People quickly went to the emergency doors of a plane that was on fire without bringing their bags, because the flight crew told them to.
According to aviation experts, one big reason why all 379 people on board were able to evacuate quickly before the plane caught fire at Haneda Airport in Tokyo last Tuesday was because they left their valuable things behind.
Japan Airlines Flight 516 caught on fire when it hit a coastguard plane while landing. Five out of the six people on the small plane died.
The perfect rescue on the Japan Airlines plane has amazed everyone and received compliments from many. Flight experts and crew members told the media that the successful flight was due to the crew following their intense training and passengers who followed safety rules.
“I watched some videos, but I didn’t see anyone carrying their bags while getting off the plane. Taking your bags during an emergency can be dangerous and slow down the escape,” explained Prof Ed Galea, who works at the University of Greenwich.
Professor Galea said that the condition of the Airbus A350 made it hard to evacuate.
“This accident was not good. ” The plane was tilted downwards, making it hard for people to walk around, he said.
Only three bouncy slides could be used to help people get out of the plane, but they weren’t put out correctly because of the way the plane landed. The slide was really steep, which could have been risky.
The plane’s announcement system broke and the flight crew had to use a megaphone and shout to give instructions during the evacuation, Japan Airlines reported.
One person has bruises and 13 others asked for medical help because they felt unwell, the airline said.
The Japan Airlines plane flew from Sapporo’s New Chitose airport at 4:00 pm local time (7:00 am GMT) and arrived at Haneda just before 6:00 pm. The small coastguard plane was supposed to bring help to people hurt by a big earthquake on New Year’s Day. An investigation is happening to find out what caused the crash.
Safety training started working.
An ex-Japan Airlines flight attendant told the media that the passengers on the plane were very lucky.
I was happy to learn that everyone on the plane was OK. “I got scared and anxious when I thought about the emergency evacuation plan,” she said. “If the two planes crashed and the fire spread in a different way, it could have been much more dangerous. ”
The former flight attendant said it can be hard to keep passengers from panicking in real-life situations. She didn’t want her name to be shared.
“But what they accomplished is really difficult to understand. ” She said that everyone was able to escape because the crew and passengers worked well together and followed instructions.
She said new crew members have to undergo tough training on how to evacuate and rescue people for up to three weeks before they can work on commercial flights. The training happens again every year.
“We take a test, talk about real-life situations, and practice using examples like landing a plane on water and dealing with a fire on board. ” The people who fix things are also part of the training,” said the person who used to work on the plane and left 10 years ago.
A pilot from an airline in South East Asia, who didn’t want to be named, said that the thorough training of the flight crew helped them to evacuate quickly.
It was really great. I believe that what happened in this situation was that the person’s training took over. He said in a situation like this, you don’t have time to think, so you just do what you were trained to do.
Airlines have to prove that all passengers can get off the plane in 90 seconds to be certified for international flights. Drills to evacuate may have real passengers participating, he said.
The pilot said that the rules for keeping planes safe had been made much stronger after some accidents in the past.
For example, when two Boeing 747 planes crashed at Los Rodeos Airport in Spain in 1977, it caused 583 people to die. This was the worst accident ever in aviation. After this happened, they looked at how pilots do things in the cockpit and how they talk on the radio. The plane crash happened because the pilots and the people who control the planes in the air didn’t understand each other.
In August 1985, a Japan Airlines plane crashed into a mountain soon after it took off from Tokyo Haneda, while on its way to Osaka. It was later said that Boeing, the company that made the airplane, didn’t repair it properly. Out of 524 people in the crash, only four survived at first, but one of them later died from their injuries.
In 2006, Japan Airlines built a museum-like place near Haneda. It has pieces from the accident. It’s meant to teach their workers about being safe.
“On our website, Japan Airlines promised that after the 1985 crash we would work to prevent another tragic accident, and we feel very sorry for the families and people who were affected. ”
We need to remember that people’s lives and property are important and we are responsible for taking care of them in our job.