UPDATE: Cyprus plane crash victims "frozen solid" (Reuters)

[Up2Late]

(It was pointed out on a newscast that, this is similar to what happened to the Paine Stewart (sp?) Jet a few years ago.)

Cyprus plane crash victims "frozen solid"

Mon Aug 15, 2005 09:02 AM ET

By Brian Williams and Karolos Grohmann

ATHENS (Reuters) - Most of the bodies recovered from a Cypriot plane that crashed near Athens with 121 people on board were frozen solid, a Greek official said, suggesting the airliner was a flying tomb before it plunged to earth. As accident investigators combed the crash site for clues, aviation experts were baffled at what appeared to have been a catastrophic failure of cabin pressure or oxygen supply in freezing temperatures at 35,000 feet -- nearly 10 km (6 miles) up, higher than Mount Everest.

One expert said reports of extreme cold suggested there was no air circulating in the cabin. "Autopsy on passengers so far shows the bodies were frozen solid, including some whose skin was charred by flames from the crash," the Defense Ministry source, with access to the investigation, told Reuters on Monday.

The Helios Airways Boeing 737 was carrying 115 passengers and six crew when it crashed 40 km (25 miles) north of Athens on Sunday. There were no survivors. Rescue workers recovered the body of the pilot, a German identified as Martin Hans Gurgen, and said they had found the plane's black box flight recorders, including the one that records pilot conversations, and would send them to France for analysis.

The recovery of the black boxes is crucial to determining the cause of the worst air disaster in Greece and the worst involving a Cypriot airline. Greek TV reported on Sunday that the pilot had told air traffic controllers the plane was experiencing problems with its air conditioning system shortly before contact was lost.

<http://go.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=9375246&src=rss/worldNews>
(more and page 2 at link above)

[lala_rawraw]

1. What could freeze people in a crash? n/t

[mudderfudder77]

2. It's in the article

The article states that the airplane most likely lost cabin pressure. Meaning the temp inside the plane was the same as the temp outside the plane at nearly 6 miles up. i.e. Cold as hell...

[madmax]

6. I hope it was quick and they didn't suffer n/t

[Boomer]

12. A few seconds evidently

For whatever small mercy it offers, cold kills relatively painlessly.

The freezing solid part happened after they were dead, so although it's gruesome to contemplate, it's not really relevant to what they experienced.

[librechik]

95. They would lose consciousness from lack of oxygen in about 30 secs

presumably

[Ouabache]

3. All ventilation, heat, went out at 35,000 ft. Its COLD up there.

n/t

[northzax]

18. funny enough, the heat doesn't matter

what matters is the compression. I figure the temperature is around -35 up there, compressing the air to a breathable 5,000 feet would raise the temp to 130 d faren. So they have to turn on the A/C.

(for dry air, figure a 5.5 degree change every 1000 feet of elevation in compression/decompression.)

[girl gone mad]

77. It was around -55F

That's approaching flash freeze temps.

[Up2Late]

13. They call it "Rapid Cabin De-pressurization"

At 35,000 feet, it would almost be like flash freezing raw meat.

I think the "Big Story" here is, that all those so called "safety measures" that Boeing and the Airlines have been telling us for the last 40 years are total BS.

As in, "If the aircraft experiences a sudden loss of cabin pressure, a little orange mask will drop down; Pull the mask over you mouth and nose, and continue to "Breath Normally."

Maybe I need to put on my Tin Foil hat, but I smell a Conspiracy!:shrug: :tinfoilhat: :hide:

[ovidsen]

29. One in a million

Or more like one many millions. The first Boeing 707, the granddaddy of all jetliners flew commercially in 1958, and since then I don't believe there's ever been an accident where everyone on board was "flash frozen".

There was obviously a catastrophic failure of some kind aboard this 737, but I don't think it means the safety systems aboard aircraft of this type are accidents waiting to happen.

I can see why reasonable minds might consider "tinfoilhat" theories, but I don't think they'll stand up. Your average passenger jet is still quite safe, safer than your average car, provided it's maintained and crewed by competent people. Safer than the space shuttle!

[Up2Late]

42. I wasn't really referring to the "safety systems," what I WAS...

...refering to was the notion, that Boeing and MD and Lockheed, etc., have told us for over 40 years, that we could survive a "Rapid De-pressurization of the Cabin" and NOT freeze to death. That is is what I'm saying might be BS.

How many other times has this actually happened?

If their are NO other recorded incidents like this happening, (which I doubt, this must to have happened before in, as you said the 47 year History of Commercial Jet travel) why is that?

Have other similar incidents like this been, dare I say it, "Covered UP"?

Is the only reason we have not heard of this type of incident before, but are hearing about it now, the availability of Non-U.S. News on the Internet?:think:

These are ALL good Questions we should be asking.

[jobycom]

50. Maybe not at 35K, but the plane doesn't materialize at that height

An accident can happen on ascent or descent, or a loss of pressure could be a little more gradual, giving the plane time to descend. It's one of those things that might buy a few minutes, which could save the plane or passengers.

Same with floatation cushions. If the plane smacks the water nose first at 500 mph, obviously they are useless. If the plane hits it at a better angle and slower speed, like the plane that crashed off the beach in Africa, some of the passengers could survive the crash, in which case the cushions might come in handy.

Better than nothing. If the stories about one of the pilots moving around in the cockpit are true, maybe the masks helped enough to make a recovery possible, even though obviously it didn't work in the end.

[northzax]

31. they are similar to the 'flotation devices'

archaic relics of a time when planes flew lower and slower. At 35,000 feet, that mask ain't gonna help. and at 500 knots, that flotation device ain't gonna either.

most people survive serious failures that take place on take off or landing (which, luckily, is where most failures take place) but at altitute? not a chance. masks, flotation devices? placebos. the Masks might help at 10-15,000 feet, anything above that you'll freeze (and the lack of oxygen will make your reactions too slow anyway) The only things that will really help you are your seatbelt and the emergency exits.

think about it, I fly 20-30 times a year, for the past 30 years, on average (I'm thirty, flew a lot as a kid) I have never talked to someone who actually had the masks deploy for a real reason. I've had them deploy due to 'computer malfunction' but not due to depressurization. And, from talking to people with millions of frequent flyer miles each, I've never found someone who actually had the mask deploy.

[Up2Late]

48. I can't remember the Comedians name, but he said, "My seat cussion...

...as a "flotation device?" "If I'm on a Jet that's going down in the Ocean, my seat cushion is going to be used as a TOILET!"

[Hekate]

79. Another comedian referred to "a pack of party balloons"

Great routine by the late Rap Replinger on a very old LP, about a stewardess on "Mahalo Airlines" -- "In the event of an emergency there are four exit doors: two at the front of the cockpit and two at the rear of the cockpit. You will be given a pack of party balloons to blow up in the event of a water landing." (Refers to those old life vests that we were supposed to inflate by mouth.)

But -- frozen solid at 35,000 feet? That is seriously creepy.

Hekate

[Art_from_Ark]

94. When JAL Flight 123 crashed 20 years ago, at least one of the 4 survivors,

Yumi Ochiai, says that the masks were deployed as the airplane made its ill-fated emergency descent.

http://www.goennet.ne.jp/~hohri/n-ochiai.htm

[AlCzervik]

17. My Dad is a pilot and said this is similar to what happened to Payne

Stewart. There is a valve on--for lack of a better technical term-"hood" and it is supposed to be checked pre-flight, it's some type of mixing valve for oxygen and my Dad swears that it was not checked pre-flight and thats what caused the problem.

[daleo]

4. It takes a while for flesh to freeze solid

It is hard to believe a plane could cruise along as a flying tomb that long. It might be something of an exaggeration, I guess. The whole thing has an X-Files feel to it.

[mccoyn]

8. The plane would have been on autopilot at 35,000 feet.

I think it could have been on cruise long enough if the pilot didn't do anything about it. This does have an X-Files feel to it.

[northzax]

9. I wouldn't think that long

actually, maybe 30-45 minutes at those temps, you're talking -35 farenheit, and passengers wearing summer clothing. Death comes in under a minute, for those unlucky enough to not die on contact. it would take a bit of time, sure, but not longer than an hour, I'd think, maximum.

[Boomer]

14. The article said seconds for death

...and at that altitude and temperature, I'd say they're not far off. It's not like these people were prepared for sub-zero conditions, after all.

[mccoyn]

16. Wouldn't it take minutes to cool the air?

Unless there was a big hole in the plane that allowed a lot of cold air in (or hot air out) the temperature would drop gradually.

The pilot radioing about a malfunctioning air conditioner suggests it wasn't quick either.

[northzax]

21. a couple of minutes

max, it's not just the 'warm air' rushing out of the cabin, it is the temperature loss by depressurization.

[slackmaster]

39. The drop in pressure would cool the air

Would you believe Gay Lussac's Law?

http://members.aol.com/profchm/gaylusac.html

[daleo]

20. Well, I don't think it would take long to die

The lack of air pressure (and consequently lack of oxygen) would probably take care of that pretty fast regardless of temperature. But it does take a while for a body to go from about 40 degrees Celsius to below freezing and "freeze solid". Remember that the inside of a plane fuselage wouldn't have wind, so this would be more like being in a deep freeze than a howling blizzard.

I live in a climate where -40 degrees isn't that uncommon. People do sometimes freeze to death (e.g. homeless, or inebriated people), but reaching the stage of freezing solid takes quite a while, as far as I understand it. It seems improbable to me that a plane would stay up in the air that long.

There may well have been some freezing, just not "freeze solid" freezing (in my opinion). Of course, someone based in Cyprus might have a rather different definition of "freeze solid" to someone based in Edmonton, Canada.

[northzax]

23. even drunk folk

or homeless people tend to have some shelter, you could freeze solid with air circulating around you and lots of bare skin in under an hour, i'd think.

[Boomer]

27. What makes you say that?

>> It seems improbable to me that a plane would stay up in the air that long. <<

It's not unheard of for airplanes on auto-pilot to stay aloft for hours, basically until they run out of fuel. As the article mentions, that happened just a few years ago to another plane.

[daleo]

37. Yes, the Payne Stewart flight was about 4 hours

Although the fact that it landed in Cyprus rather than the Mediterranean Sea makes you wonder. I am just thinking of probabilities - an un piloted plane would likely land in the biggest geographic target. Perhaps it was in some kind of circular holding pattern though.

I suppose there will be plenty of details on this story eventually. As for the frozen solid bit, maybe I am just having a typical Canadian response to stories about cold weather (a Russian or a Scandinavian would probably react similarly):

"Frozen solid? He wasn't frozen solid - maybe the first inch or so was solid, but that's it. I've seen people frozen way more solid than that...why, I used to freeze twice that solid when I did my paper route."

[Up2Late]

46. I don't mean to nit pick, but it took off from Cypress, it crashed...

...in Greece.

Another question I just thought of is, if it was intercepted by F-16s, and they had enough time to establish that most on-board were dead, could they have had to shoot it down?

If it was being guided by it's Auto Pilot to land in a major city like Athens, would they have to shoot it down at that point?

I think the Athens airport is on the edge of the Mediterranean, how did it end up crashing in the, Fire Truck accessible, Mountains? The video of the Crash site shows a LOT of Fire and EMS trucks at the scene.:shrug:

[daleo]

53. That's a good point (about crashing in Greece)

I guess I have seen the story on TV and read just enough to get that important detail wrong. That does make a pretty big difference as to how long the plane might have been in the air, unpiloted.

As to a shoot-down, since 911 it certainly is possible. If everyone was dead, I suppose it wouldn't matter, and it would be safer to bring it down away from a populated area.

Given the times we live in, there will certainly be a lot more theorizing on this matter.

[LisaL]

80. I would say it wasn't seconds, as one guy was text-messaging

his cousin they were freezing to death. More like minutes...

[tblue37]

90. That turned out to be a hoax, and the guy

who claimed to have received the text message was arrested for ti.

[TahitiNut]

58. Don't ignore the rapid dehydration of tissue at low pressure.

Just the vapor pressure of fluid in cellular tissue would result in massive evaporation, fractures to cellular membranes, and the "freeze-drying" effect. The eyes, mucosa, and lungs would go first. Death would be quick.

[Kelvin Mace]

22. Sadly, this is entirely possible

Autopilot is very good and at -35 degress it doesn't take long for things to freeze solid.

My question is why didn't the oxygen masks deploy? Why didn't the pilots take the plane down to below 10,000 feet, the standard procedure in such an emergency?

[northzax]

26. oxygen masks are useless

at 35,000 feet, you need sealed positive pressure to breathe, those aren't good enough, more of a placebo, really.

the pilots may not actually have had time, once the depressurization hit them, they were dead in a few seconds, not enough time to react, and certainly not enough time to drop 25,000 feet.

face it, something bad happens, especially in the cockpit, at 35,000 feet, you're pretty much dead.

[Kelvin Mace]

55. I wonder

How long does it take to dive to 10,000 feet from 35,000?

I wonder if you could set this as an automated emergency action by the computer, like a "dead man's switch"?

Just pondering...

[northzax]

56. without making everything not nailed down fly?

I'm not sure, but you'd really only have minute or two, so it wouldn't matter much.

[Xithras]

73. No more than 5000 feet per minute I'd think

Most descents are between a few hundred and a couple thousand feet per minute, but you could probably slam the yoke forward and get 5000 feet per minute out of it. The problem with diving faster is twofold: First, the aircraft can only move so fast before breaking apart or blowing the engines out. According to many witnesses, flight 93 (the 9/11 flight that went down in PA) actually broke apart before hitting the ground, probably from airframe stress brought on by excessive diving speed. The second problem, of course, is that you can't dive so fast that you're unable to pull out of it at the bottom. Even if you could drop at rates over 5000 feet a minute, the odds of you pulling out of it before doing your best imitation of a lawn dart are virtually nil.

So basically, even if the pilot had realized the situation and immediately put the jet into an emergency dive, he still wouldn't have been alive five minutes later when he'd have needed to pull it back out of the dive. He might have survived with a pressure suit, but he would have still landed with a planeload of dead, frozen bodies.

There are certain things in life that, when they go wrong, will simply kill you. Losing cabin pressure at 30k feet is one of those things.

[Up2Late]

84. And yet, it the effort to cover up the "frozen solid" aspect of this...

...story, the "executive air safety chairman" of the pilots union (Air Line Pilots Association, International) is tring to make it sound like something ruotine and easy to pull off in this report for the AP. :banghead: :mad:

It will be interesting to see how this is finnally Spun, most likely to blame it on pilot incompitence.

"...Authorities said the crash apparently was caused by technical failure that led to a high-altitude decompression. The plane went down in a mountainous region north of Athens, killing 115 passengers and six crew members.

Some media have reported that the victims froze in their seats before the crash, but Greek officials said the bodies were not cold when they were found. Chief Athens coroner Fillipos Koutsaftis said Monday that tests conducted on the remains showed that at least six victims were alive at the time of the crash. Those six could have been unconscious before impact, he said.

U.S. aviation experts said they could not understand the flight crew's behavior during the disaster. "It's odd," said Terry McVenes, executive air safety chairman for the Air Line Pilots Association, International. "It's a very rare event to even have a pressurization problem and, in general, crews are very well trained to deal with it." Warnings should go off if an airliner suddenly loses pressure, and pilots are trained to put their oxygen masks on immediately and dive to about 12,000 feet, where there's enough oxygen to breathe, experts said...." <http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-greece-crash-theories,0,5234136.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines >

[nookiemonster]

59. Agreed. There's no chance at that altitude.

And at that altitude, the differential air pressure probably starting tearing the fuselage apart.

Aluminum, at 35,000 feet, unpressurized.....crinkle

[beam me up scottie]

33. The masks did deploy

and the pilots were unconscious.

Read the whole article, it answers a lot of questions.

[moodforaday]

24. On autopilot

it could fly until it ran out of fuel, barring a mid-air crash or a terrain obstacle.

[cliss]

30. Same here, D.

The plane was going from Cyprus to Greece. Aren't these two countries fairly close to each other? Why would the plane need to go up to an altitude of 35,000 if it was just a "puddle jumper"?

I thought this altitude was only used for trans-Atlantic flights.

And you're right: you can't freeze a body 'frozen solid' in that short a time. I believe the plane was flying 'errantly' for about an hour before it crashed into a hillside. If I take a pound of hamburger and throw it in the freezer. If I go back and check on it after 1 hour, it will not be frozen solid. But maybe it's colder up there.

Don't know - sounds mysterious to me.

[northzax]

34. about 60-80 degrees colder, actually

your freezer ir probably at about 25-30 degrees, 35,000 feet is about (-)35-50 degrees.

[mudderfudder77]

38. It is.

Significantly colder at 35000 feet than it is in your freezer. A flash freezer like restaurants or packing plants use would be more applicable.

[Up2Late]

32. NPR reported this morning that they had F-16 intercept the Jet...

...and take Video of it as it flying.

They said they could see the Co-Pilot slumped over the Yolk, the Oxygen Masks dangling, and later someone in the Jets Cockpit trying to regain control of the Jet. Sounds to me like it was up there for much longer that a few minutes.

A modern Airliner can almost fly it's self, these days. About the only thing the pilot is their for is Communication and as a Back up safety system, in case something goes wrong (sorry to any Pilots out there, but it's true).

<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4800309>

World

Greek Probe: Victims Likely Dead Before Jet Crash

Listen to this story (on-line at the link above)

Morning Edition, August 15, 2005 · Airline officials in Greece say passengers on a Cypriot jetliner may already have been dead when their plane crashed into a mountainside Sunday. The crash killed all 121 people on board, which makes it the worst airline disaster in Greek history.

[TankLV]

65. It was aliens - I swear I know this is true!

Just because I wrote it here!

Scully? Mulder? Where are you?

[politicat]

Not at -50 F....

The cold kills fast at those temps - under 10 minutes - and freezing is quick, too.

(I remember a childhood experiment when we were at my aunt's house in Minnesota one winter - putting the meat out on the porch to freeze, and it was solid in an hour at about -20.)

Th X-files bit is that apparently several passengers/crew members were alive and trying to get messages to the ground and get control of the plane well into the 90 minutes that it wandered. Those were some tough folk....

As far as a plane cruising along for that long on its own.... they do it pretty much every day. Patrick Smith, at Salon.com in his Ask the Pilot article, talks about most of the cruising being handled by the autopilot, with only corrections by the pilot. (The article is a several months old....)

[tblue37]

88. The F-16s followed it up there for 40

minutes before it finally crashed, and it was 90 minutes from the time trouble was noticed and the plane crashed (the jets weren't scrambled immediately). There was time to freeze, I guess.

[xxqqqzme]

5. how can they be frozen

when I read most were burned beyond recognition?

[northzax]

10. imagine taking a frozen steak

and putting it in burning charcoal, the outside will char, the inside remains frozen. Airline fires are very quick burning, once the jet fuel burns off, there is little else to burn and maintain the flames.

this is why you defrost your turkey on thanksgiving, otherwise the outside will burn and the inside will stay frozen, even after hours upon hours in a 350 degree oven.

[mudderfudder77]

11. The temp

The temperature at 35,000 feet, depending where you are in relation to the equator is around 70 below zero. Wouldn't take too long to freeze a body solid in those conditions.

As for them being burnt and frozen solid, ever try grilling a frozen steak?

[Lecky]

7. What an odd tragic story...

I've never heard anything like it...

[bicentennial_baby]

15. Oh I can't wait to fly on Thursday, really

:eyes: I gotta stop reading this shit...there's been like 4 or 5 crashes since I've been in France...oy. x(

[Up2Late]

19. If it makes you feel any better, Airline crashes usually happen in 3's

If you count Toronto, and the Jet that went down in the Mediterranean Sea near Italy, this one makes 3.

AND the Thousands of daily flights that DON'T crash every day, and that the Pilot and Crew all want to get home safe too.:grouphug:

[caligirl]

49. So true. I've had two experiences personally , sisters plane crash

with two others in close timing, and husbands squadron(he was a pilot.
Always in threes.

[Kelvin Mace]

25. If you survive the drive to the airport

you are pretty much home free. :)

[bicentennial_baby]

28. taking the airport shuttle

so, for my 25 euro, let's hope the dude can drive :D

[blindpig]

44. me too

I'll need to control myself to keep from being a smart ass during the safety drill after reading this thread.:eyes:

[shraby]

35. This part doesn't fit with the rest of the story

Someone changed the auto-pilot to make it circle, and if the F-16 pilots saw someone trying to regain control of the plane, there had to be some who weren't frozen, I would think.


Greek government spokesman Theodore Roussopoulos said the F-16 pilots reported that with the pilots out of action there may have been a last-gasp effort by others on the plane to bring it back under control.

"The F-16s saw two individuals in the cockpit seemingly trying to regain control of the airplane," Roussoupoulos said. It was not known if they were passengers or other crew.

"The F-16s also saw oxygen masks down when they got close to the aircraft. The aircraft was making continuous right-hand turns to show it had lost radio contact."

[beam me up scottie]

40. Why ?

The plane was in the air for some time after the F16 pilots made their observations.

The flight was declared "renegade" when it entered Greek air space and failed to make radio contact. Two F-16 air force jets were scrambled to investigate and reported that the co-pilot was slumped in the cockpit and the pilot was not visible.

Defense Ministry officials said 90 minutes elapsed between the alert being raised and the plane crashing at 12:03 p.m.

Greek government spokesman Theodore Roussopoulos said the F-16 pilots reported that with the pilots out of action there may have been a last-gasp effort by others on the plane to bring it back under control.

[Tempest]

41. Not only that

But in another article, a relative said he received a text message from his relative on the plane minutes before the crash saying the passengers were freezing and they knew they were going to die.

[anotherdrew]

43. text message...

so they type the text message, and the cell phone waited and sent it when it got in range of a tower.

[MissB]

54. The article I read this morning said that the text message wasn't

confirmed. :shrug:

[pimpbot]

61. Guy lied about the text message, they arrested him today.

What a SOB.

[Tempest]

63. Got a cite for this?

Thanks.

[Up2Late]

74. It's in this BBC News Report, they have some Very Good Grapics too!

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4152806.stm>



"...Coroner Philippos Koutsaftis told AFP news agency that the main hypothesis for cause of death was asphyxiation.

However, a defence ministry source quoted by Reuters said it appeared that the bodies had been frozen solid.

Greek police have arrested a man who claimed his cousin sent him a text message from the aircraft minutes before it crashed saying that everyone was frozen...."

1. 0900 <0700GMT>: Helios Airways Flight ZU522 leaves Larnaca bound for Prague via Athens
2. 0920 approx: Plane reaches cruising altitude of 35,000ft
3. 0937: Plane enters Greek airspace
4. 1007: Air traffic control unable to contact aircraft
5. 1030: Greek ATC issues "Renegade alert"
6. 1055: F16 fighter aircraft scramble
7. 1120: F16s intercept aircraft; pilots observed slumped over controls
8. 1205: Aircraft crashes near Grammatiko, 40km north of Athens

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4152806.stm>

[lakemonster11]

76. http://www.ekathimerini.gr

Last paragraph of the article "Zwvtavoi sthv ptwsh."

translation:

Meanwhile, the prankster in Thessaloniki who yesterday claimed that he received a text-message from his cousin, a passanger on the ill-fated airplane, was arrested. He said what he did because of his passion for publicity.

[LisaL]

81. I find that very peculiar.

How would this guy know they were frozen? He reported the text messages before the reports the bodies were frozen. Methinks something fishy is going on here.

[Up2Late]

52. I'm just guessing here, but I wonder if someone had been in the Lavatory

at the time of the De-pressurization, could that have helped that person (or those people) survive the original event?

Or it could have been one of the Cabin Crew, who would have been very close to the Portable Oxygen mask equipment at the time of the incident.:shrug:

[northzax]

57. lavatory doors open inwards

and airplanes are pressurised at about 5,000feet. with greater pressure inside the lav than outside, you'd never get the door open. it's be like trying to open the door on a submarine 3,000 feet deep.

[Up2Late]

67. They just reported that 6 people were "still alive" when the Jet crashed.

(this was on NPR's hourly update) So my question still stands, plus brings up more.

As you said, at 35,000 feet, the door would be imposable to open, but once the Jet descended to a lower altitude, the pressure difference would also lessen and eventually would open, probably at a survivable Altitude.

Would this (being in the Lav at the time of the incident) have helped these 6 survive longer than the rest?

Would it stay relatively warm in a closed Lav?

Is there an Oxygen mask in the Lav?:shrug:

[malaise]

36. Mindblowing but it must have been

so gradual given the pressure failure that they were all dead before the crash.

[pimpbot]

45. Good discussion about this on airliners.net

The people over there are plane-crazy, thus have some good ideas about this.. I recommend checking it out. Much better than the MSM anyways..

Here is one idea:

Interestingly...
Time of Useful Consciousness:
40,000 feet 15 seconds
35,000 feet 30 seconds
30,000 feet 45 seconds
28,000 feet 01 minutes
25,000 feet 02 minutes
22,000 feet 05 minutes

I'm assuming that the crew donned their mask... realised the O2 is not flowing for them (separate O2 supply from pax). They decided one would commence descent and the other would go to the cabin to get portable Oxy Bottles or to the pax seat to go back to cockpit and take over from his would by then be unconscious colleague... The problem is, he didn't make it.

Plus, either the remaining pilot failed to put the aircraft into the rapid descent because they lost TUC in the realisation that the Crew O2 was inop, or, he decided to initiate with a shallow dive to give time for his crew mate to get Oxygen/POB before the rapid descent. "Descent at the maximum safe rate of descent and speed" (from the "Decompression - structural integrity doubted")... Well, he probably did not want to fling his crew mate in the air either.

[Up2Late]

47. Yes, a "rapid descent" would be dangerous for anyone without...

...a seatbelt secured.

A steep enough dive, and everything becomes "weightless." Sort of what you see with the NASA "Vomit Comet" which simulates weightlessness.

[Up2Late]

68. Do you have a link to that? I went there to look for the thread, but...

...I didn't find it (actually, I got distracted by all the cool info they have there, I love that sight).

[OrwellwasRight]

71. Found it:

http://www.smartcockpit.com/operations/Surviving%20Cabin%20Decompression.pdf

[pimpbot]

87. Airliners.net link

http://www.airliners.net/discussions/general_aviation/read.main/2273974/

Thats the 3rd thread on it. There are 2 previous with the same title if you want to do a search on the site for them (200+ replies on each).

[OrwellwasRight]

70. Do you have a link to the TUC Chart? nt.

[pitohui]

51. oh how awful

the poor families too

[alarcojon]

60. Weird update: Police Raid Cyprus Crash Airline

Cypriot police have raided the offices of Helios Airways, a day after one of the airline's planes crashed in Greece, killing all 121 people on board.

Officials said the police were looking for documents that could be useful in a possible future criminal investigation.

Aviation experts and investigators are struggling to unravel the sequence of events leading to the crash.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4154748.stm

[patcox2]

62. Can't you see it. people? Its so obvious.

When the time travelers from the future come and kidnap all the people, they have to replace them with dead people from their own time. Of course the replacement dead would have to be frozen and stored for this use. It was Mick Jagger that did it.

[Gloria]

64. BBC report this AM quoted an official who didn't go that far ...

also said that the pilots of the airline were refusing to fly because the whole fleet wasn't safe. The mother of the pilot of the crashed plane said that her son had said the planes weren't safe and he was only flying because he need to support his family...

[burrowowl]

91. Yep, even in the good ole U$ of A

Airline maintnenance is going down the tubes.

[Tempest]

66. Six were alive when plane crashed, coroner says

Six people who died in the crash were alive when the plane crashed, chief Athens coroner Fillipos Koutsaftis said Monday. It remained unclear whether they were conscious, he said.

"We have performed autopsies on six people. Our conclusion is they had circulation and were breathing at the time of death," Koutsaftis said.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/08/15/greece.crash.1437/index.html

[footinmouth]

69. Read the book "Mayday"

I just finished reading "Mayday" by Thomas Block and Nelson DeMille. It describes a similar scenario. This plane had a huge hole in it and the passengers that were in the lavatories and galley areas survived the lack of oxygen. The pilots were able to keep themselves together long enough to descend to a safer altitude before succumbing to oxygen deprivation. The book was written in 1998 and there are so many similarities between that book and this crash that it's scary.

[Up2Late]

72. Wow, that weird. Is it Fiction or Non-Fiction?

Just wondering if this really happened or if the Author just had a good imagination.:shrug:

[footinmouth]

82. Fiction

It was fiction and a real nail-biter. I highly recommend it, it was a very good read.

[Vinca]

75. So . . . let me get this straight.

Now, when you fly, not only do you have to bring your own food, check the pilot's blood alcohol level, check for terrorists, listen to the engines (only those with fear of flying get this one), give up your nail clippers . . . now you have to worry about freezing to death? This report is like a Twilight Zone episode.

[Blue_Tires]

78. sad and very scary

not the way i'd choose to check out

[Shakespeare]

83. Police raid airline's offices

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=4&u=/ap/20050815/ap_on_re_eu/greece_plane_crash_4

The airline's version/theory of the crash doesn't match up with what the F-16s saw when they went up (pilot slumped, passengers presumably trying to control plane--or was it terrorists?).

Something's VERY fishy about this.

[Dogmudgeon]

85. Anoxic / Hypothermic Death

Two hours at -10F to -75F -- no one is certain of the temperature at that altitude without measuring it -- and without oxygen would produce a lot of frozen corpses.

The people probably died relatively slowly of hypoxia/anoxia. Such a death is not bad at all. People who have survived loss of oxygen say it's like going under laughing gas without the intense euphoria. You just "nod off".

They would not have had much of an idea of what was happening, either. It would have gotten very cold, and they probably thought the heaters failed. Loss of consciousness would have been like getting drowsy and falling asleep, which often happens when people are very cold, anyway. In the complete loss of breathable oxygen, everyone would have died within about ten minutes of the first person dying, so the people who were able to survive lower oxygen levels without losing consciousness would have only noticed that everyone was nodding off -- including some people who would have snored a few times before respiratory cessation.

I agree, though, it's a very spooky case. But if you've got to die, it's one of the easier ways to go.

--p!

[northzax]

93. I think it was faster than that

for most people, even in an anosic state, sudden exposure to -50+ temps is a shock, combine the two and 90% of the people were likely unconcious in a minute and dead in 3. I wonder how some people survive until the crash though, that's very interesting.

[Up2Late]

86. Let the SPIN BEGIN! The AP now just issued ANOTHER version

by a different writer with several anonymous "Officials in the coroner's office..." sources! What a load of Crap the AP is!:mad:

It's like they are saying, "Now remember, it's after 5:00pm, we have over 8 hours to label established facts from earlier in the day "Theories" and what ever you do, focus on the 6 bodies that were NOT frozen solid, not the 115 that were!"

Here's the 5:00pm EDT version from the AP, see below to see the 7:32 Revisionist version:

Theories Abound About Greece Plan Crash

By MICHAEL McDONOUGH
Associated Press Writer

August 15, 2005, 5:10 PM EDT
<http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-greece-crash-theories,0,5234136.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines>

LONDON -- The Cypriot airliner that crashed in Greece may have suffered a sudden loss of cabin pressure at high altitude, causing temperatures and oxygen levels to plummet and leaving everyone aboard suffocating and freezing to death, experts said Monday. If that happened, the Helios Airways jet may have been flying on autopilot long before it crashed, the experts said. The Greek government said the crews of two F-16 fighter jets that flew beside the jetliner before it went down Sunday saw its co-pilot slumped over the controls and its pilot missing from the cockpit. Oxygen masks dangled from the ceiling at 34,000 feet.

Authorities said the crash apparently was caused by technical failure that led to a high-altitude decompression. The plane went down in a mountainous region north of Athens, killing 115 passengers and six crew members. Some media have reported that the victims froze in their seats before the crash, but Greek officials said the bodies were not cold when they were found.

(clip)

Bill Waldock, an aviation safety professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Arizona, said one clue to a sudden pressure loss would have been frost on the windows because it's so cold at 34,000 feet. If the fighter pilots could see into the cockpit, the windows could not have been iced over, he said.

But Chris Yates, an aviation analyst at Jane's Transport, said he was not surprised by suggestions that those on board the Helios flight may have frozen. Temperatures at the altitude a passenger jet flies at can drop to 58 below, he said. Yates said it was likely the aircraft "was flying essentially on a ghost flight for a chunk of its journey. The aircraft could have been flying itself for an hour, an hour-and-a-half while people were freezing to death...."

<http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-greece-crash-theories,0,5234136.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines>

(more at the link above)

And here's the 7:32 EDT version from a different AP writer:

Aug 15, 7:32 PM EDT

Coroner: 6 Alive When Greek Plane Crashed

By PATRICK QUINN
Associated Press Writer
<http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/G/GREECE_PLANE_CRASH?SITE=KING&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT>

ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Initial autopsies showed that at least six of the 121 people aboard a Cypriot plane were alive but not necessarily conscious when the aircraft crashed while on autopilot, a coroner said Monday, as authorities struggled to explain the actions of the pilot and crew.

The results of the first six autopsies shed some light on the final minutes of Helios Airlines Flight ZU522, which crashed Sunday into a hillside in suburban Athens, killing all 115 passengers and six crew members. But they failed to answer all the questions.

(clip)

Athens' chief coroner, Fillipos Koutsaftis, said he could not determine whether the six people whose bodies were examined were conscious when the Helios Airways Boeing 737-300 plunged 34,000 feet into a mountainous area near the village of Grammatiko, 25 miles north of Athens. "Our conclusion is they had circulation and were breathing at the time of death," Koutsaftis said, but stressed: "I cannot rule out that they were unconscious."

Officials in the coroner's office said ongoing autopsies on another six bodies were likely to show similar results. They asked not be named because the results had not yet been publicly released.

<http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/G/GREECE_PLANE_CRASH?SITE=KING&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT>
(more lies and revisionist reporting at the link above)

[warrens]

89. Ya know, pay attention to politics

You all remind me of the shitheads who followed the runaway wife. Idiots.

[northzax]

92. hmm, runaway bride versus 161 deaths

in a machine-type that many of us use several times a year...I was in TWO 737's this weekend, I'll be in two more this coming weekend, frankly, it's something that interests me. and a lot of other people, I fail to see how that makes us idiots.

there is more to life than politics, you know?

[kurtyboy]

96. Pay attention to your meds

n/t