and start breathing.

This happened this week to a domestic Vietnam Airlines Airbus A330 flight, flying from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam). Cruising altitude was already reached when about 30 minutes into the flight an indication of "loss of cabin pressure" was received in the cockpit. As a safety procedure, the flight crew immediately started an emergency descent diverting the aircraft from its initial planned destination and oxygen masks were dropped down. A few minutes later the aircraft safely landed in Da Nang (Vietnam). No injuries or damages occurred, but the cause for the incident hasn´t been found yet. The next day a replacement aircraft was brought to Da Nang that safely took all passengers to Ho Chi Minh.

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Incident of the week #18

Sometimes you´re just taking off from a large international airport, expecting to go home, flying with one of the best and safest airlines in Europe. But then you end up being evacuated in the middle of a grass field..

This happened this week to an Air Dolomiti ATR72, flying from Munique (Germany) to Venice (Italy). After taking-off, the flight who was carrying 58 passengers and 4 crew members was normally climbing when the pilots realised smoke was becoming visible and smelled in the cockpit. They then decided to abort climbing and divert to Munique. But while approaching to Munique, the right hand engine also begun to cause some problems and had do be shut down. While landing with only one engine the aircraft veered left off  the runway, impacting a transmissometer and came to a stop a few feet away from the runway, already outside the runway´s protected area with its nose damaged and front nose gear collapsed. All passengers had to be evacuated and no injuries occured.

Miles high club

People often ask if flight attendants also join the club. And I believe every one has pretty much the same answer: what happens at 38.000 feet, stays at 38.000 feet!! But here´s a small clue: I have seen too many toilets covered in vomit, blood, urine and faeces (on the seat, on the floor, on the bench, in the sink, even on the freakin´ ceiling) to even consider that to be exciting. Well, at least doing it in the lavatory!!

Incident of the week #17

Sometimes when a test/demo flight is being made, something terrible happens, perhaps due to the pressure from the business or the scenic side, that leads to the complete lost of the aircraft and souls on board.

This happened this week to a Sukhoi Superjet 95 departing and arriving from Jakarta (Indonesia). The demonstration flight was the second done that day and was carrying 37 passengers who were mostly potential buyers, 3 pilots, 3 flight attendants and 2 Sukhoi officials. About 30 minutes into the flight, while the aircraft was flying over Mount Salak, radio contact was lost. The crew had requested to descent to 6,000 feet and was cleared to do so by ATC, but after that no more communication was established. Mind you, Mount Salak is over 7,200 feet high.. The aircraft did not turn up to Jakarta or any other airports in the area and was "lost" for one whole day. It was then only found the next day while helicopters were searching the Mount Salak area.

Just looking at the massive deforestation, one can deduct how huge the impact was. And also confirm how steep the slop is, which are making the rescue and recovery work very difficult. In fact, first attempts to set rescuers down by helicopters failed. Only two days after the accident, rescuers were able to reach the crash site. Here you find a very nice blog entry about that. It´s worth reading it, and the pictures speak to itself.  Accessing the crash site from the air is impossible so about 1353 rescuers were sent in the field and with the help of ladders and ropes descended from the top of the cliff towards the the crash site. With the crash site found it had been confirmed that the plane had broken into small pieces after hitting the side of the mountain and there were no chance anyone had survived. So far 18 bodies have been recovered but DNA sample from their families must be provided in order to be able to identify them.

The precipitous terrain and thick fog had made it difficult for rescuers to collect the bodies.

The black boxes haven´t been found yet but an investigation has now been open. The pilots were experienced and the aircraft had done the same demo flight on the morning that same day, so it´s still early to make any conclusions for the reason of the crash. Perhaps they were trying to do a low fly to impress the potential buyers through the mountains and for some reason they didn´t see that cliff with enough anticipation due to a isolated cloud near the cliff or some type of distraction. Or perhaps they were flying over a cloud layer and requested a descent to 6,000 feet, in order to fly below that layer and have a view of the landscape, but they didn´t realise that the mountain was below them, maybe due to spacial disorientation which could have been generated by, again, some type of distraction. One thing´s for sure, and that we have learnt from past crashes history; there must have been not one single thing, but a lot of factors that lead to this accident. Looking at this photos, found from the debris, that were taken prior to and during the flight, showing the last moments of the crew and passengers makes anyone sad and thoughtful. I hope their families can find some peace.

Master Caution..

It was a long layover with the same crew, so at day 3 we all knew ourselves very well.

To comply with our safety procedures, I have to make a "cockpit check" regularly. So after setting the snacks/beverage trolley up for the service and before going into the jungle I went to the cockpit.

After opening the door, the words that came out of my mouth, were the same as usual:

- "So, everything alright up here guys?"

I couldn´t have chosen a better timing. As soon as I finished the question, the master caution button went on and a warning horn was banging loudly over and over again. At the EICAS, a short message was shown: "APU BLEED".

-"Well, I´m leaving, have fun with that guys!" - I said, and left the cockpit.

No wonders that at dinner that night they kept fooling me around saying that I had some strange vibes going on and said next time I should ask something else while entering the cockpit.

Next day, same crew, same aircraft. Airborne and after setting everything up I went to the cockpit. And not thinking about the day before I stupidly opened the door and asked exactly the same thing. Any guesses for what happened next? Exactly. As if planed, the same red master caution went on, the same warning horn was now slamming very loudly and the same message was displayed on the EICAS.

The two pilots looked at each other, then looked at me and I said:

-"Don´t say anything. I´m on my way outta here!!"

What´s the chance of that to happen?? So funny. And for now on, for them I´m the "Master Caution girl"

 :)

Courtesy of the Fabulous Flight Deck #3

After coming across to this 1970´s picture:



Captain exalts:

- "My oh my, back in my days, flight attendants used to dress like this. What happened? Where did the airline industry go wrong?

Incident of the week #16

Sometimes, even if you´re flying without passengers, an incident may happen and the crew has to evacuate themselves from the aircraft.

This happened this week, to a Saudi Arabian A300 flight from Madinah to Jeddah (Saudi Arabia). The flight originated in Mashad, Iran and then flew to Madinah where all the passengers disembarked the aircraft (their destination). The aircraft was then flown to Jeddah for repositioning purposes, with only 10 crew members on board. The flight went smooth, but just before landing in Jeddah, the crew had to abort the approach since the nose gear indicated unsafe. After unsuccefull tries to deploy the nose gear manually, the crew landed on runway 16L with the nose gear missing, came to a stop short of the runway end and was then evacuated via slides. All 10 crew members suffered no injuries.

Check-in ladies..

I was at the ticket counter, trying to change my standby ticket to a sooner flight that day, when suddenly a loud trolley-wheels sound was heard. Me and the four ladies (well, one was a guy - but you could count him as a lady too. Oh and yes, it took 4 people, 40 minutes and thousands of phone-calls to change a simple ticket!!) immediately turned our heads to where the sound was coming.

Check-in lady 1: - Uhh, nice bodies at 10 o´clock.

Check-in lady 2: - Seems to be a baseball team.

Check-in ladyboy 3: - Naa, seems more like soccer players.

Check-in lady 1: - Well one thing´s for sure, not swimmers.

Check-in ladyboy3: - Nor golfers.

Check-in lady 1: - Definitely basketball players.

Check-in lady 4: - Well for me, I don´t give a damn what they play. Because I would even pay just to be their trainer. Ohh yeahh..

Firstly I thought they were kidding, but I realise they seem to do this everyday (and honestly, galley gossiping can sometimes hit as low as that!). The thing is, they really got 100% distracted from their duties to have that conversation. Three gorgeous blond ladies, with long fake fingernails and hairdos and one even more gorgeous guy that plays for the other team, which cologne I could smell 20 feet away. And I tried so hard not to laugh my pants off, because what they were doing reminded me of this sketch.