January 10, 2007

Savannah (USA)

A Day of Emergency Flight Training

My father arranged for me to sit in on a day's worth of Emergency Flight Training today, so at 8 am this morning I attached my name tag, filled out a form, and settled myself down next to two Delta private jet pilots (ASA). Jay and Ed, despite being two and three times my age respectively, were the typical pilots in that they were full of jokes and had the world's shortest attention span. This hardly proved to be a problem for the day as our instructor, Mike, was the same way.

This kind of an atmosphere, along with endless Starbucks coffee, donuts, and assorted candy, made the morning lectures fly by. I even learned a thing or two about the science and realities of what can happen in the sky. Mike is as knowledgeable as any expert in the field of air safety, and he knows the details of every accident/near disaster for the past twenty years. Hearing his stories - often acquired after meeting with actual surviving pilots or flight attendants - more than made up for sitting through class on my supposed vacation.

After lunch the excitement really picked up as we practiced dealing with the many things that can go wrong while flying. For the disaster-simulations we joined three flight attendants and two military pilots from the Pakistani air force. I wanted to ask the two men a variety of questions about their past missions (they are from Lahore, which is in the heart of Kashmir), but their English was poor and it didn't feel right under the circumstances.

The first disaster simulation involved learning how to put out a fire in a plane, and experiencing the terrible blindness of a smoke-filled cabin. We all had to wear fire-resistant jumpsuits, along with with heavy-duty boots, a mask, and an oxygenated bag over our heads.

When my turn came to enter the cabin, I opened the door to find the entire cabin (shown above during the instructional period) filled with smoke. I screamed that (1) there was a fire in the cabin (notifying the pilots), and (2) that all passengers needed to take a seat immediately. Then, as I struggled to detach the clips holding the extinguisher to the wall - the smoke literally prevented me from seeing beyond my the protection of my hood - I continued screaming for the passengers to stay seated while I dealt with the situation. Naturally, when I brought the extinguisher toward the fire, both "passengers" were out of their seats and doing their best to get in my way. I forcefully pushed them into their seats, told them to stay put, and then did my thing with the extinguisher - holding it tightly between my legs, pulling the pin, aiming at the blazing fire at the front of the cabin. A 2-3 second spray was all it took, clearly demonstrating why extinguishers only need 15 seconds' worth of use per bottle.

Now that I was hot, sweaty, and smelling of smoke, we all went back inside and hit the large saltwater pool. Our next task was fairly straightforward: practice evacuating down an inflatable slide (shown to the right.) We were advised to sit down and go slowly to prevent slipping or back injury, but I couldn't resist the opportunity to take a running jump, thereby flying down the slide.

After more lectures on various scenarios and techniques, a life raft was brought out and we learned the tricks of climbing in and out (it is really a lot harder than one would imagine.)

Next, we climbed into the capsule shown to the right, which was to simulate a plane sinking after a crash. While the fire definitely had my heart beating the fastest, this simulation was probably the most troubling: while seated in the cabin, the plane underwent tremendous jarring before water began pouring in until it reached my waist. One of the flight attendants was put in charge of the test, and she immediately removed the emergency exit (shown vaguely to the right) and all the passengers proceeded to exit through the small opening - one leg, the torso, then the other leg. However, once outside the plane only half the job was done: there were torrential rain coming down along with a powerful wind. I pulled the rip cord on my life jacket, inflating it on the spot, and began swimming for the life raft in the middle of the pool. Once we were all inside, we pulled down the roofing and took various other measures to prepare ourselves (such as scooping out the water by creating a puddle in the middle of the raft by pushing down with our feet in unison).

The last stage of practice in the pool involved the actual rescue process. We took turns swimming out to the helicopter rescue devices and attaching ourselves as we were pulled out of the pool and onto a 10 meter high platform. It was the first time I have ever sat in one of those baskets everyone imagines in a helicopter rescue, but I also got to try a sling and a sort of retractable seat.

Overall, it was great training for dealing with disasters, but with plenty of flights still to come in my life I hope I will never need to use these techniques. Indeed, it was pointed out to me that commercial planes are made to fall apart upon impact, so unless the accident occurs on the ground, there is basically no chance of survival. This is all the more reason to invest in a private jet, if you ask me.