I have a silly question. Windows on a plane is not big enough for anybody to go through, are they?
Apparently, the window was large enough for someone to go halfway through. Pretty disturbing.
Not a silly question. I would imagine it depends upon the size of the window, and the size of the person. With a rapid decompression sucking you out quickly and with force, it could happen faster than one could imagine. Sounds like this poor woman got halfway sucked out of the window…and she wasn’t a tiny person.
Very rare for this to happen, though.
Then again, I have to reconsider my strategy of going for the mega legroom window seat in the exit row, over the engine, at Southwest…
The co pilot was MALE. Listen to the NTSB interview (National Transportation Safety Board).
Its reasonably clear from that 20 minute talk, there was no pilot error, but it will be scrutinized for 15 months, all the evidence. However, two of these same type of 737 engines have failed in the same exact way, one fan blade falling off. In this case, the fan blade appears to have cut the entire cowling off the engine and it fell off several pieces and one big piece about 65 miles north of Philadelphia. See Wall Street Journal for the best account of this accident, from the airplane standpoint.
There will be ultrasound inspections of the metal parts of this type of engine. Thats not required now, but the FAA may chance some of the detailed directions for inspections of this type of engine. There was a directive to do that, it takes time for the FAA to make changes like that. Remember this is engine number 2 that failed in a similar way, but engine number 1 did not kill anyone in the process of failing in 2016, in Florida:
The failed CFM56 engine on Southwest Flight 3472
In August 2016, Southwest Airlines Flight 3472, another Boeing 737-700, also suffered an uncontained failure of its left engine that ripped off its front cowling. In this case, shrapnel also pierced the fuselage causing decompression forcing the flight to make an emergency landing Pensacola, Florida.
@busdriver11 listening to the little snippet - I actually wondered if she sounded too calm! But yes kudos to the rest of the crew as well.
I’m not going to stop sitting next to windows. And I will continue to wear my safety belt at all times.
The Sully movie was partly about the grilling Sully & his co-pilot got during the investigation hearings on whether they had made mistakes. This pilot sounded even more cool under pressure than Sully was.
Someone mentioned a heart attack on board. I don’t think there was one — but they were giving CPR to the woman sitting by the window who died. But she had blunt force trauma. New York Times has a pretty detailed writeup they posted s few hours ago that seems to cover the facts pretty well. Can’t imagine how awful this is for the woman’s family.
I haven’t listened to the tape yet but I would not be surprised to hear the captain sounded calm. I mean, that’s the whole point of training pilots, to be able to react quickly and logically under pressure.
I know you can’t always predict how people will react in a true emergency but I’ve hear enough stories that it sounds like most pilots have that calm cool and collected thing down pat.
You should listen. There is calm, and then there is CALM.
Ha, @mathmom, initially I thought she sounded medicated! But then I decided that I’m not going to critique how fast or slow somebody talks on the radios. People react to things many different ways. Some people speed up, others slow down. Some people talk naturally slower than others, some faster. All that matters is if you can efficiently communicate.
The odds of getting sucked out of a window are amazingly low. However, to tell the truth, I always put my kids in aisle seats if I can. Ever since a Delta flight had a similar event (30 years ago) that killed a mother and son, I try not to put them in a window seat over the engine. I know the risk is miniscule, but I just can’t help myself. Now for me, I’ll sit anywhere.
When I saw pix from the cabin that one of the passengers took, my first reaction was, “OMG, they are not wearing their O2 masks properly!” Seriously, at such high altitudes, it would not take long for someone to take a few nose breaths and pass out - with their masks covering their mouth and chin!!!
^^ Seriously, Bunsen. On the airline threads we are mocking them. I guess they must be all mouth breathers?
Though to their defense, when you look at those little cups, they are pretty bad. They should make them larger, so it’s obvious that you need to cover your nose. I dunno if one of those little cups would fit my mouth and nose if I tried…
I think its sad that we are discussing the genders of the pilot and copilot…yes…there are not that many female pilots but dang…so glad that she was on it and had great training. And we wouldn’t even be discussing the gender if it was a male. Whatever. Thank god for her and her copilot and the passengers that came to help out the poor woman and the others.
Yes, I was also wondering why you wouldn’t naturally cover both the nose and mouth. But those tiny little cups are kinda ridiculously small. I wonder why they don’t make them in the shape of an air mask like you normally see.
In the pic I saw, one guy with the oxygen mask on was still wearing his air buds. Now that’s dedication to your music right there. Or maybe he was in a really good section of an audio book, even more exciting than his plane possibly crashing.
I don’t think the technology on those oxygen masks has changed in decades. It is pretty ridiculous. The other thing I find ridiculous is in an emergency scenario that people take the time to take videos and photos at all.
Folks, the masks are not rigid. They will form an oval that will fit around the nose and mouth on most faces. Haven’t you watched the FAs doing the demo? 
Yeah, the guy who was taking most of those shots said that as soon as it was apparent that there was an emergency, he frantically tried to buy internet acces. Priorities!
https://flightaware.com/live/flight/SWA1380/history/20180417/1430Z/KLGA/KPHL/tracklog indicates that it was about 20 minutes between the engine failure and landing, so passengers sitting in their seats had plenty of time to take photos and videos after putting on the oxygen masks.
I’ve been on a flight where somehow the plane lost pressure and the oxygen masks dropped. Honestly it’s not that hard to put them over your nose and mouth. I got mine on, made sure my son’s was OK, and as far as I remember others were wearing them correctly as well.
“indicates that it was about 20 minutes between the engine failure and landing, so passengers sitting in their seats had plenty of time to take photos and videos after putting on the oxygen masks.”
Still wouldn’t be what I would personally choose to do under the circumstances. But I don’t feel the urge to make a tragedy an instagrammable moment. Is there a special filter to use for airplane emergencies where someone dies and someone almost gets sucked out of a window? :-??
Not every phone user was taking photos. At least one connected to the plane wifi to send a text to her father-in-law (whom her kids were with) informing him of the situation on the plane that she and her husband were on.
Nobody said they were. I’m obviously talking about the videos and photos in my post, right?